Public Sphere: Public Writing

"Sunday Afternoon" rmricci CC BY 2.0

 

As you all know, this class is probably a little bit different than most college courses simply because you are asked to write publicly-almost immediately. For Tuesday evening by 11 pm please complete the following two part response.

First, to help you work through the brainstorming section of the second assignment--the definitional essay which was uploaded to Sakai earlier tonight--you are asked to find a website, video, cartoon, newspaper editorial, petition, flyer, or any other type of artifact that you think encapsulates public writing at it's best. Then, think of ways to describe that artifact. Pick 5 keywords really help 'define' what that artifact is and how it works. In a non-public writing example, perhaps, I wanted to use some sand from the beach: what words would I use to describe that artifact? Gritty? Rough? Fine? Particulate? Upload an example of your artifact, and compose one paragraph that answers the questions above.

Second, go out and do a websearch for the phrase "public sphere": find a resource for the class to visit and link to it/embed it. Provide a one-paragraph description of how the author/authors (this can be a video, too) would define characteristics that make up the public sphere. For example, tonight I found a wikibook that has been created about the 'public sphere'.