Sep 6, 2012 ... This essay asks that you develop a thesis-driven essay focusing on the first
seven chapters of Sherry. Turkle's Alone Together. All essays ...
TJ Puckett, English 7, Essay #1, Alone Together Due Dates: Blog Entry: 9/6/2012 by 11:59 p.m. Responses to at least two of your peers’ blogs: 9/9/2012 by 11:59 p.m. Rough Draft (at least 1000 words): 9/20/2012 by 11:59 p.m. Peer Editing of at least 2 of your peers' rough drafts: 9/23/2012 by 11:59 p.m. Final Draft submitted as an RTF through SafeAssign: 9/27/2012 by 11:59 p.m. Length: 1250 words (approximately 5 typed, double-spaced pages) Format: All essays should be submitted in Rich Text Format via SafeAssign. In your essay, you should put your name, my name, the course number, and the due date in the upper left corner of the first page of the essay. All essays should be typed, double-spaced, and should have one-inch margins. In addition, this essay requires that you use correct MLA documentation for this essay.
This essay asks that you develop a thesis-driven essay focusing on the first seven chapters of Sherry Turkle’s Alone Together. All essays – regardless of which topic you choose – should assert a central idea that addresses the topic and uses the text for support and development. Every single paragraph needs to make at least one specific reference to the book (probably in a brief quote) to help illustrate its idea. In addition, for both topics you must find one quality outside source to help you develop your ideas (I highly suggest you limit your research to the databases at Chabot’s library). I will grade your essays based primarily on the following: (1) your carefully-narrowed central idea that clearly addresses one of the topics below; (2) the development of this thesis in well-focused body paragraphs; (3) the originality and complexity of your ideas; (4) your use of and comprehension of the assigned text; (5) the overall quality of your writing. Choose One: Topic One:In the first seven chapters of her book, author Sherry Turkle explores both the benefits of and pitfalls of robot technology. One of her core focuses in these chapters is on the emergence of robots as companions and caretakers. For this essay, I want you to develop an argument that takes a stance on the future of robot technology as it relates to companions/caretakers. In doing this you need to make sure that you recognize both sides of the argument – the positives as well as the negatives. However, you should ultimately take a stance on the issue (i.e. “for” or “ against” using robots as companions/caretakers). You should use both Turkle’s book as well as one outside source to help you develop your ideas. Please Note: Make sure you aren’t just summarizing Turkle’s ideas in your essay but instead synthesizing the information and using it to come up with your own ideas about the topic. Topic Two:In her book Sherry Turkle mentions several movies/television shows that portray robot technology. In addition, several of you have mentioned films that have robots in your discussion forum
postings. For this topic, I want you to choose a movie that has a robot as a central or supporting character and analyze the portrayal of robots in the film using the first seven chapters of Alone Together as the foundation of your analysis. You should come up with a central idea that asserts your main point about robot(s) in the film and then use evidence from both the book and the film to help you develop your ideas. Please note: As we will be reading, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? in a few weeks, you cannot use the movie Bladerunner for this topic. In addition, your outside source for this assignment is not your movie; you will want to find a secondary source (for example, an article of film criticism) to help you analyze your movie.
