Project 1: Documents and Discourses (Unit 1) Language from Syllabus You will enter into the discourse of sustainability by exploring the meaning sustainability and related ideas has for you based on some preliminary fact-finding, investigation, and reflection. You will compile a short annotated literature review of sources useful to you, provide pertinent information that helps you understand sustainability (including an info-graphic), relate a brief anecdote that suggests something important about the topic, and compose a short reflection on the subject (4 pages, approximately 1500 words minimum—not counting the info-graphic). Discussion of the Project The idea behind Project 1 is to provide you with an occasion to participate collaboratively in the course’s assertion that “sustainability” is not something that a person defines and identifies in a simple way, but rather a dialogue, or even a contentious “contact zone” where people debate ideas, sometimes in a constructive way, sometimes not. Rather than simply defining sustainability, you are asked to assemble a collection of perhaps multimodal “artifacts” representing a collection of ideas about sustainability. Some of these ideas may be yours, but some may be drawn from others engaged in the dialogue. You may draw upon materials you have been given for this course, but you will most likely have to do a little independent investigation to find a broader sampling of information and perspective. Your Project 1 collection should include the following:
a short annotated literature review of sources useful to you
pertinent information that helps you understand sustainability (including an info-graphic)
a brief anecdote that suggests something important about the topic, and
a short reflection on the subject
These artifacts do not have to be integrated into an “academic” essay—they just have to be there. Put them into one Word document however you want to do it. Annotated Bibliography List a minimum of four sources using APA format and summarize each one in about three sentences. Summarizing them is not hard. Just describe how you make sense of what the sources say—put them in your own words. Yours might be more coherent. Pertinent Information Information grounds anything you say and makes you credible and effective. Have a lot of it. The information you provide should come from one or more of the sources you list in your bibliography. Cite the sources you use for the information parenthetically using APA style. No one remembers how to use APA style. Look it up here. You’re encouraged to use an info-graphic as part of this section. An info-graphic is a graphic visual representation of information. The purpose of info-graphics is to present complex information clearly and simply. The danger of info-graphics is that they can oversimplify or otherwise distort facts or perspectives. Watch it. Your info-graphic can be one that you design yourself from information you find. Alternatively you may include an info-graphic you find somewhere. Cite your sources. If you want to design one, try this site: http://piktochart.com/. It might help. A Brief Anecdote An anecdote is a very short narrative. Story-telling has more power than most of us think about. A story embodies ideas in terms of lived human experience. It is pointless to think about abstractions like “sustainability” without telling stories which narrate events that make it relevant. Your story can have anything to do with sustainability as you think about it. It can be a story about your own experience or someone else’s. In your reflection, you might discuss it… Reflection So enter the dialogue. Be someone discussing sustainability. What are your thoughts? Your questions? Your assertions? Your values and principles? Rehearse that little speech you are going to give to someone you just met while standing on the roof of Perch in downtown LA watching the sun go down and sipping a…mineral water.
