Introduction to the Course

Because we spent quite a lot of time giving people a chance to get an idea of what the entire Truth in Society section is about and how it'll work, I don't want to take a lot of time with the English section of it; much is similar. But I do want to make sure that people have a real chance to understand what I'm trying to do and how I'm trying to do it. I'll pass out copies of the course introduction, but we'll talk about them on Thursday rather than today. Between now and then you should read it through -- and, even more important, go to the English 1006T Web site, bookmark it if you're using Netscape or add it to your "favorites" if you're using Internet Explorer, and spend some time following up the links (there's an assignment in this regard; see below).

Today

We're going to spend a bit of time here looking at how some texts embody or contain beliefs in them that aren't explicitly stated, and how that can affect our own beliefs and assumptions even without our knowing it. We're going to start with some texts you've already looked at -- some of the readings we made available in connection with Manufacturing Consent.

The main thing I want to achieve today is to make some reasonable decisions about which of those texts were important.

I've set up some groups (we'll count off). I'll give each group a set of the yellow "reading log" sheets. Read through them, looking for ones that say things about texts that make you think the text might be worth all of us spending some time with. When you've finished looking through them, each group should agree on no more than three of the readings that you'd like to recommend we spend some time looking more closely at. Someone from each group should write yours on the board. We'll negotiate a short list if there's time. If we manage that, I'll make copies of one of the readings and put them on a chair outside my office door.

Between now and Thursday

One thing you should do, if we've arrived at a reading, is to pick up your copy from the box and read (or reread) it with some care.

The second thing is this: read carefully through the Web site for this course, especially the introductory prompt and the materials it includes links to.

Having done that, send me (at hunt@stu.ca) an email in which you pose at least one question about the English section of Truth in Society. It should be a question you think others might want a response to, as well, because what I'm going to do is extract the messages from the emails, put them on the course Web site, and respond to them there. This email message will have to be sent before Wednesday night.