Assignment

Due

Length

Description

EX1.1

06.1.2K

1 or less

Based on Orwell's own stylistic choices & emphasis, do you believe him when he says that the remaining three motivations combined are more important to him than "political purpose"? Assess his claim.

EX1.2

10.1.2K

1 or less

This exercise is intended to get you thinking about the foundations of authority. Is it grounded in a human life, or is it built of stuff that exists above and beyond the merely human? For the purposes of this exercise, you may draw on any experiences you wish (see below), but I would like your one-page essay to center on the Miller essay. Your question: How are personal names used to signify "authority"? Using various examples to support your points (from "everyday life"; from classes you have taken; from books you have read), discuss how Miller uses the names "Orwell" and "Adorno" to signify large belief systems.

EX1.3

13.1.2K

1 or less

This exercise will require you to go beyond the sometimes superficial ways in which we use personal names to signify authority. It will also give you a chance to work, in a brief space, with a variety of materials.

Using what you have read so far, and perhaps having a look at such RBR materials including biographical materials, define the term "Orwellian" as comprehensively as you can. That is to say, what RANGE OF MEANINGS does this term support? In later exercises we will discuss ways of using a various or ambiguous term in ways that focus the meaning appropriately.

ESSAY1.1

17.1.2K

2-4 pgs

As we have seen, many readers, for many reasons, have put Orwell forward as a model of what an ethical writer should be. The critic usually uses the name and reputation "Orwell" to champion a value such as "clarity" or "decency" or "honesty." Focusing on one of the Orwell texts you have read ("Why I Write," "A Hanging," "Shooting an Elephant," "Looking Back on the Spanish Civil War," the letters and wartime diary, the opening section of Nineteen Eighty-Four, or the "Newspeak Appendix"), propose an ethics of speech or writing that you believe the text exemplifies; OR, discuss an ethical dilemma that you believe Orwell struggles with but does not fully resolve. In either case, you will identify a central problem and discuss how the text convinces us of this problem's centrality.