Imagining Identity in a Networked Age
Building on our exploration of digital technologies and identity, in unit 4 we’ll reflect on fictions that consider how these technologies impact the way we interact with others and the way we see ourselves.
Skills Focus for Unit 4
Purpose
- Establish a motive for your essay (explain why you’re writing) by indicating in your introduction the conversation you’re joining, the idea you’re responding to, and how you’re contributing to the conversation
- Craft a well-focused and rhetorically effective thesis statement
- Gracefully conclude your essay
Exposition
- Close reading: notice and reflect on striking details and patterns
- Substantiate and illustrate claims by citing evidence or examples
- Analyze evidence: connect evidence to claim by spelling out your interpretative reasoning—explain how or why the evidence supports your claim
Organization
- Headline paragraphs with topic sentences that make strong analytical claims
- Establish forward momentum: Thoughtfully arrange your sequence of paragraphs so that each new paragraph deepens your argument and propels it forward
- Achieve “flow” by using transition language in paragraph openings to explain how the new paragraph logically relates to the preceding paragraph
Sentence Style
- Manage emphasis