This course builds off the habits of academic inquiry and writing skills of WRI 1000 to prepare you to write college-level academic papers and to develop the research and critical reading strategies that are central to whatever discipline you major in. Toward that end, the real subject of this class is your own writing more than it is any of the subjects with which we engage ourselves. This class uses Communication as one perspective for building habits that will be useful across disciplines. Writing is something we do (practice) as scholars and getting good at it takes work (also practice)—which means writing, refining, rethinking, and rewriting. You will have several opportunities to develop and flex your writing and revision habits throughout the quarter. So as a start – think about the fact that we seem to have a love-hate relationship with our devices. We hear “put that phone away” from so many people in our lives and we know we’re probably too dependent on them. But it’s also the way we are connected – and that’s not so bad, right? Terkel thinks we might be losing our ability to converse without distraction, without mediation, without our precious devices. We will take on stand on whether she’s right or wrong or whether it’s a mix. We will discuss our “addictions” and do some experimenting on ourselves. And in the end you’ll have some research and findings to pull out the next time someone says, “put that phone away.”