Background:

The issue of free speech versus hate speech has been a hot topic for years, but especially since the last election. The topic seems particularly important on college campuses these days. There seems to be a division among the public and students themselves. One group argues that students cannot be sheltered from the real world, and that in order to be exposed to opinions that differ from their own, colleges need to allow complete freedom of speech; the other group argues that college is meant to be a safe space for all students to learn and succeed, and that certain kinds of speech and expressions are hateful and even violent, leading students to become fearful in their college environment. Your job for this essay is to choose a side, craft a strong and clear argument and support your opinion with the many readings and videos we have seen on the issue.

Reading and Writing Skills

reading

Over the course of this assignment, we will be focusing on a couple key academic reading and writing skills, which you will use throughout your career as a student and which constitute the basis of most scholarly writing. The first skill we are focusing on is summarizing and citing sources, as both a reading a writing skill. The vast majority of writing you will do for school is text-based composition, meaning that you first read something and then respond to it in writing. Gone are the writing prompts such as “what did you do over summer break?” In higher education, scholars read articles and then respond to them with their own ideas. And when they respond, they do so by referring back to their original sources directly. For example, an academic writer may begin an essay by citing a few articles and summarizing the arguments in those text. She would then respond to those arguments with an opinion of her own. Of course, the first step in that process is fully understanding the argument developed in an article and then knowing how to correctly cite those ideas. That is what we will do in this assignment.

The other reading and writing skill we will be focusing on with this assignment is responding with your own argument. As I discussed in the paragraphs above, academic scholars do not write in a vacuum—their arguments are typically in response to other arguments about the same topic. You will be doing exactly that for this assignment.

Focusing Questions

Now that you briefly understand what we are doing with this assignment and why we are doing it, I will now introduce our guiding questions.

Should colleges and universities allow or ban hate speech on their campuses? Why? Why not?

Assignment Overview

The section below outlines the specific requirement of this assignment.

Purpose:

The purpose of this assignment is to:

Read and respond to a college-level text.
Compose college-level writing.
Produce an academic summary of an article.
Respond to a topic with an original argument.

Goals

This assignment will help students meet the following Student Learning Objectives, as stated on the course syllabus:

Analyze college-level/academic texts by critically evaluating information and applying it to students’ own arguments as evidence.
Synthesize material from multiple texts to create and support an argument in response to a prompt.
Create writing that is clear and concise.

Task

Compose an essay, between 800-1200 words in length, which presents an argument about the place of hate vs. free speech on college campuses (keep in mind the prompt asks you to narrow this idea down to college campuses specifically, not in general).

More Specifically:

Your essay must also include your argument about whether college campuses should ban or allow what could be considered hate speech on their campuses. That means you need a thesis and topic sentences which state your claim and reasons. You also need support for your argument in the form of cited material and personal experience
- You are required to cite both personal experience and the texts we discussed.
- Your argument should include at least one counter-argument, or point your opposition could raise, to which you respond with a refutation.

Required Structure:

The essay should include a minimum of 5 paragraphs: an introduction that ends with a thesis, 3 body paragraphs in PIEIE and a conclusion

Introduction should include background to the issue and end with your clear thesis (answer to the prompt question)
Three body paragraphs should provide clear sub-claims (points) or reasons why you think one way or the other and evidence from the sources (quotes and paraphrases that are cited) to support your claims. Each paragraph should follow the PIEIE structure (meaning there would be two quotes per body paragraph).
- Body paragraphs should be begin with a Point, provide two examples from the articles/sources and explain each example
- One of the body paragraphs should start with a counter argument (in one sentence) right before the Point
Your conclusion should restate the thesis and give the essay a sense of finality
You must use a minimum of 2 of the sources we have discussed or you have found for support (all should be cited in MLA style)

NOTE: Since you are citing the article, and possibly your own sources, don’t forget your Works Cited page.

Due Dates:

Rough Draft for Peer Review (30 Points)-Due on Thursday of Week 9
Final Draft (100 points)-Due on Tuesday of Week 10

Samples:

Free vs Hate Speech Essay Sample 1

Free vs. Hate Speech Essay Sample 2

Free vs. Hate Speech Essay Sample 3

Need Help?

As you write, it may also help to review Understanding Your Assignment.

If you need further assistance, please consider taking advantage of our Online Tutoring with the Writing Center.

Their hours for this semester are Monday & Thursday 9am-6pm, Tuesday & Wednesday 9am-7pm, and Friday 10am-2pm. They can help you on Zoom, or through email. To make an appointment, you can click on Make an Appointment with Chris or click on Tutoring, right from Canvas. You can email Cuyamaca.Tutoring@gcccd.edu or call (619)660-4525 to and leave a voicemail.

Also, don't hesitate to email me with questions or concerns (kim.bailey@gcccd.edu or Canvas Inbox), or post questions to our Class Q&A Discussion.

Happy Writing!

Kim