Assignment #2, Part 1
Your second assignment comes in two halves: the first part will be a group exercise, due on Monday 2/10, and the second a brief essay (due on Friday 2/14), in which you will analyze a document.
Precise terminology is particularly important in a course that treats such a sensitive and challenging topic as intolerance. Gustave Flaubert habitually spent hours or even days laboring over a single sentence, searching for "le mot juste" -- the right word. But one needn't be a great artist or tortured perfectionist to care about accuracy of expression; we all want to choose the most appropriate words to communicate our thoughts.
Below is a list of words related to the subject of our seminar. I will assign each of you a few of these terms, for which I would like you to do the following:
- Read Kane pp. 242-9 on dictionaries and thesauri.
- Look up your assigned words in a good dictionary and provide definitions for each. Include the part of speech, etymology, and any relevant examples your dictionary provides. (Note: you may need to look under another entry to find a full definition and etymology; for example, "the state of mind of a bigot" is not an adequate definition for the word "bigotry.")
- Then look up your words in Webster's Dictionary of Synonyms. If the entries you find here shed any additional light on the meaning, usage, or connotations of your terms, include this information along with your definitions.
- Type your definitions up clearly and turn them in on Monday 2/10. Together, your sheets will form one large lexicon, which I will then xerox and distribute to each seminar member. To save paper, please single-space your definitions (use boldface or underlining for the terms themselves).
You'll notice that "antisemitism" is not on the list. Instead of looking it up, please read the brief essay by Shmuel Almog entitled "What's In A Hyphen?"
| Two words for everyone to look up: etymology and connotation. Just look them up; do not include their definitions on the page you hand in. |
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