The required reading for the course is available in a course pack being printed at Student Print, which is on the 3rd floor of the Student Services Tower:
Required and additional readings are also available in an online archive:
Click here for the archive containing readings (UW login required)
Section blogs can be found running down the right side of this page. These should be used for posting research reports, online assignments, and any other notes of interest you wish to share. Be aware: the blogs are public. They may be viewed by anyone, and they will be indexed by search engines. Keep this in mind when you decide how to present yourself and what you share.
Learn@UW should be used for posting draft essay assignments and feedback on those drafts. We will be using the 'discussion' feature.
Writing resources
The Writing Center at UW-Madison is a place to get help with the mechanics of writing: grammar, spelling, organization and argument structure.
TAs in J201 are content specialists--they can help with media-related questions and help you find relevant resources and craft strong arguments. But they are not writing coaches. We expect that essays turned in--including first drafts--will be clean, with good grammar, spelling, punctuation and organization.
For help with style, especially citation and bibliography, see Purdue's OWL resource. Assignments turned in in J201 should conform to APA style, described here.
News resources
Even though nearly every major news organization
now has an online presence, for J201 we strongly recommend that you subscribe
to either a local or a national newspaper or news magazine in print
form over the course of the semester, so that you build experience (daily) with this traditional medium for entertainment, strategic communication,
and journalism.
In-section quizzes may include prominent current events questions!
Some newspapers you might consider:
- The Wisconsin State Journal
- The Capital Times (available free each Wednesday)
- The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel
- The Chicago Tribune
- The Chicago Sun-Times
- The Minneapolis Star-Tribune
- The New York Times
- The Washington Post
- The Los Angeles Times
Some news magazines you might consider:
- Time
- U.S. News and World Report
- The Economist
- The Nation
- The Weekly Standard
