Wikipedia:Wiki Ed/Queen's University/RELS 452 852 The Contemporary Religious Situation (Fall)
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- Course name
- RELS 452 852 The Contemporary Religious Situation
- Institution
- Queen's University
- Instructor
- MonstreDélicat
- Subject
- Religious Studies
- Course dates
- 2015-09-14 – 2015-12-31
- Approximate number of student editors
- 14
- For searching related articles for internal links, consider using the "religion portal" as a starting point: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Religion
The purpose of this course is to situate both religion and the study of religion through a scholarly examination of various manifestations of religion in the contemporary world – and a questioning of what it actually means to use the word “religion” as an analytic category to guide our study.
Today, what’s known as the scholarly study of religion is far from just about what particular people and groups believe and practice. It’s still about religion construed in this sense, but it’s also about its transformation (“religion online” and “online religions”), its cognates (“spiritual but not religious” [SBNR], new religious movements [NRMs], etc.), its biological bases (cognitive science of religion), its disappearance or reappearance (questions about the secular and the postsecular), and public ways of dealing with its absence and its presence (policies of tolerance, accommodation, and pluralism – or not!) in civil life. These are among the most established modes of study in this interdisciplinary and still fairly young field. However, there are some scholars, like those affiliated under the rubric of “critical religion,” who argue that religion as a category shouldn’t, in fact, be used in the ways it commonly has been. Therefore, if we take the ordinary and extraordinary events of contemporary life and the field itself to have a mutual role in constituting “the contemporary religious situation,” then characterizing this situation is a fraught business.
To this end, I have organized a reading list around several major concepts, trends, and issues, but the linkages among them are many – for instance, the concept of “religion twice removed” (ie. “religious” stories then used in popular media plotlines and then used by young people constructing their own understandings of religion) would fit in equally under the unit on secularization and the unit on media and popular culture. You should understand the reading choices I have made and the way I have organized them in relation to each other to be provisional, that is, one useful way among many possible useful ways. I have foregrounded Canadian authors and examples, privileged very recent scholarship, and focused quite a bit on “new media” in hopes of making this material as relevant to your experiences as possible. The downside to this is that we are missing out on local specificities in diverse global contexts, though no single course could aspire to give a “representative” selection anyhow (representative of what, we’d have to ask, at least...), and we will nonetheless encounter case studies that offer up the idiosyncrasies of place across countries and continents. I have chosen some resources that are favourites of mine and some that represent new and exciting directions. I am leaving the final week of the course open for us to decide as a group what topics we would like to fill in based on the curiosities we have developed over the arc of the semester. We can read more about a certain topic we have already delved into, or introduce new ones.
What this course asks of you is to approach it in the spirit of intellectual adventure, to keep in perspective why you’ve chosen to be part of this group, and to collaborate with us, your colleagues.
Timeline
Week 1
- In class - Wikipedia essentials
- Overview of the course
- Introduction to how Wikipedia will be used in the course
- Understanding Wikipedia as a community, we'll discuss its expectations and etiquette.
Handout: Editing Wikipedia
- In class - Editing basics
- Basics of editing
- Anatomy of Wikipedia articles, what makes a good article, how to distinguish between good and bad articles
- Collaborating and engaging with the Wiki editing community
- Tips on finding the best articles to work on for class assignments
Handouts: Using Talk Pages, Evaluating Wikipedia
- Assignment - Practicing the basics
- Create an account and then complete the online training for students. During this training, you will make edits in a sandbox and learn the basic rules of Wikipedia.
- Create a User page.
- To practice editing and communicating on Wikipedia, introduce yourself to another student on their user talk page.
- Explore topics related to your topic area to get a feel for how Wikipedia is organized. What areas seem to be missing? As you explore, make a mental note of articles that seem like good candidates for improvement.
Resources: Online Training for Students
- Milestones
All students have Wikipedia user accounts and are listed on the course page.
Week 2
- In class - Exploring the topic area
- Be prepared to discuss some of your observations about Wikipedia articles in your topic area that are missing or could use improvement.
Handouts: Choosing an article
Week 3
- In class - Using sources
- Be prepared to explain close paraphrasing, plagiarism, and copyright violations on Wikipedia.
Handouts: Citing Sources and Avoiding Plagiarism
- Assignment - Add to an article
- Add 1–2 sentences of new information, backed up with a citation to an appropriate source, to a Wikipedia article related to the class.
- Assignment - Choosing your article
- Research and list 3–5 articles on your Wikipedia user page that you will consider working on as your main project. Look at the talk page for existing topics for a sense of who else is working on it and what they're doing. Describe your choices to your instructor for feedback.
Week 4
- In class - Discuss the article topics
- Discuss the topics students will be working on, and determine strategies for researching and writing about them.
- Assignment - Finalize your topic and start researching
- Select an article to work on, removing the rest from your user page. Add your topic on the course page.
- Compile a bibliography of relevant, reliable sources and post it to the talk page of the article you are working on. Begin reading the sources. Make sure to check in on the talk page (or watchlist) to see if anyone has advice on your bibliography.
Week 5
- In class - Wikipedia culture and etiquette
- Talk about Wikipedia culture and etiquette, and (optionally) revisit the concept of sandboxes and how to use them.
- Q&A session with instructor about interacting on Wikipedia and getting started with writing.
- Assignment - Drafting starter articles
- If you are starting a new article, write an outline of the topic in the form of a standard Wikipedia lead section of 3–4 paragraphs in your sandbox. Wikipedia articles use "summary style", in which the lead section provides a balanced summary of the entire body of the article, with the first sentence serving to define the topic and place it in context. The lead section should summarize, very briefly, each of the main aspects of the topic that will be covered in detail in the rest of the article. If you are improving an existing article, draft a new lead section reflecting your proposed changes, and post this along with a brief description of your plans on the article’s talk page. Make sure to check that page often to gather any feedback the community might provide.
- Begin working with classmates and other editors to polish your lead section and fix any major issues.
- Continue research in preparation for writing the body of the article.
- Milestones
All students have started editing articles or drafts on Wikipedia.
- Assignment - Self-Assessment
- Fill in template - will include reflections on course overall and on your Wikipedia contributions.
Week 6
- In class - Moving articles to mainspace
- We'll discuss moving your article out of your sandboxes and into Wikipedia's main space.
- A general reminder: Don't panic if your contribution disappears, and don't try to force it back in.
- Check to see if there is an explanation of the edit on the article's talk page. If not, (politely) ask why it was removed.
- Contact your instructor or Wikipedia Content Expert and let them know.
Handout: Moving out of your Sandbox
- Assignment - Moving articles to mainspace
- Move your sandbox articles into main space.
- If you are expanding an existing article, copy your edit into the article. If you are making many small edits, save after each edit before you make the next one. Do NOT paste over the entire existing article, or large sections of the existing article.
- If you are creating a new article, do NOT copy and paste your text, or there will be no record of your work history. Follow the instructions in the "Moving out of your sandbox" handout.
- Begin expanding your article into a comprehensive treatment of the topic.
Week 7
- In class - Building articles
- Demo uploading images and adding images to articles.
- Share experiences and discuss problems.
Resources: Illustrating Wikipedia and Evaluating Wikipedia
- Assignment - Choose articles to peer review
- Select a classmates’ article that you will peer review and copyedit. On the table at the bottom of this course page, add your username next to the article you will peer review. (You don’t need to start reviewing yet.)
Week 8
- Assignment - Complete first draft
- Expand your article into a complete first draft.
Week 9
- In class - Group suggestions
- As a group, offer suggestions for improving one or two other students' articles, based on your ideas of what makes a solid encyclopedia article.
- Assignment - Peer review and copyedit
- Peer review two of your classmates’ articles. Leave suggestions on the article talk pages.
- Copy-edit the two reviewed articles.
- Milestones
Every student has finished reviewing their assigned articles, making sure that every article has been reviewed.
- In class - Media literacy discussion
- Open discussion of the concepts of neutrality, media literacy, and the impact and limits of Wikipedia.
- Assignment - Address peer review suggestions
- Make edits to your article based on peers’ feedback. If you disagree with a suggestion, use talk pages to politely discuss and come to a consensus on your edit.
Week 10
- In class - Discuss further article improvements
- Continue discussing how the articles can be further improved. Come up with improvement goals for each article for next week.
- Assignment - Continue improving articles
- Return to your classmates' articles you previously reviewed, and provide more suggestions for further improvement. If there is a disagreement, suggest a compromise.
- Do additional research and writing to make further improvements to your article, based on your classmates' suggestions and any additional areas for improvement you can identify.
Week 11
- Assignment - Final article
- Add final touches to your Wikipedia article.
Handout: Polishing your article
- Assignment - Self-assessment
- Fill in template - will include reflections on course overall and on your Wikipedia contributions.
Week 12
- Milestones
Students have finished all their work on Wikipedia that will be considered for grading.