Week 9 Workshop: What words do to thought

An essay workshop — you leave with a thesis you can defend and one experimental paper you have actually read

22 April 2027

Before the session#

Watch Arrival again. You saw it in week two for its phonology and you will see different things now, which is the point of screening it twice.

Read one of the papers from the essay brief in full, including the method section. One paper read properly is more useful than several read in summary.

In the session#

We begin by writing the film’s argument on the board in the strongest form anybody can manage. Arguing against a weakened version of the claim proves nothing; the essay only works if you have first stated the case as well as the film does.

Then thesis statements, out loud, one each. If yours can be restated as “the film is unrealistic,” it is not a thesis and you will be asked to try again. The film is not a documentary, and it is not being judged on factual accuracy. The question is what it is claiming about the relationship between language and mind, and where that claim comes from, and what it would take for it to be true.

Afterwards#

The essay is due at the end of next week. Bring a draft to the week ten workshop if you want it read.

After that the course returns to building. Two subsystems remain, and both are about what your language does not say.