Wikipedia:Wiki Ed/Brandeis University/Women and War (Spring 2020)

This course examines how African women writers and filmmakers, representing vastly different historical and cultural experiences, bear witness to war. It interrogates how women who are survivors of war, genocide, and dictatorship use testimony to mediate acts of resistance that track the existence of violence and trauma within multiple and intersecting sites of oppression. The course will feature oral histories by women from the Gambia as well as memoirs, novels, poems, and testimonies from Sierra Leone, Liberia, Nigeria, Rwanda, Democratic Republic of Congo, Burundi, Uganda, Sudan, and South Africa. Authors include, Aminata Forna, Lemah Gbowee, Fanta Regina Nacro, Veronique Tadjo, Marie Beatrice Umutesi, Pumla Gobodo-Madikizela, Leila Aboulela, Njabulo Ndebele, and Chimamanda Adichie. Students will examine how these writers resist political and sociocultural silencing systems that reduce traumatic experience to collective amnesia, silence, denial, and terror. Students will be introduced to the historical circumstances that shaped the work of each writer, and we will pose questions about the impact of African women’s trauma narratives on conflict transformation in various African societies.

Week 2
Welcome to your Wikipedia assignment's course timeline. This page guides you through the steps you'll need to complete for your Wikipedia assignment, with links to training modules and your classmates' work spaces.

Your course has been assigned a Wikipedia Expert. You can reach them through the Get Help button at the top of this page.

Resources:


 * Editing Wikipedia, pages 1–5
 * Evaluating Wikipedia

Create an account and join this course page, using the enrollment link your instructor sent you. (Because of Wikipedia's technical restraints, you may receive a message that you cannot create an account. To resolve this, please try again off campus or the next day.)

This week, everyone should have a Wikipedia account.

Week 4
Resource: Editing Wikipedia, page 6

Week 6
Reach out to your Wikipedia Expert if you have questions using the Get Help button at the top of this page.

Resource: Editing Wikipedia, pages 7–9

Biographies

Books

Cultural Anthropology

Films

History

LGBT+ Studies

Women's Studies

Everyone has begun writing their article drafts.

Week 7
Guiding framework

Every student has finished reviewing their assigned articles, making sure that every article has been reviewed.

Week 8
You probably have some feedback from other students and possibly other Wikipedians. Consider their suggestions, decide whether it makes your work more accurate and complete, and edit your draft to make those changes.

Resources:


 * Editing Wikipedia, pages 12 and 14
 * Reach out to your Wikipedia Expert if you have any questions.

Week 9
Now that you've improved your draft based on others' feedback, it's time to move your work live - to the &quot;mainspace.&quot;

Resource: Editing Wikipedia, page 13

Week 10
Now's the time to revisit your text and refine your work. You may do more research and find missing information; rewrite the lead section to represent all major points; reorganize the text to communicate the information better; or add images and other media.

Week 11
Continue to expand and improve your work, and format your article to match Wikipedia's tone and standards. Remember to contact your Wikipedia Expert at any time if you need further help!

Week 12
It's the final week to develop your article.


 * Read Editing Wikipedia page 15 to review a final check-list before completing your assignment.
 * Don't forget that you can ask for help from your Wikipedia Expert at any time!

Write a paper going beyond your Wikipedia article to advance your own ideas, arguments, and original research about your topic.

Week 13
Everyone should have finished all of the work they'll do on Wikipedia, and be ready for grading.