Cinemorphosis

Category: Education in the AI Age

  • Comma Splices and Other Endangered Species

    Comma Splices and Other Endangered Species

    I’ve been grading college essays for nearly forty years, and for most of that time, spotting a comma splice was like being a tennis umpire catching an out-of-bounds serve: instant whistle, raised flag, righteous indignation. A run-on sentence was not merely a mistake—it was a moral offense. A fragment was a cry for divine intervention. I was the Grammar Constable, badge polished, citation pad ready.

    But something has shifted. I look at a comma splice now and instead of reacting like a hall monitor on Red Bull, I simply ask: What’s the point? In a world where students increasingly treat AI like an in-house copyeditor, how long will “grammar errors” even exist? Am I really supposed to send them to syntax jail when a few prompts and a grammar model will sand off their linguistic rough edges? Policing grammar suddenly feels as antiquated as lecturing people about proper carburetor maintenance. The role I’ve played for decades—keeper of the mechanical rules—feels obsolete.

    This morning I graded a paper with a textbook comma splice. A few years ago, I’d have winced like I’d bitten into a lemon rind. Today? I barely blinked. The author will eventually click a button and let a machine fix it. My outrage, like the comma splice itself, is becoming a relic of the combustible-engine era.

  • Heroes and Living Dead: What Douglass and Chekhov’s Nikolai Teach Us About the Meaning of a Good Life

    Heroes and Living Dead: What Douglass and Chekhov’s Nikolai Teach Us About the Meaning of a Good Life

    College Essay Prompt

    We often assume that the pursuit of freedom and happiness is a universal human impulse, shared across eras, cultures, and personal histories. Yet the paths individuals take toward those goals can be radically different, and those differences reveal whether one’s concept of happiness liberates or destroys. Few figures illustrate this divide more clearly than Frederick Douglass and Nikolai Ivanovitch from Anton Chekhov’s short story “Gooseberries.” Douglass’s character and trajectory embody a moral code that turns hardship into purpose: through literacy, community, courage, and a refusal to internalize oppression, he transforms enslavement into a platform for human dignity—not only for himself, but for others. By contrast, Nikolai pursues a narrow, adolescent fantasy of happiness, one built not on self-growth or empathy but on domination, comfort, and the myth of personal entitlement. His life becomes a grotesque parody of fulfillment—an existence of empty pleasures, self-deception, parasitic dependence, and spiritual decay beneath the veneer of material abundance.

    In a 1,700-word essay, analyze how Douglass’s journey to freedom stands as a model of healthy, ethical happiness while Nikolai’s descent exposes a warped, toxic version of happiness rooted in narcissism and self-indulgence. Your essay should do the following:

    1. Compare the moral foundations of Douglass and Nikolai’s pursuits.
       Explain how Douglass’s “Bushido-like” moral code—discipline, responsibility, representation, courage, and community—shapes his identity and empowers those around him. Contrast this with Nikolai’s rejection of accountability, his obsession with land ownership, and his willingness to deplete others—emotionally, financially, and spiritually—to maintain his fantasy of contentment. Discuss how each man’s vision of freedom manifests in their treatment of other people.
    2. Analyze the role of community vs. isolation in each character’s development.
       Douglass’s path is paradoxically individual and communal: he cultivates internal strength, but he locates freedom in solidarity—those who teach him to read, abolitionists who elevate his voice, and the enslaved people whose suffering he speaks for. Meanwhile, Nikolai constructs a private empire that excludes others, even the brother who once supported him. Consider how their relationships either amplify or erode their humanity.
    3. Examine the symbolic images of transformation and degradation.
       Use key passages from Douglass’s Narrative to show how literacy, speech, political action, and public representation transform him from an enslaved boy into a moral and political leader. Then show how Nikolai’s physical and spiritual decay—his swollen body, the petty rituals of comfort, the stagnant gooseberries—reflect the collapse of his inner self. Avoid plot summary; instead interrogate how each author uses these symbols to define what “freedom” looks like in practice.
    4. Discuss how each figure embodies or violates a healthy definition of happiness.
       What does Douglass’s version of happiness require? Effort, growth, sacrifice, connection, and the willingness to uplift others even when it hurts. What does Nikolai’s version require? Exploitation, avoidance of reality, refusal to change, and the delusion that comfort equals fulfillment. Describe how a life built on purpose creates meaning, while a life built on selfish gratification becomes spiritually unlivable.
    5. Address at least one counterargument.
       Consider why Nikolai might be appealing to some readers. Isn’t his dream of having a small estate, comfort, and peace understandable? Why might some view Douglass’s path as impossibly heroic—too demanding, too painful, or too noble for the average person? Engage with these viewpoints seriously, and rebut them using evidence from the texts.
    6. End with a conclusion that points to broader implications.
       Connect your contrast to the world we live in now. What do Douglass and Nikolai teach us about modern definitions of success, happiness, and the “good life”? Can happiness exist without social responsibility? Does personal freedom become toxic when it is purchased at the expense of others? Ask yourself what moral code has the power to sustain a person—and why some forms of comfort inevitably rot the soul.

    Your essay should not merely compare two characters; it should interrogate the meaning behind their choices. You are ultimately making an argument about what counts as real freedom and real happiness. Your goal is to show that the paths we choose do not simply determine the lives we build—they determine the kind of people we become.

  • Beyond the Self-Made Myth: Frederick Douglass, Community, and the Fight Against the Sunken Place

    Beyond the Self-Made Myth: Frederick Douglass, Community, and the Fight Against the Sunken Place

    College Essay Prompt:

    Public narratives frequently present Frederick Douglass as a “self-made man,” emphasizing his escape from slavery, his disciplined pursuit of literacy, and his celebrity as an abolitionist. In a 1,700–2,000 word essay, evaluate how this popular framing obscures the communal, political, and structural forces that shaped Douglass’s rise and activism. Which relationships, institutions, and collective efforts made his achievements possible, and why do certain commentators downplay them?

    Then, drawing on one or more of the following—Get Out, Black Panther, The Evolution of the Black Quarterback, or ALLENIV3SON—analyze how these works depict barriers that cannot be overcome through individual effort alone. In what ways do they present the “Sunken Place” as a system sustained by stereotypes, gatekeeping, or power hierarchies? Explain how collective action, representation, or community support becomes necessary for breaking those barriers. Your essay must include a counterargument that fairly represents the appeal of the “self-made” narrative and a rebuttal grounded in evidence from Douglass and your chosen texts.

  • Inside the 2026 Spring Semester: Stupidification, Katrina, and the Myth of the Self-Made Man

    Inside the 2026 Spring Semester: Stupidification, Katrina, and the Myth of the Self-Made Man

    3 Essay Assignments for my Freshman Composition and Critical Thinking Classes, Spring 2026 Semester

    Freshman Composition Class

    Essay1: How Black Mirror Imagines the Stupidification of Social Media

    This essay prompt asks you to write a 1,700-word argumentative essay analyzing how the Black Mirror episodes “Joan Is Awful” and “Nosedive” portray the digitally intensified “stupidification” Jonathan Haidt describes in “Why the Past 10 Years of American Life Have Been Uniquely Stupid.” Your goal is to take a clear, debatable position on whether these episodes exaggerate social-media anxieties or accurately reflect the psychological and social pathologies shaping online life. In a 200–250 word introduction, you must define “stupidification” using Haidt’s key ideas—such as the Babel metaphor, outrage incentives, the collapse of shared reality, identity performance, and tribal signaling—and then connect these concepts to one concrete example from your own life or observations. End your introduction with a focused thesis evaluating how effectively the two episodes illuminate the realities of social-media-driven stupidity.

    Essay 2: Hurricane Katrina: Natural Disaster or Man-Made Catastrophe?

    This essay prompt asks you to write a 1,700-word argumentative essay on the claim that Hurricane Katrina was less a natural disaster than a national failure. Drawing on the documentaries Hurricane Katrina: Race Against Time and Katrina: Come Hell and High Water, along with Clint Smith’s “Twenty Years After the Storm” and Nicholas Lemann’s “Why Hurricane Katrina Was Not a Natural Disaster,” you will analyze how government neglect, weak infrastructure, racial inequity, and media distortion contributed to the catastrophe. These works reveal a fourfold betrayal—red-lining, unprepared institutions, delayed aid, and harmful narratives—that left New Orleans, especially its Black communities, vulnerable and abandoned. Your essay should evaluate how systemic issues of race, class, and policy exacerbated the disaster while also exploring how families, neighborhoods, and cultural identity fostered resilience. Ultimately, you will consider what Katrina teaches us about justice, responsibility, and the human cost of institutional failure.

    Essay 3: The Myth of the Self-Made Man

    Many commentators, institutions, and public narratives present Frederick Douglass as the quintessential “self-made man,” using his rise from slavery to argue that personal discipline and individual grit are enough to overcome oppression. Write an essay analyzing why Douglass is framed this way: What political, cultural, or ideological purposes does this simplified narrative serve, and what parts of Douglass’s life and writing does it erase? Then, drawing on one or more of the following—Get Out, Black Panther, The Evolution of the Black Quarterback, and ALLENIV3SON—argue how these works challenge the myth that individual effort alone is sufficient to escape a modern form of the “Sunken Place.” Use evidence from Douglass and your chosen texts, address at least one counterargument, and provide a reasoned rebuttal.

    Critical Thinking Class

    Essay 1: Shame as Entertainment: The Myth of Moral Fitness in The Biggest Loser

    With 70 percent of Americans now overweight or obese, it’s no wonder the nation is obsessed with weight loss. That obsession fuels a vast industry of diets, influencers, and reality shows, none more infamous than The Biggest Loser. The series, which became the subject of the three-part docuseries Fit for TV: The Reality of The Biggest Loser, reveals how television turned the suffering of overweight people into prime-time entertainment. Contestants were pushed, shamed, and humiliated under the guise of “motivation.” The so-called fitness experts preached self-discipline, grit, and moral purity, but what they really offered was a cocktail of cruelty and pseudoscience disguised as inspiration. In a 1,700-word essay, analyze how the abuse documented in Fit for TV exposes the deeper myths behind weight loss culture. Drawing on Fit for TV, Julia Belluz and Kevin Hall’s essay “It’s Not You. It’s the Food,” and Rebecca Johns’s “A Diet Writer’s Regrets,” develop an argument that answers this question:

    What is intrinsically abusive about the gospel of self-discipline in weight loss, and how does this ideology blind us to the systemic causes of obesity while offering a hollow sense of meaning through influencers and their heroic panaceas? Your essay must include a counterargument and rebuttal section and a Works Cited page in MLA format with at least three sources.

    Essay 2: Ozempification and the Age of De-Skilling

    This essay prompt asks you to write a 1,700-word argumentative essay on whether dependence on AI always harms human skill—or whether, in some cases, it can be “bad but worth it.” Drawing on Kwame Anthony Appiah’s “The Age of De-Skilling,” you will use his distinctions between corrosive de-skilling, “bad but worth it” de-skilling, and unacceptable forms of de-skilling to evaluate how AI affects our thinking, creativity, and agency. You must take a clear position on whether AI meaningfully frees us for deeper work or mostly dulls our abilities and trains us into passivity. Your essay should distinguish between lazy reliance on AI and intentional collaboration with it, include a counterargument–rebuttal section, and incorporate an example of Ozempification—the growing cultural pattern in which people outsource effort, discipline, or agency to an external system, becoming passive “users” rather than active participants—from a Black Mirror episode such as “Joan Is Awful,” “Nosedive,” or “Smithereens.” You are required to use at least three sources in MLA format, including Appiah.

    Essay 3: The Whole Truth About Ultra-Processed Foods

    Using Olga Khazan’s “Avoiding Ultra-Processed Foods Is Completely Unrealistic,” Dhruv Khullar’s “Why Is the American Diet So Deadly?” and Julia Belluz and Kevin Hall’s “It’s Not You. It’s the Food” as your central texts, write a 1,700-word argumentative essay analyzing whether ultra-processed foods deserve their reputation as the villain of modern nutrition. Evaluate the claim that the only truly healthy diet is one built exclusively on whole foods.

    In your essay, define what counts as “whole,” “processed,” and “ultra-processed,” and analyze how clear or meaningful these categories actually are. Then examine the real-world constraints shaping American diets, including economics, time, geography, marketing, and systemic inequities. How realistic is it for the average eater to avoid ultra-processed foods altogether? What trade-offs—financial, cultural, and practical—shape people’s choices?

    As part of your argument, consider how emerging tools like GLP-1 medications or AI-guided meal planning may influence how we define “healthy eating.” Do these tools expand options for overwhelmed consumers, or push us toward a future where food becomes less cultural and more optimized?

    Your essay must include one counterargument–rebuttal section and an MLA Works Cited page with at least four sources.

  • How Black Mirror Imagines the Stupidification of Social Media

    How Black Mirror Imagines the Stupidification of Social Media

    Write a 1,700-word argumentative essay examining how the Black Mirror episodes “Joan Is Awful” and “Nosedive” dramatize the forms of “stupidification” Jonathan Haidt describes in “Why the Past 10 Years of American Life Have Been Uniquely Stupid.” Your task is to make a focused, debatable claim about how these episodes portray digitally amplified stupidity. Do they exaggerate our anxieties for shock value? Do they rely on sensationalism that weakens their insight? Or do they capture the very real psychological and social pathologies reshaping our digital lives? Craft a thesis that clearly stakes out your position on the relationship between social media and stupidification.

    Introduction Requirement (200–250 words):
    Define “stupidification” using Haidt’s central ideas—his Babel metaphor, the incentives for outrage, the breakdown of shared reality, the rise of identity performance, and the tribal signaling that fuels online conflict. Then connect Haidt’s concepts to one concrete example from your own life or observations, such as a social-media argument, an online trend, or a family dispute shaped by digital platforms. Conclude your introduction with a precise thesis that evaluates how accurately “Joan Is Awful” and “Nosedive” reflect the pathologies shaping contemporary social media.

  • How Pre-Digital Cinema Imagined the Stupidification Social Media Perfected

    How Pre-Digital Cinema Imagined the Stupidification Social Media Perfected

    Write a 1,700-word argumentative essay analyzing how The King of Comedy (1982) and/or The Truman Show (1998) anticipate the forms of “stupidification” depicted Jonathan Haidt’s “Why the Past 10 Years of American Life Have Been Uniquely Stupid.” Make an argumentative claim about how one or both of these earlier films relate to today’s digitally amplified forms of stupidification. Do they function as prophetic warnings? As examinations of longstanding human weaknesses that social media later exploited? Or as both? Develop a thesis that takes a clear position on the relationship between pre-digital and digital stupidification.

    Introduction Requirement (about 200–250 words):

    Define “stupidification” using Haidt’s key concepts—such as the Babel metaphor, outrage incentives, the collapse of shared reality, identity performance, and tribal signaling. Then briefly connect Haidt’s ideas to one concrete example from your own life or personal observations (e.g., online behavior, comment sections, family disputes shaped by social media). End your introduction with a clear thesis that takes a position on how effectively the earlier films anticipate the pathologies depicted in Haidt’s essay. 

    Be sure to have a counterargument-rebuttal section and a Works Cited page with a minimum of 4 sources. 

  • The Age of Academic Anhedonia

    The Age of Academic Anhedonia

    I started teaching college writing in the 80s under the delusion that I was destined to be the David Letterman of higher education—a twenty-five-year-old ham with a chalkboard, half-professor and half–late-night stand-up. For a while, the act actually worked. A well-timed deadpan joke could mesmerize a room of eighteen-year-olds and soften their outrage when I saddled them with catastrophically ill-chosen books (Ron Rosenbaum’s Explaining Hitler—a misfire so spectacular it deserves its own apology tour). My stories carried the class, and for decades I thought the laughter was evidence of learning. If I could entertain them, I told myself, I could teach them.

    Then 2012 hit like a change in atmospheric pressure. Engagement thinned. Phones glowed. Students behaved as though they were starring in their own prestige drama, and my classroom was merely a poorly lit set. I was no longer battling boredom—I was competing with the algorithm. This was the era of screen-mediated youth, the 2010–2021 cohort raised on the oxygen of performance. Their identities were curated in Instagram grids, maintained through Snapstreaks, and measured in TikTok microfame points. The students were not apathetic; they were overstimulated. Their emotional bandwidth was spent on self-presentation, comparison loops, and the endless scoreboard of online life. They were exhausted but wired, longing for authenticity yet addicted to applause. I felt my own attention-capture lose potency, but I still recognized those students. They were distracted, yes, but still alive.

    But in 2025, we face a darker beast: the academically anhedonic student. The screen-mediated generation ran hot; this one runs cold. Around 2022, a new condition surfaced—a collapse of the internal reward system that makes learning feel good, or at least worthwhile. Years of over-curation, pandemic detachment, frictionless AI answers, and dopamine-dense apps hollowed out the very circuits that spark curiosity. This isn’t laziness; it’s a neurological shrug. These students can perform the motions—fill in a template, complete a scaffold, assemble an essay like a flat-pack bookshelf—but they move through the work like sleepwalkers. Their curiosity is muted. Their persistence is brittle. Their critical thinking arrives pre-flattened. 

    My colleagues tell me their classrooms are filled with compliant but joyless learners checking boxes on their march toward a credential. The Before-Times students wrestled with ideas. The After-Times students drift through them without contact. It breaks our hearts because the contrast is stark: what was once noisy and performative has gone silent. Academic anhedonia names that silence—a crisis not of ability, but of feeling.

  • Eating in the Real World, Not the Ideal One

    Eating in the Real World, Not the Ideal One

    Using Olga Khazan’s “Avoiding Ultra-Processed Foods Is Completely Unrealistic” as a central text and at least three additional credible sources, write a 1,700-word essay that supports, refutes, or complicates the claim that the only path to health is a diet built exclusively on whole foods—and that ultra-processed foods should be treated as the villain of modern nutrition.

    In your essay, define what counts as “whole,” “processed,” and “ultra-processed,” and analyze whether these categories are as clear—or as moral—as public discourse suggests. Examine the extent to which a modern eater can realistically avoid ultra-processed foods, and whether some of these foods can coexist with a healthy, sustainable lifestyle.

    Your argument should also address the larger forces shaping our dietary choices: economic constraints, systemic inequities, marketing, food deserts, the influence of GLP-1 medications, and the cultural narratives that determine which foods are celebrated and which are condemned. Include a counterargument-rebuttal section that engages opposing viewpoints in good faith, and conclude with an MLA-formatted Works Cited containing a minimum of four sources.

  • The Myth of the Self-Made Man

    The Myth of the Self-Made Man

    Essay Prompt

    Many commentators, institutions, and public narratives present Frederick Douglass as the quintessential “self-made man,” using his rise from slavery to argue that personal discipline and individual grit are enough to overcome oppression. Write an essay analyzing why Douglass is framed this way: What political, cultural, or ideological purposes does this simplified narrative serve, and what parts of Douglass’s life and writing does it erase?

    Then, drawing on one or more of the following—Get Out, Black Panther, The Evolution of the Black Quarterback, and ALLENIV3SON—argue how these works challenge the myth that individual effort alone is sufficient to escape a modern form of the “Sunken Place.” Use evidence from Douglass and your chosen texts, address at least one counterargument, and provide a reasoned rebuttal.

    8-Paragraph Outline

    Paragraph 1: Introduction

    Open with the cultural popularity of the “self-made man” myth and how Douglass is often drafted into that narrative. Introduce the contemporary film(s)/docuseries you will analyze. End with a thesis that presents your argument and mapping components.

    Paragraph 2: How Douglass Is Framed as the Self-Made Man

    Explain the most common public uses of Douglass—textbooks, political speeches, social media, corporate training, etc. Describe the appealing simplicity of the “rise by grit alone” narrative.

    Paragraph 3: Why This Framing Is Useful (to Whom and for What)

    Analyze the motives behind this selective portrayal. Discuss how the myth supports certain political or ideological agendas: minimizing systemic racism, shifting responsibility to individuals, or celebrating a sanitized American Dream.

    Paragraph 4: What This Narrative Omits

    Show what disappears when Douglass is turned into a solo hero: abolitionist networks, Anna Murray’s role, collective struggle, federal intervention, racial terror, psychological trauma, and Douglass’s critique of American power.

    Paragraph 5: Modern Text #1—How It Challenges the Self-Made Myth

    Explain how your first chosen film or docuseries exposes structural forces no individual can escape alone. For Get Out, this may be psychological colonization; for Evolution of the Black Quarterback, structural biases; for Black Panther, political histories; etc.

    Paragraph 6: Modern Text #2 (Optional if using more than one)

    If choosing a second text, show how it reinforces or expands the critique. If using only one film, broaden the analysis: zoom in on multiple scenes, characters, or arcs that dismantle the self-made myth.

    Paragraph 7: Counterargument and Rebuttal

    Present the strongest version of the opposing view: Douglass “proved” that grit is enough; modern examples of individual triumph exist; the Sunken Place metaphor is too pessimistic. Then rebut each point with evidence showing that exceptional individuals do not invalidate structural realities.

    Paragraph 8: Conclusion

    Show why reducing Douglass to a self-made hero is not only historically inaccurate but also misleading for understanding modern struggles. End by synthesizing your insights across Douglass and the contemporary works.

    Four Thesis Statements with Mapping Components

    Thesis 1

    Although many public narratives portray Frederick Douglass as the perfect “self-made man,” this framing ignores the collective networks that shaped his freedom, misrepresents his political message, and distorts the historical reality of slavery; by contrast, films like Get Out and The Evolution of the Black Quarterback reveal how structural forces—psychological control, institutional racism, and inherited power—make the self-made myth dangerously incomplete.

    Mapping Components:

    (1) collective networks,
    (2) misrepresented political message,
    (3) distorted historical reality,
    (4) structural forces in modern texts.

    Thesis 2

    The myth of Douglass as a solo architect of his destiny persists because it offers a convenient story about American meritocracy, but Black Panther and ALLENIV3SON expose the limits of individual effort in the face of systemic pressures, inherited trauma, and institutional barriers. Together, these works demonstrate that liberation requires community, history, and structural change—not just personal grit.

    Mapping Components:

    (1) meritocracy narrative,
    (2) systemic pressures,
    (3) inherited trauma,
    (4) institutional barriers.

    Thesis 3

    Frederick Douglass is often drafted into the self-made-man myth to support political arguments that blame individuals rather than systems, yet both Get Out and Black Panther challenge this myth by showing how racial surveillance, technological domination, and geopolitical history create Sunken Places no individual can escape alone.

    Mapping Components:

    (1) political uses of the myth,
    (2) racial surveillance,
    (3) technological domination,
    (4) geopolitical history.

    Thesis 4

    The popular image of Douglass as the ultimate self-starter survives because it offers a comforting fantasy about upward mobility, but documentaries like The Evolution of the Black Quarterback reveal that success stories are never purely individual—they emerge from networks, opportunities, and battles with deeply entrenched structures. Both the historical record and modern media refute the idea that grit alone can defeat the Sunken Place.

    Mapping Components:

    (1) fantasy of mobility,
    (2) networks and opportunity,
    (3) entrenched structures,
    (4) historical and modern refutation.

  • The Goldilocks Hybrid and Its Two Dysfunctional Siblings

    The Goldilocks Hybrid and Its Two Dysfunctional Siblings

    We offer three flavors of writing instruction at my college, each with its own personality disorder. First, there’s face-to-face: two hours, twice a week, the old-fashioned “sit in a room and pretend we’re a community” model. Then there’s hybrid: one in-person meeting supplemented by a sleek online spine. And finally, we have asynchronous online, which is technically a class but spiritually a self-guided pilgrimage through Canvas punctuated by optional Zoom sightings of your professor, like glimpsing a rare bird.

    Last place is easy: asynchronous. It’s not a class so much as a bureaucratic scavenger hunt akin to DMV traffic school. You spend your days inside Canvas like a minor character in a Russian novel, distributing grades, tracking submissions, and playing AI Police as if you’re guarding the border between Education and the Land of the Auto-Generated Essay. It’s less “learning” and more “completing modules to avoid moral decay.”

    Second place goes to face-to-face, which works fine—but let’s be honest, students do not need to see you twice a week. Once is enough to build rapport, offer real-time feedback, and remind them you’re a living mammal. Twice? Now you’re edging into overexposure. The ones who enjoy you on Tuesday will find you insufferable by Thursday.

    And then we reach the hybrid: the Goldilocks of pedagogy. One meeting a week—just enough humanity to feel legitimate, not enough to trigger claustrophobia. The college saves money on electricity and preserves precious classroom space. Students get to cosplay “the full college experience” once a week. And you, the professor, are consumed in manageable doses—like vitamin A. Beneficial in moderation. Toxic in bulk.