Overview
For this assignment, you will be expected to write a 4-6 page (1000-1500 words) paper using the existing course materials.
One of the central questions that this course asks is whether capitalism is a rational economic system. Through our lessons we are asking whether it makes sense, for people, to let the market be the central and determining factor in our lives. In the world today, nearly every person on this planet is dependent on the market for their survival; as such, we need to consider what to do about it.
The most immediate way we experience this market dependence is through our jobs. As working people, we spend most of our life creating profits for someone else, in exchange for a wage. This paper is an opportunity for you to connect your own personal experience of work with the theory and data you have learned in this course.
Your assignment is to tell me about a job you have had, and show me how your experience of that job relates to what you have learned about capitalism. You can choose whatever aspects of the job you want to, but remember that the goal is to show me how your real-world experience connects to the content we learned in class. (Naturally, I will not be sharing your papers with your bosses, so you don’t need to worry about getting in trouble for criticizing them. But if it worries you, it is perfectly ok to change the name of the company.)
Although much of the essay will be about the job in question, this is an academic assignment, not just a diary. You need to draw from and reference the course materials. You can talk about the modules, the videos, the readings, or films, whatever is most useful to illustrate how your job fit into the world of capitalism. You might think, “I remember when ___ happened at my job at Starbucks. This reminds me of what the professor said in Video 4 when he said “____.” It also reminds me of that statistic from Module 3, which was ____.”
I hope you find this to be a useful and interesting way of connecting the course material to your real world. If you have not had any jobs that you think you can talk about for the assignment, then you can use a job that one of your parents or grandparents has had.
Unfortunately, I always have to be aware of the possibility that students might try to cheat on assignments. To prevent this from happening, I will be arranging zoom meetings with half of the class (randomly selected) to discuss your assignments with me before I give them a grade. If the work is your own, then it will be a nice little opportunity for us to talk about the job you had and the ways you have been thinking about it. If you copied your essay from someone else or from a website like course hero, even if you changed a few words around to hide it, it will quickly become obvious in our conversation and you will be penalized to the full extent of Humber’s Academic Integrity regulations.
Honest, real work will get a better grade anyway. In this assignment I want to hear from you, I want you to write as though you were speaking to me: clearly and directly. Writing clearly can be challenging. I'm not talking about grammar and spelling, I'm talking about whether someone can sit down and read what you've written and understand your point. This is why you should write simply and clearly. Do not try to dazzle your audience with the big words you know (because maybe you don't actually know them). Do not try to construct really long complicated sentences. This usually backfires! Write in the same way you speak, and write as if you need the person reading it to understand exactly what you mean. That way, your ideas will shine through, and will not get lost in confusing sentences and big words.
On that note, I ask you not to use any software like synonym generators or grammar fixers, because it will look like cheating to me. I will not take off marks for spelling and grammar mistakes, because I want to hear your voice come through your essay. If you do your own work, even if it isn't the best work in the world, I will be generous, because my goal here is to help you succeed. However, if I suspect that you have been dishonest, I will no longer be generous. This is explained in more detail in the plagiarism policy for the course.
When you do take ideas or quotes from the course materials, which I will expect you to do, you must cite it. I don't care what format you use, the point is to communicate to me what you are drawing from so that I can see that you understand it correctly. If you quote something make sure you understand what it means, do not just throw random quotes into essays. Show me that you've gone through and understood the material well enough that you have an opinion about it.
Good luck! I hope you will enjoy having an opportunity to connect the course to your life and I look forward to chatting with many of you about it. You will get a message from me if you are selected for a zoom conversation to arrange a time for our meeting. If you don’t respond to a request for a meeting, you will get a grade of zero.
The due date is firm, but if there is a reason you absolutely cannot meet it, please arrange this with me in advance. If you need any help while you are working on the essay, send me a message and I will be happy to give you whatever guidance I can! please do not use AI.