Ryan Schram's Anthrocyclopaedia

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====== First essay: Improving AI reference material ======

**Default due date:** Apr 04, 2025 at 11:59 p.m.

**Word count:** 1000 words

In this writing assignment, you are evaluating online sources about one of the big ideas or authors from the first six weeks of class and you are rewriting what these sources say based on your own knowledge and thinking about your chosen topic.

Imagine that your writing will be on Wikipedia or another online encyclopedia, and it will be where students and the general public land when they do a web search for the topic.

It is easy to imagine a future in which all encyclopedia articles and top search results like that are generated by AI. In the future, nstead of going to an actual book or website written by well-informed researchers, people will just read the synopsis that comes from an embedded AI chatbot.

How do you feel about that?

Well, let’s dive into AI-generated reference material and see how we can make it better.

===== Possible topics for this assignment =====

Choose one of the following important concepts or important thinkers from the first six weeks of class.

  * Symbol or sign, particularly as defined by Ferdinand de Saussure and applied in symbolic anthropology.
  * Historical ethnography
  * Jean Comaroff and John L. Comaroff
  * Eric Wolf, particularly his critique of classical approaches to ethnography
  * Michel-Rolph Trouillot, particularly his concept of a “savage slot” in Western thought (Trouillot [2003] 2016).
  * Marshall Sahlins, particularly his work on ethnohistory
  * Practice
  * Habitus
  * The ordinary
  * Social norms and normativity (in anthropology, as opposed to philosophy)

===== The procedures for the assignment =====

Your writing will have three parts, two of which you will write yourself and should be about 500 words each.

1\. The first part will be the AI-generated summary about your chosen topic. You can use any tool for this that you want, and you probably should try several different ones so you have something you can work with.

You should also cite the source for this generated text. This is your "acknowledgement" of the (required) use of a generative AI tool.


2\. The second part is your commentary and criticism of the generated text. What is the main message, claim, or most important idea that the AI text gets across? Would students in other areas of study be able to understand it? Does it answer the questions people want to know when they consult an encyclopedia or do a web search for reliable information? Are there errors? Are these things that are confusing, misleading, or too simple? Is it biased, subjective, or located in a specific perspective, and if so what is it? What needs to be corrected, expanded, or improved?


3\. The third part is your rewrite of the first part. Using your own knowledge of this topic and the sources from class, edit the AI-generated text to make it say what you think it should say so that students and lay readers will have what you think is the most important thing to know about your topic.

Here's a good procedure for working on this part:

* Open a blank word-processing file, copy the AI-generated text into it, turn on the "Track Changes" function, and edit the text line by line.
* Then hide the changes so you can see your new version without markup (blue and red text for insertions and deletions), and read it over again, editing your own final product to your satisfaction.
* When you have finished your edits, save the file, and copy the finished, final, edited text into your main document for submission.
* You may need to "approve" your changes one by one so that your markup is no longer visible.((And you might want to save two working documents, one with your changes marked up and one with the changes "approved" so the markup is taken out.))

When rewriting the AI-generated text, focus on getting across what you think is the most important information, particularly what the topic tells us about anthropology as a discipline and as a conversation. 

A good reference article is more than just a bunch of basic facts. It also synthesizes these details into a more comprehensive picture. Contrasts between authors we have read in class can be useful here. To understand what something is, it's good to see what it is not. To understand why someone's ideas are important, it's good to see how they are different from other thinkers.

In other words, while this is not an argumentative essay, it should still have a main point, and it should explain the reasoning that leads you to arrive at this point by making inferences from specific facts to larger conclusions.


==== How your work will be evaluated ====

This essay will be based on your reading and interpretation of the assigned readings and the recommended readings. You do not have to research other sources besides these readings. You can orient yourself by reading many outside sources, and if you use information or ideas from other authors you should cite them just as you would in any essay or other scholarly writing. There is however no minimum or maximum required number of sources. Instead, you should focus on explaining the main ideas of the authors we read in class in your own words, and develop your own reasoning from these ideas to support your synthesis of what you know from your own reading.

This isn’t an argumentative essay, but any writing needs to (1) have a main point, even if that is a synthesis of all the facts, rather than a strong claim, and (2) explain the reasoned inferences you use to arrive at your main point.

The strongest way to make a point, and to synthesize a lot of material into a short, direct statement, comes from a close reading of primary sources (assigned readings). Deferring to other people’s authority and expertise is not actually very persuasive.

Otherwise, your essay will be evaluated based on how it measures up in several specific ways:

  * Do you have an appropriate topic for this assignment?
  * Is the generated text authentic, that is, did you use an AI tool to create it?
  * Can you explain why you doubt what this generated text says? Does your criticism and commentary demonstrate that you are questioning what you read?
  * By reshaping the generated text, can you express a single direct main idea that communicates what you think is the most important thing to know about your topic?
  * Can you explain the reasons for your conclusions (your synthesis of facts)?
  * Have you carefully edited your final, corrected text (and your commentary) for clarity and readability, striving to use short, simple words that anyone can understand?

The word limit is not a grading criterion. It’s simply a guideline. This is meant to be a short and relatively straightforward assignment, but it calls for more effort than a weekly writing assignment. You can use your word count as a diagnostic. If you are writing more than 1000 words for parts 2 and 3, ask yourself how you can edit them to focus on the most important information and ideas, especially your main point. Aim to write as much as possible and then edit what you have written to get your main idea across in a direct and accesible way.

Since this is a new assignment, we should discuss these instructions in class and they may change based on our discussion.

==== Formatting and software requirements ====

For a description of the required appearance and file format of your essay, see the page [[|Formatting and software requirements]].

==== Can I use AI? ====

Yes, in fact, you have to :) But for the parts you write yourself, you are free to use tools to help you write better. You still have to acknowledge your use of these tools. This guide gives examples of how you can acknowledge your use of an AI tool: https://canvas.sydney.edu.au/courses/51655. Remember, you are responsible for what AI tools create for you.

==== Do I have to use AI? I hate AI. ====

Yeah, you and me both. Every time you use a chatbot to generate text, the AI computer consumes a bottle of water and uses the electricity needed for using a light bulb for one hour (Verma and Tan 2024). And they aren’t solar-powered, either. This is gonna work out great! /s

A lot of AI is hype but it’s already clear that students need to learn not just how to use generative AI tools, but to learn their limits, and especially learn to see when AI is used on you. This is an exercise in developing those skills, which are also crucial for being a good anthropologist and a good thinker.

If you really detest the idea of using AI tools, please talk to me about alternatives.

==== Can I write on a topic other than the ones from the above list (or even one not covered in the first six weeks of class)? ====

If a student has a really good idea for an alternative topic, I’d be open to hearing it. Please talk to me about it. Explain why you are curious about an alternative topic and what you would want to learn by writing about it.

===== References =====

Trouillot, Michel-Rolph. (2003) 2016. “Anthropology and the Savage Slot: The Poetics and Politics of Otherness.” In //Global Transformations: Anthropology and the Modern World//, 7–28. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-1-137-04144-9.


Verma, Pranshu, and Shelly Tan. 2024. “How Much Energy Can AI Use? Breaking down the Toll of Each ChatGPT Query.” //The Washington Post//, September 18, 2024. https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/09/18/energy-ai-use-electricity-water-data-centers/.



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