English homework

This week you will read a selection of literary works from the Tudor Age to the Age of Revolution. Students will study works of prose, poetry, drama, and fiction in relation to their historical and cultural contexts. Texts will be selected from among a diverse group of authors for what they reflect and reveal about the evolving British experience and character.  We begin the course by reading about the origin of British literature. The literary texts you will read in this unit will provide you with knowledge of the history that impacted the earliest works.   Student Learning Outcomes Addressed:   

· Identify key ideas, significant historical or cultural events, and characteristic perspectives or attitudes expressed in the literature of different periods or regions.

· Analyze literary works as expressions of individual or communal values within the social, political, cultural, or religious contexts of different literary periods.

  Core Competencies Addressed:

· Biographical, historical and literary analysis

 Readings: Interview a Character Assignment Instructions

       

        From   British Literature I   “Part 2: The Tudor Age,” 

· Introduction, pages, 599-602.

· Sir Thomas More’s “Preface” to Utopia, pages 602-607.

· William Shakespeare, “Sonnets 18,” and “Sonnet 106,” pages 1174-1177, page 1178, and page 1182.

· William Shakespeare,  King Lear, Act 1 & Act II pages 1280-1298.

          From  British Literature I,  “Part 3: The Seventeenth Century: The Age of Revolution”

· “Intro,” pages 1415-1420.

· John Donne, “Holy Sonnet 10,” pages 1420-1421, and pages 1428-29.

· John Milton, “Lycidas,” pages 1712-1714 and 1722-1726

          From  A Glossary of Literary Terms

· “Sonnet,” pages 369-370

· “Tragedy,” pages 405-408

· “Three Unities,” pages 403

· “Drama,” page 95

· “Elegy,” page 103

                 

Assignments or Assessments: One Discussion board post and responses

· Discussion 3: The Tudor Age and The Seventeenth Century

One reading quiz on the readings for this week One Journal

Annika Ganapathiraju

Professor Zeenat

ENGL 2331

27 April 2025

Critical Thinking Core Competency: Interviewing Ishtar

The AI I used for this assignment was ChatGPT to create a mock interview with the goddess Ishtar from The Epic of Gilgamesh. Through this conversation, I wasn’t able to deepen my understanding of Ishtar’s character. Still, I did find that the chatbot successfully mimicked her dramatic and intense personality as portrayed in the original text.

Throughout the mock interview, the chatbot captured Ishtar’s pride and sense of entitlement very well. When I asked if she regretted sending the Bull of Heaven to attack Gilgamesh and Uruk, Ishtar responded, “Regret? Regret is for mortals who cannot reshape the world with a scream or a storm.” This mirrors how Ishtar behaves in the epic when she goes to her father, Anu, in rage after being rejected by Gilgamesh. She demands the Bull of Heaven to be released, stating, “But if you will not make this Bull… I will smite [the gates of the Underworld], break it down and release the ghosts” (92, 505-506) if she is denied. Both the chatbot and the original text emphasize Ishtar’s impulsive anger and her belief that consequences are beneath her concern.

The chatbot also reflected Ishtar’s self-confidence. When I asked what it was like to have Anu as a father, the chatbot wrote, “I am Ishtar—not a mere reflection of Anu. And even he, my father, must acknowledge that.” In the original text, Ishtar approached Anu not as a humble daughter but as a goddess demanding her due, demonstrating a similar arrogance. This answer aligned with the original work’s portrayal of her as someone who uses her divine status to intimidate others.

Another place where the chatbot’s portrayal felt authentic was in its blending of love and war. When asked whether she chose to be the goddess of love and war, the answer I received was, “Love and war are not separate to me. They are two sides of the same coin, bound by the same spark.” In The Epic of Gilgamesh, Ishtar’s actions show how closely linked passion and destruction are in her character. Her immediate pivot from offering love to inflicting revenge after Gilgamesh’s rejection highlights this dual nature.

While the chatbot did capture the simple aspects of her personality, it didn’t over new insights into Ishtar’s complexity. In The Epic of Gilgamesh, while she is mostly portrayed as vengeful and proud, there a subtle moments (such as her mourning for Tammuz) that suggest deeper emotions within her. The chatbot touched on this when it said, “Perhaps not regret, but something near it. A shadow of what could have been, if they had been stronger.” Because the chatbot didn’t explore these emotions with much depth, my understanding of Ishtar didn’t significantly deepen.

Even though the chatbot’s portrayal didn’t further my understanding of Ishtar’s inner complexities, it did successfully mimic her voice, style, and dominant traits as depicted in the story. Through dramatic, powerful language and a constant proud tone, it stayed true to Ishtar’s character and made the mock interview experience engaging.

Interview a Fictional Character

Completing this assignment will fulfil the requirements for the Dallas College Critical Thinking Core Competency Assignment. The Critical Thinking Core Objective allows students to develop a wide variety of skills:

· Analyze issues

· Complex/creative problem solving: anticipate problems, solutions and consequences

· Knowledge application: apply knowledge to make decisions

· Pattern detection: detect patterns/themes/underlying principles

· Research: gather proper resources and information to conduct research

· Analysis and interpretation: analyzing and interpreting data to synthesize information

Upon successful demonstration of a skill, you may be eligible to apply for a Digital Badge. 

Interview a Fictional Character

Choose any one character from the readings you have completed in this class. This character could be someone you found interesting or intriguing. You will first read the literary text and gain some understanding of the character and the character’s motivations.

Have a conversation with an AI-crafted fictional character to explore the underlying intricacies of a literary text.

LEARNING OBJECTIVES

· Engage in critical dialogue with a fictional persona to develop conversational skills Practice active listening in order to probe lines of inquisition previously unexplored for a certain fictional character

· Critically reflect on the accuracy of AI to capture the nuances of characters from well-interpreted literary texts

INSTRUCTIONS

Generate Interview Questions

1. Students generate interview questions for a fictional or historical character that are broad, open-ended, and show an understanding of historical or literary context. Students may use an AI tool of their choosing, such as  Character.AI, (in the past, some students have said that this tool is hard to navigate) ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, etc. Students may work with a tool that has enhanced voice mode features, such as GPT-4o (I found this tool to be the best) or Google Assistant, to create a sense of flowing conversation. You can send me your questions to review before you conduct the interview.

· This step is guided by a rubric, peer feedback, and teacher feedback to ensure questions will generate meaningful conversation. 

· Students should “put themselves in their character’s shoes” and imagine what types of questions will “get them talking.”

· Students should consider noting down particular themes that they may want to focus on (e.g., political views, personal values, relationships, etc.).

2. Sample open-ended questions:

· Can you describe a significant friendship or rivalry and its effect on your life?

· What has been the most challenging obstacle you’ve faced, and how did you overcome it?

· If you could change one thing about your past, what would it be and why?

· Were you involved in any significant political events and, if so, how did it shape or alter your beliefs?

· What are your thoughts on the societal norms and expectations of your era?

· How do you perceive your own role in the narrative? Do you agree with how the author has portrayed you?

Conducting the Interview

1. Students practice interviewing a character of their choosing and share the experience in class.

· If possible, students are encouraged to use the voice chat feature that some AI models offer to support a conversational experience.

· Students interview the historical or fictional character in question using a rubric for active listening as a guide. Active listening entails maintaining attentiveness, understanding and empathizing with responses, reflecting on answers, demonstrating non-judgmental engagement, and responding appropriately with opinions.

Evaluation

1. Students will then copy and paste and share the chat transcripts with the teacher for evaluation and assessment of critical thinking, active listening, problem-solving, and any other objectives the teacher chooses. 

· This can further the goal of developing empathy in students, conversational skills, or problem-solving, analysis, and critical thinking.

Analysis

1. Students then analyze the chatbot. Did it further their understanding of the character in question? Did it mimic the character from the book or from history, or did it fail to capture characteristic nuances? 

2. Students will write a paper using quoted evidence from the chat transcript itself– in comparison with the book or textbook– to show that the bot either mimicked/missed mimicking the character in question or furthered/did not further their understanding of the character in question.