Essay Plan (Week 9)

This week we have to plan out our essay. To be honest, I've barely thought about it, given it's due in week 12, and that I have plenty of other assignments due earlier. But anyway.

Because I enjoyed The Matrix, and mainstream cyberpunk media, I figured I'd choose this question:

Choose a William Gibson short story such as Burning Chrome (see readings week 10). Compare the economic and social world it conjures with the imagined world of another cyberpunk author’s short story or novel. How close are these imagined worlds to our world and are we moving towards the imagined worlds or away from them?

As for what two stories I'd choose to compare, I thought I'd do Burning Chrome (seeing as it's a reading) and either Snow Crash, by Neal Stephenson (I read his Anathem, which was interesting) or Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, by Philip K. Dick (the inspiration behind Blade Runner). I still haven't decided, but really, for a basic plan, it doesn't matter.

So here's the plan.

1. Introduction.

    I'll probably introduce cyberpunk briefly, introduce the topic question, and outline the essay.

2. 1st Body Paragraph.

Old-School.

    Here I'll compare the economic world both books conjure. I'll detail them, compare them, and then further compare them with reality.

3. 2nd Body Paragraph.

    Here we'll focus on the social. Again, I'll compare and compare again.

4. Probably the conclusion, it's only 1000 words after all. Here I'll sum up, presenting a combined view of what cyberpunk predicts and reality as it is and what it might be. Here I'll explicitly answer the question, using all the afore paragraphs as evidence.

So that's the plan!