Misc
I need to change the midterm exam date, suggest October 11 (was October 4). Let me know if this would pose a problem for you.
Questions?
Peer Review “Race and ‘The Gold Bug’” Drafts
Note that as you turn in a link to your draft, I’ll send back a usually vacuous “thank you.” But this lets you know I got your link, and if there are obvious problems (e.g., I can’t read the document), I’ll let you know in the reply.
See additional guidelines for these peer reviews.
Comments
While I don’t necessarily expect you to use outside sources in this essay, if there is some piece of outside knowledge you have (e.g., from another course) that would be helpful, feel free to use it. You should cite such sources; ideally you’ll find a printed source for whatever you’re using and list it in a “works cited” section at the end of your essay.
Framing: the idea that facts (especially from others) shouldn’t just get dropped into an essay without explanation. State the fact, but be sure that around it you say why you are mentioning it, how you interpret it, how it helps your argument, etc.
Next
Substitution ciphers (the kind of code used in “The Gold Bug”).
Idea: represent each letter of the alphabet by some other symbol. Then replace each “plaintext” (i.e., unencrypted original message) character with its corresponding symbol to get the “ciphertext” (i.e., encrypted message). To decrypt, use the mapping from letters to symbols backwards.
“Key” = information that lets you decrypt/encrypt = mapping between letters and symbols in this case.
Tuesday we’ll keep looking at substitution ciphers and try breaking each other’s codes.
Read “The Black Chamber” web site (http://www.simonsingh.net/The_Black_Chamber/chamberguide.html) on substitution ciphers and breaking them.