This writing assignment asks you to briefly (5-7 pages, 1500 to 2000 words) write about what you think the programming language of the future will look like, while also commenting on the thoughts of Paul Graham,Gregory Wilson and Bret Victor on this topic.
One form of writing that is encountered quite regularly in magazines such as the New Yorker, the Atlantic, the New York Review of Books and others is the book review essay. In this form of writing the reviewer discusses a recent book (or, often, more than one book on a related topic) while also injecting their own, often strongly felt, opinions about the topic the books address. When this is done well the reader comes away with the feeling that they understand, at least vaguely, what the reviewed books are about, as well as seeing them from the unified perspective provided by the reviewer.
For this assignment, I want you to write in this format about what programming languages will be like in the future. The three works that I want you to discuss as part of your essay are The Hundred-Year Language by Paul Graham, Extensible Programming for the 21st Century by Gregory V. Wilson from ACM Queue Magazine, and the YouTube video of a talk from the DBX software developers conference in July 2013 by Bret Victor. See Bret Victor's website for more information about this talk. I should come away from your paper with some idea of what Graham, Wilson and Victor think about this topic, as well as a clear idea of what you think. To be clear, you do not need to spend an equal amount of time on all three works.
You should write this paper for an audience of informed computer scientists (rather than a typical New Yorker reader, for example) who have not read the articles in question. You are expected to follow the conventions of academic prose. You are not required to cite other sources besides the three references you are given, but, if you do refer to other sources, you should cite them using a standard academic citation style.
Please upload a copy (preferably PDF) of your paper, as well as bringing in a hardcopy. The "on-timeness" of the paper will come from the upload time, which should be before Midnight on Friday, September 15.
I encourage you to take advantage of the Writing Center for help in writing and editing your paper. Call them at x4484 or stop in to sign up for an appointment with a Writing Center consultant.