ENGL 386.008/.009 | American Women Writers of Color | Fall 2005
-- Paper # 2 Assignment --
---Paper #2 Due Date: December 9---
Contents (click to jump to the following sections)
Paper 1 Assignment:
Pick one theme from the list below, and in a paper of about 1,000 words,
compare/contrast how that theme is treated through two different
works, choosing two different genres (genres = poetry, essay, novel,
short story). You must choose from the works we have read for class since the mid-term (anything after Faces in the Moon).
List of themes:
women of color appropriating masculine privilege or power
writing as survival for women of color
women of color and their awareness of history
women of color resisting or manipulating the dominant gaze (racist, patriarchal, classist, and/or sexist)
women of color identifying/bonding with other women rather than, or despite, identifying/bonding with men
Use pertinent critical vocabulary and terms from your class notes to help your discussion.
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What I'll look for in your paper:
(For extra help, see my Writing Tips page.)
»» Content-wise:
- Be sure that your paper makes an argument or states a claim.
Clearly state this argument or claim in your introductory ¶.
- Make sure that you actually compare and contrast your chosen works --
I will count off if you simply discuss the two works distinctly from each other,
without drawing any relation between them.
- Use analytical concepts/terms and critical vocabulary where pertinent. (See the Terms and Concepts site, as well as your class notes, for reminders.)
- Use those concepts and terms in ways that show you understand what they mean.
- Refer to and quote your primary sources: substantiate your argument and illustrate your claim by quoting the essays, poems, short stories, or novels you choose.
- Quote sparingly but judiciously: pick quotes that actually apply, but do not expect quotations to do your work for you. Use them only to illustrate a point you have already made. No bloc quotations.
- Pay attention to historical context (don't ascribe events or motives to the wrong time period).
- Distinguish when you're discussing a poem, an essay, a
novel, or a short story; these genres are not interchangeable. Get
titles correct, and punctuate them correctly. (Titles of poems, essays, and short
stories go between "quotation marks", while titles of novels are
underlined or set in italics.) Spell author names
correctly; convention dictates that you use the author's full name the
first time you mention her in a body ¶, and then use her
last name in a signal phrase thereafter. Mistakes of author name, work title, and genre of works is
inexcusable, and will fail your paper.
- Never write about a
piece of literature without having that literature and your notes on it open in
front of you.
»»Writing mechanics & technical guidelines:
- Submit a copy to Turnitin.com--use same ID and psswd as for Paper #1 for your class/section.
- Pay attention to spelling,
punctuation, grammar, word usage, basic proofreading and editing.
- Type or computer print anything written outside the classroom.
- Maintain margins at 1" all around
- Type/print on only one side of each page
- Use black ink only, and make sure print is dark and legible
- FONT: use only Times, Times New Roman, or Palatino fonts; maintain font size 12
- Double-space all type
- Use a separate cover sheet, including
the following information, centred on the page:
your paper title,
Paper #1
your name
course and section #
date submitted
- Begin page 1 at the top margin
- No header/number for page 1; every page after page 1 should carry a
header including your last name and the page #, starting with page 2. (For steps on how to do this, see the instructions I wrote for my writing classes.)
- All pages and cover sheet should be stapled, in correct order, BEFORE you come to class; papers submitted with pages in the wrong order will be read in that order and graded accordingly; papers not stapled will be returned unread
- Papers should adhere to MLA format guidelines for in-text citations and for
Works Cited entries. Consult an MLA guide or the MLA section of a writing
handbook for help. Papers that do not adhere to MLA format will be returned
unread, counted late, and penalized.
- Include a properly MLA-formatted Works Cited Page.
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»» Troubleshooting & therapy:
If you have general technical questions about the assignment,
- reread the assignment first to see if the
answer's there already
- see the syllabus to see if the
answer's there already
- ask others in the class for peer help
- if these don't work, then
e-mail me or see me during my
posted office hours -- I'll happily clarify for you.
If you have content or conceptual questions specific to just your paper, see me during posted office hours -- I'll gladly discuss them with you.
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