WRITING ASSIGNMENT # 2
(AFH/ENG/HUM/WST 394 / Myles / SPRING 2003)
The Assignment: Write a 7-10 page analytical interpretation of one
or two works. Your essay must make an interesting, well-developed, persuasive
argument about a significant topic related to our readings. You must provide
outstanding reasons and evidence for your argument. A list of suggested
topics is provided, however, you are free to choose your own topic with
approval from me.
Prospectus: Provide a 100 word prospectus describing the proposed subject of the paper, its thesis (if known), works to be covered, and source materials. The prospectus will receive comments, but will not be graded. If the prospectus is missing, the paper grade will be lowered 0.5 points.
Sources: You must read two literary criticisms for your longer paper. You must cite these sources appropriately in your paper using the MLA format.
Format: For your rough and final drafts, use MLA essay format. All cited sources must be listed in a Works Cited page, and all sources listed in your Work Cited page must be cited your text.
Length: Both rough and final drafts must be a minimum length of 7-10 full pages. I would appreciate it if you would not exceed 10 pages.
Prospectus with Topic, Thesis, and Bibliography due Wednesday, April 9.
Rough draft with three copies due Monday, April 21.
Student Peer Review of Rough Draft due Wednesday, April 23.
FINAL DRAFT WITH Invention Work due Monday, May 5.
Suggested Topics for Paper #2
Contending Forces
1. Discuss Hopkins' use of the story-within-a-story structure to frame the novel.
2. Consider and discuss Hopkins's presentation of black women's sexuality.
3. Consider and analyze how Hopkins's uses the black vernacular in the story.
4. Examine Hopkins's treatment of the "folk" in the novel. What strategies did she employ to present the folk experience as vital to an understanding of African American life and culture?
Iola Leroy
1. References to religion abound in Harper's novel Iola Leroy. Discuss her representations and allusions to God and Christianity in the story.
2. What kinds of oppression do African American females experience in the novel? What is the relationship between those forms of oppression and the forms of power they have?
3. How are the issues of gender, race, and class intertwined in this novel?
4. Examine Harper's and Hopkins's Morrison's use of race or gender in their works.
Passing
1. Discuss Bob Kendry, Brian Redfield and John Bellew's roles in the novel.
2. Discuss Larsen's commentary on the institution of marriage as presented in the story.
3. Discuss the role of women's sexuality in the novel.
4. What does the novel say about class consciousness?
5. How does the novel distinguish black culture from white culture?
6. In Larsen's text, the female is defined by the acquisition of commercial products, consumer goods, and commodities. As women, the females are at the center of complex process of exchange. Money is crucial to Larsen's narratives, including Quicksand, structuring power relations, controlling social movement, and defining the boundaries of Irene's, Claire's, Gertrude's and Zulena's environment. In the story, there are hints that money and materialism allows for social movement. Although money permitted some the women movement within the text, what did money produce in terms of buying their way out of the marginalized positions for black women? In terms of their migration into white society? What did it produce in terms of defining black women?
7. Discuss if the conclusion of the text offers any resolutions for Irene.
Other (Includes short stories and dramas)
1. Choose any two authors whose works we have read, trace common and disparate literary constructions of the theme of self-development, self-knowledge, self-definition and/or self-renewal.
2. The Reconstruction represents a period of change and movement for blacks. Examine the theme of migration in any of the texts we have read. The migrations may be physical, artistic, emotional, or spiritual.
3. Discuss the new black woman and address how any of the writers we have discussed support this concept in their writing.
4. Discuss any writer in how she uses performance, movement, places and any other imagery from black culture, as well as socio-political and historical images in her work.
5. Discuss the treatment of "true womanhood" in two literary works.
6. Examine "resistance" in any of the novels. What kinds of resistance do the novels depict?
7. Consider how female sexuality is used in any two texts we have studied.
8. Discuss the use the "mulatto" figure in any two novels. How are the writers using this figure in telling their stories? What social, political, and cultural issues does the figure of the mulatto raise in the novel?
9. Pick any two of the writers whose works we read. Discuss how certain African American characters in those authors' works combat white dominance and whether their efforts bring success.
10. Choose any two works that offer characters who choose socially unacceptable behavior. Contrast how each writer critiques society through these characters' choices.
11. The "marriage plot" refers to a fictional formula that
foregrounds romantic relationships, focuses on courtship, and generally
culminates in marriage or at least a betrothal. Discuss how African American
writers in the nineteenth century used the marriage plot as a theme to
explore complex questions of sexuality and subjectivity.