Review Essay: Arts of Intimacy and Reconquest and Crusade

EUH 4312: History of Spain

Prof. Terry-Roisin

Review Essay: Arts of Intimacy and Reconquest and Crusade

Reconquest and Crusade, and Arts of Intimacy are two very different books about the history of

medieval Spain. In this assignment, you are responsible for reading and analyzing both books. Use

your notes from class discussion, and your reading notes to write your own take on the two books—

does one argument or set of evidence convince you more than the other? In what ways are both

compelling to you?

Requirements/Citations

• This assignment is worth 100 pts-10% of your grade in EUH 4312

• Your Review Essay is DUE (to Canvas) Weds. Oct. 9 before class at 4pm

• 3-4 pages double spaced, less than three full pages loses points, late papers lose points.

• Footnotes according to the Chicago Manual of Style1

• If you are making extensive use of notes you took during our class discussion, provide this footnote where you use the material.2

• If you know that you are quoting my words, feel free to quote me.3 But I hope you will be telling me what you think!

• Bibliography of the two books at the end, according to the Chicago Manual of Style

Directions

The name of this assignment is a Review Essay. A Review Essay is a book review of multiple

books, and in some cases, makes a claim as to the “state of the field” on a particular question. It

assesses each book’s contribution to scholarship. There is a general convention that scholars tend

to follow regarding book reviews, and that is that they are generous and positive, first and foremost.

A book is a work of love, it takes a long time, and a lot of work, and it’s been through peer review,

meaning that many people have ensured that it is a quality piece of work. After assessing a book’s

strengths, a book reviewer will turn to a few things they thought were missing, a few questions

they had, or an issue they found with the book’s argument, scope, sources, etc. They may also

reveal in what ways they agree or disagree with the author and why. We have already done the

first step of identifying each book’s Method, Sources, and Argument in class which are the

building blocks of a book review. You should include in your Review the ways in which the two

books are alike or different. Use your own words to answer the questions that follow, and quote

from the two books when necessary. The goal of the overall report will be to compare and contrast

the two books and provide your own unique assessment. Please title your report Review Essay:

Arts of Intimacy and Reconquest and Crusade. You may use headings (Method, etc.) to structure

your paper, but you don’t have to. Your review needs to be organized, with an introduction and

conclusion, but you may arrange the body paragraphs in ways that don’t align perfectly with

headings, as long as you cover all of them throughout.

1 Author First Name Last name, Title (Publisher City: Publisher, Publication year), page.

2 Fa19 EUH 4312 Class Discussion, date.

3 Elizabeth Terry-Roisin, Fa19 EUH 4312 Lecture, date.

Method

What kind of history is Reconquest and Crusade? What kind of history is Arts of Intimacy?

(economic history, social history, etc.) What methods are the authors using? How are they

different? Imagine that the authors studied medieval history in graduate school. What

outside field do you think they chose to study? (Hint: my own outside field was Spanish

literature. A person’s outside field can reveal other influences on their methods from a

different discipline, like anthropology or economics). Or is their primary field something

different than history?

Sources

What types of primary sources are quoted and relied upon by Joseph O’Callaghan in

Reconquest and Crusade? What types of sources to the authors analyze and discuss in Arts

of Intimacy? How do the sources relate to the method? (like a diplomatic historian reading

diplomatic cables).

Argument

What question is each book answering? What is the overall argument of each of the two

books? How is the argument of the book affected by the method used and the sources

analyzed? Do you think the sources and methods led them to different conclusions? How?

Are the arguments compelling to you and are they proved with the sources provided? Do

they rely on earlier scholarship and arguments? If so, who influenced these authors?

Assessment

At the end of any scholarly book review is an overall assessment. Assess both books. Does

one of these books seem more compelling to you? Why? Or is there something about both

that convinces you? This is the place for you to give your opinion or give recommendations

for further research, different methods, etc.

Reading Tips: Begin with the Introduction. Read the Introduction to Reconquest and Crusade and

take notes. Then read the Introduction to Arts of Intimacy and take notes. Then consider the table

of contents and the scope of each book. Read the conclusions and read the chapters that seem to

you to be key. Finish each book if you have time. Do what you need to do to feel confident that

you know what each book is about, and you have the good notes you need to complete this

assignment. But you don’t need to read every word or chapter to succeed.

Plagiarism Warning: I have turned in students for plagiarizing a similar assignment in the past,

and you do not want to have the same experience. To avoid it, do not do any googling or look

anywhere else for help, with the one exception perhaps of reading book reviews of other scholarly

books on different subjects. I will provide one or two examples of this genre for you on Canvas.

You have all you need to do this assignment in the two books. Your reading/assessment of the

two books is enough. Your assignment will be run through Canvas and then Turnitin.com and run

through a database of web pages and student papers. Do not risk an F on this assignment by

googling and searching for summaries or reviews of the books. Read the books by yourselves,

practice your own skills of reading, writing, and analysis, and get the most out of this assignment!

Being able to analyze a secondary source and write a Book Review/Review Essay is a skill you

can bring to most “book” fields in the humanities and social sciences.