Close reading essay

HCAC104/CACW104 TEXT AND CONTEXT

Assessment 2:

Close Reading Essay GUIDELINES

Marked out of 100 – Weighting 40%

Word Limit:

750 words Font 12pt; Spacing 1.5

Release Date:

Week 10: Monday 19 October 1:00pm A copy of the assessment will be released to the Text and Context Moodle Site Assessments Folder by 1pm

Due Date:

Week 13: Monday 9 November, by midnight

Submit to the Text and Context Moodle Site

Assessment Criteria

The Close Reading Essay assesses your ability to: ▪ Identify the relationship between a text’s historical/cultural circumstances and its formal

properties

• Analyse a creative text, providing detailed evidence to support your analysis
• Express yourself using in appropriate scholarly style, such as coherent sentences and paragraphs and academic language

This task requires you identify the connections between historical/cultural circumstances of a creative work and its formal composition.

You will choose one of the case studies studied in Weeks 3-10 of the subject. You will be given an essay question based on the text’s engagement with an element of its episteme and an excerpt from the text to analyse.

You will be given THREE WEEKS to write a short essay that analyses the way the text’s form reflects its historical context.

You may use further research, but you are not required to do so. You may also provide evidence from outside the excerpt. However, your focus should be providing evidence from the excerpt to support or challenge the question.

You should not limit your analysis to the content (what happens) of the texts, but also focus on the formal properties of the writing. Formal properties may include: structure, voice, point of view, order of events/information, choice of words, rhythm, sentence structure, etc.

You must provide direct evidence from the text to support your claims. Quotations from creative and critical texts are included in your word count.

Your response MUST be in essay form, comprising:

A brief introduction that outlines the specific formal elements you will examine. Paragraphs with quoted evidence from the text that support your claims and explains how they connect to the text’s episteme A conclusion that confirms your approach.

See next page for submission method

Submission Method:

 Go to the Text and Context Moodle site and click on the “Assessment” folder.  Click on the button “Assessment 2: Close Reading Task - Submission”.  Scroll down and click on “Submit Paper”  In the “Submissions Title” box, type your name and student number (e.g. Joshua Lobb - 7654321) Drag and drop your essay into the “File to Submit” box. Your file MUST be a PDF

and be saved as “[Your Name] - [Student No.]” (e.g. Joshua Lobb – 7654321)

Tick the Turnitin confirmation submission.  Click on “Add Submission”.