3 questions, totally 6 pages
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takehomeexam.docxSpring 2014 Name ___________________________
Take-Home Midterm Exam
200 points, due by 6 March at 12:00 p.m., AZ MST
Directions: Consider the following questions in sections A, B, and C. The directions are specific to each respective set of questions. Type your answers (or copy and paste) into the space following the questions you choose.
Precede your answer with the original question; you may delete other questions within each section you choose not to answer. Try to be specific and detailed in your answers, but you do not need to quote from the text extensively.
Across the entire exam—sections A, B, and C—you need to write about 4 of the following texts: Simon Ortiz’s From Sand Creek, Laura Tohe’s No Parole Today, Luci Tapahonso’s The Women Are Singing, Michael Yahgulanaas’ Red, and James Welch’s Winter in the Blood . Advice, before you commit to the two texts in the comparative section A, be sure that you have two additional texts that make for a “good fit” with the questions in B & C.
For the purposes of this test, “text” means “book.” Thus, when a book includes a number of poems or stories, you may cite from more than one poem or story in that book. Poems or stories from the same book are part of the same “text.”
A. Select one of the following comparative questions and develop an essay of approximately three double-spaced pages. Use specific details, but you do not need to cite extensively from the text. (100 points)
1. Focusing on parent-child relationships in two different texts, discuss aspects of family structures as represented by each respective author. Note how tribal cultural influences and/or societal pressures influence family dynamics in positive or negative ways.
2. Compare and contrast two characters in different author’s texts who are outsiders—either marginalized, alienated, or rule-breakers. What motivates them and/or how does society condition, shape, or react to them (their actions, their existence)?
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4. Using two authors, compare their representations of the legacies of the trauma of colonialism.
5. Pick two texts and analyze how the respective authors develop the tension between different cultural groups to develop theme and plot. How do the authors create the binaries of insider/outsider? What insights are provided about the respective societies, about the potential gains or losses
B. Select one of the following questions and develop an essay of approximately one and a half double-spaced pages. Use specific details, but you do not need to cite extensively from the text. (50 points)
1. Select one text and analyze the importance of place and of land and its connection to tribal/cultural values.
2. Select one text and examine its representation of actual historical events and the role of memory and imagination in the process of remembering.
3. Select one text and examine the role of storytelling and stories for particular individuals/characters.
4. Isolation is a powerful psychic, emotional, and in some cases, physical experience. Analyze one author’s exploration of this experience.
C. Select one of the following questions and develop an essay of approximately one and a half double-spaced pages. Use specific details, but you do not need to cite extensively from the text. (50 points)
1. Using from Sand Creek analyze the depiction of non-Native characters and their understanding or misunderstanding of Native people and culture.
2. Discuss one author’s representation of resilience, endurance, and cultural survival.
3. Using one author’s text as your basis, analyze how minor characters are used to develop and enhance plots or themes involving major characters.
4. Using this imperative phrase from Tapahonso’s work, “remember the things they told us,” explore how two different poems explore the importance of tradition and cultural values.
5. Using one author’s text, explore how “witnessing” and the notion of “testimony” is a useful framework for interpreting a situation, a character, or to understanding the relationship of reader to represented event.
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