FOR A-PLUS WRITER ONLY

A: At the very end of each chapter in Pollard is a section titled, “Global Themes and Sources.” You will use the written sources, collectively called “Competing Perspectives.” Because the written sources in each chapter are based on a particular theme, you will select all of the primary written sources from the chapter of your choice in order to write a paper with a central idea. DO NOT pick and choose written sources from different chapters!

Having said this, here is more about what you are NOT to do. DO NOT select any of the visual sources, found in the sections called “Interpreting Visual Evidence.” I noticed the visual sources are much more difficult to work with. HIST. 110B students only: DO NOT select content in chapters 10 and 11

Q: Are section titles necessary? If so, how should they be formatted?

A: Yes, section titles are needed. The two parts of your paper must be clearly identified. After writing an introduction, the first section should be titled, “Summations” or something similar. The second section should be called, “Analysis” or something similar. Each of the sectional titles should be centered or lined up with the left margin.

Q: How are we to do notations for the Journal assignment?

A: The method is the same as for the first (In Search of Ancient Ireland or Kaffir Boy) term paper. You will be doing endnotes, information for which can be found in the Course Guides folder. For the purposes of the Journal assignment, you will treat the Pollard text as a one author, one book source. Read and carefully follow the instructions in the first full paragraph on p. 3 of the Journal prompt. At the beginning of the summation section, you must identify (by author and title) each primary document you have selected. In order to simplify the process, however, the notations will appear as Pollard (author) and Worlds Together/Worlds Apart (source).

Q: What should I write as analysis?

A: There are two types of analysis you should do for this assignment: scholarly (generally, compare and contrast) and personal assessment. In order to write a paper that’s as cohesive as possible, you will select written sources all appearing in the same chapter. The reason for this is that Pollard and her co-authors grouped documents thematically in each chapter.

Experiment with the balance, but the analysis of your paper could be as low as 35% scholarly and 65% personal, or more scholarly than personal. Make sure you find a good balance, too, between the amount of summation and the amount of analysis that form your paper.

you will be allowed to inject more of your personal reactions into the journal assignment (in line what a journal does). Just keep in mind that your journal paper must have some analysis in it in order for it to be fully functional. Second, as a means of enabling you to create this paper faster during a higher stress time of the term, a more casual, personal approach seems appropriate.

Let’s see what the casual approach means by way of a few examples. Unlike the Matabane assignment, you will be allowed to use self-references (“I,” “we,” “us”) throughout the paper

INTRODUCTION:

Through and through, you will write the introduction in a casual style. Begin the journal assignment with a paragraph that allows you to make a personal statement based on something that happened in your life or something about which you read or heard. The statement must connect with some aspect of the journal. Follow this first paragraph with one that hints at content you will cover. For the introduction of the journal, you are advised NOT to identify (by titles) the sources that you will use. Instead, tell the reader a little about the types of things the reader will encounter. (Save the titles of sources for the Summation of Documents and Analysis and Personal Reflections sections.)

SUMMATION:

Begin this section by identifying (by titles and authors) all of the documents (PRIMARYSOURCES) that you will cover. After you do this, mention a number of details you read about in each of the documents you selected. DO NOT analyze just yet. Remember, you will summarize content first.

EXAMPLE OF NOTATION:

In order to avoid writing long, unwieldy notations, consider for the purpose of notes that Pollard, vol. 2 is the key source. The first (long-format) notation would be written in this style:

Elizabeth Pollard, Worlds Together, Worlds Apart, Concise Edition, Vol. 2 (New York and London: W.W. Norton, 2015), ___.

VERY IMPROTANT:

You could write something like this: “In this section, I will be summarizing a few key points from Okuna, Fifty Years of New Japan and Charles Darwin, On the Origin of Species.” By doing this, you are furnishing very clear identification of the sources you’re using, ones that were reproduced in Pollard, vol. 2. Identifying each source at the very beginning of the summation section, you will not be compelled to write complicated endnotes. (Important: this identification at the beginning of the summation section does NOT replace endnotes!)

Once you do this, you are now ready to include the endnotes in your paper. For the purposes of this assignment, your endnotes will take the form of one author and one book (the same format as for the Kaffir Boy paper). The first note must be written in the long-format citation and second and subsequent ones done in short-format citation.

Long-format: Elizabeth Pollard and others, Worlds Together Worlds Apart, Concise Edition, Vol. 2 (New York and London: W.W. Norton, 2015), __. [Underscored is where the page number goes.

Short-format: Pollard, Worlds Together, Vol. 2, __.

THE GOAL HERE IS:

What you SHOULD do is to jot down anything that YOU find to be important. The goal here is to select at least three items from each of your chosen written documents, nine points total that catch your eye and you believe to be important. You may select up to five items you find to be noteworthy from each of the documents, but definitely no more than that.

ANALYZING:

Analysis of the written sources is followed by your personal views of this assignment. By analysis, I mean that you should compare and contrast the documents with one another. After this more traditional analysis, finish your paper with your overall thoughts on your experiences with the sources that you selected.

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