Topics for Paper 2

Proposal for Paper 2 due (50-100 words).

Paper 2 due (8-10 typed, double-spaced pages); electronic copy due by 9 p.m. If you are handing in a paper copy, you must hand it in in class. The paper copy is optional; the electronic copy is mandatory.

Guidelines

1. For this paper, you will want to use either secondary sources (i.e., literary criticism in the form of books and journal articles) or additional primary sources--stories, poems, plays--beyond the ones we've read in class.

2. Remember, Wikipedia and "student help" sites like Sparknotes, eNotes, pinkmonkey, encyclopedia.com, and the rest are NOT legitimate sources for this paper. The phrase "secondary sources" means "journals and library books," along with some legitimate literature web sites. Ask me if you're not sure whether a site counts as a legitimate source.

3. Web pages are someone's intellectual property and ALL WEB PAGES MUST BE CITED just as journal articles must be. Copying without attribution is plagiarism, and you will receive an F for the paper even if your paper is only partly copied from a source without attribution. See the syllabus for more information on the consequences of plagiarism.

4. Style counts as well as substance, so edit and proofread your paper carefully.

5. Bring your paper to me before it is due if you'd like to discuss it.

Requirements

Option I. Texts in Context Paper

Examine the periodicals in which one of these novels appeared (Holland Library has many of these in their original bindings) and read selections from the other works included in the same volume. What was the context within which this work was originally read? What works surrounded it—travel articles, short stories, author profiles, opinion and commentary, or some other form of writing? How do the works of this author compare with those of his or her now-forgotten contemporaries? What made the work become a "classic"? You’ll probably want to choose 3-4 pieces from the volume and analyze them in detail.

You may instead want to work with the primary source materials to which you were introduced when we visited the MASC. You might also choose to look at a work's reception in the popular news outlets of the day or to compare it with a popular story on a similar topic.

Here are some questions to help you get started. Your paper should be a formal piece of work; it shouldn’t answer each of these questions in turn.

  1. What kinds of fiction appear in the same volume with the work we read in class? Do they address similar themes? Do you notice a preponderance of one kind of story or setting (e.g., dialect stories, stories about the West, stories about courtship, and so on)?
  2. Does the journal publish travel pieces, jokes, articles on current events, letters to the editor, illustrations, and other kinds of matter in addition to literature? Does any of this relate to the subject of the work? How might the existence of these features alter the way in which a reader 100 years ago would have read the novel?
  3. Judging by the kinds of articles and other materials in the volume, what were the concerns of the original audience? What was the political climate like? Does the journal address or ignore concerns such as racism, women's suffrage, industrialism, imperialism, poverty, inequality, and the rights of labor?
  4. What books are reviewed in the periodical? Read through some reviews and figure out what kinds of qualities were valued in books during that period. What were the controversial literary issues of the day?
  5. Does the magazine version of the work include illustrations? If so, how do they enhance or detract from the experience of reading the book?
  6. Does the magazine version of the work differ from the version as finally published? What’s the effect of these changes?

Option II: Traditional Critical Analysis Paper. 

These are broad topics and are only suggestions; you will need to shape and to limit them.  I encourage you to stop in to see me well before the paper is due. If you want to write on a topic that does not fit under one of these topics, please let me know.

  1. If you have special knowledge of some aspect of the culture of this era (e.g., nineteenth-century painting, sculpture, fabric or decorative arts, or music; the landscape or vegetation discussed in the work; the architectural features; etc.), analyze one of the works in terms of this knowledge. You might find good information at the Library of Congress's American Memory Home Page, Harpweek, or other sites (see http://www.wsu.edu/~campbelld/amlit/sites.htm).
  2. Several of the works we’ve read discuss the experiences of African Americans, Asian Americans, or Native Americans in nineteenth-century American culture. In what ways do such writers as Chesnutt, Sui-Sin Far, Zitkala-Sa, and Johnson reflect on and criticize nineteenth-century American society? What features such as irony, inverting or reversing conventions and stereotypes, or complex systems of symbolism do they use to convey their message?
  3. The literature of this era is sometimes seen as furthering the nation's imperialist and expansionist aims; according to some writers, it implicitly promotes an agenda that is racist and anti-immigrant and that seeks to affirm the aims of white America. Write an essay in which you support or refute this idea using historical information as well as analysis of the works.
  4. What images of women are presented in late nineteenth-century American literature?
  5. Some of the works we've read make use of supernatural elements such as ghostly figures or superstitions, rituals, and folktales that turn out to be true. Choosing at least one of the works we've read--you may also use others that we haven't read yet, of course--discuss the function of supernatural elements in the work. Is it possible for a work to be considered realistic if it has supernatural elements? If you discuss folktales and the like, be sure to use a scholarly source to look up its origins.
  6. Look closely at one or more of the formal features of a work or works, such as point of view, structure, contrasting characters, and so forth. Here are some examples:
    1. How does the point of view from which the story or the character of the narrator is told affect the meaning of the story? Is the narrator reliable or unreliable? Can you compare the narrators of several of the local color stories?
    2. How is the work structured? Does it have a frame story? Parallel episodes? Contrasting characters? What effect do these have on the meaning of the work?
    3. How is a feature such as setting used in the story? How does the author use setting symbolically?
  7. The Damnation of Theron Ware is in many ways a novel of ideas in which a naïve minister confronts such turn-of-the-century movements as scientific rationalism, aestheticism, the emancipation of women, anti-immigration and anti-Catholic sentiments, and so on. Research one of these movements and write a paper showing how Frederic uses its ideas in the novel.
  8. Choose a particular theme, symbol, idea, or pattern of imagery that is significant in one or more works and analyze it. Some possibilities would include the following:
Option III.  Annotated Web Version of Text

Texts produced:

Option III asks you to prepare an annotated hypertext (web site) or wiki version of works studied this semester. Your web site or wiki will define words, analyze images and themes, create a coherent interpretation, and provide a brief bibliography of works consulted. Important: It must be available for viewing on the web when you're done.

If you choose this option, your prospectus will outline your plans for the project.  You may work in a group if you choose this option; all participants will share in the final grade. 

In interpretation level and analytical quality, this should match the kind and length of work you would do for the 8-10 page paper; the difference is that your analysis will be broken into shorter segments and connected to the text by links. 

Your group will also need to write a 3-4 page essay explaining why you made the choices you did in terms of analysis. Your paper should provide metacommentary on the reasons why you chose what you did, sites you chose (or declined) to link to, conversations you had about interpretation, ideas, insights, responses to the text, and so forth.

You have server space on the WSU site, if you want to do a traditional web site, or you can set up your web site elsewhere. Free wiki sites (for setting up a wiki) include www.pbwiki.com and www.wikihost.org, among many others.