Structured Essay

The assignment: Identify an interpretive question that interests you in one of our primary texts we read in this unit. Use the structure below to show how you can answer that question with reference to one of the secondary texts we’ve discussed.

Note that you could choose a secondary text that we read together, or you could choose one that was mentioned more briefly. If you choose a text we didn’t read together, our librarian and I can help you find it. See the worksheet for more help choosing a text!

Length: 4-5 pages
Format: MLA

Structure

• In the first paragraph, name your primary text (with author and publication date in MLA format) and articulate your interpretive question. Engage your reader in the question, showing why you’re interested in it, and how you think it promises to shed some insight on the primary text.
• The second paragraph is the orienting paragraph, where you provide more context for the question, noting that your reader may not be as familiar with the primary text as you are. Orient your reader about the primary text you chose, summarizing it briefly and explaining in greater detail what makes you curious to know more about it.
• The third paragraph is very important, because this is where you lay out your plan to answer the question. What methodologies seem promising for this, in what way? What secondary texts will prove helpful to you in your analysis?
• In the fourth and subsequent paragraphs (you will need to decide how many), demonstrate how you are trying to answer the question you raised. Refer to the primary text in specific ways, and put the secondary text to good use. Make sure that every paragraph has a clear main idea and a topic sentence that asserts the claim you’re making in it.
• In the conclusion, assess the progress you’ve made toward answering your question. What is illuminated for you by this analysis, and what would you still like to know?
• In your “Works Cited” list, use MLA format to provide full bibliographic information about the texts you cite. (You will use in-text citations throughout the body of the exercise.)

Worksheet, Let’s Go

1. Remind yourself which texts we read in this unit and refer to the definitions of primary/secondary texts to note the ways we read ours.

We have discussed Beloved as a primary text, and we’ve discussed Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl as a primary text and as a secondary text.

If you choose to read Beloved as a primary text, you could use Incidents as a secondary text *if* it helps you address the interpretive question you raise. You could also use any other secondary text we mentioned or discussed.

If you choose to read Incidents as a primary text, you will need another secondary text to help you answer the question the question you raise. You have some secondary texts in your Norton Critical Edition, and we’ve discussed some other texts, too.

2. Raise an interpretive question that is genuinely interesting to you.

Look back over your notes and Slack posts to identify a moment when you felt real curiosity             about one of the primary texts we discussed. See if you can capture that curiosity in a          sentence that ends with a question mark.

Write the question here:

3. After you put your question into words, see if you can categorize it in one of the methodologies we discussed.

Does your question seem most answerable if you think of it as a question about Genre,         Theory, Text in Historical Context, or Literary History?

Write the methodology you choose here, and explain how/why you think this methodology  will work for you. If you have questions about that, note them here, too.

4. Plan which passage you’ll read from your primary text. This essay is very short! You won’t have time to do much close analysis, so you will have to choose it carefully.

Which passage are you planning to read, and how/why did you choose it? Write the answer

Here.

5. Plan the way you’ll use your secondary text. What will it help you do with your primary text that would be hard to do otherwise? Write the answer here.

6. What questions do you have about this project right now?