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LITR 4340 American
Immigrant Literature
Revise & extend
Essay 1 to include settler or dominant culture / email exams deadline: midnight Tuesday 14 May 2019 |
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(This webpage is the assignment for our course's final exam, to be updated until last class meeting, when paper copies are distributed.)
Format:
Email to
whitec@uhcl.edu.
Open-book, open-notebook:
Use
course web instructional pages + outside sources (<optional).
Official Exam Date:
Monday, 13 May 2019, 7-9:50pm;
No regular class meeting. Classroom available for student use.
Instructor keeps office hours 4-10, Bayou 2529-7, 281 283 3380.
Relative weight of final exam: 40-50% of final grade.
5-10 days after submission, each student receives individual email of final grade report including notes and grades for final exam and course.
Three parts to Final Exam:
Part 1.
Revise & extend Essay
to include USA's
dominant / "settler" culture.
(At least 16 paragraphs total.)
Part 2. Web Highlights.
Review three
Model Assignments from previous semesters,
including at least
one Essay from 2018, 2016, or 2013 final exams.(5+ paragraphs)
Part 3.
Complete Research Report
with bibliography or works
cited
(8-10 paragraphs.)
Part 1.
Revise & extend midterms Essay
to include USA's
dominant / "settler" culture.
Revise your Essay draft from Midterms 1 & 2 according to instructor feedback and extend to include USA's dominant / "settler" culture.
Use terms and themes from Course Objectives, definitions from term-webpages, and historical backgrounds (USA's dominant culture, dominant culture waves of immigration, "Pilgrim Fathers" & "Founding Fathers", Scotch-Irish) to introduce and develop examples from readings and presentations.
Possible prompts: (You can't cover all of these, but definitely work with one or more.)
In what ways is the USA's dominant
/ settler culture an immigrant culture, and
how does it differ from later
immigrant cultures?
In what ways do the
Pilgrim Fathers," the "Founding
Fathers," and the
Scotch-Irish
create the
dominant
culture to which later immigrants assimilate, and
minorities resist?
When later
immigrants assimilate to American culture, what kind of
dominant culture
do they
assimilate
to?
Identify styles, symbols, and values of the
USA's dominant
culture: plain style,
English language, literacy,
Protestantism,
self-government, individualism / nuclear family, freemarket capitalism.
Why is the USA's
dominant
culture hard to isolate,
identify, and study as part of America's
multicultural landscape? What features or qualities of
the dominant
culture make it resistant or unattractive to
analysis? What advantages to
knowledge of this subject? Can rewards of studying
dominant
culture overcome
students' instinctive rejection of this subject?
How did the
dominant / settler culture create
minorities? (African Americans,
American Indians,
± Mexican Americans)?
What
balances should educators make between teaching
assimilation to the
dominant culture or teaching
multiculturalism? Why might
multiculturalism include the study of the
USA's dominant
culture or not?
Are American systems and values
"universal," or are they
limited by race or ethnic descent? Does the
USA's
dominant / "settler" culture trust later immigrants
with the systems or institutions it developed?
Required: references
to Course Objectives 1-3 + knowledge of course-website definitions for terms,
applied to text-examples. (All
course objectives and terms open for discussion.)
Required:
Essay 1 must have an appropriate
title
(possibly revised from Midterm1 and Midterm2 title).
Optional: personal references—not required, but you may refer to your own backgrounds,
previous knowledge, & interpretations of materials. Relate all such
references to the assignment or objectives.
Required textual references for final additions to Essay: For discussion of Dominant Culture, refer to Of Plymouth Plantation at least twice*, Hillbilly Elegy at least once; at least one text from the USA's founding generation (Crevecoeur, Declaration, or Constitution). You may also use our one poetry presentation poem for one of your text selections.
Poem (since second midterm): Enid Dame, “On the Road to Damascus, Maryland"; for other poems scan syllabus or see listings at Midterm1 & Midterm2.
Part 2. Web Highlights.
Review three
Model Assignments from previous semesters,
including at least
one Essay from 2018, 2016, or 2013 final exams.(5+ paragraphs)
Write Part 2
as
an essay
with introduction and conclusion, not just a list of 3 items.
Unify your learning
experience. Compare and contrast
the three assignments you review. What did you learn from reviewing model assignments that you
didn't learn from in-class instruction (or extended or confirmed it in some way)?
Web Highlights essay must have a
title.
Review at least one final exam essay
1 from
2018 final essay samples,
2016 final essay samples,
or 2013 essay samples.
Your second and third items may be another final exam
essay, a final research report, web highlights or any other
Model Assignment from previous semesters or this semester.
If you had
special problems with one of
the parts on Midterms 1 or 2, consider looking at and reporting on more
Model Assignments for that part.
“Review”: describe what interested you, where, why you
chose it,
what you learned. You may criticize what you found, but not required.
What did you learn from reviewing model assignments that you
didn't learn from in-class instruction? Or how was your learning extended or confirmed?
Compare and contrast the three assignments you review, and summarize what you learned from them relative to each other.
To identify passages,
refer to selected submissions using student names, years, paraphrases,
summaries, and brief quotes, or copy, or paste brief selections into your web review. (Both options in models.) Either way,
highlight and
discuss language used in the passages as part of
your commentary. Critique what you learn.
Also remember to write it as an essay, not just a list of 3 items.
Better submissions unify the three reviews into a whole, purposeful essay in
which the learning experience of one review connects to the learning experience
of another, and your entire learning experience is previewed and
summarized in the essay's introduction and conclusion.
Successful submissions sometimes start by identifying a subject of special interest, then choosing Model Assignments that meet
this interest.
Organization: Most students follow a
classic "5-paragraph essay" organization, but of course more sophisticated
variations and options are possible.
Introductory paragraph: Briefly describe assignment
and your chief interest or theme in choosing selections.
3+ body paragraphs: For most students, 1 item = 1
paragraph, but best essays organize paragraphs thematically or cross-reference what they learn from one item with
what they learn from another. See
paragraph organization.
Concluding paragraph:
Summarize learning, re-emphasizing key words or ideas and reinforcing reader's
final impression of your theme or idea.
Part 3. Complete Research Report with
bibliography or works cited (8-10 paragraphs)
Models of 2018 final research reports, 2016 final research reports and 2013 final research reports
Revise your Research Report Start from Midterm2 according to instructor feedback and extend to include additional research and applications.
Add 4+ paragraphs and 2+ outside sources to your Midterm2 draft.
Content: emphasis is on information, not opinion and analysis, though some summary and evaluation is welcome and expected. It's a report foremost. (In other words, you're not "interpreting" a text but rather reporting facts and information about your selected topic.)
What
did you
want to learn? Why?
What
did you
find out or learn? How?
What
would you like to learn next? (that follows from what you have learned so far)
How does
this knowledge apply to our course or your possible development of its topics?
Description of default or likely organization:
Introduction: Why are you interested in your topic, and what do you wish to learn? What relevance does it have to our course and / or your career? What question are you trying to answer?
Body paragraphs: How did you start your research, and what did you find?
Works Cited / Bibliography: Include a list of your major research sources.
MLA style is preferred, but other
standard forms are acceptable. Don't spend too much time fussing over forms
when you should be feeling impassioned over your subject.
Here's my test for a listing: Would
I be able to track it down using the information provided?
You may use previous research
reports for 1 or 2 of your sources, or use those reports themselves as
sources. (LITR 4333 Model Assignments)
(LITR 5731im Model
Assignments)
Possible sources for research:
interview
with an expert, including former teachers (phone interviews are fine) or faculty
here at UHCL
reference
works in library or on web—the more specialized the better (e. g., use
"handbooks to literature" for definitions rather than "Webster's
dictionary")
no need
for primary research or reading.
For instance, if you wanted to do your report
on Reyna Grande, you don't need to read more of her books. You only need to
read about her.
welcome to
use previous research report submissions on similar topics from our
Model Assignments as research sources.
Readability & surface competence:
Your
reader must be able to process what you're reporting. Some rough edges are acceptable, but chronic errors or
elementary style limit quality.
Review & edit
your midterm before submitting. Don't make instructor
write, "You expected me to read your midterm when you didn't even read it
yourself?"
Content
quantity
and
quality:
Evidence of learning, esp. understanding of terms and application to texts.
Coverage and analysis of
required texts.
Use of course resources
including instructional webpages
(esp. for terms)
+ materials from class discussion and lecture.
Interest & significance: Make your reader
want to process your
essays by making the information meaningful to our study of
literature and culture.
Thematic
unity / organization:
Unify materials along
a line of thought that a reader can follow from start to finish. (Paragraph
Organization & Transitions /
Continuity)
Dr. White's Instructional Materials
