LITR 4533 Tragedy take-home midterm Model Assignments

Due date window: Submit by email to whitec@uhcl.edu between due b/w Wednesday 11 June & Sunday 15 June

Value: App. 25-35% of final grade

Contents: (3 essays)

• Pre-Essay. Develop a "working definition" of genre & apply to any genre of your choice besides tragedy. Cite at least 2 examples of your genre from your reading, viewing, or listening experience and 2 secondary / critical research sources from course website or beyond. (4-7+ paragraphs, 2-3 double-spaced page equivalent)
  

• Essay 1. Write an opening draft of Essay 2 (overall learning experience) on final exam (4+ paragraphs, 1.5-2 double-spaced page equivalent)

• Essay 2. Review or preview possible topics of interest for Essay 2 (special topic) on final exam (3-4 paragraphs, 1.5-2 double-spaced page equivalent)

Special requirements:

• Provide a title for each essay.

• Refer to a previous midterm  or final exam sample from Model Assignments at least once somewhere in your exam. (More than one reference can be impressive.)

• In Pre-Essay, Essay 1 or anywhere, refer at least once to Aristotle's Poetics and Nietzsche's Birth of Tragedy.

• In Essay 2 or anywhere, refer to most if not all the plays we read up to the midterm, including Oresteia trilogy (Agamemnon + selections from Libation Bearers & Euminides); Mourning Becomes Electra / Homecoming reading assignment; plus or minus Oedipus the King; Bacchae selections; Hamlet selections; other plays known or referred to.

Audience: a future member of our class (who may read your exam on Model Assignments). Help that student learn his way through our course materials as you have. Make them care!

Of course your ultimate audience is me, your ancient instructor, but I mostly respond to how well you can show what you're learning, both in terms of responsibly accounting for essential course content and how readable and compelling your writing can be.

Details:

Pre-Essay. Develop a "working definition" of genre & apply to any genre of your choice besides tragedy, citing 2 or more examples of your genre from your reading, viewing, or listening experience + 2 secondary / critical research sources. (4-6 paragraphs, 2-3 double-spaced page equivalent)

"working definition" = use the Introduction to Genres to develop your overall practical approach to the subject of genre, identifying some features of genre that apply to your example(s); your definition may not be perfect but it's a starting point. You can revise or redevelop your definition as you work with your examples.

• Your genre may be any item (except tragedy) from the list of genres or elsewhere on webpage or in your experience. (You may compare-contrast with tragedy.)

• Your genre may be literary or extra-literary, for instance a category or genre of film, music, theater, dance, visual art (genre paintings), reality TV, sitcoms, stand-up comic monologues, etc.

Your choice of genre and examples will be your primary research sample to analyze in at least two ways:

• Refer to Introduction to Genres, Narrative Genres, and / or Aristotle's Poetics

• Analyze your examples and compare & contrast your / their genre to other genres (examples welcome)

Since there are no pure genres, don't panic if your genre or examples turn into or mix with other genres. Describe and evaluate.

Also don't panic if you can't finish describing everything in the time or space allowed. Summarize how far you've gotten and indicate what remains.

Recall course attitude: genres aren't rules but conventions or family traits; not boxes but yardsticks. If the genres change or connect with others, that's normal, so don't protest, just describe.

Warning: the biggest danger for students is neglecting the materials available on the website. Using the course's materials in relation to your reading is a good start on demonstrating that you're learning something.

Essay 1. Write an opening draft of Essay 1 (overall learning experience) for final exam (3-4 paragraphs, 1.5-2 double-spaced page equivalent)

• "opening draft" = first few paragraphs, maybe a couple other paragraphs to be developed later in essay.

• For your final you're not locked into what you write for the midterm. The purpose is to start thinking and expressing. I'll offer brief feedback for final. (You can change what you write for the final or not.)

• Even though our course is Tragedy and Tragedy must remain a focus, your essay isn't limited to tragedy. Compare and contrast to other genres.

Essay 2. Review possible topics of interest for Essay 2 on final exam (3-4 paragraphs, 1.5-2 double-spaced page equivalent)

• final exam offers 10 options for 2nd half of exam. As you'll see, you may write 1 long essay on 1 topic or 2 shorter essays on 2 topics.

• For your 3-4 paragraphs, consider which topics you find interesting and consider a couple examples so far. You may also briefly refer to literary works beyond our course.

• As with Essay 2, what you write here for Essay 3 doesn't lock you in for part B on final exam.

2012 student models of Final Exam part B; 2010 student models of Part B of Final Exam

Options for midterm Essay 2 / final exam Essay 2

1. Tragedy and its Updates (Obj. 2a)

2. “Plot is the Soul of Tragedy” + Comedy & Romance (Obj.1, Aristotle’s Poetics, Genres handout)

3. Families in Tragedy + The Oedipal / Electra Conflict

4. Tragedy and Spectacle

5. Classical Humanism and Judeo-Christianity or other religious traditions in Tragedy (Obj. 3)

6. Tragedy as greatest genre--extension of midterm essay.

7. Tragedy’s cultural and historical backgrounds (Obj. 3a)

8. Sophocles and O'Neill: a review of styles, subjects, and stature in four plays.

9. Teaching Tragedy

10. Nietzsche's Birth of Tragedy and the Apolline / Dionysiac.

11. Aesthetics of Tragedy: the sublime and beyond: What pleasures and pains with tragedy?

12. Self-generated topic of your choice that would be recognizable to a member of our class.

(see final exam for details and prompts)

Advice—especially the first bullet makes a big difference in grades:

• Review objectives, course website, connect to texts.

• Interweave what you came in knowing with what the course offers.

Grading standards: readability, interest, substance

Quality of writing: central theme consistently present throughout essay + power and appeal; unity, organization, and development; transitions and connections; surface quality (absence of chronic errors); inclusion of titles.

Evidence of learning: All exams are expected to use central terms and themes from objectives with text-examples highlighted in lecture-discussion with competence. Knowledge from beyond the course and on-the-spot inventiveness are impressive, but first and foremost demonstrate mastery of the course’s essential materials. Beware my criticism: "You could have written this essay without taking the course."

Students naturally want to show what they already know and for the instructor to exclaim, "I have nothing to teach you—you know it all already!" But experience teaches that we never know it all. A more interesting persona or attitude for a critic is to discover something they don't quite understand but to learn by writing, rethinking, rewriting. Questions, problems, and issues are good as long as you learn from them.

Extension of learning: The best exams not only comprehend the course’s terms, objectives, and texts but also use the student's voice to refresh, extend, or vary terms and themes with examples from the class and from experience beyond our class. Make our course meet the world!

Mix your language and ideas with the course's.