Housekeeping

Next week: I’ll be collecting your self-assessment sheet for a quick check and some feedback on your participation. Please bring your completed copy (up to Week 8). You will fill out Week 9 and return it to me by the end of class.

SA Papers: feedback and assessment will be available some time tomorrow. For now, a note on source incorporation:

Keep in mind that there are many ways to effectively engage with sources, but we always want to avoid simply dropping them on their own, or using too many without giving ourselves space to analyze them in detail. One thing to consider is how to create sentences that address your argument in conversation with the text. Exs:

• Mrs. Mallard’s state of mind was changing so rapidly her conscious mind was not able to engage with it; her appearance denoted this conflict, as she was at once someone with “a certain strength” and “whose lines bespoke repression” (parag. 7).
• As Mrs. Mallard looks out the window, she sees “patches of blue sky,” which represent her mind opening up to newfound freedom (parag. 5).
• The passage of time in “A Very Short Story” compresses the relationship into something more serious than it was. Luz experienced a one-sided relationship as she wrote “many letters that he never got until after the armistice” (parag. 3), and by the time the protagonist receives 15 in a row, he gets to absorb all the emotions she might have already felt and forgotten about.

In general, as you revise your writing, always read it out loud for clarity and double-check that you’re presenting a clear thesis at the start of your paper. Don’t promise that an argument will be made, or that characters will be analyzed — begin with the strongest stance so you have a clear path for the body paragraphs.

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Group-led Discussion!

Theory Time: Unpacking New Historicism

What was the Old Historicism?

Types of evidence when we research cultural contexts and history?

Keywords

• Hegemony
• Subaltern
• Subjectivity
• Positionality
• Cultural Materialism 
• Contextual analysis (the author is back)
• Primary Sources

Last 5 minutes: complete your participation self-assessment

Housekeeping:

Reading Quiz

SA #1 will be returned today. Please pay close attention not just to overall feedback but line-level comments in the document. If you received a “1” revisions are optional but encouraged to maintain the default grade contract (B). Revisions will always be due within 2 weeks of receiving feedback and must use track changes (or “suggesting” on Google Docs). Use the same upload link as before.

SA #2 due Sunday: we’re practicing psychoanalysis theory — more on that later today!

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Discussion Leaders!

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Thesis Statement Practice

For Short Analysis #2 we will continue to focus on Chopin. As a pre-drafting exercise, let’s consider what a good thesis statement does…

• Pick one key term from Chapter 4 and do some free writing on your ideas about how it relates to the narrative.
• Then, re-read your notes and circle some words you think stand out as potential arguments
• Later, you may want to go back to the text to find some examples of lines that you think would support that reading
• Pair up with a peer to compare your exercises and offer each other suggestions. Discuss which ideas may be suitable/strong enough to develop n argument.