DRAFT (of 6+ pages/1800 words) due Tuesday, April 16at 10am in OAKS
[complete draft=5% of final project grade]
REVISION (of 2700-3000 words) due Monday, April 22 at 5 am in OAKS
[counts for 75% of final project grade]
The Extended Researched Analysis will incorporate some of the material you encounter while performing the research documented by your Annotated Bibliography.
However, the paper is not a traditional “research paper” – presenting information that describes a subject – but rather an analysis produced in dialogue with others whose information, ideas, or arguments you encounter in your research. Along the way, you may well incorporate some “factual” information that you glean from your research that helps support or demonstrate your analysis, and some of your sources may be primary sources from the middle ages or the present.
Your paper should follow one of the following three models. In any case, your project topic should clearly engage with the course’s theme (you remember: King Arthur & His World). Your essay must:
- Perform a literary analysis of one or more medieval texts on our syllabus–using this opportunity to read extended scholarly analyses of one or more medieval texts
OR - Analyze a feature of medieval culture that has arisen in medieval text(s) we’ve discussed (kingship, for instance, or courtly love, or medieval chivalry, or the Wars of the Roses), and apply that to a reading of one or more texts
OR - Analyze a feature of contemporary culture in relation to a feature of medieval culture that we have encountered in medieval text(s) we’ve discussed. The online article “Chivalry isn’t dead. But it should be” on the blog Made by History could serve as an example
OR - Analyze a text we have read this semester alongside a different version of the same material (Geoffrey of Monmouth’s presentation of Arthur’s origins compared to Malory’s, for instance)
OR - Analyze a 20th- or 21st-century Arthurian text (from 1975 or later) in terms of what you have learned about medieval Arthurian culture.
NOTE: If you would like to work on a project that you’re not sure will meet one of these expectations, see me before 5pm on Wednesday, April 3 to get your idea approved.
The extended researched analysis will be produced in 2 parts, with a shorter version in draft form due a week before the final fully revised full-length version is due. The shorter version will undergo peer review in class.
Your paper will include at least 4 research sources (which may or may not be on your annotated bibliography; in other words, you’re not limited, in your paper, to using only items that you included on your annotated bibliography). 2 of these sources must be critical articles or chapters (which is to say, the other 2+ could be online resources that are not academic journal articles or academic books).
A successful paper will demonstrate the following:
- a thorough understanding of all texts you address in your analysis;
- effective integration of (but not complete reliance upon) source material; and
- a careful, rhetorically thoughtful presentation of your analysis to your audience.
In addition, a successful paper will:
- be analytical and interpretive in purpose and method, rather than only descriptive;
- be structured around a clearly-presented thesis supported by sufficient examples and explanation, in a logical fashion;
- use MLA guidelines effectively; and
- follow the standard expectations of Modern English grammar, punctuation, and spelling.
As the third bullet point of section two above indicates, I expect you to follow MLA style conventions for all text citations, works cited entries, and paper heading and title. I’ve added links here to three different sections of the Purdue OWL (Online Writing Lab) website that have proven to be very helpful. For further assistance, visit the Writing Lab in Addlestone and/or come see me for a quick personal tutorial; it will be assumed that you know how to fulfill those expectations. Reacquaint yourself with them.
(Do remember that your Annotated Bibliography does not serve as a Works Cited page for the paper itself. You must turn in a new Works Cited page with the paper, one that has no annotations and includes only those texts you use in your paper.)
Papers will be graded in terms of grammar, style, and structure as well as content and argumentative strategies.
I’m always happy to discuss your brainstorming, your early plans, your rough drafts, revisions, and research, and any general or specific questions about your writing.
Find a copy of the rubric I will use when scoring this assignment here.