Submit to designated the BLOG using the relevant category.
Length: ~800-1000 words (equivalent of 4 pages, double-spaced, in Word)
Purpose
Scholarship and criticism is a central activity of professional literary study, and English graduate students should be able to read and grapple with this kind of writing, comprehend its argument, identify its theoretical backing, and to enter into critical conversation themselves as they participate and complete assignments in this and other graduate classes. This assignment provides a structured opportunity toward some of these ends.
Scholarly articles represent months–often years–of careful thought, reflection, and writing. When we encounter these articles as undergraduates, they can seem dense and difficult, and our goal was often just to find a quote to extract that supports our point.
As graduate students, you will be engaging this material more frequently, more deeply, and more confidently both in this class and across the MA curriculum. Even as we begin to undertake the work of research more independently in other courses, ENGL 511 is all about slowing down the process, and taking the time to fully consider the arguments of others–and not just what is argued (e.g. the “main point”), but also how the author supports her argument by making careful stylistic, structural, and rhetorical choices along the way. That is, our attention to these articles will be focused just as much on how the argument is presented given genre-based constraints and moves as on the content and merits of the argument itself.
Process:
Preliminary discussions will encourage the class to analyze the essay according to certain genre-based considerations–e.g how the author creates a research space, how they enter a key “critical conversation,” how they use sources, how their argument is structured, how they cite and integration other voices.
The S&R itself, however, will stand as a public-facing, engaging summary of the chosen article, addressing the main claim and sub-claims of a recent critical article or book chapter (hereafter, “article”) noting its most important supporting evidence, and identifying the critical conversation that the article engages. Furthermore, you will respond to this article, entering the conversation yourself and providing additional supporting or complicating evidence via a carefully chosen moment of close reading.
Though the summary and response are two distinct aspects of the essay, they should flow together seamlessly in the final version of your essay.
Relation to Learning Outcomes
Successful completion of this assignment will demonstrate that you are practicing, in part, the program-wide Student Learning Outcomes 2 & 3, which specify that students successfully completing ENGL 511 will be able to
- Summarize contemporary scholarly and critical writing.
- Understand the practice of criticism through the metaphor of conversation and demonstrate this understanding in their own critical writing.
Note: the first part of SLO 3 will be demonstrated in this assignment, while other assignments will give you an opportunity to practice developing a critical conversation in your own writing.
Evaluation
This paper will be evaluated according to 4 key criteria, and a rubric will be used to offer feedback in each area.
- Accuracy & Understanding: Does the author clearly grasp the nuances of the article’s argument, and convey that understanding through a thorough and accurate summary covering the main claims and most important sub-claims? Is the summary written for an external audience that might not have read either the article or book under discussion?
- Capturing the Context: Does the author describe the broader context for the argument–a context that might be critical, theoretical, and / political? Please note that context can be very local (a discussion amongst critics), but it also addresses the broader motivation for the essay by describing its exigence: what problems or issues is it addressing that might transcend these more local critical arguments about a given author’s work?
- Response: Does the author respond in a nuanced way to the article’s main argument, moving beyond mere agreement or disagreement to more careful qualification, extension, refinement, or complication of that argument? Does the author use a carefully chosen moment of close reading and engagement with Yamashita’s novel to support the response?
- Organization and Style: Does the author write clearly and concisely, applying relevant lessons from our “Style” readings? Does the author incorporate at least one well-framed quotation? Does the author maintain the summary frame through frequent use of signal phrases throughout to maintain the summary frame? Are individual paragraphs cohesive, and does the author transition smoothly from paragraph to paragraph through carefully constructed transitions that bridge ideas and guide the reader accordingly?