What is a synthesis? A synthesis is a written discussion–simply speaking, compare and contrast to develop a bigger understanding of it–that draws on one or more sources. It follows that your ability to write syntheses depends on your ability to infer relationships among sources – essays, articles, fiction, and also non-written sources, such as lectures, interviews, and observations. This process is nothing new for you, since you infer relationships all the time. In fact, if you’ve written research papers, you’ve already written syntheses. In an academic synthesis, you make explicit the relationships that you have inferred among separate sources.
Below are some necessary steps you should follow to help you synthesize research:
- Determine the goal(s) for your discussion such as reviewing a topicLinks to an external site. or supporting an argument
- Organize the discussion among the authors of your found researched materials
- Lead the discussion among the authors of your sourcesLinks to an external site.
- Provide comments and build logical guidance for your audience
- Summarize the most vivid of the authors’ examples and explanations
- Finally, draw your unique conclusion on the topicLinks to an external site.: in fact, the answer to your research question
Ethnic Studies is the critical and interdisciplinary study of race, ethnicity, and indigeneity with a focus on the experiences and perspectives of people of color within and beyond the United States. Since the emergence of ethnic studies as an academic field in the late 1960s, scholars have analyzed the ways in which race and racism have been, and continue to be, powerful social, cultural, and political forces and their connections to other axes of stratification, including gender, class, sexuality, and legal status.
“Baldwin-Buckley race debate still resonates 55 years and on.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MRzkHgMaPL4Links to an external site.
Q1. After carefully watching the above clip several times, please point out the main idea or claim of Baldwin and Buckley with at least 3 complete sentences, respectively. Then, you can express your view on both of them by putting one voice over the other to intrigue your readers. By the way, which state(s) still had the voting rights issue until which year? (Note: Please do not use the N-word and replace it with African-American).
Please correctly identify the exact page for the following quotes, and then elaborate on how each quote reflects the main idea of the entire work with at least three complete sentences for each question of Q2-5.
“Battle Royal” (pp. 1-12) from Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison
https://learning.hccs.edu/faculty/selena.anderson/engl2307/readings/battle-royale-by-ralph-ellisonLinks to an external site.
Links to an external site.or, https://archive.org/details/pokemon-incensesLinks to an external site.
Q2. A small dry mustached man in the front row blared out, “Say that slowly, son! “What, sir?” “What you just said!” “Social responsibility, sir,” I said.
“You weren’t being smart, were you boy?” he said, not unkindly. “No, Sir!” “You sure that about ‘equality’ was a mistake?” “Oh, yes, Sir,” I said. “I was swallowing blood.” “Well, you had better speak more slowly so we can understand. We mean to do right by you, but you’ve got to know your place at all times. All right, now, go on with your speech.”
Q3. “I stood beneath his photograph with my briefcase in hand and smiled triumphantly into his stolid black peasant’s face. It was a face that fascinated me. The eyes seemed to follow everywhere I went. That night I dreamed I was at a circus with him and that he refused to laugh at the clowns no matter what they did. Then later he told me to open my briefcase and read what was inside and I did, finding an official envelope stamped with the state seal: and inside the envelope I found another and another, endlessly, and I thought I would fall of weariness.”
“Sonny’s Blues” (pp. 17-48) by James Baldwin
https://www.sjsu.edu/faculty/wooda/2B-HUM/Readings/Baldwin-Sonnys-Blues.pdfLinks to an external site.
Q4. “”Sonny,” I said, “I know how you feel. But if you don’t finish school now, you’re going to be sorry later that you didn’t.” I grabbed him by the shoulders. “And you only got another year. It ain’t so bad. And I’ll come back and I swear I’ll help you do whatever you want to do. Just try to put up with it till I come back. Will you please do that? For me?” He didn’t answer and he wouldn’t look at me.”
Q5. Please carefully read the following poem, written by Sherman Alexie, and regroup the poem into two parts and summarize each part with 3-5 complete sentences–why did you divide the poem into the two parts that way? Please point out the tone and the main idea of the poem as clearly as you can, and what is the didactic theme of the entire poem–as a reader, what have you learned to become a better person?
https://exceptindreams.livejournal.com/193765.htmlLinks to an external site.
“Why ethnic studies matters?” by Ron Espiritu:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XvvMgujD4i8Links to an external site.