1865 brought three major historical pivots, the collapse of the Confederacy, the abolition of slavery, and the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. What was it like to live through this moment? Emotionally, intellectually, and socially, how did various Americans grapple with these changes? In order to receive a passing grade, students must demonstrate detailed knowledge of the lectures and all the assigned readings for Part 3 of the course (Modules 11 and 12). Given the nature of this question, students may also draw on the readings and lectures from Part 2, but should not do so to the exclusion of the readings and lectures from Part 3.
Your answer should come in the form of an essay organized around a thesis that clearly addresses the assigned topic. You should state your thesis in the first paragraph of your essay and focus on developing it throughout your entire paper. Each paragraph of your paper should work to persuade your reader that your interpretation is insightful and correct. A thesis does not have to be simple; complexity and nuance are signs of thoughtfulness. Your thesis should, however, be crystal clear to your reader. Please also make sure that your thesis is analytical and explanatory and not merely descriptive.
Your essay should be between four full pages and five full pages.
Content Standards: We will evaluate your take-home papers based on the following criteria. 1) Persuasiveness: does the paper develop a coherent and convincing argument that addresses the issues raised by the essay prompt? 2) Comprehensiveness: does the paper reference and discuss as much of the assigned material from the current module as is possible? 3) Evidence: does the paper demonstrate intellectual command over this assigned material and utilize it as evidence to support its argument? 4) Clarity: can an informed reader – one familiar with the same lectures, discussions, and readings – understand without confusion or uncertainty the various ideas in the paper, how they relate to each other, and how they address the issues raised in the essay prompt?
Prose Standards: Write clearly and concisely. Follow standard formal grammatical and spelling conventions for American English. Proofread carefully for grammatical and typographical errors. Papers that have more than two errors, including instances of passive voice and unclear antecedents, on a page will be marked down. We will discuss techniques for proofreading and strong writing during the semester.
Formatting: All take-home writing assignments for this class must be double-spaced, without extra spacing between paragraphs (in Microsoft Word, set your “before” and “after” line spacing to zero). Header material, including your name, the date, the paper title, and other information must appear on a separate title page. All take-home writing assignments must be written in 12-point Times New Roman font, with one-inch margins on all sides of the paper. All multi-page assignments must have page numbers. Your paper must have an original title. All citations must be in parenthetical form and must include the name of the author of the referenced source and the relevant page numbers. All writing assignments for this class focus on assigned readings, and students should not use outside sources without the advanced permission of the instructor. For each of these guidelines that a paper does not follow, a three-percentage-point deduction will apply to the paper’s grade.
Citations: When writing your essay, you must provide citations that indicate your sources of information. These citations should indicate both the specific source and the pages or PPT slides in which this information is located. You do not need a Works Cited page if you follow this guideline. Citations should be placed at the end of the last sentence to which they pertain, and should be as precise as possible in terms of the pages to which they refer. In a strong essay, nearly every sentence other than the topic sentences and those in the introductory and concluding paragraphs will contain a relevant citation. For this assignment, you are required to use in-text parenthetical citations. The sentences below offer examples of parenthetical citations that refer to the AUTHOR and the PAGE NUMBER or the LECTURE NUMBER and SLIDE NUMBER.
Example 1: Indeed, as Descartes put it, “I think, therefore I am” (Descartes, p. 2).
Example 2: As pointed out in lecture, most people wrongly believed that killing off local foxes would increase their yield of chickens (Lecture 10, Slide 12).