Textual Analysis Paper

This paper focuses on a greater consideration of a text as a whole. I want you to focus on the literary merits of the work, as well as its place in the world.  You are responsible for learning and incorporating the terms from the class dictionary into your own writing.

Prompt: In this paper, you will take a work from our readings (except O'Connor), or find one of your own, and analyze its literary implications, as well as its implications in the greater world. Novels are too long, but magazines articles, some newspaper articles, stories, poems, comic books, blogs, the Onion, and about any form of text (as long as it's at least 1000-2000 words) would be appropriate for this topic. First, pose an interpretive question about the work and respond to it analytically in forums and in freewrites.

In the introduction to your essay, make an interesting, problematic, or significant assertion about the work, one that can be explored in several different ways according to evidence in the text. Look for an assertion that might lead to differences in opinion among your classmates and that offers readers new insights into the work. Show your readers where and how the text of the story supports your interpretation.

Your task in this assignment is not to discover the right way to interpret the text, but to explain, in objective terms, your way of reading some aspects of the text.  Summary is only a small part of this paper; assume your audience has the literary work in front of them. After the introduction and a brief summary, explicate the work in terms of theme, metaphor, symbol, and other literary terms we've learned. Before the conclusion, a paragraph or two about its worldly implications where you relate the text to gender/race/class, or satire, or historical or current events. You will need sources to analyze the worldly implications, and you might need sources to explicate the text.

Learning Goals:

Analysis

Focused Explication

Objective Language and Writing

MLA parenthetical citation

MLA format

Nuts and Bolts:

4 pages (1000 words)

5 sources 

MLA Works Cited page (separate page)

Course Policy Paper Guidelines