For your fourth formal paper assignment, you’ll be looking at westerners’ perceptions of North Korea. Having read Duiker’s discussion of N. Korea in Chapters 7 and 11, you’ve learned about the split between North and South Korea, and that since the Cold War there has been an active communist government in North Korea. This government has most often shut its doors to outsiders, especially in the later-20th and early 21st centuries.
For this paper, though, you’ll be looking back at a brief period of interaction between North Korea and some American citizens who were looking for a way to improve the United State . First, read the four primary sources published online at the Wilson Center Digital Archive: https://digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org/topics/north-korea-and-american-radical-left. These four sources were composed by Eldridge Cleaver (1935-1998), a prominant member of the Black Panther. For details about Cleaver and these sources, read Benjamin R. Young, “Our Common Struggle against Our Common Enemy: North Korea and the American Radical Left,” Wilson Center, 2013, https://www.wilsoncenter.org/sites/default/files/media/documents/publication/NKIDP_eDossier_14_North_Korea_and_the_American_Radical_Left.pdf.
Develop and prove an independent thesis using two to four of the primary sources from this collection. You may use the Young article, as well as Duiker, Contemporary World History, as secondary sources to help you understand these sources and historical/cultural context in which they were written.
– IF YOU NEED THE DUIKER TEXTBOOK, I HAVE ATTACHED IT ON THE ORDER.
Thesis ideas to consider:
• How did Cleaver see N. Korea’s society, economy, and government, as compared to those of the United States?
• Did Cleaver see the United States as able to improve? How could this be done?
• How was Cleaver received by North Korean leaders? Would this relationship be possible in the 21st century?
• Or develop your own based, on what YOU see in two to four of these sources
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As required for all history papers, cite your sources using footnotes composed according to the Chicago style of citation, or in-ext citations composed according to [modified] MLA requirements.
• When using MLA to cite a primary sources, remember to include the last name of the author of the source you are citing, and the number for the page where you saw the material to which your paper refers. Likewise, remember to end all Chicago style citations with the number for the page (in Duiker) where you saw the material to which your paper refers.
• The goal of citations is for your reader to trace your evidence, so make sure its traceable!
