this is the list of short stories that we read for this class. bellow you can find the instruction for this essay.
1.The Lazy River By Zadie Smith
2. The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas
3.the yellow wallpaper by charlotte Perkins
4.orange world by Karen russell
5. The living sea by Tiphanie yanique
6. Hanalei bay by haruki Murakami
7. who is like god by Akwaeki Emezi
8. the prophet’s hair by salman rushdie
instructions:
You have two options:
1. Compose a 4-5 page close reading of a symbol, device, technique, or passage from one or more of the assigned stories that we have studied. If you are looking at more than one story, you can explore the way that the stories are bound together by a particular theme.
You must use at least two scholarly sources in addition to your primary text or texts. That means that even if you use two stories, you still need to use two research sources.
2. Compose a 4-5 page critical lens essay in which you read one or more of the stories that we have engaged with during the session.
You must use at least two scholarly sources in addition to your primary text or texts. That means that even if you use two stories, you still need to use two research sources. Critical lenses include psychoanalytic theory, Marxist literary criticism, postcolonial literary theory, queer theory, new historicism, reader response, and others. For Marxist literary theory, you might read “Omelas” as a critique of capitalism and capitalism’s dependence upon the suffering of the lower classes. In terms of postcolonial literary theory, you could think about how the concept of the nation and of neo imperialism shapes our understanding of “The Living Sea.” You could apply queer theory to a reading of “Who is like God” to explore the mother’s reaction and the lack of nuance in her understanding of gender and sexuality. These are just a handful of examples. I would just add that there’s a difference between a psychological reading and a psychoanalytic reading. Both are valid, but they have slightly different focuses. A psychological reading of “The Yellow Wall-paper” would focus on the narrator, her symptoms, and her progression from PPD to PPP, whereas a psychoanalytic reading would typically focus more on what teh story is revealing about its author’s psyche. These lines get blurry, because you can technically psychoanalyze a character, but again, it involves moving beyond just identifying symptoms that present and diagnosing the character on teh basis of those symptoms.
Remember:
The best researchers seek to apply research to a text in support of an original, central idea, rather than assemble a collage of other people’s ideas and arguments. An original argument is not necessarily an argument that no one has ever made before, but an idea that you are trying in earnest to develop from a place of academic curiosity and inquiry, even if other authors have explored it elsewhere. Don’t spend your time searching for essays that already say what you want to say; rather, search for essays that create an opportunity or a frame for you to say what you want to say. If you are applying a critical lens (feminist literary criticism, Marxist literary criticism, formalism, structuralism, critical race theory etc), you should consider looking at the Purdue OWL Introduction to Literary Theory which includes a list of sources that you might consider for each different lens.
The paper should be formatted according to MLA guidelines (12 pt. font, Times New Roman, double spaced) and should use MLA citation style (in-text parenthetical citations and a works cited page with full citations for your sources; the short stories should be cited by author and title, but since they are all provided via Blackboard you won’t have the additional information necessary to provide a full citation. You should, however, have all the information you could possibly need to cite your research). If you need a refresher on MLA you can check out the Purdue OWL MLA Style Guide.
Remember there’s no such thing as wasted research, just research that that you’re not ready to use yet. So even if you have a source that doesn’t seem like it’s going to work for the argument that you want to make, remember that you might be able to use it somewhere down the line, and that as long as you learn something from the source, you’ve not wasted your time. With that said, if it becomes painfully clear that a source isn’t going to benefit you, it’s also OK to put it down and walk away or to try to read it selectively.
