Professor instructions:
Your second project is to stage and enter a debate on some aspect of defining (describing/determining/delimiting/displaying) “violence” by constructing an analytical framework from the insights of other scholars. The specific topic is open, but consider challenging a universalized assertion about violence by mobilizing theoretical perspectives from psychoanalysis (Herman), feminism and/or critical race theory (Crenshaw), postcolonialism (Mbembe), queer/disability theory (Puar), and/or post-Marxism (Han), as well as your own particular subject position(s). It may also be prudent to select one event/case study (such as those we have discussed in class) to serve as a unified source of examples. Use at least three sources from the course to frame your own observations and support your own conclusions. You may use one or two outside sources, but are not required to. If you would like to follow any particular theoretical threads further, I might be able to make some suggestions.
This requires your clear assessment of each text’s own perspective, disciplinary background, and presumed audience. You must give thought to how each enters and intervenes in the structure of your essay in a logical and artful manner. Moreover, it requires a clear articulation of how these texts relate to your own central argument. A central challenge of this assignment is to carefully deploy your own personal positionality as an intellectual resource for evidence and analysis in rigorous scholarship.
Some examples of ways to set up your argument include:
A classic “lens” essay. Look at an assertion in one “target” text through the perspective of another “lens” text, using the theoretical tools of the latter to analysis the claim. A third text might make a brief appearance as a parallel example or counter-claim.
Triangulation. Look at a concept through three different motivated perspectives, then position your argument between them.
Tool box. Assemble a new set of theoretical tools appropriate to your topic by collecting keywords, concepts, and analytical questions from three separate texts.
My instructions based on what my assignment I want it to be about
– I want you to write the role of childhood in determining violence.
– By childhood, I want you to explroe Freud and psychoanalysis from Herman.
– I also want you to make sure you make links to The Body in Pain by Elaine Scarry.
It doesn’t have to be perfect. It is a draft. I don’t want you to write the entire thing in 1700 words, but I want you to write an introduction and two or three body paragraphs in detail.
