The writing assignment is to engage in conversation with either Foucault’s Discipline and Punish or Bakhtin’s Rabelais and His World How does the author make his claim? What evidence does he use? How does he account for other critiques? What argument can you make with their text? Can you tease out a critique? Or push their argument in a new direction? Use significant evidence pulled directly from the text. Your draft should feature a central thesis that makes a strong claim of your own, one around which you will structure your paper. Make a clear, nuanced argument that goes beyond whether the author is “right” or “wrong.”
Things to keep in mind:
Be very clear about your audience. Who are they? Why should they care about this text and your argument? Do not assume they have read the material.
Be very clear about the structure of your argument. What are you building towards? What parts need to be in place and in what order?
Show, don’t tell. Your argument will be more persuasive if you carefully organize and describe evidence, rather than telling your audience how they should feel about it.
Pay close attention to contradictions or lack of clarity within the text, and ask which questions those issues raise. You do not necessarily need to answer them, but your own position on how they affect your interpretation should be clear.
Feel free to briefly introduce other texts—e.g. Mbembe, Hall et al., Bakhtin or Foucault (depending on which author you are already working with), or something from another class—in order to clarify your argument. But that reference should always drive the reader back to the central text. This should remain a close reading of one particular text.
