In a clear, concise, and well-organized essay of 4-6 pages, respond to one of the prompts below. Be sure to articulate how your response builds on and/or disagrees with the critical articles in the prompt you’ve chosen, and do those articles full justice by paraphrasing fairly, quoting responsibly, and citing properly (using MLA format). Use specific, detailed analysis of the text of Beloved (i.e. close-readings of language, structure, or imagery) to support your argument. In this assignment, unlike the previous 2, you won’t be provided the passages to close-read. Instead, you’ll need to choose the passages that you think best support the argument you want to make (and to articulate to the reader why these passages are important for your claims).
Objectives:
• Continue to develop the skills you learned in Assignments 1 and 2: make an argument that is neither totally obvious (i.e. the “the sky is blue” argument) nor an unjustifiable opinion (i.e. the “I like spaghetti” argument); support that argument with specific and detailed close-readings of the text; and articulate that argument clearly and concisely and in a well-structured essay for a particular audience (i.e. your peers).
• Situate your argument in a critical conversation by articulating how it responds to current debates about Beloved. Use the articles provided to show either why your argument is important, what it can tell us that other articles didn’t, or how it will build on conclusions that others have drawn.
• Use the skills we learned in class to break down and understand dense critical works so that you can appreciate their methods for making arguments and respond to their arguments with your own ideas.
• Use proper MLA citation format to avoid plagiarism and to give credit to your fellow scholars for their contributions to your research.Click Here To Get More On This Paper!!!!
• Continue to develop the skills you learned in Assignments 1 and 2: make an argument that is neither totally obvious (i.e. the “the sky is blue” argument) nor an unjustifiable opinion (i.e. the “I like spaghetti” argument); support that argument with specific and detailed close-readings of the text; and articulate that argument clearly and concisely and in a well-structured essay for a particular audience (i.e. your peers).
• Situate your argument in a critical conversation by articulating how it responds to current debates about Beloved. Use the articles provided to show either why your argument is important, what it can tell us that other articles didn’t, or how it will build on conclusions that others have drawn.
• Use the skills we learned in class to break down and understand dense critical works so that you can appreciate their methods for making arguments and respond to their arguments with your own ideas.
• Use proper MLA citation format to avoid plagiarism and to give credit to your fellow scholars for their contributions to your research.Click Here To Get More On This Paper!!!!
Some Things to Keep in Mind:
• Both of the articles listed below can be found on Blackboard on the “Assignments” page, in the folder named “Readings for Assignment 3.” (Though you should already have the Travis article for our class discussion on 11/12.)
• In order to receive full credit for this assignment, you should include a discussion of BOTH of the articles listed in the prompt. You may draw additional material from SCHOLARLY sources (i.e. no Wikipedia please) but this is not necessary (and you won’t get extra credit just for using an additional source).
• Keep in mind that proper citation format is required not only for your secondary sources (i.e. the critical articles listed below) but also for your primary sources (the book on which you’re writing—in this case, Beloved).
• Both of the articles listed below can be found on Blackboard on the “Assignments” page, in the folder named “Readings for Assignment 3.” (Though you should already have the Travis article for our class discussion on 11/12.)
• In order to receive full credit for this assignment, you should include a discussion of BOTH of the articles listed in the prompt. You may draw additional material from SCHOLARLY sources (i.e. no Wikipedia please) but this is not necessary (and you won’t get extra credit just for using an additional source).
• Keep in mind that proper citation format is required not only for your secondary sources (i.e. the critical articles listed below) but also for your primary sources (the book on which you’re writing—in this case, Beloved).
Prompt:
Molly Abel Davis suggests in her article, “Beyond Empathy,” that we aren’t supposed to identify with Sethe in Beloved but that, in fact, the novel is most instructive in showing us how to feel sympathy even for those characters whose lives we can’t imagine and whose choices we would never have made. Stephen Daniels argues that in fact Paul D is the character with whom we are supposed to identify—and that it is only by putting his story “next to” Sethe’s that we can fully understand the novel’s meaning. What do you think? Are we supposed to identify with Sethe in this novel? And if we aren’t supposed to identify with Sethe, are we supposed to identify with any of the characters? Which one(s)? Support your answer with analysis of short passages from the text, discussing things like Morrison’s language, imagery, and sentence structure.Click Here To Get More On This Paper!!!!
Molly Abel Davis suggests in her article, “Beyond Empathy,” that we aren’t supposed to identify with Sethe in Beloved but that, in fact, the novel is most instructive in showing us how to feel sympathy even for those characters whose lives we can’t imagine and whose choices we would never have made. Stephen Daniels argues that in fact Paul D is the character with whom we are supposed to identify—and that it is only by putting his story “next to” Sethe’s that we can fully understand the novel’s meaning. What do you think? Are we supposed to identify with Sethe in this novel? And if we aren’t supposed to identify with Sethe, are we supposed to identify with any of the characters? Which one(s)? Support your answer with analysis of short passages from the text, discussing things like Morrison’s language, imagery, and sentence structure.Click Here To Get More On This Paper!!!!
Some things you might want to (but don’t have to) consider in your essay:
• There are a number of places where Morrison shifts—somewhat rapidly and without warning—from one character’s point of view to another (as, for instance, when she goes from Sethe’s hearing Paul D’s song to Paul D thinking about his own song on p. 48). What is the effect of these shifts on the reader? Why do you think Morrison does this? What is she trying to suggest about the characters or their relationships to each other?
• A few times throughout the novel, we hear a story from one character only to hear it repeated or continued, later, by another character. (This is most obviously true of the central narrative of Beloved’s death, but it is also true of other events.) What are the differences between the story as told by one character as opposed to another? What do these differences tell us about the differences between the characters? Is one version of the story more credible than another version? Why? What is it about one character’s language or way of speaking that makes you believe him/her and not another?
• Beginning on page 237, Morrison includes several chapters in which the 3 women of Sethe’s immediate family (Sethe, Denver, and Beloved) speak in their own voices, in the first person. Why do you think Morrison includes these chapters in a text that is otherwise told in the third person? Why does she include these chapters at this specific moment in the story? You might also analyze the differences between the languages of these chapters. Are there words, images, or stories that are common to all 3 women? How do they tell them or describe them differently? What does this tell us about the differences in their characters? Beloved’s chapter, in particular, has a very odd syntax. Why? And who is speaking in the fourth chapter, the one that follows these three (beginning on p. 253)? What is this chapter doing? How does it add to our understanding of these characters or of the novel as a whole?
• The first time that we hear the story of Beloved’s death in its entirety (the chapter beginning on p. 174) it is not from Sethe or Paul D’s point of view. Whose point of view is it from? How do you know (i.e. what words or images reveal the character who is speaking here)? Why would Morrison put us into this character’s head when she is relating what is arguably the most important scene in the book? Why is she forcing the reader to identify with this character at this moment? (Or are we supposed to identify with this character? And how does or identification with—or failure to identify with—this character affect how we identify with the other characters in the novel?)Click Here To Get More On This Paper!!!!
• There are a number of places where Morrison shifts—somewhat rapidly and without warning—from one character’s point of view to another (as, for instance, when she goes from Sethe’s hearing Paul D’s song to Paul D thinking about his own song on p. 48). What is the effect of these shifts on the reader? Why do you think Morrison does this? What is she trying to suggest about the characters or their relationships to each other?
• A few times throughout the novel, we hear a story from one character only to hear it repeated or continued, later, by another character. (This is most obviously true of the central narrative of Beloved’s death, but it is also true of other events.) What are the differences between the story as told by one character as opposed to another? What do these differences tell us about the differences between the characters? Is one version of the story more credible than another version? Why? What is it about one character’s language or way of speaking that makes you believe him/her and not another?
• Beginning on page 237, Morrison includes several chapters in which the 3 women of Sethe’s immediate family (Sethe, Denver, and Beloved) speak in their own voices, in the first person. Why do you think Morrison includes these chapters in a text that is otherwise told in the third person? Why does she include these chapters at this specific moment in the story? You might also analyze the differences between the languages of these chapters. Are there words, images, or stories that are common to all 3 women? How do they tell them or describe them differently? What does this tell us about the differences in their characters? Beloved’s chapter, in particular, has a very odd syntax. Why? And who is speaking in the fourth chapter, the one that follows these three (beginning on p. 253)? What is this chapter doing? How does it add to our understanding of these characters or of the novel as a whole?
• The first time that we hear the story of Beloved’s death in its entirety (the chapter beginning on p. 174) it is not from Sethe or Paul D’s point of view. Whose point of view is it from? How do you know (i.e. what words or images reveal the character who is speaking here)? Why would Morrison put us into this character’s head when she is relating what is arguably the most important scene in the book? Why is she forcing the reader to identify with this character at this moment? (Or are we supposed to identify with this character? And how does or identification with—or failure to identify with—this character affect how we identify with the other characters in the novel?)Click Here To Get More On This Paper!!!!
