English 272M Assignment on Melal

Hershinow

Suggested Length: 1000-1500 Words

Rough Draft (bring to class): Friday, December 2nd

Due Date: Friday, December 9th

Process and self-assessment cover sheet. Attach a paragraph or two in which you discuss the paper’s strengths and weaknesses: What were the particular challenges the paper presented and how did you go about meeting them? With what degree of success?

Be sure to have an appropriate title and to give specific examples including at least 3 direct quotations.

OPTION 1—Essay

Using Melal as your point of reference, examine one or more specific difficulties facing the Marshallese of Ebeye and Kwajalein in the 2^nd half of the 20^th century. What accommodations were necessary? What were the costs and benefits of these accommodations?

OPTION 2—Essay

Examine the ways in which Melal provides insight into one of the course themes: the importance of place; storytelling; identity; assimilation and alienation; colonialism and post-colonialism; conflicting cultural norms and ideals; insiders and outsiders; the response of Pacific Island societies to a changing world. I suggest that you start by thinking of something specific about Melal that really caught your attention—an event, character, technique, etc.—and start working from there as you think about how it contributes to one of the course themes. Try to keep the focus on one of the course themes, even though others overlap and will likely be mentioned.

OPTION 3—Essay

What is added to Melal by having a “three-fold telling?” (Chad Blair, Honolulu Weekly review) What would be lost if the story of Rujen, the boys, or the Marshallese gods was left out?

NOTE: For options 1, 2, and 3 you can write either a persuasive paper or more of an exploratory paper (or some combination of the two). The difference is that with a persuasive essay your purpose is to argue for a particular interpretation by establishing an idea and persuading readers with plenty of supporting evidence and logical argumentation. In an exploratory paper your purpose is rather to look at all the many possible aspects of the idea, cultivating different points of view, examining all the contradictory elements, and then arriving at a conclusion.

Audience: No matter which option you choose, you can assume that your readers have already read the novel, so you are to give interpretation and analysis, not plot summary. Do not, of course, assume that your readers know your assignment; the paper will have to speak for itself.

Format: Essays should be double-spaced using 12-point font and 1” or 1 ½” margins.

GRADING CRITERIA: In judging the success of option 1, 2 & 3 papers I will be looking at:

a) idea—analysis, interpretation, insight, aptness, freshness

b) support—reasoning, evidence

c) organization—follow-through, focus

d) style—clarity, emphasis, interest, language, voice, transitions

e) mechanics—grammar, spelling, punctuation, proofreading.

These items will not necessarily carry equal weight.

OPTION 4--Creative

Use your own internal time machine to imagine yourself as one of the important characters in Melal 2 or 3 years in the future. As you reflect on the events of Good Friday 1981, how do you feel about how your life has progressed? Has it developed the way you would have expected at the end of that fateful day? Or, if you prefer, you can write as an all-knowing observer telling about one or more of the characters. Either way, your job is to comment on the events and ending of the novel by imagining what things are like 2 or 3 years later.

Note: For this option it’s fine to go beyond 1500 words.

GRADING CRITERIA: For option 4 I am especially interested in:

a) The liveliness, imagination, and clarity of the situation;

b) Your ability to connect with the substance and techniques of the novel and the course;

c) The overall style and organization of the paper;

d) Your handling of mechanics: grammar, spelling, and punctuation.

These elements do not necessarily carry equal weight.

PROCESS OF COMPOSITION: By the time you begin drafting your paper you should already have done a lot of informal writing and thinking about the novel in class and at home. Writing is a messy business, and no two people do it quite the same. What follows is a general process that works for many people.

ESL students (and perhaps others) should be able to get help at the Kahikoluamea Center (Iliahi building) at any stage in the process.

Starting. Review the novel keeping in mind the topic you will be writing on. Reread your travelogue entries. Talk with people, freewrite, doodle--let the ideas incubate.

Organizing. Write down on a clean piece of paper the main points in the exploration as you discover them. Decide on the issue or problem you want to be your focus. Make note of specific incidents or passages that support the main ideas. Compose a statement of the main idea of your paper or the question you want to find an answer to.

Composing. Only now are you ready to begin writing. For this first draft, don't worry too much about mechanics. Just try to develop and support the ideas as clearly and convincingly as you can.

Revising. This can be thought of as re-visioning. After you have finished writing the first draft, let it sit for a day or two, then begin revising to make it clearer, more convincing, and smoother. This stage may involve rereading and rethinking, searching the text for supporting evidence, developing and supporting your ideas, getting feedback from classmates. You might literally cut your paper apart and rearrange parts of it. Read it out loud to someone else to see how clear it is. If it satisfies you, move on to final editing. If it still seems lacking, revise some more.

Editing. Write a new version paying special attention to matters of fine tuning—clarifying and sharpening, combining, condensing, making sure of the examples, and correcting the spelling, punctuation, and grammar.