Sexuality/ Overt Sexual Situations

Purpose: To formulate a clear, argumentative thesis statement, and develop support for it in an essay that utilizes academic research, interpretation, and a visual “text.” You will learn and practice the following research skills: evaluating sources, citing sources, effectively incorporating paraphrase and/or quotes and engaging in our class readings (articles from Composing Gender & The Atlantic).
Step one: After carefully reviewing as many music videos as you can, pick one that speaks to the gender issues we have talked about in this class thus far. You may pick from any era or language/ country.
Contextual and audience information: Since the work you will undertake in this paper (textual analysis/interpretation) is most commonly found in academic writing, where readers often know something about the text under discussion, we will work with a common text – music videos. Assume that while all your readers may not be members of this class, they have seen the video and are familiar with some of the discussions around it; thus you do not need to waste time summarizing the video. Your goal in this task is to discuss ideas, themes, and rhetorical strategy, NOT to tell me if you liked or disliked the video. You may use “I” (first person) as long as it relates to your argument.
Writing Task: To what extent is gender represented in this music video? Analyze one scene, theme, idea, character, motif, image, set of images, audible effect, issue, or technique used in the video/s.
You may write about one or two videos. Two would be to use a compare/ contrast approach. However, note if you decide to talk about two of the videos, there must be a clear connection! Careful — Your focus is not the song itself.
Focus on the VIDEO, not the song. This is a visual analysis; so I often tell people to watch the video many times with no sound on.
Consider how this video may have moved gender equality further, or halted it. You may need to contextualize the time/place/director/artist to accomplish this.
Ensure that your essay has a focus/thesis, and is not a collection of unconnected points about the video. While you are analyzing one aspect of the video/s, a strong paper will make connections between this one aspect and what you see as the important issues about/in the video/s.
You should use research to support YOUR thesis. Support your thesis with specific reference to and examples from the video/s, and detailed discussion of these references/examples. The research will come from our class articles. You are not required to find outside sources. Use of Composing Gender and Orenstein’s article in The Atlantic will suffice for this essay.
This is not a report-where you collect and then report information. Instead, you will develop and argue a debatable position on your selected topic. You will not turn in a paper that pieces together other people’s ideas or a summary. Instead, you will support a thesis statement and use sources to back up your claims.
As many of these videos use adult and college-level themes, only choose those if you feel comfortable discussing, re-watching, and reading about those ideas.
Use of counterargument will be mandatory for an “A” paper.
Suggestions to steer your idea/thesis – You may choose a topic from one of the following options in relation to the writing task above or I encourage you to explore your own:
Nudity
Sexuality/ Overt Sexual Situations
Social Norms
Religion/ Religious Symbols
Gender or Gender Roles
Identity
LGBTQ representation
Race
Pop Culture theory
Consumerism
Self – Realization
Socioeconomic Relationships
Color Theory
Costumes
Remember you must have an argumentative edge. Meaning, you don’t just want to summarize what the text is about, but analyze and interpret.
Quoting from the works Carefully choose quotes from the article or video(s) to support the arguments you are making in each paragraph. I would recommend including 1 brief quote (less than 4 lines of text) in each paragraph. You many include no more than 2 long quotes (more than 4 lines). Remember to provide analysis for each quote. Do not simply summarize the quote. Ask yourself, “why is this quote important?” or “how does this quote support the ideas in this paragraph?”
Quoting from Outside Sources: You must use 2+ of the articles provided from either CG or The Atlantic (Orenstein). Wikipedia, Spark Notes, Ask.com, Yahoo Answers or any similar study guide or Q&A websites are not acceptable sources for this essay.
I have designed a research page Links to an external site.for this course; it may help you as a starting point for your papers.
General Tips:
Be very specific! List your main points or reasons in your thesis statement. I may refer to this as a complex thesis statement or demonstrating the HOW, WHY, or BY WHAT MEANS within the thesis.
Your thesis is often the last 1 or 2 sentences of your introduction.
Mention the full title and author’s first and last name somewhere in the introduction.
Include at least 1 quote from the texts in each paragraph.
Come up with an interesting title “Essay 1,” “Final Draft,” or using the title of one of the texts is not adequate. Create your own title.
Format: Upload your Essay as one file (doc or PDF only) before the due time on 02/28. Format is mandatory as double- spaced, MLA 8th Edition, 12 point font, one-inch margins on all four sides, Times New Roman. You must include a Works Cited Page with your essay. You must check your upload to verify that it uploaded correctly. If I can’t open your essay, you will not receive credit. Students that use .pages (or any other program) need to review their format and upload with care. Review the syllabus policy on late work. I urge you to edit with rigor and revise. Don’t fluff your writing; make every word matter. You will be evaluated on your engagement with our course materials, critical thinking, grammar/ punctuation, and style. Your Works Cited page is not included in your 1,200 word requirement.
Review the ENG 305 essay grading rubric in advance and while you revise your writing.
Refer to the OWL website (Links to an external site.) (Links to an external site.) if you need MLA citations or Works Cited Page.
All students are encouraged (and may earn extra credit) to seek writing help at the online CenterLinks to an external site.. review the following links as you will be evaluated on structure, organization, cohesion, citations, support, and how you craft your essay in relation to our main course ideas. Do not hesitate to ask for help.
Tips on Essay Structure (Links to an external site.)
Template to Help You Outline
Need help writing a good introduction? (Links to an external site.)
Every good essay has a solid thesis (Links to an external site.)
How do I write a counterargument? (Links to an external site.)
Basic Essay structure, “The Classical Argument” (Links to an external site.)
Need help thinking about a counterargument? database to help you.
MLA REMINDERS:
* Videos, Song Titles, TV episodes, and Podcasts are in “quotes”
* Books, Websites, TV Shows, Albums, and Films are underlined or in italics
* Articles or Chapters are in “quotes”
Finally, I permit multiple uploads until the essay is due. Use this as a tool to help you. View your originality report to check your citations and correct where needed. This is your responsibility. If you are unsure how to use this, click this video HERE (Links to an external site.). Ignore that this was designed for Moodle, and not Canvas. Anything over 18-20% and you might want to verify you have not strung together any questions that don’t have explanation or support for each of them.
If you have questions, email me sooner than later!
When you are done, have read this prompt several times, went over the rubric, reviewed workshop comments multiple times,