Essay 1: PostSecret
PostSecretbegan as a personal art project and has become an international community, now entering its second decade. strangers from around the world have been sending their secrets to a suburban home in Germantown, Maryland, scribbled or pasted onto anonymous postcards. Over time, the mailbox at 13345 Copper Ridge Road has held not only secrets but wedding bands, engagement rings, and razor blades: objects taped to cards and sent away as untraceable secrets themselves.
Choose from questions #1-2 on page 395 of the Assignments for Writing Section to produce your rough draft.
Requirements
• Rough Drafts should be 2-3 pages long.
• Print and bring this rough draft to class on the due date indicated on the syllabus.
• All essays should conform to proper MLA style
• All drafts should be double-spaced, printed, and proofread for error. Your name should appear on the first page and in the header of every page along with the page number.
• Be sure to properly cite all Web or outside sources.
Proposal & Bibliography: ESSAY 2Proposal Due: Will be presented orally
Proposal
Your proposal will be a 5 minute (max.) presentation of your paper idea. Although you can change your idea for your paper at any time, the proposal is intended to help you build toward the final paper. In your proposal presentation you should:
1. Identify the topic or issue you will focus on and your thesis statement.
2. Create two research questions for your topic, and describe how your research questions will help you respond to your topic. Think about what the driving questions are that you have about this issue, what the main arguments are around it, and what you need to find out about it in order to take an informed position.
3. Specifically describe what kinds of primary sources you will look for - what are the specific texts or kinds of texts you want to focus on in your analysis?
4. Your proposal should identify your topic and the position you are taking, state the primary claims/points of discussion you will offer in your essay, and state at least one counterargument you are considering.
Note: A proposal is not a draft of your paper. In your presentationfully describe your main argument in this essay: what your topic is and what position you are taking.
Annotated Bibliography
This will be a brief annotated bibliography of your sources.
• Your annotated bibliography should include a minimum of two outside sources, plus an annotation for the essay the essay you chose from Emerging(so no less than three annotations). You must have a mix of primary and secondary sources.
a. Citations: Organize your citations alphabetically, just as you would on a Works Cited page.
b. Annotations: Annotations are basically further information you are providing about your sources, and so should be organized in paragraphs under each citation.
c. Provide 1 paragraph for each source: You will summarize the source and explain why you believe the source is credible or why you believe it is helpful for your paper. You may also include what specific parts of the source interest you (note: the summary is about the source as a whole and may not address specific points that are important to your topic).