Assignment task:
Overview:
Building on your outlining skills, you will outline an analysis of a medieval manuscript illustration and utilize the source text from the Bible to support it. You will need to select passages from the Bible to summarize, paraphrase, or quote, depending on the needs of your argument. Need Assignment Help?
Instructions:
Images are often created as a part of a larger work. This is true of illustrated pages in medieval manuscripts, which correspond to the text of the Bible. Like any visual narrative, these illustrations are an interpretation of a story, but unlike Greek myths, these images are dependent on clearly defined source material that must be interpreted by the artist and viewer. Due to the limitations of the medium, the illustrator must make choices regarding how to tell the story, what parts of the story to tell, and what parts of the story to omit. Those choices often serve the artist's, patron's, or broader culture's ideological motives and priorities.
In this assignment, you will begin to structure an analysis of the selected manuscript illustration, utilizing the text of the Bible to interpret the artist's choices. To accomplish this, you will fill out the attached worksheet, gather analytical observations about the image, and choose supporting passages from the text to summarize, paraphrase, or quote. From this process, you will also formulate a thesis statement based on your observation and analysis. For all steps of the assignment, you will use the annotation tool.
Step 1: Observe and Annotate
Before you formulate an argument, it is important to read the passage and examine the image for points of similarity and difference. For this step, I want you to find three to five passages you see present in the image, highlight the passage in the text, and indicate on the image where you see each of the passages.
Step 2: Formulate a Thesis Statement
Using the observations you have gathered in Step 1, formulate a thesis statement for your paper, filling in the appropriate area of your worksheet. Remember: A thesis statement is an argumentative statement that will be used to structure an essay. A strong thesis statement should be clear and specific, and make an argument based on your analysis.
A strong thesis should also have "stakes." This means that the statement should help you write a comparison that reveals something important about the meaning of the works and myths. For more guidance on how to formulate a successful thesis statement, review the tutorial from Step #1 of the Mythological Comparison (in Unit 2).
Step 3: Structure Your Argument
Once you have a strong thesis statement, fill out your worksheet. This is also in the annotation tool.
Fill the left column with the relevant observations about the image. If you have used your worksheet to take notes, be sure to rearrange your observations according to how you might best make your argument and erase any observations that do not contribute to that goal.
Fill the right column with relevant references from the Bible, choosing to summarize, paraphrase, or quote from the text. Each approach has its own purpose within a paper. Choosing which one to utilize will depend on the point you are trying to make. In general, summarizing and paraphrasing are used to convey broad ideas, while quoting should only be used if the actual text of the source is relevant or supportive of the discussion. When in doubt, it's probably best to summarize or paraphrase.
Check out these sources for more guidance:
- The Purdue Owl. "Quoting, Paraphrasing, and Summarizing." Purdue University.
- The Purdue Owl. "Paraphrase: Write it in your own words." Purdue University.
- GMU Writing Center. "When to quote, paraphrase, or summarize." George Mason University.
A good argument will have three to five observations -AND- three to five passages from the text to support it.
Citations:
The Bible is a bit of a different animal when it comes to citations. In many ways, this is easier.
There is only one footnote format you need to know.
1Book Title Chapter: Verse Version.
For this particular assignment, a footnote might look something like this: 1Genesis 19:7 NRSV.
At the end of your paper, this should be in your Works Cited:
Exodus. In The Holy Bible: NRSV, New Revised Standard Version. New York: Harper Bibles, 2007.
Submission
For this assignment, you will use the annotation tool to annotate and fill out the outlining worksheet.