Assignment: World Historical Marker Commission of TSU
Public history is any type of history that is directed at the general public (that is, NOT something done mainly for students and teachers in the history classroom). Historical markers are a form of public history that just about everyone has seen sometime, somewhere (there are several on the TSU campus). You will be creating your own historical markers for sites that were historically significant in the period before 1500 CE.
For more information on public history and historical markers:
National Council on Public History, "What is Public History?"
Historical Marker Database.
Assignment
Write a historical marker a place that was important before 1500 CE. Upload your marker into the D2L (elearn) dropbox for the assignment. Topics are indicated below. Your lowest grade will be dropped.
Compose a text (entirely in your own words) that is historically accurate, full of interesting detail, grammatically correct, and no longer than 150 words. The focus of your marker should be on the time period covered in the course (before 1500 CE and as indicated in the assignment).
Your historical marker assignment should include the following sections:
(1) Text of the marker. Required elements are a brief description of the historical site/object (remember that in real life marker readers are generally able to see the site, so keep this to a sentence and/or focus on things not necessarily visible), historical context (what was going on in that place generally, such as religious movement, establishment of an empire, etc.), specific historical details relevant to the site, and historical significance. Put information entirely in your own words. Try to avoid quotations since a real-life marker doesn't include facilitate citations, EXCEPT you are encouraged to quote briefly from primary sources if relevant (and you must, of course, clearly identify the sources). Even though real-life markers do not include citations of secondary sources, you should cite sources for all information (citations not included in the word count). Remember to stick to the 150-word limit.
(2) Process paragraph: This paragraph (about 100-200 words) will discuss your process in creating the marker. The first part of your paragraph should address the academic decisions you made in putting together the marker. Things to include are your decision to leave out some information (not enough room on the marker), your decision to include other information, things that you wanted to add but couldn't find information about (for example, if you wanted to give the population of a city but couldn't get that info), and decisions that you had to make about organization and presentation. Be sure to provide in-text citations of sources in this paragraph. The second part should be a more personal discussion. You can discuss why you chose your topic, how well you liked (or disliked) the available sources), any surprises along the way (either good or bad surprises; for example, there was a name that could be spelled several different ways, which made looking it up difficult, or if you found out something cool you didn't know before or if your sources gave seemingly contradictory information), and any help (from a librarian or a writing tutor, for example) that made your marker better. You will be graded on content (providing insight into how you worked) and writing (paragraph structure, grammar and style).
(3) Full citation (Chicago Manual of Style) of all sources used in your marker and in the process paragraph. You must use at least one article (minimum 200 words) in the collection Oxford Reference Online Premium or Gale Virtual Reference Library (both available on the eBooks page of the TSU library; password required for off-campus access); you may also use your textbook (give full citation of book and cite specific chapter and page numbers) and articles from JSTOR (available from TSU databases) and/or the History Compass Journal (in Wiley Online Library on the TSU library's Database page); note that these should supplement, not replace the Oxford and Gale Reference sources. If you wish to use any other sources, you must get written permission from the instructor ) at least 48 hours before the assignment is due and attach a copy of your correspondence to the assignment. Your fact-checker and the director will be looking to make sure that the information you include is supported by your sources, so include in the text of the marker ONLY information that you found in your sources and include in the citation section ALL sources used. If there is a disconnect between sources cited and the information in the marker text, you will be severely penalized. Your editor and the director will be looking to make sure that the form of the citation is correct.