Using “Coming off Age in Mississippi” by Anne Moody, study the way that it could bridge a generic (that is, having to do with genre) divide between history and literature. Discuss how teachers could teach as literature, a book that is important, as history. Do the issues in teaching in those ways line up? Would the study of the book for its use of (or divergence from) literary/autobiographical conventions shed any light on how it might be used more effectively as history. Paper should include a descriptive but not pretentious title, an introduction that provides an overview of the issue at hand, a clear thesis, a brief survey of the pertinent scholarship (if any) on the particular issue, a description of what remains to be corrected or addressed in that body of scholarship, a description of the method you use to address the issue, careful engagement of both primary and secondary (if any) sources, a clear conclusion, and clear signposting throughout.
