Written Assignment #1 – Time Travel to Where? Format: As per course outline: Word document (not pdf) – upload to Moodle in ‘Assignment’ folder – double spaced
Requirements: 750 to 1000 words approx..(more is OK, less means it might not be as developed as it should be…..)
3 sources (academic) minimum: Only 1 encyclopedic/Research starter source permitted) – no more than 1 website (educational/academic) – sources of an academic nature – 1 audio visual (podcast/documentary) acceptable if of an academic quality. NB: More than one website is acceptable for ‘news’ of your contemporary aspect, if necessary. Make sure they are reputable news sources.
Works Cited in MLA9 format (use style guide)
Objectives:
This first assignment has multiple objectives: (Research – ThiAllow students to explore a topic and historical time period that interests them.
Intended to get students practicing the goal of ‘making an argument’ (your ‘Thesis’) on a historical topic
Using specific and detailed historical facts to support their argument (the ‘Evidence’)
Researching and using academic historical sources
Referencing their sources using both in-text citations as well as a Works Cited page (MLA9 required)
Asking students to think of the connections between our present day and past historical moments/events around the world, and across time….
Question:
Todays’ global world is full of news of events and things happening all around the planet, from Montreal to Russia, Southeast Asia, Africa, South America…. Etc. Economies are changing and evolving; people are immigrating and moving from one region to another; wars are erupting all over the world every decade; different groups of people are persecuted for various reasons; and in some places governments and nations are becoming more progressive or authoritarian …..at times it’s discouraging to see our global world in such disarray…..
But if we look at our historical past, these kinds of things have been happening for centuries, so has our world really changed? Would you argue that our present-day world has changed significantly from the past, or do our contemporary global challenges and events bear a resemblance to the past? If we could time travel back in time and place to explore this connection, where would you go and in what way does it connect to or inform our present?
Answering the question asked of you will help you formulate a thesis position (your ‘argument’). You will need to explain, argue and support whatever position you choose and state in your introduction through the use of historical facts and argumentative statements to convince your reader.
Proper essay structure is required with an Introductory paragraph with its clearly stated Thesis; separate body paragraphs with strong topic sentences that convey the idea under discussion and a solid mix of both specific historical details interspersed with argumentative sentences. A concluding paragraph to wrap up your argument.
Don’t forget in-text citations when you are quoting something specifically from a source, or paraphrasing ideas or information taken from one of your sources. Use your MLA9 style guide to in-text reference correctly the different type of sources used (ie. a book is referenced differently than a documentary). And of course, a Works Cited that references all your sources used.
How to start………you could approach this from either direction:
If you know you’d like to time travel and explore Australia back when Britan started shipping prisoners from UK to Australia in the late 1700s, then you could discuss the historical conditions of this decision, what this early ‘prison system’ looked like, and who was ‘transported’ to Australia. To connect it to today’s world, perhaps you could make an argument that the prison systems and who get incarcerated hasn’t really changed much in 240 years; marginalized peoples are still being incarcerated at a much higher rate in many countries today….Black Americans, Indigenous peoples, working class people, etc. just like in Britain in 1780…..
Or a contemporary issue like Alberta, Canada and trans kids’ rights makes you wonder if it is different / better/worse than what the gay community faced in earlier times. I could time travel to Stonewall, NY and mid/late 20th century United States and compare t events today with the early American and Canadian gay rights movement. I could argue that despite the advancement in rights for gay and trans rights in the last decades of 20th century North America, this recent Conservative government involvement highlights a regression of human rights for this group of people in Canada…..
