The second formative assignment is a 500-word response on either unit 2 ('India in 1857') or unit 3 ('The Harlem Renaissance').

 

Unit 2: India in 1857

Select one of the following questions and compose a response in 500 words (excluding references and bibliography). The purpose of these questions is to enable you to practice, in a short piece of writing, the kinds of analytical tasks that you will undertake within more extended pieces of work for the long essay and the exam. Feel free to discuss the questions and texts with me (Stuart Middleton) if you wish.

Questions:

• Choose a text from unit 2 and comment on how it presents itself as a truthful account of the Indian uprising.
• Assess the usefulness of William Howard Russell’s reports for The Times as a source on the Indian uprising.
• Does the 'Narrative of Mainodin' present an account of the uprising in Delhi 'from purely native sources'?
• What is the effect of the numerous quotations from scripture and poetry in Katherine Bartrum's A Widow's Reminiscences?
• In what sense are Bartrum and Inglis's texts 'diaries', and does this affect their reliability as historical sources?
• Comment on how a history of the Indian uprising, of your choosing, reflects the political beliefs of its author.
• What is the most important ‘silence’ concerning the Indian uprising in Charles Dickens and Wilkie Collins’s The Perils of Certain English Prisoners?
• Assess the historical value of any fictional text on the Indian uprising of 1857-8.

 

Unit 3: The Harlem Renaissance

Select one of the following questions and compose a response in 500 words (excluding references and bibliography). The purpose of these questions is to enable you to practice, in a short piece of writing, the kinds of analytical tasks that you will undertake within more extended pieces of work for the long essay and the exam. Feel free to discuss the questions and texts with me (Alice Kelly) if you wish.

• How do Nella Larsen's Passing and/or Claude McKay's Home to Harlem represent distinct answers to the challenge of Black modernism?
• Choose one text from the unit to demonstrate what Houston Baker says distinguishes the Harlem Renaissance: namely, a move from the 'negro problem' to the challenge of building a Black nation.
• Choose one text and make an argument about why it best addresses the problem of the "racial mountain" laid out by Langston Hughes.
• Which character most successfully 'uplifts the race': Ray from Home to Harlem or Toledo from Ma Rainey's Black Bottom or another character of your own choosing?
• How has the Harlem Renaissance been selectively remembered?
• Which figure best defines what is distinctive about the Harlem Renaissance: place, migration, history, or philosophy?

 

Style and formatting requirements:

• Length: 500 words
• Format: 12-point, double-spaced, Times New Roman
• Student number at top of the page and in document name
• Paragraphs: use standard-length indents for paragraph breaks. No line breaks. Eliminate the extra spacing that Microsoft Word automatically inserts by going to ‘Format’, then ‘Paragraph’, and tick off the “Don’t add space between paragraphs” box.

 

Please email your assignment to the module convenors by 12pm (noon) on Wednesday 7 February 2024.