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A. Assignment Overview

Total 100 Points

Be sure to review all the instructions and details before beginning.
Read all directions. If you are unclear about a particular portion, please ask for clarification as soon as possible.

What is your final assignment?

For this class, you are required to write either an essay or book review of our course book, A Different Mirror (2008).

Your book review should be at least 1,150 words. Please look at the final lecture to comprehend what goes in a book review. I highly recommend that contact me before the weekend if you are having trouble with the assignment. I will be unavailable to reply to messages during the final weekend.

*No external sources. Base your response on the author’s conversation in the assigned book and, as an add-on, you can tie in lectures, multimedia, and your own personal experiences, stories, and examples.

B. Essay Guidelines (60 Points)

Your essay should be 1,150+ words in length. There is three (3) dimensions used to evaluate this assignment. Combined, all three elements add up to 100 points.

1. Documentation (30 points): the topics discussed in your essay are supported by sources in this course by using page citations.
2. Structure (40 points): the technical/organizational requirements for your final exam.
3. Elements (30 points): the understanding and ability to academically apply course curriculum effectively in writing.

This is an academic course which means all responses are graded based on academic integrity and structure. Please remember to cite and substantiate your claims/argument with book/page or lecture references.

Evaluative Dimension #1:
SUPPORTED DOCUMENTATION (30 points)

In your essay or book review, I ask you to make sure to discuss and analyze the histories, identities, and experiences that make up American History based on the book. The groups to be included are Asian Americans, African Americans, European Americans, Mexican Americans, and Native Americans. Leaving out one or more groups may result in a grade deduction.

My hope is that you’ll entertain a broad range of topics, issues, concepts, and groups in your book review. To ensure you are discussing relevant topics discussed by Takaki in your essay, here is a list of prompts that you will want to consider (but not required) as you outline your book review.*

1. Define and discuss race and ethnicity.
2. Describe how indigenous and Native American culture and identity under European colonialism.
3. Describe and discuss the African Americans experience.
4. Discuss Takaki’s concept of El Norte and the Mexican American experience.
5. Discuss World War II and it’s dilemmas, with Japanese-Americans and African-Americans.
6. Describe and discuss the role of ethnicity or race in shaping Euro-American identity.
7. [OPTIONAL] Define and discuss Takaki’s notion of “We Will All Be Minorities.

*I would like you incorporate responses to at least four (4) of the prompts/questions above to ensure the scope of your review is broad enough to include multiple histories that make up American History.

Evaluative Dimension #2:

STRUCTURE & ORO (40 points)

Paragraph 1 (5 points)

Introduction / Thesis

Set the stage in one paragraph. Introduce your reason(s) for selecting the quotes and topics you will present and analyze as part of your book review. Based on your selected quotes, what is your argument/concluding analysis about the history, identity, and experience of ethnic groups in America? Your thesis statement should answer “Based on the book by Takaki, what is your main takeaway about American History?”

Summary of Content (10 points)

Brief summary of the key points of each chapter or group of chapters is required. Paraphrase the information, but use a short quote when appropriate.

Analysis and Evaluation of Content (20 points)

The core of your essay or book review – the thing that makes it your own – is the analysis and evaluation. This section should be organized into paragraphs that deal with single aspects of your argument. You do not necessarily need to work chronologically through the book as you discuss it. Given the argument you want to make, you can organize your paragraphs more usefully by themes, methods, or other elements of the book.

Conclusion (5 points)

Sum up or restate your thesis or make the final judgment regarding the book. You may find it more effective to write two paragraphs in order to balance the book’s strengths and weaknesses in order to unify your evaluation.

Evaluative Dimension #3:

ELEMENTS (30 PTS)

The elements below represent the second dimension I will be grading as part of your Final Exam. Your academic paper will be evaluated on your ability to achieve each element effectively. Your final submission should offer high quality writing that is both clear and substantive.

Definitive Quotes (10 points)

The quotes you select should support your thesis statement (“Based on the book by Takaki, what is your main takeaway about American History?”). Never let quotes stand on their own—explain them. There is one skill for picking out relevant quotes from a text, and another skill involved in understanding what it says. For each you will present and analyze it. Be sure to pick quotes throughout the books and incorporate the different perspective of authors on the same thing. See this short guide to quote analysisLinks to an external site. by UC Berkeley.

Thesis Statement (5 points)

Your essay’s thesis statement is a sentence that answers the question, “Based on the book by Takaki, what is your main takeaway about American History?” Your thesis needs to be stated upfront, usually at the end of the introduction. Your introduction should fit the body of your essay. The thesis ought to tell your reader exactly what you will be arguing in your paper. In addition, it ought to give the reader some hint about why you’re going to argue that way.

Academic Coherence (5 points)

The organization of the essay or book review is clear and academically cited. The essay is organized according to the narrative arguments made by the experts/authors used for this class. Throughout the body, the essay introduces and discusses analytic points that best support the thesis. Each paragraph is unified around a clear main point. Paragraphs each highlight a point in your argument and avoid unrelated topics. Quotations are punctuated correctly and integrated well into the essay to narratively support your thesis.

Course Concepts (10 points)

This course has introduced you to a new way to think that includes how to makes sense of issues around American identity and experience based on historical evidence in order to improve your objective understanding of U.S. history. Analysis is different than opinion or commentary. Opinion is strictly what you think. Evidence or education is not required. Commentary is an elaborated form of informed opinion. Depends if it is an expert or layperson, a commentary may imply accepted known facts in its general argument. Unlike the opinions or commentaries, analysis considers the evidence at hand and draws meaning from it using theoretical concepts and frameworks. In your final exam, your writing needs to demonstrate your ability to apply course concepts in your quote analysis. In other words, use concepts discussed in class to analyze quotes and create a strong argument.

C. Discussion Prompt

MAIN PROMPT

Write an essay or book review of our course book, A Different Mirror (2008).

Your essay or book review must address at least the below prompts according to (1) Professor Ronald Takaki as explained in A Different Mirror; (2) lectures given by Professor Francisco Fuentes; and, (3) course multimedia.

1. Define and discuss race and ethnicity.
2. Describe how indigenous and Native American culture and identity under European colonialism.
3. Describe and discuss the African Americans experience.
4. Discuss Takaki’s concept of El Norte and the Mexican American experience.
5. Discuss World War II and it’s dilemmas, with Japanese-Americans and African-Americans.
6. Describe and discuss the role of ethnicity or race in shaping Euro-American identity.
7. [OPTIONAL] Define and discuss Takaki’s notion of “We Will All Be Minorities.

D. Resources

TUTORIALS

Tutorial on “How to write an academic book review“

Tutorial on “How to write an academic essay“

Tutorial on MLA style guide (citations and examples)

Tutorial on APA style guide (citations and examples)

GRADING

Curious to know what an ‘A’ paper looks like?

I’d like to take a moment right now to describe in general terms the way I will read and interpret your final exam. I’ve laid out my remarks concerning letter grades below in order to give you a better sense of the impression and quality behind an academic essay.

You wrote an “A” Book Review when …

Book review offers a high quality of writing, organization, and precision. The mechanics are perfect in grammar, spelling and punctuation, reflecting time and thought put into the work, so that it is a seamless reading experience. Clearly justified and very easy to follow, so that the reader is left in no doubt as to why the structure proceeds as it does.
Ambitious, perceptive, and offer interesting, even complex ideas. The discussion or presentation enhances, rather than just repeats, the reader’s and writer’s knowledge. The paper does not just rehash the readings, there is a context for all the ideas; someone from outside the class would be enriched, not confused, by reading the paper. The discussion or presentation enhances, rather than just repeats, the reader’s and writer’s knowledge. The paper does not just rehash the readings, there is a context for all the ideas; someone from outside the class would be enriched, not confused, by reading the paper.

You wrote a “B” Book Review when …

Writing does not achieve the complexity or precision of a book review but thoroughly achieves its aims. Ideas are solid and their organization is understandable, even if some patches require more analysis and/or synthesis. The language is generally clear and precise but occasionally not, with a mechanical error or two on every page. There may be too little structure or explanation of where the author is coming from. The context for the evidence may not be sufficiently explored, so that I have to make some of the connections that the writer should have made clear for me. This is a solid work whose presentation, execution and ideas may be well done but at times falls back on vaguer statement, or doesn’t follow lines of thought as far as possible.

You wrote a “C” Book Review when …

The book review doesn’t move forward but rather repeats its main points, or it may touch upon many (not well related) ideas without exploring any of them in sufficient depth.
Punctuation, spelling, grammar, paragraphing, and transitions may be a problem, with errors on every page that get in the way of reading the content. The paper that is largely summary of the course material, or reiterates the text, but is written without major citations or in-depth analysis. The paper is chiefly a personal reaction to something which is poorly referred to or explained in such a way that it’s difficult to identify what the personal reaction is regarding. Well-written, but not as much intellectual content as needed—more opinion which is unconnected to the class. You gave some thought to but the paper has problems in one of these areas: conception (there’s at least one main idea but main ideas require more clarity); context (confusing); use of evidence (low or often absent—the connections among the ideas and the evidence are not made and/or are presented without sufficient reference to material from the course, or material proving empirical claims of fact, or add up to platitudes or generalizations): language (the sentences are often awkward, dependent on unexplained abstractions, sometimes contradict each other).

You wrote a “D” Book Review or worse when …

Your efforts in this book review fall short of grappling more seriously with key ideas. The paper is extremely problematic in many of the areas: aims, structure, use of evidence, language, etc. The paper does not come close enough to addressing the expectations of the assignment, weekly assignments were not connected and the readings were not interrelated to major points. The paper is shorter than they ought to be to grapple seriously with ideas. The paper is extremely problematic in many of the areas mentioned above: aims, structure, use of evidence, language, etc. The paper doesn’t come close to addressing the expectations of the assignment, and really seems to reveal that the weekly assignments were not connected and the readings were never read.