The Holocaust: Problems of Representating the Experience of Genocide in Literature & Film

fall 2006
English 261.401 Tuesday/Thursday 1:30-3 PM
Arts Cafe, Kelly Writers House

POSITION PAPERS

Each student will write 4 short position papers. They are due at the start of the class session, on the first day of discussion of a new reading or film. On the day when you are submitting a position paper, bring two copies to class. Keep one during class discussion and give one to Al as class begins.

The whole point of these papers is to help inspire passionate and well-informed class discussion; thus late papers, good as they might be, are not helpful to the class as a whole. Late papers cannot be submitted. Nor are papers submitted on time from a student who is not in class that day.

Position papers are short - between 500 and 750 words. The papers do not make a full interpretive or analytical case in support of the position being contended. They present the case generally and then give very specific instances of the interpretation and analysis that would be needed if the position were to be argued fully. Position papers indeed have a distinct interpretive position. You may anticipate a counterargument and/or present what you take to be an opposing view, but finally it should be very clear what your position is on the matter you are presenting. Your position responds to some issue, topic, problem, scene, character/person, narrative matter, or passage (in the case of a text). Be sure, at least at one point (or two), to be very specific. But also be sure to make your general contention. A rule of thumb: Ask yourself whether someone, upon reading this paper, would know how to disagree with its view.

References to--and brief quotations from--the text should be specific (including page citation). References to specific scenes or moments in a film should be as specific as possible.