GUIDELINES FOR FALL-TERM POSITION PAPER

This paper assignment offers an opportunity to engage more deeply with the issues raised in one week’s reading. After carefully reading the assigned texts, please write a 3-5 page essay that makes a strong argument in answer to one of the following questions. Your essay is due at the beginning of class on the day the issue will be discussed:

1. Were reformers justified in their efforts to change the behaviour of poor people? (due 6 October)

2. Which was more significant in the lives of poor southerners in the post-Civil War South -- race or class? (due 13 October)

3. Did poor children really benefit from the work of the SPCC? (due 20 October)

4. Should the state have had the power to quarantine Typhoid Mary? (due 27 October)

5. Were settlement workers like Jane Addams motivated by the desire to help poor people or control them? (due 17 November)

To produce a good essay, you must begin by doing the assigned reading very carefully. Follow the guidelines in the handouts "How to Read a History Book” and “How to Analyze a Primary Source," making sure that you fully understand the scholarly arguments and any primary source that has been assigned. Ask yourself how the readings complement one another. Where do they differ, and where do they agree?

Only after you have come to grips with the reading should you begin to develop your own argument – and locate the concrete evidence you will need to back it up. You may, if you wish, do additional reading, although this is not required. You may also use some evidence from recent times, provided that it does not overwhelm your historical analysis. Finally, you are permitted (and in fact encouraged) to discuss your overall argument and specific ‘talking points’ with other students writing on the same topic. However, the paper itself must be written by you and you alone.

Your paper will be marked for grammar and style as well as for the persuasiveness of your argument. Please follow the History 4069 style guide. Make sure that your essay is divided into proper paragraphs (with a separate introduction and conclusion). Sentences should be complete and in a logical order, and there should be no spelling or grammatical errors. Quotations should be transcribed exactly and placed in quotation marks. If no outside sources have been used, you may put citations in parentheses, with page numbers following the quotation “like this.” (Ladd-Taylor, p. 3) If you do outside reading, please use footnotes or endnotes following the Chicago Manual of Style, as described on the style guide.

Please be considerate and put your paper in proper form. Don’t forget to number the pages, check for typos, and use proper methods of citation. Notes and rough drafts must be turned in with your essay. Late papers will be penalized.