Essay 2 Overview This essay builds on the analytical skills you practiced

Essay 2 Overview

This essay builds on the analytical skills you practiced in essay 1–and that we’ve been practicing all semester. You’ll use close reading to respond to a scholarly article about one of the literary texts we’ve read this semester. By writing about a scholarly article, you will hopefully achieve the following goals:

Gain a deeper understanding of the literature.

Incorporate research into your writing and cite sources appropriately.

Recognize that literary studies is a scholarly field, and conversations about these texts happen beyond our class.

Your essay should contain a thesis: a claim in which you agree and/or disagree with the article’s argument. Then, you will use close reading and evidence from the literature we’ve read to support your thesis. Your analysis should discuss your thoughts about the article’s major points. Here are some questions to help you generate ideas:

What makes you agree and/or disagree with the article’s main points? Which points are convincing/not convincing and why?

What makes the essay’s close reading of the literature strong? Could you add on to the close reading in any way?

Are there parts of the literature that the article overlooks–parts that you think should be analyzed regarding this topic? If so, provide that analysis using the close reading strategies.

Does the article mention other texts written by the author? Do the points about those texts connect to the literature you’re focusing on, and if so how?

Submit at least 750 words of your draft of Essay 2. It’s okay if it’s a rough draft. Feel free to include any specific questions you have about your draft in the file or in a comment on the assignment.

***Please upload as a Microsoft Word file (.docx) because this is the file type that is compatible with the plagiarism checker software.

***Include a thesis and a Works Cited page (scroll down for help with this). 

 Works Cited page

At the minimum, you should have two sources on the WC page (the article you are analyzing and the literature).

Cite the work of the literature like we did in Essay 1 (use the format for a work in an anthology).

Here’s MLA format for an academic article from a library database (screenshot from this page on Purdue OWLLinks to an external site.):