English 1A/Pepper
Major Assignment #1
Defining the Abstract Through Personal Experience
By this point in the semester we have read Kay S. Hymowitz’s “The Teening of
Childhood” and Marie Winn’s “The End of Play.” Both essays are quick to point out the various
problems and attacks on this country’s notion of childhood, but you may have noticed that
neither essay offers very many solutions. In one sense you can look at these essays as mere
reports on problems—interpretations of the problems that leave it to the reader to think of
solutions. But these essays may also be looked at as the authors (both of them adults) invoking a
nostalgic longing for the past.
A basic definition for “nostalgia” is a wistful longing to return either personally or as
a society to the conditions or ideas of an earlier time period in history. Of course, nostalgia
is an abstract concept and therefore not as easily defined as something concrete that you can
touch and feel. There’s a world of difference in defining something like a desk (which any two
people who look at will describe in relatively the same way) and something like patriotism,
which is another example of an abstract concept. You merely need to look at out recent political
climate to realize that average Americans define “patriotism” in drastically different ways.
Defining the abstract can rarely be done in a dictionary with only a few sentences. To
define the abstract, one must often use an extended definition which requires multiple pages and
the consideration of multiple aspects of the concept to explain. With this in mind, your
assignment is as follows:
Write an essay of extended definition that explains all aspects of nostalgia as you
come to understand them through pre-writing and re-reading of the two articles.
Remember, since nostalgia is abstract, everyone might choose to empathize different
aspects and there really is no right or wrong answer. Therefore, you and your own
personal experiences and observations are the authority in this particular essay. To that
extent, your essay will be evaluated on the extent to which it reveals something about you
and your life but always does so for the purpose of defining nostalgia.
There are any number of ways to accomplish this, and figuring out the way that suits you
best is a large part of this assignment. Perhaps you want to be nostalgic yourself throughout the
essay. Or maybe you want to describe how family members or older people in your life
demonstrate nostalgia and how it ends up affecting you. Maybe you want to take the exploration
to a larger scale and talk about how you see nostalgia around you in daily media, fashion, or
activities. What ever route you choose, remember that your examples and stories should always
be working towards definition and should not be there just for the sake of being there.
Ask yourself the following questions to get your pre-writing started.
 what causes someone to become nostalgic for something? What
role does the present have to do with shaping that nostalgia?
 what are some of the qualities inherent in nostalgic objects (think of the
marbles in Winn’s essay) or time periods that may account for their appeal?
 is it possible for someone your own age to even be nostalgic or does nostalgia
only come with more years under your belt?
 is nostalgia a worthless pursuit entered into only by old farts, or is there some
value in nostalgia itself
These are just a few questions to start you off. The only limit is your own imagination.
Nitty gritty no-fun stuff— Refer to your syllabus for proper paper format. Give your paper an
appropriate title. If I see Essay #1, I will not dock you, but I will not be a happy camper either.
This paper should be 4-5 pages.
Due Dates
September 24th—bring three copies of first draft for peer workshopping. Failure to bring three
copies will not only hurt you with a lack of feedback, but your participation grade for the class
will also seriously suffer.
September 27th—first draft is due along with second draft reflecting changes since the workshop
October 4th—final draft is due at beginning of class. Turn in all previous drafts and any prewriting