History 202: Course Journal Instructions
The professor requires all enrolled students to complete a course journal. The goals of
the journal are: to provide practice in writing analytically; to encourage a critical
approach to the assigned reading; and to give students experience in the process of
historical analysis. The assignment makes students compare source documents from
Reading the American Past with the general overview of events, actors and outcomes
that The American Promise provides.
The source documents are found in the chapters of Reading the American Past. To
complete the assignment, answer the questions that the professor presents below.
Begin work on the assignment as soon as possible. When you compose your entries,
do not quote from the sources or other resources. Instead, cite the material that you
have selected for consideration or as evidence. Ask your professor for instructions.
You may not use a pencil to complete your assignment. Otherwise, the structure and
format of the assignment have no restrictions. You must complete one draft entry by
April 22 and turn it in for the professor’s inspection. Keep the draft with your other
entries as you work on the assignment during the quarter. Failure to turn in a draft for
review will lead to a 15-point penalty against your assignment’s overall score. Students
must turn in their completed journals, along with any reviewed drafts, in class on or
before June 3.
Assignment 1: The Gilded Age.
Review the source documents in chapter 18 of Reading the American Past and chapter
18 in The American Promise. Write a journal entry that addresses the following
questions. Cite the page number and the text from which you get the information that
you are using to answer the professor’s questions.
1. Inequality appears to be a given to the commentators in the reader. For each
commentator, what did inequality signal about the United States and what did
Americans need to do as a result?
2. Judging from the textbook’s overview of conditions in the Gilded Age, which
commentator appears to make the most sense? Explain your choice using
evidence cited –not quoted –evidence from the readings.
Assignment 2: Dissent and Conflict in the 1890s
Review source documents in chapter 20 of Reading and chapter 20 in Promise. Then
address these questions:
1. Which of the individuals whose testimony or writing appears in the reader is,
in the context of the 1890s, the most radical? What makes them so? Explain
your choice and cite evidence in support of your choice.
2 What made race so important to the individuals whose arguments appear in
the reader selections in this chapter?
HST 202: Course Journal Instructions, continued
Spring 2011
Assignment 3: Progressive Crusading
Using evidence from chapter 22 in Reading and chapter 22 in Promise, answer this
question:
In what ways were the ideas and arguments that Wilson, Debs, and Norvell make
In their printed selections “Progressive” and in what ways did their ideas and
arguments depart from the Progressive movement?
Cite –do not quote –evidence in support of your assertions and comparisons.
Assignment 4: The New Deal in Context
Using evidence from chapter 24 in Reading and chapter 24 in Promise, address this
question:
Hoover and Roosevelt had distinct views about the government and its role in
the economy. What events in the 1920s and 1930s supported the position of
each?
Cite –do not quote –evidence in support of your assertions and comparisons.
Assignment 5: Society’s “Children”
Review sources in chapter 28 of Reading and chapter 28 of Promise. Then answer this
question from the reader:
“4. Each of the documents in [chapter 28] makes assumptions about the state of
American Society and what it means to be an American. To what extent do the
documents agree and disagree about these matters? Each document called for
changes in the state of American Society. Did the documents also advocate for
changes in what it meant to be an American? If so what changes did they seek?
Why?”
Cite–do not quote –evidence in support of your assertions and comparisons.