Inquiry 2
English 112
Composition and Literature
Cultural and Historical Analysis
Description:
Sources:
Total Points:
Turn in:
Due:
(a) Annotated Bibliography
(b) 10-minute multi-media oral presentation
(c) 5-6 page thesis-driven essay
A desert island narrative of your choosing
Several other academic sources to aid in your analysis (see below)
300
Final draft of Essay, and Writer’s Memo (for part c)
(a) on the “Assignments” tab of niihka, by class time on the due date
(b) in class, on the first day marked for class presentations
(c) on the “Assignments” tab of niihka, by class time on the due date
The Assignment
The goal of this assignment will be the development of a class-wide “archive” of desert island stories, built over
the course of three distinct phases (see below), and culminating in a longer, thesis-driven essay analyzing the
cultural and historical significance of a desert island narrative of your choosing. Even before the research and
presentation-building necessary for developing your argument, spend some time over the next few days selecting
the object of your inquiry. Look over the list of desert island texts appended to this assignment sheet (or research
a different text not mentioned here), and come to the next class with a list of your top five preferences for this
inquiry. After receiving confirmation on which text has been selected for you, familiarize yourself with the text
fully (read it, watch it several times, play it for an extended period, etc.) over the next couple of weeks while you
also conduct research for the annotated bibliography phase of this assignment. Next, prepare an analytical
argument about some of the issues this text raises and explore their larger cultural and historical significance by
setting up a 10-minute-long presentation to the class. This presentation will function as a graded rough draft for
the essay.
Part A: Annotated Bibliography (Worth 50 points)
To prepare for your presentation and essay, you will need to do substantial research into your chosen text by
finding materials that either help critique or contextualize it. That is, your research may be about your text, or it
may provide helpful cultural context for it. As a guiding principle for your inquiry, develop a list of analytical key
words for yourself as we have practiced in class, and use those as a basis for your research. For example, if you
had chosen Foe, you might include an essay on its depiction of “sexuality,” but you also might include a book
addressing the history of Robinson Crusoe “adaptations” or one dealing with eighteenth-century British
“colonialism.” All sources that you find must be suitable for academic writing: use the resources provided through
our libraries, as discussed in class. Compile a minimum of five sources for your bibliography.
For the bibliography itself, provide an MLA-style citation for each source, as well as a paragraph (roughly 200
words) that (a) summarizes the main argument of the source and (b) explains its specific significance for your
chosen text. Please upload the annotated bibliography to “Assignments” in niihka on the appropriate date.
Part B: In-Class Oral Multi-media Presentation (Worth 100 points)
Now that you have completed your preliminary research, you will have a more complicated and nuanced
understanding of the text, one that will benefit the class as a whole. In a ten-minute (no more, no less) class
presentation, you will share your analysis with your peers by focusing on one scene of the text. Though you will
only address one scene, your argument should make claims about the larger argument of the text as a whole.
Your researched materials will function as a lens for your analysis (you must use at least one of the sources from
your bibliography), and you will explain both how these critics help forward some aspect of your analysis, but also
how your analysis goes beyond what they can account for. Your presentation must use some form of visual aid
(PowerPoint, Prezi, clips from the scene, a handout with a specific passage of text, etc.) in order to advance your
argument and to better show your audience (rather than tell them) how you are making these claims.
NOTE on Group Work: You may present on a single text as a group, but within very specific limits. Should multiple
students express interest in the same text, they will be responsible for presenting as a group; however, each
student will still be expected to present ten minutes of analysis. (There will be a limit of four students assigned to
any film, TV series, or book and two students assigned to any short story or individual TV episode.) It will be
important that the group meet to discuss which person will be analyzing which scene as well as the combination
of the presentations as a whole. Group members will have to make sure that they not only choose different
scenes, but that their analysis covers different themes and/or issues within the text. It will be extremely
important that the individual presentations do not repeat similar ideas or information, and that they are
connected in a fluid and logical order, with effective transitions between individual students’ parts. You may find
that you will use similar sources for the annotated bibliography or for your analysis here, so when using the same
theoretical or historical lens, in order to avoid repetitiveness with the “fits/does not fit” part, students may
choose to divide up the “fits” from the “does not fit,” with one or two students using the source to help explain
their analysis and the other one or two students showing how their analysis of the text goes beyond what s/he
can account for. All of this will need to be worked out during group meetings, along with any logistics concerning
the showing of film clips, etc.
Part C: Cultural and Historical Analysis Essay (Worth 150 points)
Now that you have assembled your materials and received feedback on your preliminary findings through your
presentation, you are ready to present your final analysis in its most formal and sophisticated form. Craft a wellorganized, well-supported paper analyzing your text and citing at least two of the sources you’ve used in your
bibliography and/or presentation.
This analysis should take the form of a 5-6-page thesis-driven essay, following the strategies for developing thesis
statements, paragraph structure, and essay organization we have been discussing through the whole semester.
The Writer’s Memo
In a short, 1-2-page memo (addressed to me), take the opportunity to reflect on your writing process. Some
questions to consider (though you needn’t address all of these) include: How did you select this particular text?
How did you focus on those particular implications? Were there other ideas (from other sources) that you had
uncovered that you did not explore here? If so, why not? What aspects of this essay did you find particularly
challenging? Why? What are one or two aspects of your writing that you would like to improve for future essays?
Do you have ideas of how to address those issues? This short writer’s memo should follow the format of a
standard professional memo, which is to say, be sure to cut out anything superfluous that does not address the
topic of your rhetorical choices for this assignment and your strategies for improving your writing in the future.
Criteria for Evaluation (for Part C)
 Focus: the focus of your essay should examine the text as closely as possible, while using a number of
peer-reviewed, academic sources to aid in your cultural and historical analysis of this object
 Unity: the essay will be unified by clear arguments about what the text means and why it is historically
significant; the thesis will address every aspect of your argument, including those aspects that rely on
your use of secondary sources
 Coherence: each paragraph has a topic sentence and moves logically from one to the next with careful
transitions
 Support: this should appeal to specific and concrete detail from the text to support to your claims, along
with specific quotations from the secondary texts that help advance your claims
 Critical Thinking: critically engage with the text’s implicit and symptomatic meaning; in other words, it
should reflect how you are critically interpreting these details why they matter: So WHAT?!
 Readability: trim any fat from your prose (make every word count!), revise for clarity, and check for
proper spelling and grammar
List of Possible Desert Island Texts
Film
Television
Forbidden Planet (Wilcox 1956)
Robinson Crusoe on Mars (Haskin 1964)
Blue Lagoon (Kleiser 1980)
Crusoe (Deschanel 1988)
The Island of Dr. Moreau (Frankenheimer 1996)
Muppet Treasure Island (Henson 1996)
Six Days, Seven Nights (Reitman 1998)
The Beach (Boyle 2000)
Cast Away (Zemeckis 2000)
Swept Away (Ritchie 2002)
The Breed (Mastandrea 2006)
Gilligan’s Island (1964)
Lost in Space (1965)
Fantasy Island (1977)
“Das Bus.” The Simpsons (1998)
Survivor (2000)
Temptation Island (2001)
“Lost at Sea” or “South Pacific.” Survivorman (2004)
“Hawaii: Deserted Island.” Man vs. Wild (2006)
Crusoe (2008)
Arrow (2012)
Video Games
Literature
Shakespeare, William. The Tempest (1610-11)
Wyss, Johann David. The Swiss Family Robinson
(1812)
Ballantyne, R.M. The Coral Island (1857)
Verne, Jules. The Mysterious Island (1874)
Stevenson, Robert Louis. Treasure Island (1883)
Wells, H.G. The Island of Dr. Moreau (1896)
Golding, William. Lord of the Flies (1954)
O’Dell, Scott. Island of the Blue Dolphins (1960)
Walcott, Derek. Pantomime (1978)
King, Stephen. “Survivor Type” (1982)
Cesaire, Aime. A Tempest (1985)
Morpurgo, Michael. Kensuke’s Kingdom (1999)
Martel, Yann. Life of Pi (2001)
Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag
Tomb Raider
The Sims: Castaway Stories