Description
Writing Assignment #3: Slavery
Purpose: The goal of this assignment is for you to gain a more nuanced understanding of slavery in the United States through analysis of primary documents. To do this, you will need to utilize the skills of document analysis weve been practicing each week, and demonstrate your ability to write clearly and follow the guidelines of writing for the historical discipline. This assignment will also include some research and citation formatting.
Directions: Each student should choose ONE of the primary source pairs listed in the module and use those two documents as the basis for their essay.
Students will then write at least 5 paragraphs (and at least 1,000 words) comparing and contrasting the perspectives of slavery expressed in these documents. What do these documents reveal about slavery in America?
Your short essay should have a thesis statement at the end of your first paragraph outlining your interpretation of the documents and their significance in argument form. Your paper must also provide specific examples from the text, and incorporate information from Building the American Republic and additional secondary sources that you choose through your own research. You should use at least two secondary sources in your essay, including Building the American Republic.
To support your thesis and analysis of the sources, you should provide relevant context, explain each documents perspective, analyze what the documents are arguing, and how the documents relate/inform one another. And finally, you will need to discuss what these documents reveal about slavery in the early 19th century. Or in other words, you should expand on the questions included in the courses document worksheet in essay format. You are not pretending to be the documents author you are using the documents point of view as a window into this controversial past event.