LITR201 Essay 3: Folk Tales as Cultural Productions

Instructions

Folk Tales as Cultural Productions
This third essay assignment asks you to think about the Middle Eastern and African folk tales. For this essay, you may only reference these specific works,
though some minor citation and use of secondary sources is allowed.
Since this is a close-reading essay, however, please use secondary
sources only sparingly.
Be sure to focus your essay on a strong thesis, organize it around a
few specific main points, and support your response with evidence from
the text or texts you are discussing, especially quotations, as you
respond to one (1) of the following prompts:

Looking
at either the Middle Eastern Tales or the African Tales, focus on 2 or 3
main characters’ goals, actions, and/or social mores. Create an
argument that explains what do these characters show you about the
ideals and values of the culture from which they come. Support your
claims through interpretation of direct and specific evidence from the
texts you’re discussing.

Choose
one (1) tale from the Middle Eastern Tales and one from the African
Tales, and create a thesis that compares what these showed you about the
audience for those readings in terms of what they found important
and/or entertaining. Do the tales seem to show any shared values, or are
they completely different?

Compare
the role that religious teachings seem to play within one or two
stories. Are they central? Peripheral? Completely unrelated? If
necessary, do some research on the religions being represented so that
you can work from an informed viewpoint.

Some
of the African stories we read focus heavily on animals as
protagonists. Why do you think that the tellers chose to use animals in
these roles? What would change if a human figure were to be used?

Make your own topic:
come up with your own critical question about the assigned works from
this unit, and write an essay arguing for your answer to that question.
If you choose to do this prompt, please note that you are required to post your critical question and working thesis to the Week 9 Essay forum so that you can receive feedback from your instructor and classmates.

Please be sure your essay also meets the following guidelines:

Has a word count of 600-900 words (check with your instructor before submitting anything longer)

Includes the student-teacher cover letter

Format
the essay using MLA essay format (see the attached sample essay) and
MLA-style citations, including a works cited list at the end; for help
with MLA format, please visit Diana Hacker’s.bedfordstmartins.com/resdoc5e/RES5e_ch04_o.html”>Research and Documentation Online

Spell check, and watch out for homonyms!