Research documentation guides—M.L.A. style

• Detailed parenthetical citation MLA style at University of Wisconsin-Madison

• Detailed Works Cited MLA style at University of Wisconsin-Madison (NOTE: Don't use for online database sources. See next link for that.)

• Citing an online database source for an article: M.L.A. at Cornell U.

• Detailed advice for Annotated Bibliography and M.L.A. style

• How to cite a DVD, film, performance, TV, radio, online sources from Berkeley

• Detailed advice for Annotated Bibliography

Requirements

Overview

   All papers must be in 12 point Courier / Courier New, double-spaced, numbered pages—printed on one side. All papers must have a complete and accurate Works Cited page, M.L.A. style.

Touchstone Text

   How can you use class work, then, to help develop your own project?

   We will be reading and discussing Anthony Swofford's memoir Jarhead, which details his experience as a sniper in the first Gulf War. Making Jarhead the centerpiece, or even a sizeable portion, of your Senior Seminar Paper would result in failure of the course. If, however, you are interested in war and masculinity, you certainly should use class discussion of Jarhead to suggest ways that you might make another work the focus of your investigation, say, Michael Herr's Dispatches, about the Vietnam war. In this way, a class work, such as Jarhead, may become a touchstone for, say, a theme like self-destructive masculinity, but not the primary subject of your analysis.

  If you are unsure about your approach at any time, come by for a chat.

• 2 Brief Seminar papers (500-750 words—no longer) (20% & 20%) —Sign up for date

   Brief, but focused and forceful, assessments of the reading of the day and how readings connect to the seminar themes and/or your own research interest. Well-written and succinct, these papers are the product of serious, analytical consideration of the works at hand.

   Use your seminar papers to explore, engage and extend your understanding or questioning of masculinity, employing research that gives evidence of some serious, in-depth reading. Class discussion, and works read for and discussed in class, are meant to model and stimulate the kind of critical work that you will undertake in your own original research. A paper that rehashes works discussed in class will not succeed.

     The seminar papers should also include relevant research that you are using as it helps inform a discussion of the reading for the day that you present. That is, evidence of research undertaken on your own initiative is expected in the brief seminar papers. Papers that are wistful, casual, or anecdotal will not succeed.

   1) Offer a quick and incisive overview of the readings for the day and your own relevant research and how they bear upon a masculinity theme. This is synthesis, where you pull threads together and make sense of things. What do you see emerging from the readings for the day? What do connections, gaps, contradictions do you see when comparing our class discussions and the readings for the day to your own research?

   2) Focus on a particular vein drawing from your synthesis and open that up for the class. For instance, you find in your research that war builds a positive masculinity, a claim that contradicts the self-destruction theme discussed in class. You could make that your seminar paper thesis.

   3) Put a double-spaced hard copy of your paper in my mailbox by noon the day before the class your paper is due. Also, e-mail me a copy pasted into the e-mail.

   4) Each paper must have a complete and accurate bibliography (M.L.A Works Cited page).

   5) Make a photocopy for each member of the class. You may single-space these and print on two sides to economize, if you choose.

• Seminar Paper Proposal (500-750 words)—Due 3/11

   This is a formal, carefully written and developed, proposal that succinctly sets out your "project," anticipating—imagining yourself into—the final paper that you will write. Include:

• A possible title

• A working thesis. Include a statement on why your thesis is relevant or interesting.

• The primary texts that you will be working with—literary or cultural—and your anticipated focus.

• The secondary texts you expect to use and your anticipated use.

• A working bibliography

• Annotated bibliography (required) —Due 4/3

   1) Read your secondary sources—articles in journals or books by literary critics, feminist critics, African American studies critics, sociologists, psychologists, and so on—thoroughly, underlining and annotating;

   2) In a paragraph, summarize the author's thesis and how he or she argues the thesis;

   3) In a sentence or two, explain how the work is or may be relevant to the paper that you will write.

• How an annotated entry must look.

• Rough draft (required)—Due. 4/8

   This should set out a clear thesis and be as complete as possible. For incomplete drafts, append a detailed description of how you plan to finish the draft and make an appointment to turn in the incomplete draft in person during an office hour.

• Formal Précis (250 words) of long paper— Due 4/17

• Senior Seminar Paper (5,000-6,250 words) (60%)—Due 4/24

   The paper will foreground its theoretical position as it offers close, analytical reading of texts and/or cultural practices as they pertain to masculinity.

   An original, thoroughly researched and well-written essay exploring connections between scholarly discourse on masculinity and masculinity as represented in literary texts and/or in influential nonfiction texts and media. All papers will consider in depth at least one literary text (fiction or nonfiction). Films, other media and texts may be considered for analysis, but may account for no more than half of the paper's project.

   Use books and scholarly (or otherwise appropriate and influential) essays that you find in your research to support and develop your thesis. For literary papers, you must use the M.L.A. Bibliography in your research. For other papers focusing on, say, media representation and reception of masculinity, use the appropriate scholarly and media research databases. The number of scholarly articles and books that you end up using in the paper will be determined by how many relevant sources you find and by your approach.

• Use M.L.A. style for documenting sources used in the paper. Include a standard Works Cited page.

• Document all sources: if you get an idea, a paraphrase, or a quote from a source, credit and document it. Use of undocumented sources is plagiarism. Plagiarism results in failure of the course.

Heading:

• Name

• course

• date

• Précis: Place just above title.

• Title: Assert a descriptive, effective title.

The Research Portfolio (Turn in with final paper)

   Keep a research portfolio as you do your work. This means keeping all photocopies of articles and your own notes, excluding texts used in class or on reserve. Include the rough draft and other drafts in which you have made substantive changes. In all cases, works studied in class may not be used in your Senior Seminar paper, except as a briefly cited touchstone. (See above.) Please observe this requirement or risk failing the class.

What not to offer in your Seminar Paper

• mere summaries of works that never lead to analysis

• casual observations and rambling prose

• diffuse analysis that leads nowhere

• hurried work

What you should offer

• a focused thesis resulting from your close analysis of primary materials and masculinity theory

• work that engages the thinking of others (secondary scholarship), challenging or expanding theories as you develop your own thesis

• a professionally prepared final draft with a letter-perfect, style-perfect Works Cited bibliography

• a thoroughly revised essay, carefully edited for clarity, argument and analysis

General Course Policies

Coming Late to Class & Waltzing In and Out

   Walking in late is disruptive and counts as absence, as does walking in and out during class. If you have a special, documented need, let me know.

Office Hours

   My door is always open, and I am happy to see you during my office hours, as well as other times that I'm in my office—drop by or call or e-mail to see if I'm in. You are welcome anytime to come by and talk about your class work in general, or about a specific reading or essay draft on which you are working.

Learning Disabilities

   CNU Disability Policy: Students with documented disabilities are required to notify the instructor on the first day of class and in private if accommodation is needed. The instructor will provide students with disabilities with all reasonable accommodations, but they are not exempted from fulfilling the normal requirements of the course. Work completed before the student notifies the instructor of his/her disability may be counted toward the final grade at the sole discretion of the instructor.

   If you believe that you have a disability, you should make an appointment to see me to discuss your needs. In order to receive an accommodation, your disability must be on record in the Dean of Students’ office, 3rd Floor David Student Union/DSU (Telephone: 594-7160).

CNU Success Policy

   We want you to succeed at CNU; therefore I may notify the Academic Advising Center if you seem to be having problems with this course. Someone may contact you to help you determine what help you need to succeed. You will be sent a copy of the referral form. I invite you to see me at any time that I can be of assistance in helping your with the course material.

Attendance

   Not Attending Class Can Result in Failure of Course

   You may miss one week of class without any penalty or consequence. You are responsible for the material covered, of course, and I draw my exam questions from material covered in class, class discussion and lecture, as well as from our texts.

   Additional absences will result in reduction of your final course grade.

   That means that a "B" in all of your coursework can become a "C," if you have excessive absences. It also means that a passing grade for the course can become a failing grade for the course.

   In the case of an emergency, contact me as soon as possible. Emergency absences can be excused, and I may ask for documentation.

 Complete All Work

   You must complete all work by the last day of class to receive a passing grade.

Incompletes

   Given only in extraordinary circumstances. Plan to complete work by last day of class. Not completing the work results in an "F," not an "I."

A Few Themes &Works of Fiction to get you thinking about approaches you might take.

• Masculinity as performance

• Endless proving of masculinity for an audience

•Masculinity moving from inner values to outer show—consuming, body

•Social construction of gender v. essential gender identity

• Gender role abrasion

•Separate Spheres

•Black Masculinity —rage, justifying existence, self worth; holism, group identity, beyond social pathology

•Breadwinner Masculinity

• Self-made men

•Self-Actualizing Masculinity

Fathers

• "All the Way in Flagstaff" (Vintage)

• "Minor Heroism" (Vintage)

• "The Benchmark"( Dorris)

• "Jeopardy" (Dorris)

• "Winter Father," Andre Dubus

 Lost Men (and boys) & Loss

• "Murderers" (Vintage)

• "Talk of Heroes" (Vintage)

• "Men Under Water" (Vintage)

• "Emergency" (Vintage)

• "Qiana" (Dorris)

• "Name Games" (Dorris)

• "The Vase" (Dorris)

• "Rock Springs" (Vintage)

• "One More Thing" (Carver)

• "Mr. Coffee & Mr. Fixit" (Carver)

• "So Much Water, So Close To Home" (Carver)

Men Embattled

• Dispatches, Herr

• "The Things They Carried" (Vintage)

• Changing Fictions of Masculinity, Rosen

—introduction & chapter 1 (on Beowulf)

• Hamlet, Shakespeare

• Changing Fictions, chapter 3 (on Hamlet)

 Men in Transformation

• "Cathedral" (Vintage)

• "Earnest Money" (Dorris) in Working Men

• "Oui" (Dorris) in Working Men

• "Viewfinder" (Carver)

• "The Calm" (Carver)

• "Why Don't You Dance?" (Carver)

• "Groom Service" (Dorris)

Perceptions of Masculinity & Men in the Media

• "Merchants of Cool" PBS documentary and interviews, full video available online

• "Queer Guy With A Slob's Eye,"John Weir (8/10/03 NYTimes)

• "Coming Together Where A River Forks," Lou Ureneck (4/13/2003 NYTimes)

• "The Weaker Sex," Maggie Jones (NY Times 3/16/03)

Men & War

• From Chilvalry to Terrorism: War and the Changing Nature of Masculinity, Leo Braudy (reserve)

Primary texts:

•Henry IV: Part II, Shakespeare

• Henry V, Shakespeare

• The Illiad, Homer

• The Odyssey, Homer

• Dispatches, Michael Herr

• Beowulf

• Cold Mountain, Charles Frazier