Women’s Studies

Order Description
This paper should develop a focused analytical idea using textual evidence. Please use MLA citation and pay attention to the advice for papers in the syllabus.

Paper Guidelines:
Keep the following in mind as you draft your papers, both VSPs and the LP.
• Use correct MLA format. Don’t know what it is? Consult a style manual in the library. THERE ARE NO
EXCEPTIONS to this. If your paper does not follow MLA style format, you will lose half a point.
• Papers must be double-spaced, with margins of at least an inch. The font should be 12 pt.
• Title you papers!
• DO introduce key terms and main ideas of your argument early in your paper. Make sure your argument is about what a text does. That is, make a claim that an author or text endorses or stages a certain argument or world view and use the text to prove that claim. Define your terms as you proceed.
• DO support your argument with textual evidence. When you make an assertion, substantiate it with a
short, concise quote, and then move on to your next point. If you wish to quote a text at length, make
sure you justify this by doing a close, analytical reading of the quote, paying particular attention to
language, rhythm, meaning, connotations, etc., in order to further your argument.
• DO ask yourself the all-important question, “So what?” Why is what you’re saying important or crucial? Imagine a resistant reader who is always skeptical, always asking at every step along the way, “So what?” Once you’ve established what you think is a workable thesis, ask yourself if there are larger
implications to your claims. What do the specific, interesting things you’ve noted in your argument do? Are there political or social ramifications to your argument? While you might not include these ideas in your introductory paragraph, you will find them handy when you make a graceful exit from your paper. A conclusion that saves a little something new for your patient reader is always appreciated!

Think about each paragraph proving and developing a piece of the larger argument. One of the primary outcomes to this course is critically analyzing texts using the lens of gender. Everything you need to write the paper is in the readings for this class. I discourage you from doing further research because that often leads to plagiarism (intended or not) and that will result in failure of the course.

Please, please, please do not go to external sources for help – seriously, you have developed fantastic reading skills in this class! Trust them! I’m not looking for “genius” or mindbending/groundbreaking readings… I’m looking for demonstration that you “get” what kinds of arguments texts make, how and why literature matters, and how to assert, prove, and develop an argument using text(s).

Prompt: “Feminism: The radical notion that women are people.” – slogan of the National Organzation of Women. Using the texts we’ve read so far, what do you think feminism is? Is it “radical”? What might its implications be for society and/or for you personally?

Only available sources:

-Persuasion by Jane Austen
-Roxana by Daniel Defoe
-Vindication of the Rights of Woman by Mary Wollstonecraft
-A Room of One’s Own by Virginia Woolf
-This Sex Which is Not One by Luce Irigaray