19th Century Horror Stories

The seminar paper is your opportunity to examine the major critical issues, historical, social, and cultural contexts, and/or authors we have studied in this course in light of your own interests and expertise as an English major. It is, in this sense, meant to be a cumulative experience, designed to allow you to integrate knowledge from your other courses and area of deep study, and to engage with the scholarly expectations of English as an academic discipline. Write your seminar paper on Frankenstein by Mary Shelley (1818 Text), the article, “My Words to Victor Frankenstein Above the Village of Chamounix: Performing Transgender Rage” by Susan Stryker, “This Thing of Darkness’: Frankenstein and Racial Discourse” by Allan Lloyd Smith, The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson.

The core expectations and corresponding skills on which you will be evaluated, are:
Your ability to choose a significant, appropriately limited topic;
Your ability to investigate and support a thesis of your own design;
Your ability to analyze with skill and insight the evidence from specific literary texts;
Your ability to integrate your analyses with relevant and appropriate scholarship on your topic;
Your ability and to present the whole in a clearly organized, well-written fashion that conforms to the standard practices of academic research and writing in the discipline of English.

Your paper should provide a specific thesis and a close analysis of your primary texts. Repeating broad, obvious generalities (i.e., “women were limited by society’s expectations in the nineteenth century”) or ideas we have discussed in class will NOT be sufficient.

Your in-text citations and list of works cited should follow MLA format. Make sure the sources you rely on most heavily are scholarly –that is, JSTOR, MLA Bibliography, LION, and other databases accessed through the library catalogue are good places to start; Google Scholar, Academia.edu, and others that are not tied to a university library can sometimes be dicey.

Thesis/central argument is stated clearly and explored comprehensively, it is complex, yet precise delivering relevant information and contextual factors necessary for full understanding

Information is taken from source(s) with enough interpretation / evaluation to develop a comprehensive analysis or synthesis. Viewpoints of experts are questioned and evaluated thoroughly. Integrates and addresses alternate, divergent, or contradictory perspectives or ideas fully.

Conclusions and related outcomes are logical and reflect student’s informed evaluation and ability to place evidence and perspectives discussed in priority order; reviews results with specific consideration of further work.

Identifies multiple approaches for solving the problem. All elements of the methodology or theoretical framework are skillfully developed. Appropriate methodology or theoretical frameworks may be synthesized from across disciplines or from relevant subdisciplines.

Project offers significant insight and increases understanding of the subject; thoroughly explains significance and implications of conclusions, adds substantial new knowledge.

Writing conveys major points and support with clarity, organization, and efficiency. Rhetorical approach demonstrates clear understanding of audience and purpose. Format, correctness of language and any appropriate rich media are demonstrated correctly and enhance meaning, making clear the interdependence of language and meaning,