Per the posted group presentation project guidelines, each group should be “divvying” up the work in terms of assigning group members to particular aspects of the project (researching and selecting thematic links to other works, passages of significance, overall design, image research, content and caption writing, selections for the Works Cited slide, group credits, etc.). The final PowerPoint presentation must be emailed to me by Monday, 4/19. Here are the groups for the PowerPoint presentations.
Final Project: Group PowerPoint Presentation on Minion (20 points)
The members of each group will focus on one of the sets of linked themes listed below, and to analyze those themes as delineated in L.A. Banks’s Minion. In addition, each group is expected to link their presentation to at least three other authors whose texts explore their linked themes, and utilize them in the overall presentation. As some of these themes overlap, you may also interweave some of the other relevant thematic discussions from other readings done during the semester into this group presentation.
Your major theme should be considered as the central, controlling idea of your piece—again, if you find that other themes of significance are surfacing and converging with your major theme as you develop your project, please note them. Your thesis should reflect your theme in a clear, well-articulated manner.
Linked themes:
1) Alienation and community
2) Education and intellectualism
3) Faith and religion
4) Gender relations, sexism, sexual exploitation, and sexuality
5) Justice and injustice
6) Radicalism and rebellion
You are encouraged to use video, film, photographs, text (including quotes from the text), and other documents to create a PowerPoint presentation of your work (maximum10 minutes in length).
You must include a slide listing the “Credits,” i.e., the specific contribution made by each group member. In addition, you must create a Works Cited Page as the final slide of your presentation, using MLA-style. Refer to the MLA Style Guide on the course blog for MLA-style compliance. At our final class meeting, the group members will present their projects. I encourage you to be as imaginative as possible with these presentations.
Below is a list of the criteria for your PowerPoint, adapted from a rubric adapted from a former colleague.
Final Project Rubric for PowerPoint Presentation Photo-documentaries and Essay
The following categories provide a clear list of the elements that are expected in each group’s project, regardless of its form and purpose. Use these criteria as a tool that will enable you, as the designer, to produce persuasive communication by means of innovation, creativity, and polished reflection. Each of the categories is worth 4 points, for a total of 20 points of the final grade.
GROUP NAME_____________________________________
Thesis and Purpose:Points_____
How clear is your thesis? Is the topic compelling and relevant not only to your own interests but to an issue of larger significance? How well do the images (photos, film, or other visuals) illustrate both the thesis and its related ideas in a cogent manner?
Composition:Points_____
Does the project follow a logical flow of thought? Do these ideas transition well and are they well-supported by both visual and interpretive qualities? Is the project free of grammatical errors and does it show familiarity with simple, compound, and complex sentence structures? Can it be used as a model for other students in the future?
Technical Image and Quality/Audio Recording and Editing:Points_____
How well have you operated your camera, produced high-quality digital files, or created high quality images? This also includes how well you utilized the basic elements of photography, including lighting and composition, to make or choose the most interesting photographs possible. Do the photographs demonstrate a variety of images and perspectives? Do they seem to illustrate or create a pattern of thought? How well have you recorded (or integrated) sound, including ambient sound and interviews, and how will have you edited the packaged product if sound is not provided? How does the overall final project look, including captions, titles, transitions, audio, and image?
Caption Information and Presentation:Points_____
Is there a clear integration of the visual and written composition of the final project? How well have you complemented your images with written text? How does the written text (approximately 750 – 900 words) act to amplify and enhance the quality of the project as a whole? Are original insights supported by relevant research in your written text or is it merely expository?
This Tuesday, we will view Marlon Riggs's 1994 documentary Black Is...Black Ain't. In addition, we have the following presentation. Please note next Tuesday's presentation as well.
Tuesday, 3/16 Faraji Johnson: Stokely Carmichael (Kwame Toure): "Definitions of Black Power"
Tuesday, 3/23 Catherine Kilpatrick: Barbara Jordan: "Who, Then, Will Speak to the Common Good?" (1976)
Below is a poem by black lesbian feminist poet and scholar Audre Lorde (1934-1992). Here is a link to more information on Lorde, her life, and her work: Voices From the Gap: Audre Lorde
Coal I is the total black, being spoken from the earth's inside. There are many kinds of open how a diamond comes into a knot of flame how sound comes into a words, coloured by who pays what for speaking.
Some words are open like a diamond on glass windows singing out within the crash of sun Then there are words like stapled wagers in a perforated book—buy and sign and tear apart— and come whatever will all chances the stub remains an ill-pulled tooth with a ragged edge. Some words live in my throat breeding like adders. Other know sun seeking like gypsies over my tongue to explode through my lips like young sparrows bursting from shell. Some words bedevil me
Love is word, another kind of open. As the diamond comes into a knot of flame I am Black because I come from the earth's inside Now take my word for jewel in the open light. --Audre Lorde
AfricanAmerican girl, full-length portrait, seated on stool, facing slightly right. Photo by Thomas E. Askew. From Types of American Negroes, compiled and prepared by W.E.B. Du Bois, v. 1, no. 59. Part of the Paris Exposition of 1900.
Literary/Textual Analysis Quiz #3
Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye:
Write an essay of between 300-500 words (2 pages—MAXIMUM) in answer to the following question. DUE TUESDAY, MARCH 9th, 2010--at the BEGINNING of class.
In author Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye, shame and internalized racial self-hatred are motivating factors in the actions of some of the major characters we meet in the first 93 pages. Discuss how these self-destructive factors manifest themselves in two (2) of the following characters: Junior, Pecola, Geraldine, Cholly. Please base your response on textual evidence and quotes from the text. I am not asking you for your opinion in the absence of reasoned analysis, although you are free to include a final personal observation at the end of your essay. For this quiz, please paraphrase and include only page numbers, MLA-style. Ex: (54).
Discussion
Ellison's "The World and the Jug"
We will discuss Ellison's major argument in this seminal essay on Thursday, as we continue to discussion the Morrison novel. Please come prepared to participate.
Presentations This Week
Tuesday, 3/9
Patrick Racine:William Pickens, "The Kind of Democracy the Negro Expects" (1919) Shena Fraser: Charlotta Bass, "Acceptance Speech for Vice-Presidential Candidate..." (1952) Leonard Stewart: Malcolm X, "Exhorting Afro-Americans to Confront White Oppression" (1965) Timmia Dansby: Shirley Chisolm, "I Am for the Equal Rights Amendment" (1970) Faraji Johnson: Stokely Carmichael, "Definitions of Black Power" (1966) Amanda Griffin: Barbara Jordan: "Who, Then, Will Speak to the Common Good?" (1976)
