FOUR PAGE DOCUMENT-BASED ESSAY



FOUR PAGE DOCUMENT-BASED ESSAY

TAKE HOME ESSAY QUESTION FOR UNIT 1 TEST:

“DBQ” (Document Based Question)

(DBQs are 45% of the free response portion of the AP exam, with 55% divided between 2 additional essays. All of the free response essays are 50% of the entire AP exam grade)

This essay is not timed, but challenge yourself to think through and outline the essay well before you start writing so that it is well organized from the start. DO NOT WRITE A PAPER LONGER THAN 4 PAGES, TYPED, DOUBLE-SPACED. NEITHER SHOULD YOU WRITE ONE SHORTER, EITHER. Hand in – stapled to your essay -- your initial brainstorming, notes, and outlining (not including what is in your notebook – give me what you write as you formulate your analysis). Citations may be limited to parenthetical references using (author’s last name, page) (in Rowlandson packet, first part, use “Editor”).

Use as many documents as you can and account for as much historical complexity as possible. “DBQ”s are designed to allow for creative interpretation using documents and additional “background information” that you bring to bear on the documents. Do not guess about facts. Use only those you are confident are correct.

“What did King Philip’s War indicate about the changing character of the New England colonies? Were the colonies strengthening or weakening in the era, and in what way? Use the documents and additional background knowledge you have to analyze the history of New England in the late seventeenth century and early eighteenth centuries.”

TIPS ON WRITING A GOOD HISTORICAL ESSAY:

Please read these carefully and think about them,

Mark up the question and make sure you address all of the parts of the question. Note for instance, that this is not a paper on King Philip’s War. It uses the example of the war as a window into the larger history of New England in the period described.

❑ Do not assume that your reader knows anything about the topic that you do not tell him/her.

❑ A story (narrative) is important and compelling, but all of its points must be subordinated (put in the service of) a specific theme and argument chosen for this particular essay. All of the information and interesting insight into an event or events cannot fit in any one essay. You must be selective, picking only those details that illustrate your main point(s).

❑ However, while you must be selective in choosing what details to include, neither can you choose a theme and/or argument with its supporting details that overlooks information that historians seem to agree is of great significance. Your essay must reflect conversations among a community of historians of which you are a part. Weigh what is of importance in the secondary literature.

❑ Any person, place, moment, or issue that is introduced must be explained, and in as concise, but clear, a way as possible. Proximate (immediately related) rather than ultimate significance (the big and abstract picture) is the priority (that is, immediate historical relationships – context at the time—as opposed to civilization and the history of the world in general). In short, let the reader know what, where, when, your theme/topic is taking place.

❑ Remember that your reader must be reminded of your theme, preferably in fresh language, again and again throughout the essay. Don’t let the reader lose track of your argument and analysis amidst details, important though they are.

❑ Ethical evaluations of the conduct of people from other ages may be legitimate, but they distract from the main job of the historian: to understand people’s lives in the context of their time, not ours, on their terms, however disturbing, not ours.

❑ Avoid the use of passive tense which tends to imply that ideas, situations, forces arise and persist without anyone making them happen. Ask, who did this, thought this, made that happen. If you assign concrete agency and responsibility, you are more apt to include more people, groups, forces, processes, and thereby to tell a more layered and complex story that is truer to life.

................
................

In order to avoid copyright disputes, this page is only a partial summary.

Google Online Preview   Download