Department of English

Faculty of Arts, Chulalongkorn University

Final Paper and Presentation Guidelines

Final Paper

The final paper (1½–2 pp.; MLA format) is a way for you to engage thoughtfully with the issues and questions we have read about and discussed this semester and to bring together skills in reading, critical thinking, and writing that we have worked on these past few months. In groups of three, you will choose a literary work or works from the following list to read carefully and form a panel discussing that work. If you want to study a piece not on this list, please clear it with me first. Each member of the panel will focus on one aspect or element of that short story or play. Taken together the individual examinations should help answer a question that your panel poses about the work. Use the panel topics below as a prompt for developing an argument that you elaborate on in your paper. Give your paper a title. Hand in your work in class on Monday, September 19, 2011 and submit a digital copy on Turnitin.com.

Information for initial login to Turnitin.com:

• On the Turnitin.com homepage, click "Create Account" at the top right hand corner
• On the Create a User Profile page, at the Create a New Account heading, click "student"
• On the Create a New Student Account page, type in the following class ID and password, then provide the user information (Chula recommends using your chula e-mail account) and set up your account password, check that you are over 13 years old, and click "I agree--create profile"
  
• Class ID: 4106558
• Class Enrollment Password: inspector5
• You are now ready to submit your assignments
  

Literary works list with suggested supplementary reading:

• Woolf, Virginia. "The Legacy." A Haunted House and Other Short Stories. 1944.
  

• Cheever, John. "The Swimmer." 1964. 

• Chopin, Kate. "The Story of an Hour." 1894.
  

• Crane, Stephen. "The Open Boat." 1894. 

• Faulkner, William. "Red Leaves." 

• Ives, David. Time Flies. Time Flies and Other Short Plays. New York: Grove, 2001. Print. [Arts Library PS3559.V435 I95T 2001]
• Carpe Diem
  

• Jin, Ha. "Saboteur." The Antioch Review 54.4 (1996):  409–19. JSTOR. Web. [Chula network access]
  

• Lardner, Ring. "Champion."

• Lardner, Ring. "Haircut." 1922. Haircut and Other Stories. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1954. 9–21. Print.
  

• Poe, Edgar Allan. "The Tell-Tale Heart." 1843.
• Poe, Edgar Allan. "The Philosophy of Composition." 1846.
• Edgar Allan Poe
  

• Yamamoto, Hisaye. "The Legend of Miss Sasagawara." The Kenyon Review 12.1 (1988): 99–115. JSTOR. Web. [Chula network access]
  

Possible Panel Topics

• The Heart Takes a Legendary Journey
  This panel will discuss portrayals of self-discovery of in Cheever's "The Swimmer," Rossetti's "Up-Hill," and Chopin's "The Story of an Hour," each capturing a wrenching stage in a character's consciousness from different time periods in human history.
  
  • How do the issues agonizing the characters reflect or comment on the contexts of their times?
    

  • What literary forms have each author found to contain and express the mental processes of the character, and how are these literary frameworks and devices appropriate and effective?
    

• Killed by Love: Crimes of Ignorance in Kate Chopin's "The Story of an Hour"
  

  This panel will examine the ironies of what Kate Chopin has called "kind intention" in her short story "The Story of an Hour."
  

• Speaker 1, "Love, the Blind Murderer"
  This paper investigates Chopin's provocative proposal in the story about love: how it can be a dangerous player in causing extreme suffering both physically and mentally in a person.
  
• Kinds of love (sisterly, husbandly) which are commonly lauded and unquestioned but become suspects in their ultimate beneficence, considering their effects on Louise Mallard
  
• How is love blind?
• How can/does love kill?
  
• Speaker 2, "What We Don't Know Can Hurt Us"
  This paper takes on the question of ignorance and discusses the ways in which "not knowing" is not innocent but guilty.
  
• Key knowledge and lack of knowledge in the story
  
• The role of not knowing in the progress and the telling of the story
  
• Speaker 3, "Life and Death: Sentence and Reprieve in Chopin's 'The Story of an Hour'"
  This paper discusses the irony surrounding life and death in this very short story. In tracing the presentation of life and death through their shifts in meaning to the end, I hope to show how Chopin contemplates the desirability of each in response to external circumstances.
• What are the conditions of living for Louise Mallard? What is her life like? What does living entail? What prospects can she look forward to?
  
• How does Mrs. Mallard's changed feelings about her life expectancy comment on the climactic ending and on the doctors' pronouncement?
  
• Ars longa, vita brevis
  
  This panel will explore life limitations as expressed in three literary works: Chopin's "The Story of an Hour," Ives's Time Flies, and Ha Jin's "Saboteur." Some questions that we will discuss are:
  

  • What do the contrasting lifetimes (short human life vs. long literary life) enable the authors to achieve?

• Stories and Realities
  This panel will explore the interplay between fiction and reality in imaginative writing.
  
  • How are literary works different from lived reality? How are they the same?
  • What is truthful about fiction?
  • What is fictional about our perceived reality?
  • How might fiction allow authors to say things about reality that they otherwise might not be able to?
• Crime and Punishment
  This panel will investigate ideas about crime and its consequences (physical and psychological).
  • What constitutes a crime or are presented as crimes in the work? In what ways are they criminal or damaging?

  • What are the consequences of the crime(s)?

• Panel Title
  Panel description
  
  • Questions and issues that the first speaker will discuss
  • Questions and issues that the second speaker will examine
    
  • Questions and issues that the third speaker will engage with
    
• Panel Title
  Panel description
  
  • Questions that we would like to ask about the work and work toward answering
  • Concepts and issues in the work that we will address
    
• Panel Title
  Panel description
  
  • Questions posed that we will attempt to answer
    
  • Issues that we will discuss
    

Sample Panel Descriptions and Outline

• Killed by Love: Crimes of Ignorance in Kate Chopin's "The Story of an Hour"
  

  This panel will examine the ironies of what Kate Chopin has called "kind intention" in her short story "The Story of an Hour."
  

• Speaker 1, "Love, the Blind Murderer"
  This paper investigates Chopin's provocative proposal in the story about love: how it can be a dangerous player in causing extreme suffering both physically and mentally in a person.
  
• Kinds of love (sisterly, husbandly) which are commonly lauded and unquestioned but become suspects in their ultimate beneficence, considering their effects on Louise Mallard
  
• How is love blind?
• How can/does love kill?
  
• Speaker 2, "What We Don't Know Can Hurt Us"
  This paper takes on the question of ignorance and discusses the ways in which "not knowing" is not innocent but guilty.
  
• Key knowledge and lack of knowledge in the story
  
• The role of not knowing in the progress and the telling of the story
  
• Speaker 3, "Life and Death: Sentence and Reprieve in Chopin's 'The Story of an Hour'"
  This paper discusses the irony surrounding life and death in this very short story. In tracing the presentation of life and death through their shifts in meaning to the end, I hope to show how Chopin contemplates the desirability of each in response to external circumstances.
• What are the conditions of living for Louise Mallard? What is her life like? What does living entail? What prospects can she look forward to?
  
• How does Mrs. Mallard's changed feelings about her life expectancy comment on the climactic ending and on the doctors' pronouncement?

Revision

It is recommended that you have a first draft to give your panel members to read a couple of weeks before your presentation date. Read each other's papers carefully, making constructive comments on the pages, and fill out the workshop sheet for each paper. Then set up a time to meet, return the paper with comments, and discuss each other's contribution to the panel's investigation. Once you have your first draft and feedback sheet back from each of your panel member, consider the comments and rewrite your paper to fix problems and make it more effective. Some things to keep in mind as you proofread and edit your work:

• Does my title show that I have a point to make?

• Is my thesis sound, clear, and interesting?

• Have I supported my thesis with compelling evidence?

• Is the organization of my paper logical and appropriate to the arguments I am making?

• Is my language clear, consistent, and suited to the subject matter?

• Do each of my paragraphs have a clear point and coherence?

• Are my sentences varied, interesting, and effective?

• Do my verbs agree with their subjects? Pronouns with their nouns?

• Is my paper free of spelling mistakes?

• Have I cited my sources properly?

Final Presentation

Presentations of your final papers will take place on the last two days of class: Monday, September 19, 2011 and Wednesday, September 21, 2011. Each panel of three papers will have fifteen minutes to present their work (five for each speaker). This will be followed by a ten-minute question and answer session. A moderator will be presiding over the presentations and discussion session of each panel, introducing the speakers, mediating the questions and responses, and making sure things stay on schedule.

A program of the final presentation schedule will be posted on our detailed schedule page once panel and paper titles, speakers and moderators are finalized. You are responsible for e-mailing me your working paper and panel titles and any revisions to them by Friday, September 16, 2011.

Please inform me of any special equipment needs such as speakers if you are planning to play a video or audio clip. Otherwise our usual computer (which uses Microsoft Office 2003) and LCD projector will be provided.

Panels Submitted

• Cheever's "The Swimmer"
  This panel will explore elements in John Cheever's short story "The Swimmer."
  Moderator:
  Speakers:
  
  • Veerawin Suksantinunt, "paper title"
    
  • Panrawee Weerapan, "paper title"

  • Isaraporn Kitcholwiwat, "paper title"

• The Fictional and the Real in "The Swimmer"
  This panel will examine differences and similarities between the fictional world and reality in John Cheever's short story "The Swimmer."
  Moderator:
  Speakers:
  
  • Luksika Sae-ung, "paper title"
    
  • Grittigar Sa-ngasang, "paper title"

  • Punnapa Stapornviriyakul, "paper title"

• Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart"
  This panel will study Edgar Allan Poe's short story "The Tell-Tale Heart."
  Moderator:
  Speakers:
  
  • Chomsiri Tirapornvitoon, "paper title"
    
  • Patteera Chaladmanakul, "paper title"

  • Animmarn Leksawat, "paper title"

• Fear in "The Tell-Tale Heart"
  Panel description
  Moderator:
  Speakers:
  
  • Onrumpa Kidmai, "paper title"
    
  • Araniya Wipatavit, "paper title"

  • Speaker 3, "paper title"

• Ives's Time Flies
  Panel description
  Moderator:
  Speakers:
  
  • Kanchana Manalert, "paper title"
    
  • Chaisopon Ngamlerdsuporn, "paper title"

  • Supamon Rungruangratanakul, "paper title"

• "The Story of an Hour"
  Panel description
  Moderator:
  Speakers:
  
  • Nawaporn Suksaran, "paper title"
    
  • Lojana Kiatpermsin, "paper title"

  • Aimratee Sidhikosol, "paper title"

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Last updated September 19, 2011