This paper will be on some aspect of the short stories, essays, or drama we have read. Choose one of the following topics for your essay. Be sure to form a well-thought out thesis, narrower in focus than the topic given. Some of the topics are expressed as questions (rather, I've given you some specific tasks to perform), but keep in mind that good essays always seek to solve some problem or answer some question about the text. Note: you must devise a thesis by limiting the topic.

1. Consider something that has happened to you that you consider very important in your life as a gendered person. What kind of question(s) did that occurrence pose? Now choose a character from one of the readings or the author of an essay you have completed this quarter. Ask that person a question related to what happened to you. The body of your essay will be the answer the person gives. This answer must be consistent with his or her personality as revealed in the work read and with the way the person solves problems.

2. Suppose you had to teach either "Trifles" or "The Associate" to high school sophomores. What would you make your main objective of the lesson? For example, would you consider the values or lack of values in the play? Would you teach it as a lesson in understanding a different and perhaps initially shocking point of view? Would you teach the movie as a lesson in the value of higher education? Once you have decided on your objective, write an essay about the way in which you would teach the play or the movie, the preparation you would give the class and what you would stress in the follow up discussion, and the assignment(s) you would give. Choose a particular event or scene and consider in depth what you would do with that scene to make it stand out in students' minds.
3. Pick a short story we've read and a poem or play we've read that have similar themes. "Daddy" by Sylvia Plath and "The Yellow Wallpaper" by Charlotte Gilman come to mind. Compare the themes and the way in which the writer uses the techniques proper to the particular genre she is working in to communicate the theme. Discuss whether one writer makes better use of techniques and also whether one genre seems better suited to the particular theme and why.

4. Setting is obviously important in "The Yellow Wallpaper" and The Awakening, stories that take place against a realistic or naturalistic background. How does each author evoke a sense of place and atmosphere? How does setting supplement or complement other aspects of the story including character, theme, or plot? Or write a n essay that shows that the authors use symbolism tied into specific imagery (I.e., "verbal pictures" sometimes using "metaphor" or "simile"--special literary comparisons) to create a tone and a pervasive atmosphere.

5. Women's independence is a theme in a number of the works we have read. Choose two pieces of literature in which personal freedom is a prominent issue and discuss/compare how these issues were dealt with by each author. Were they similar? Different? What was the cost to the self for freedom? to others? to society in general? Be specific in your discussion of symbols, images, characters.

6. We discussed Aristotle's notion of tragedy, including what makes a tragic hero, at length. We have also indicated what makes a hero comic in the classical sense. Recheck your notes for these definitions. Arthur Miller's idea of the modern tragic hero emphasizes the clash between the character and the environment, especially the social environment. He says that each person has a chosen image of self and position and that tragedy results when the character's environment denies the fulfillment of this self concept. Indicating which definition of hero you wish to work with, select a protagonist from either of the two plays we read or Laurel from the movie and argue that the character is a tragic or a comic hero.

7. Nineteenth century social scientists see women as the earliest form of what Karl Marx called "exchange value"; that is, women were the earliest "objects" that men exchanged for barter purposes. According to feminist Gayle Rubin such a view of women deprives the woman of the opportunity to make exchanges in the market themselves, and it also implies that the inability to make money for the husband makes a woman useless. Choose one or two pieces we've read that deal with women's economic issues and show how these support or challenge Rubin's ideas.