Number of Pages: 4 (Double Spaced
Writing Style: APA
Number of sources: 5
With gender as a focus, you will examine a specific element (literary devices, imagery, motif, etc.) that you compare/contrast to another element within one text or between two (no more than two) literary texts of the Canterbury tales. (that is the style I choose)
(teacher example)
Here is an example of an approach you might take in considering Enkidu and Gilgamesh. Look at the passage that introduces Enkidu in The Epic of Gilgamesh and compare some aspect of it to Eve’s role in the Old Testament, in response, the writer might develop a paper that speaks to or develops, among other ideas:
? Creationism (Enkidu is created from water and clay by the goddess Aruru) & Eve’s creation from Adam’s rib, both establishing the ?masculine? partners (Gilgamesh & Adam) as dominant
? Enkidu?s transcendence of the wilderness to civilization and Eve’s ˜transgression’ from the Garden of Eden to the wilderness of civilization
? The connection of Enkidu to women (appearance, goddesses, nature, etc.) in the work and to Eve, and their similar exiles from ?Gardens of Eden?
The goal of your paper is to make that one passage (or whatever specific element that serves as the subject of the essay) the focus of your response, but you should refer to other parts of the text to illustrate connections that make your passage significant.
An analysis that compares and contrast elements is not simply a listing of the similarities and differences. Your thesis should make clear that there is a focused and precise purpose to your comparison that either reveals some new idea that is realized only as a matter of that comparison or that uses one text to highlight something interesting and thoughtful about the other. The thesis should answer the question: ?So what?!?
