Summative Assessment 3 (Essay worth 200 points): Jim Crow 1.0 and Jim Crow 2.0
The Assignment:
In a 1,500-word essay that adheres to current MLA format, provides a minimum of 4 sources for your Works Cited page, and presents either a block-paragraph or point-by-point paragraph comparison design, develop a thesis that connects Dr. David Pilgrim’s video presentation of the Dr. David Pilgrim’s video “The New Jim Crow Museum” as an explanation of “Jim Crow 1.0” to Childish Gambino’s video “This Is America” as a gut-wrenching picture of “Jim Crow 2.0” today.
Your essay should explore the following: What are the parallels between Jim Crow 1.0 and Jim Crow 2.0? What new mutations do we see in Jim Crow 2.0? How has Jim Crow evolved to be in its current state that is in many ways less flagrant yet more insidious than Jim Crow 1.0?
The Purpose:
In terms of content, I want you to understand the meaning of Jim Crow as a pernicious, bald-faced racist ideology that persisted in many parts of the country after the Civil War in which recalcitrant or unrepentant racists resented the downfall of the slavery plantation economy and wished to resurrect oppression of African-Americans in any way they could. Additionally, I want you to see how Jim Crow morphed after the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s into a more sneaky beast, revealing itself through media stereotypes, mass incarceration, and normalized violence against African-Americans, as we see in Childish Gambino’s “This Is America.” By seeing how Jim Crow exists today, we can fight against its normalization and resist it becoming part of the mind-numbing “ambience” of American society.
In terms of writing skills, I want you to see how a comparison design, either block method or point-by-point, gives more depth, power, and detail to an important term such as Jim Crow.
For example, author Michelle Alexander in her magisterial nonfiction work The New Jim Crow, a book that focuses mainly on mass incarceration, she devotes a lot of time in her book to the evolution of “The Old Jim Crow” with “The New Jim Crow.”
Moreover, a comparison expository design is an effective way to roadmap and organize your essay. We use comparisons all the time to help us weigh the value of similar things or to understand how something evolves such as the early stages of Facebook, Twitter, or Netflix with their current state in order to understand what kind of trade-offs these changes make.
The Method and Time Required:
I suggest you devote your introductory paragraph defining Jim Crow as you see this term presented in David Pilgrim’s video “The New Jim Crow Museum.” Give a one-sentence definition of Jim Crow and expound on your definition by giving distinguishing characteristics an example from the video. By doing this, you are writing an extended definition to help the reader understand Jim Crow. You’d be surprised how many people have no idea or at best a vague idea of what Jim Crow. Helping your reader have a clear grasp of a central term in your essay makes your writing more clear and effective. The Purdue Writing Lab has an effective description of extended definitions with the link here.
So to recap, in Paragraph 1 you would summarize the YouTube video presentation of David Pilgrim’s “The New Jim Crow Museum.” You might focus on the history of Jim Crow as a misinformation campaign to saturate minds with racist ideas that dehumanized black Americans in the service of promoting the false religion of white superiority. You might want to call this original Jim Crow the first incarnation: “Jim Crow 1.0” because in the second paragraph you’re going to contrast Jim Crow 1.0 with today’s Jim Crow, what might be called “Jim Crow 2.0.”
In Paragraph 2 you want to transition to Childish Gambino's “This Is America” video by summarizing the distinguishing characteristics of Jim Crow that are presented in the video.
Here are some template sentence examples of transitioning from the first paragraph to the second paragraph:
While Jim Crow 1.0 consisted of _________, ___________, and __________, we see in “This Is America” that Jim Crow 2.0 has morphed into a new oppression characterized by __________, _____________, and _________________.
With similar characteristics of Jim Crow 1.0 illustrated in “This Is America,” Childish Gambino also shows Jim Crow’s new manifestations, which include _______________, _________________, and _________________.
What’s important is that you provide a clear transition between the first and second paragraphs. The Purdue Writing Lab has a good explanation of these paragraph transitions, which you can find on this link.
Make Paragraph 3 Your Thesis Paragraph
You might find it easier to make Paragraph 3 your lone thesis paragraph in which you develop a thesis that will highlight the parallels between Jim Crow 1.0 and Jim Crow 2.0.
Sample Comparison Thesis Templates
While Jim Crow 1.0 emphasized __________, __________, __________, Jim Crow 2.0 became a different beast in that it focused on _______________, _______________, and _________________.
While there were some key differences between Jim Crow 1.0 and Jim Crow 2.0, especially in that 2.0 emphasized __________ and __________, they have key similarities, which include ________________, ___________________, __________________, and ________________________.
Deciding on a Structure After Your Thesis Paragraph:
Before you go on, decide on a comparison structure, either block method in which you spend the first half of your body paragraphs explaining Jim Crow 1.0. Then in the second half you explain the characteristics of Jim Crow 2.0. On the other hand, you may want to use a point-by-point in which you show the parallels between Jim Crow 1.0 and 2.0 point by point. There is an excellent site explaining the correct use of block and point-by-point method by Michelle Bickwell of the MJC Writing Lab.
Once you decide on what kind of comparison to write, you might want to focus on these parallels between the Jim Crow Museum and “This Is America”:
We see normalized violence against African-American community as seen in both videos.
We see White America consuming black culture for entertainment (depending on all variations of minstrel stereotypes) while turning their back on social injustice as seen in both videos.
We see White America using guns as a form of intimidating and oppression against the African-American community as seen in both videos.
We see White America exploiting African-Americans as a form of entertainment in the form of violence as seen in both videos .
We see black America wearing a dual mask to survive in America: a happy entertainment face on one hand and the horror of violence and being gaslighted everyday on the other.
If you want, you can have a contrast paragraph: Childish Gambino addresses the use of American consumerism a technology ("This is a celly" and the worship of bling) as a distraction for all Americans, regardless of skin color, from racism, violence, and white-ethnic fascism, which is spreading throughout America and the world.
Your conclusion should be a powerful restatement of your thesis designed to achieve pathos or emotional impact. For a further discussion on using pathos for more effective writing, consult Purdue OWL University article “Aristotle’s Rhetorical Situation.”
After your conclusion, you will have a separate page for Works Cited using current MLA format as explained in this these videos:
Purdue OWL video for Word
Purdue OWL video for Google Docs.
Title for Your Essay
Make sure your essay has a strong title. Avoid a generic title like “Jim Crow” or “Essay 3.” Try to have a catchy title that is relevant to your focus.
Here is a somewhat dry academic title: “The Meaning of Jim Crow Throughout American History.”
Here is a more impressive title: “Let Us Not Sweep Jim Crow Under the Rug.”
Time Needed for the Assignment
Of course, everyone is different, but estimating the time based on the assigned videos, supplementary material, note taking, first draft of a 1,500 word essay of about 8 paragraphs, making a Works Cited page, and then rewriting your draft for correct grammar, spelling, and format, I would say that over the course of 4 weeks you could very well spend 16 hours, or 4 hours a week, to get this essay to a polished state that is ready to upload.
Content Resources:
Your main sources are the following:
Suggested Supplementary Material
For the “This Is America” video, you may consult the following:
Insider’s content:
Hidden Meanings Behind Childish Gambino’s ‘This Is America’ Explained
Inside Edition’s content:
The Hidden Meanings Behind Childish Gambino’s ‘This Is America’ Video” (with Dr. Lori Brooks)
PBS Newshour's content:
The stark, chaotic power of Donald Glover’s ‘This Is America
Make Stuff’s content:
This Is America: Childish Gambino’s Genius Absurdity
BucketHeadNation’s content:
Dad Reacts to Childish Gambino--This Is America
Regarding the Jim Crow Museum, I recommend the following:
David Pilgrim’s Ted Talk video:
My Racial Journey: Using Hateful Items as Teaching Tools
David Pilgrim's autobiographical online essay, “The Garbage Man: Why I Collect Racist Objects.”
Suggested Design and Format Resources:
For comparison essay structure, I recommend the following:
Free English video:
Point-by-Point vs Block-Style Essay
For MLA format, I recommend the following:
Jason Morgan’s video:
Formatting a paper in MLA style
How Points Are Earned on This Assignment
Essay 3 has a maximum 200 points. You earn points through the following:
One. Meaningful thesis statement that generates compelling body paragraphs of a thesis or claim and a strong exposition driven by a distinct writing voice (authorial presence). This thesis produces meaningful content and a powerful writing voice that passes the “So what?” question, meaning that the writing matters, is significant, and elevates the reader to a higher understanding about an urgent topic. 80 points maximum.
Two. Clear organizational design, also called an expository mode, that has a logical sequence and follows a clear comparison design. 40 points.
Three. The use of signal phrases and correct MLA in-text citations whenever you cite paraphrased, summarized, or quoted material. 30 points.
Four. The essay has sound sentence mechanics, sentence variety, correct spelling, and correct grammar usage suitable for college-level writing. The most common errors students make are comma splices and sentence fragments. 30 points.
Five. The essay conforms to updated MLA format for pagination, spacing, and Works Cited page. 20 points.
Essay Checklist to Maximize Your Success
One. Do you have a meaningful thesis statement that generates compelling body paragraphs of an argumentative thesis or claim and a strong exposition driven by a distinct writing voice (authorial presence).
Two. Does your essay have a clear organization design that logically drives your exposition?
Three. Does your essay correctly use signal phrases and correct in-text citations?
Four. If your essay is a counterargument, do you have an adequate counterargument-rebuttal section to show you have addressed opposing views?
Five. Does your essay have a Works Cited page with a minimum of 4 sources for the first three essays and minimum of 5 sources for your fourth essay? Do these citations satisfy requirements of authorship credit so that you are staying clear of plagiarism?
Six. Are your sources credible, that is to say do they come from authors who have peer credibility as opposed to authors with a sneaky, biased, or strident agenda?
Seven. If your authors are biased, did you disclose that bias in your essay?
Eight. Is your essay free of frequent grammar and sentence mechanic errors, especially comma splices and sentence fragments?
Nine. Does your essay conform to the current MLA format?
Ten. Does your essay have a distinctive title that alerts your readers to your tone and main focus?
Eleven. Does your essay have college-level paragraph transitions to make your essay flow and enhance its clarity?
Twelve. Do you have a conclusion paragraph that contributes to the expressiveness and/or persuasiveness of your essay?
Due Date, Submission Method, and Late Policy
Your Essay 3 is due as an upload to turnitin on at 11:59 pm. Please do not submit this essay on Canvas because Canvas does not currently have a plagiarism tool on it. Please only upload to turnitin. Also take note, if you make the mistake of uploading to both Canvas and turnitin, Canvas will “freak out” and not save your grade unless I go into Canvas and tell it which of the upload grades I am choosing.
Regarding late papers, as you know, to be fair to punctual students, a full letter grade, as many as 25 points, is taken off of late papers.
Formative Assignments to Build Essay 3
Essay 1 is a summative assignment in that it measures student learning outcomes that you should have gathered as you prepared to write your first essay.
Along the way, you want to cobble together your essay piece by piece (called scaffolding in higher education) so you learn the writing process. Some of these “pieces” are called formative assignments, which measure your progress as you scaffold your essay together.
Formative Assignment #1 (40 points)
Write an introduction and thesis paragraph by Week 9.
Formative Assignment #2 (40 points)
Write your counterargument-rebuttal paragraph by Week 10.
Discussion Questions
I will provide discussion questions on Canvas. These don’t offer points. Their purpose is to get the wheels spinning inside your brain about the subject, steer you in the right direction, give you an opportunity to commiserate with me and other students, give you ideas for your introduction and thesis, and in general keep you focused on the writing task.
Some Relevant Discussion Questions You Could Incorporate Into Essay 3:
What did you learn about Jim Crow from Dr. Pilgrim’s Jim Crow Museum?
How did Childish Gambino’s “This Is America” add layers of meaning to Jim Crow?
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