Scene Analysis Guidelines

Due Dates:	Requirements:
Working Draft—October 2nd, 2018 Final Draft—October 11th, 2018	3-5 typed pages MLA Format

Objective

To construct a persuasive argument about a specific scene in Robinson Crusoe or Pride and Prejudice.

Procedure

Choose a specific scene from either Robinson Crusoe or Pride and Prejudice. Consider your definition of scene as you identify one, and be ready to defend your selectionÕs status as a scene.
Take notes including specific details in the scene, details that explain its meaning and significance. Such details include setting (including architecture, if applicable), time scale or interval, characters present, point-of-view, plot, dialogue, punctuation, context in a larger collection of scenes that make up this novel, and anything else the author has used in order to make his or her meaning clear to an audience. (It may not be possible to find an example of each of these elements.) Focus on those details that are the most useful in explaining the meaning of the scene.
Formulate a thesis statement summing up the meaning and significance of the chosen scene. This thesis will undoubtedly change as you write your paper, but at least it will give you a starting point. A good thesis is arguable rather than obvious.
Write a draft of your argument about the scene. Refer to specific words and phrases in the scene in order to support the points in your argument. You may also refer to other quotations in the larger work, as long as you maintain your focus on the passage in question. This assignment does not require you to consult outside sources, though you are welcome to do so, if you wish. Be sure to include outside sources in your list of works cited, if you choose to use them.
Bring a word-processed, correctly formatted draft of this paper to class on October 2nd, 2018, for peer editing.
After considering feedback from peer editors and reconsidering your own argument, revise your paper.
Proofread your draft to identify and correct spelling and grammatical errors.
Turn in the completed final draft along with a peer-edited working draft in class on October 11th, 2018.

Thesis Statement

This is a one-sentence version of the whole paper, and it should be in an arguable claim. It should not merely restate the passage in your own words. A good thesis statement refers directly to the chosen work, saying something like, "A key moment in Pride and Prejudice occurs when . . ."

Good thesis statements will challenge readers in some way to regard the scene in a new light. They may make claims regarding the sceneÕs importance to the larger work, or to a little-noticed subtext within the work.

Some possible thesis language:

In this scene, the main character realizes for the first time that . . .

This scene demonstrates the authorÕs tendency to . . .

This scene may appear on its surface to be about . . . but it is actually about . . .

These are just a few examples of thesis-statement language that can lead to productive arguments about the text. Please adapt these to your needs or develop your own.

Writing Tips

MLA format means you should include a list of works cited at the end of your paper, even if it only includes one work. For example:

Defoe, Daniel. Robinson Crusoe. Oxford UP, 2007.
Some grammatical tips:
1. Avoid using the passive voice whenever it is possible to do so. When writing in the passive voice, you remove the subject from the sentence or at least de-emphasize it. This makes writing less engaging to most readers.
  
  Example:
  
  PASSIVE VOICE:
  
  However little known the feelings or views of such a man may be on his first entering a neighbourhood, this truth is so well fixed in the minds of the surrounding families, that he is considered as the rightful property of some one or other of their daughters. (Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice, p. 1)
  
  (Structure: object/"to be" verb/past participle)
  
  ACTIVE VOICE:
  
  However little they may know of such a man on his first entering their neighbourhood, the surrounding families have fixed this truth so firmly in their minds, that they consider him as the rightful property of some one or other of their daughters. (Schwetman, rewriting this as an active-voice sentence, 2018)
  
  (Note structure: subject/verb/object—with the addition of the implied subject)
2. Avoid contractions when writing college papers. Replace they're with they are and replace don't with do not (these are just a few examples of the numerous possible contractions out there.
3. Italicization is the best way to signal that you are referring to a word itself and not to the thing that the word represents. Notice how I am using italicization of the terms in the following section "d". You should also italicize titles of books (even in parenthetical references and lists of works cited) and foreign-language words like Bildungsroman or sine qua non.
4. The word it's (with an apostrophe) is a contraction of it is. The word its (without an apostrophe) is the possessive of it. Its and whose both deviate from the above rule about possessives.