The final paper for this course will be the culmination of your previous writings based on diverse readings and screenings on the theme of Home. In it you will be using your other essays and responses as building blocks to construct a paper that explains and illustrates the ways in which Home is a multidimensional concept and experience that encompasses the body, the mind and spirit, the physical residence, the city/town and neighborhood, and the environment.
We have explored Home as both an individual and communal space and one which has evolved over time as a place of comfort and security, privacy, and well-being. We have discussed design and technology. We have also considered how home is not always a safe, fair, or permanent place for all because of myriad forces, such as colonization and racism, gentrification and poverty, war, environmental disasters and urban renewal, and population growth and changing demographics. Homes are inextricably bound to our history and identity; they are the repositories of the best and worst aspects of our humanity. Whether we live in a penthouse on Nob Hill or on a bench in Golden Gate Park, there is much to say about the values, ideas and practices that comprise the place we call Home.
–To write this paper, please follow the steps below:
THESIS:
–Begin with a well-developed THESIS that provides your most comprehensive definition of Home. Remember to state the many levels on which home is understood and experienced. Please refer to the whiteboard drawing that features these levels as a guide.
–The thesis paragraph is also the place to introduce the range of sources that will inform your writing. Tell your reader that many artists, psychologists, architects, scholars, historians, urban planners, political thinkers, etc. have written about Home and that you will be referring to their ideas in your essay. They have shed light on the many aspects of home that we so often come to take for granted.
–End your thesis paragraph with a PREVIEW STATEMENT that announces what you are about to do in the essay: In the following, I will be discussing the many ways in which Home is thought about and experienced and be sure to say that you will be using your own residence, neighborhood and city as examples.
BODY
The BODY of your essay must contain several paragraphs in which you discuss each level of Home: Home as the body, as a state of mind and self-identity, as a physical residence, as a neighborhood and town/city and as an environment.
Review the sources in the Modules and those which you found in your research. Review your own previous papers. Some questions to consider based on materials we have covered in the course:
–how does body serve as a home?
–how does home both reflect and shape the self?
–how does the home convey our personal and family history?
–how does our home offer us comfort, intimacy, privacy, and well-being?
–how does the homes design signify an aesthetic and an age?
–what is its style and size and features? Locate it in a city and neighborhood.
–how does the home fit into a broader community of neighborhood and city? Locate it.
–what is the history of that city and neighborhood?
–how has the city and neighborhood changed over time in response to socio-economic, political, demographic and environmental forces and events?
–what are the advantages and disadvantages of the home neighborhood and city?
–in what ways could it be improved?
–how are you complicit in its finer features and its flaws?
CONCLUSION
In the conclusion of your paper, limit any summary of your previous points to one statement.
Instead, discuss why its important to develop an understanding of home. Consider, for example, some of the following questions:
–Why should we know its history? How does that knowledge empower us and/or make us feel more at home or more convinced that we must leave? Whats at stake when we ignore history?
–How can you contribute to the evolution of your hometown and community such that it becomes a better place for us all to live?
WORKS CITED PAGE
Citations: Please refer to the many guides in the Module to citing sources, but particularly PURDUEOWL.com
You must cite at least seven sources in your essay and list them in proper MLA format on a Works Cited Page.
Length: 6 pages.
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