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ETST 301: Ethnic Studies and Society (Professor Matthew Irwin)

ETST 301 Research Projects (Professor Matthew Irwin)

*Always consult Cougar Courses for full research assignment guidelines.

Introduction

Zines are handmade magazines. They contain articles, diary entries, rants, interviews, stories, drawings, collages, photographs, and any other creative interpretation of information imaginable. They can be by one person or many, found in stores, traded at comic conventions, exchanged with friends, or given away for free. Zines are written in a variety of formats, from computer-printed text to comics to handwritten texts. Topics covered are broad, including politics, art and design, personal journals, social theory, or a single-topic obsession. Zines often highlight insightful, provocative, political, and outrageous writing. They include personal stories, fiction, rants, poetry, essays, journalism, visual design, and photographs.

Assignment

Unlike an analytical or research paper, a zine allows you to employ multiple forms of media and different theoretical frameworks in a fun and creative way. Your zines will incorporate both expository writing assignments as well as more creative components, which might include (but certainly not limited to) poetry, photographs, drawing, magazine clippings, or collages. For your final project in this course, you will be making collaborative zines on key people and events in ethnic studies history. We will then submit these zines to the CSUSM Library’s communities archive project as well as an online database to create a resource for future ethnic studies students — ethnic studies history for students, by students.

Details

  • Write 600-1,000 words on the topic
  • Collaborate with classmates
  • Submit Project Journals
  • Participate in Progress Reports
  • Participate in Draft
  • Participate in Revisions
  • Turn in ten (10) printed-and-folded zines as well as a PDF

Content

  • Class will decide topics together
  • Cite at least five (5) sources
    • only one from course materials
    • quote sources where relevant
  • Use your own words o quote sources where relevant
  • Zine must include multiple forms, genres, and media
    • e.g. poems, block quotes, photographs, magazine clips, illustrations, marginalia ...
  • Define the term in your own words
  • include footnotes and works cited page

*Always consult Cougar Courses for full research assignment guidelines.

Assignment

 For this assignment, you will demonstrate your understanding of ethnic studies by defining several key terms and then collaborating with classmates to create definitions for an ethnic studies glossary. Each entry will take the form of a mini literature review, a method scholars use for examining what has already been said about a topic.

Details 

  • Write five (5) entries, 200-300 words each
  • Participate in Peer Review
  • Participate in Revisions
  • Collaborate with classmates to create final definitions
  • Turn in a Word document or PDF on Cougar Courses
    • (no other file type will be accepted)

Content

 In your definitions, you must include the following elements and moves. This list should not be read as an outline of sequential order:

  • Define the follow terms
    • whiteness
    • white supremacy
    • essentialism/anti-essentialism
    • neoliberalism
    • multiculturalism
  • Cite at least two (2) sources per entry
    • only one from course materials
    • quote sources where relevant
  • Define the term in your own words
  • List properly formatted citations at the end of each entry

For examples, see Keywords in American Cultural Studies, NYU Press (requires CSUSM login and password)