Final Project and Presentation

HIST 319

Each of you has learned how to examine and interpret primary and secondary sources during this course. Now you will have a chance to investigate women's diverse experiences in the past through independent research. Some of the final steps of your project include learning about what other students have learned through their experiences in presentations.

Through this project, you are to describe or interpret an event from the past. Choose a key event, personality, or movement related to women's history and create a digital narrative that incorporates images, quotations, and other supplementary research in order to bring your story to life. For some examples, check out Documenting the American South, http://docsouth.unc.edu/classroom/narratives/classroom.html

The format of your presentation must be electronic/digital and must be shared with the class as a formal presentation. That is, you may create a powerpoint, a movie, or some other digital presentation that can be shared with the rest of the class through the projector. You are limited to 7 minutes maximum, so be sure to time your presentation before delivering it in class.

The content of the presentation should be a response to a historical question about women's experiences. Focus on the topics that have been covered in this class: Feminism, Woman's Suffrage, Superheroes/villains, Female Utopia, Medicine, Asian American Communities, Domestic Service, Civil Rights, Working-Class Labor, Creativity, Modern Families, Sexuality.

Source Requirements:

• 7 credible primary sources that have not been assigned in class;
• 2 secondary scholarly sources that have not been assigned in class
• Additional material may include sources assigned in class

Guidelines:

1. Scholarly Question: Each presentation must ask a scholarly question and your presentation of sources must respond to your question.
2. Source Analysis: In your presentation, do not simply present each source. Instead use your sources to present an argument about your topic and then refer to the sources as evidence.
3. Visual: Each presentation must be accompanied by a digital presentation.

NOTE: This item needs to be emailed to the instructor (kwarren@ku.edu) by 5pm the day before your presentation.

4. Time Limit: 7 minutes maximum
5. Q&A: 5 minutes

Other Guidelines:

1. Your digital narrative must have a focused topic. Find a specific person, movement, or event that is of interest to you. For instance, a narrative on African American women would be too large for this project; but, you could compose a narrative about African American domestic labor. (Before selecting your final topic, be sure that there are images available over the web and/or that you have access to a scanner).

2. You should have a specific goal for your project. If you decide to focus on a historical figure, like Leslie Marmon Silko for example, you should think about your narrative's purpose. Are you simply trying to tell the story of her life in a straight-forward biography, or is your goal to explain her creative process? This is an important question to ask yourself, because this is how a digital narrative gets its focus.

3. You should keep in mind the narrative's point of view. If you were creating a narrative about women's work, would you focus on the employers' or employees' point of view? Or, are you going to try and tackle both?

4. Be aware of pacing. With these short narratives, you may be tempted to cram your presentation with as many words as possible in order to fit everything in. Resist the temptation! Pay careful attention to word choice, enunciate clearly, and pace yourself. Remember, part of the assignment is to concisely and vividly recount this historical topic (the same goes for slides).