The following is excerpted from a mid-term exam assignment for an upper-level course at a university, and is posted with permission. In posting this I make these points for instructional purposes to help you succeed in a relatively easier fish class:
1. This is a test for seniors as well as for graduate students. It's tough.
2. Although your major is not English, be aware that upper-level courses in your major will be just as demanding.
3. This is for an online course, which means that all the work must be accomplished outside the classroom. The really good thing about online courses is that they permit flexibility for the student.
4. Observe the requirements for making logical arguments; this is the sort of thing you must demonstrate in your little-bitty-baby-1301 research paper.
5. College is about scholarship (look it up; "scholarship" does not mean a handout), not about moods and feelings.
(The bits in red are those most needful to you; once you get to the yellow bits you may cease and desist.)
English 4320 / 5320: XXXX / XXXX
Midterm Exam Fall 2011
The midterm exam for English XXXX / XXXX
· is open book and open notes.
· is worth 200 points.
· is not proctored.
· must be submitted to Turnitin.com.
· has two possible due dates. Midterm grades for undergraduates (graduate students do not receive midterm grades) are due on Sunday October 16. Accordingly, if undergraduates would like their midterm exam score to be reflected in their overall midterm grade then they will need to submit their midterm exam to me as an email attachment no later than 10 AM on Friday October 14. If I do not receive their midterm exam by this time then their midterm grade will be calculated from their forum posts and other exercises such as their retellings of the tales, their Proppian dissection of a tale, etc. The alternative to the Friday morning deadline (for graduates as well as undergraduates this time) is to submit the midterm exam to me no later than 3 PM on Monday October 17. Finally, of course I will be happy to receive and grade midterm exams submitted earlier than these deadlines.
The entire exam should be typed, double spaced, Times New Roman 12 point font with regular margins.
You may use any text assigned for this course on the exam: readings, videos, images, films, web pages blogs, etc. However, you may NOT employ ANY texts or Internet sources not assigned for this course.
Your exam should have a Works Cited page citing every source that you reference in your exam. In addition, be sure that each time within the exam that you quote a source that you remember to cite the author’s last name and page number from which you found the quotation. Be sure to place quotation marks around exact quotations. Failure to comply with these requirements may result in plagiarism, so please be careful.
Remember that the point of an exam is to show off all that you have learned so far in the course. If in doubt, write more, not less (but keep it relevant).
Essays. Respond to 2 of the following prompts (100 points each). Essays should be succinct arguments with clear theses. Relevant and specific examples should serve to bolster your arguments, as well as the clear use of the texts assigned for the class (and, of course, you should feel free to take your examples from these assigned sources). Make sure to give each essay a title appropriate to your discussion. For each essay be sure to identify which prompt you are addressing.
Remember that this is an exam in an upper division / graduate level course. In other words, essays should be guided by folklorist Michael Owen Jones’s dictum that
“Judgments should be disciplined; mere likes and dislikes must play no part in criticism.”
Essays should be models of academic rigor and scholarly insight. Throughout the course so far you have been introduced by the instructor to a wide range of theory as it pertains to folk and fairy tales. Apply this theory in your essays. Also, be sure that your essays are not merely summaries of tales or films (be sure to avoid summaries in general as they are not particularly useful in analytical discussions) but are instead thesis driven discussions.
Avoid repetition between essays. In other words, be sure that your essays cover separate ground. Each essay should have its own distinct thesis and the examples and theory that you employ to support your claims should differ in each essay.
Essays should not be simply recycled discussion forum responses that you have already handed in for a grade. Although you may refer to some of the same ideas, you should write original essays for the exam.
Undergraduates: Each essay should be at least 4 FULL pages in length. This page length is in addition to any images that you include as well as the Works Cited pages for the exam.
Graduates: Each essay should be at least 5 FULL pages in length. This page length is in addition to any images that you include as well as the Works Cited pages for the exam.
Good luck!
1. To rephrase anthropologist William R. Bascom, fairy tales are “important mechanism[s] for maintaining the stability of culture. [They are] used to inculcate the customs and ethical standards in the young, [. . .] to reward him with praise when he conforms, to punish him with ridicule or criticism when he deviates, to provide him with rationalizations when the institutions and conventions are challenged or questioned, to suggest that he be content with things as they are, and to provide him with a compensatory escape from the ‘hardships, the inequalities, the injustices’ of everyday life.”
Assume for the purposes of your response that the above statement about some of the cultural functions of fairy tales is correct. Fairy tales are thus deeply didactic, imparting lessons to their audiences. What are some of these lessons? How do fairy tales manage to impart these lessons? What are the effects of these lessons upon their audiences? Address at least two of Bascom’s functions of the fairy tale in the above quotation, while also employing the relevant ideas of at least two other fairy tale theorists in your response.
2. Discuss the contributions of two of the following theorists or groups of theorists to fairy tale scholarship. Describe the theoretical conception or orientation they are known for, and discuss how this conception or orientation is helpful (or, it could be argued, necessary) when discussing fairy tales from a scholarly perspective. For each of the persons (or group of persons) that you discuss you should employ ideas from 2 or more of the assigned course readings to support your answer. (NOTE: While you have been exposed to quite a few of the important ideas of some of these theorists, for others you have had a more fleeting introduction. You need not do additional research. Employing the texts assigned for this class is sufficient.)
a) Vladimir Propp
b) Antti Aarne, Stith Thompson and Hans-Jörg Uther
c) Jack Zipes
d) Donna Napoli
e) J.R.R. Tolkien
f) Donald Haase
3. Fairy tales have been manipulated and changed in any number of ways to accomplish cultural, political, or ideological goals. Compare/contrast how two of the following persons or groups have manipulated fairy tales. Discuss the relevant ideas of at least three fairy tale theorists/authors in your response. (Note: I am aware that Angela Carter and Neil Jordan can be considered feminists. I am referring to them here in this prompt as the specific authors of the film The Company of Wolves.)
a) Charles Perrault
b) The Brothers Grimm
c) The Communist Chinese AND/ OR the Nazis
d) Walt Disney
e) Feminists
f) Angela Carter and Neil Jordan
4. Folklorist William A. Wilson has observed that “while folklore may be factually false, it is psychologically true.” It could be argued that the same could be said of fairy tales, that while they “may be factually false, [they are] psychologically true.” To what degree is this statement true about fairy tales? (Be specific about which fairy tales that you are discussing, as well as who the tellers of these tales are.) Be aware that, whatever your answer to the above question is, it will have deep theoretical implications. Accordingly, address the relevant ideas of at least three fairy tale theorists in your response.
5. Write a fairy tale in which you incorporate at least 18 of Propp’s 31 functions and at least 5 of Propp’s dramatis personae. After writing your tale you must then write a detailed synopsis in which you identify specifically the functions and dramatis personae that you have employed. If you are looking for a model or template to follow, see Theodore R. Hovet’s article, “‘Once Upon a Time’: Sarah Orne Jewett’s ‘A White Heron’ as a Fairy Tale,” pages 64-67, in which he identifies the dramatis personae as well as their related functions within Sarah Orne Jewett’s short story “A White Heron.” (NOTE: The tale that you to write is to be your original fairy tale, not a retelling of a tale. Also, please be aware that this essay prompt may necessitate a longer page length from the other prompts.)
6. Sandra M. Gilbert and Susan Gubar have argued about that, as a result of “her absolute chastity, her frozen innocence, and her sweet nullity” Snow White is “not only a child but [. . .] childlike, docile, submissive, the heroine of a life that has no story.” Begin with the assumption that the above description of Snow White is also true to a degree of Rapunzel and Rosaleen at the beginning of the films Tangled and The Company of Wolves. To what degree do Rapunzel and Rosaleen, during the course of these films, manage to effectively write lives that, unlike Snow White’s life, have stories? In other words, how successfully do these heroines manage to evolve to the point that they are able to effectively claim agency over their own lives? In doing so, to what degree must they leave behind their earlier attributes of being “childlike, docile, and submissive”? Address the relevant ideas of at least two fairy tale theorists in your response. (Note: It is your choice whether to discuss either Rapunzel, Rosaleen, or compare/contrast the characters.)
