The Newspaper Assignment For this class you are required to write a 5-6 page (12

The Newspaper Assignment
For this class you are required to write a 5-6 page (1200 to 1500 word) paper following the guidelines in the syllabus. One of your options is to base this essay on your reading of one issue of The New York Times, The Chicago Tribune, The Atlanta Constitution, The Los Angeles Times, the Memphis Commercial Appeal, or other big city newspaper approved by your instructor. (You may not use the Washington Post.) Most libraries will have at least some of these newspapers on microfilm, and the New York Times has begun putting some of their old issues on the internet in their public archive. The Library of Congress has a large collection of digitized newspapers. The University of Memphis Library has a good collection of newspapers on microfilm. The Main Branch of the Memphis Public Library has some newspapers on microfilm. The main branches of most city libraries will at least have back issues of the local paper and often the New York Times. You may pick any year from 1877 to 1969. Your instructor will pick the exact week you will write on. You may choose any newspaper within that week. This will ensure that no students have the same assignment. Your date must be approved by your instructor. If you have trouble finding a newspaper for your particular date, contact your instructor immediately to arrange a different day for you to write on. The point of this assignment is to write about an average day in history. You may not write about the day of the Kennedy assassination, the attack on Pearl Harbor, the 1929 stock market crash, or any other day in which a single incident dominated the news and crowded out everything else.
In this paper, you need to describe life in the United States on the particular day of your assignment. What were people concerned about? How did they live? What were the pressing issues of the day? Try to include political, economic, foreign policy, social, cultural, and labor issues. Read the whole newspaper. Do not simply read a few articles and write on them. Keep in mind that a newspaper is more than just its articles. What can you learn from letters to the editor? What products are being advertised? What companies are hiring, and for what kind of jobs? Are there any personal ads? Any political cartoons?
Concentrate on important issues and themes. Relate what you read to issues covered in the lectures and discussions of this class. Do you see any evidence of a consumer culture? How are issues of race, ethnicity, and gender treated? How do Americans view their position in the world? Consider the importance of industrialization, immigration, progressivism, populism, or other relevant ‘isms.’ What are the popular social or political movements? What is the editorial stance of the newspaper? This listing is not all-inclusive. You will probably run across other topics that are worthy of comment. This assignment is purposely somewhat broad to allow you the freedom to approach it as you see fit. Try to have fun, but remember to focus your paper on important historical issues.
Your paper must be an analysis of what you have read. You should be mining the newspaper for important data that help you understand and discuss life on that particular day. Do not simply summarize a series of disconnected articles in the paper or summarize the newspaper in order either by page (‘page one said _______; page two said ________; etc.) or by section (sports, business, etc.). In particular, do not discuss items that have no relevance to your thesis. Possible examples of these include: sports scores, the weather, horoscopes, TV or radio guides, etc. The fact that it was clear and sunny or that the Mets beat the Cubs has nothing to do with the larger issues you need to address. The fact that both teams had recently hired African American players would be important in a discussion of racial attitudes. Similarly, a recent natural disaster would allow you to discuss how local, state, and federal governments responded to the emergency. If you want to discuss prices, remember that a price is meaningless without context. A $10,000 home may be cheap, or very expensive, depending on the cost of living. How much does the average person earn?
Context, of course, is important for everything you discuss. Do not simply project current attitudes on to the past. Make a real effort to understand how people felt in the past, why they acted the way they did, and what they valued. Writing your paper as a direct comparison between the past and the present is not a good idea. Reading the textbook chapters and online lectures that apply to your newspaper’s date is a good idea. You may run across news items that you do not understand and may need to consult other sources to understand terms or learn the background of important events (wars, natural disasters, political campaigns and events, etc.). You should do so.
Writing Your Paper
Your paper should be neat, grammatically correct, well written, and 5-6 pages in length. You must have a thesis, which you support with evidence, reasoning and logical argument in the body of your paper, and a conclusion. Papers lacking these will be penalized. You should articulate your thesis in the first paragraph of your paper, and your thesis and conclusion must agree. Showing your instructor a draft of your paper before it is due, is always a good idea. Parenthetical references are fine for this assignment (New York Times, 3 March 1898, 3). At the top of your first page, list the city, newspaper, and date that you are writing about (Memphis Commercial Appeal, April 1, 1927). You do not need a bibliography unless you use sources other than your newspaper and the textbooks. All quotations must be marked as such.
Quick suggestions: Avoid using too many quotations. Quote only when absolutely necessary. Do not use long quotes (more than a sentence or two). Be sure to mention who you are quoting. Failure to cite your source is plagiarism and will be handled through the appropriate channels. Avoid contractions. Organize your paper into discrete paragraphs. Avoid overwriting (using several sentences when a single, short sentence will make your point). Avoid the passive voice. Avoid using phrases such as “seems to,” “may be,” “appears to,” and similar phrases that weaken your writing. Write with confidence. Write about history in the past tense. Use your spelling checker and grammar checkers, but use them wisely. Keep a copy of your term paper (in case it is lost).Do not play games with fonts and margins–your instructor will count words if he or she must. Upload your paper in Microsoft Word (–.doc) or Rich Text format (–.rtf). Your instructor may not use the same word processor that you do. Ask if you have questions. Apart from the New York Times, two other online sources of old newspapers are:
http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/newspapers/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:List_of_online_newspaper_archives
Going to the library, though, is still the best way to proceed, because online archives are often incomplete, leaving out ads and other important material.
Stephen Stein, July 11, 2001, revised April 2003, September 2017, & October 2021