This writing assignment requires you to write several short sections of one or two substantive paragraphs each. Perhaps the “explanation” section could have three paragraphs. The total word count should be about 900-1000 words.
Choose one of the following journalists the journalistic publication for which he or she is best known. It’s all laid out for you below. You must use at least two sources. I used Wikipedia for some of the information here, but you CANNOT use Wikipedia as a source. Use Wikipedia to get you started, if you wish, but you must find the original source for the information that you find there! Other sources used to compile this list are at the bottom. You are free to use them yourself!
Show your sources by using MLA format throughout: in-text parenthetical citations, and a list of Works Cited at the end, formatted correctly!
Put your work into sections. Each section should have a subheading in bold, as follows:
Biographical sketch of _________ [fill in your journalist’s name: Ida Tarbell, John Hersey, for example]
Historical context
Explanation and analysis [This should be an expression of your perspective and analysis on the journalist’s importance and influence in American history or culture or journalism, or all three.]
Choose ONE from the following:
Ida Tarbell — American writer, investigative journalist, biographer and lecturer. She was one of the leading muckrakers of the Progressive Era of the late 19th and early 20th centuries and pioneered investigative journalism.[1] Born in Pennsylvania at the onset of the oil boom, Tarbell is best known for her 1904 book The History of the Standard Oil Company. The book was published as a series of articles in McClure’s Magazine from 1902 to 1904. It has been called a “masterpiece of investigative journalism”
Upton Sinclair – Wrote “The Jungle,” a novel based on Sinclair’s seven weeks’ working undercover in Chicago meatpacking plants, an experience he also wrote about for a Socialist newspaper. “The Jungle,” however, reached a mass audience in the form of a novel, which harshly criticized the moral poverty and corruption of the rich and the harsh realities of wage laborers.
Ida B. Wells — outspoken African American journalist. Wrote “Southern Horrors: Lynch law in All Its Phases,” published as a pamphlet. She operated a newspaper in Memphis, Tennessee. Wells’ efforts were central to our early understanding of the mixture of hatred, greed, fear, and terror that motivated white lynching of African Americans.
John Hersey. The New Yorker magazine devoted its entire August 31, 1946 issue to an article by John Hersey titled “Hiroshima.” He later put his reporting together in longer form in his book “Hiroshima.” He tells the story of six residents of Hiroshima and how their lives were intertwined on that fateful day when the United States dropped the atomic bomb on the city.
Ronan Farrow — Published “From Aggressive Overtures to Sexual Assault: Harvey Weinstein’s Accusers Tell Their Stories” in the New Yorker magazine in 2017. Weinstein, a powerful Hollywood mogul, had been accused by dozens of women of rape, sexual assault, abuse, and harrassment during his three-decade reign of power in the film industry. Farrow’s work gets priority here because of its depth, the way in which he elevates the first-hand accounts of Weinstein’s alleged victims, and its centrality as a cultural point of orientation.
Ta-Nehisi Coates – Wrote “The Case for Reparations,” for the Atlantic Magazine. Coates’ work was very timely and also forward-looking, as reparations is on Pres. Biden’s agenda now.
Sheri Fink –“Five Days at Memorial: Life and Death in a Storm-Ravaged Hospital.” This is narrative medical journalism, written in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina by the Pro Publica and New York Times correspondent who is also a physician.
Sources:
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