Close Reading Assignment
World Humanities 101 | Fall 2022 | Tyson Ward, Instructor
Please make a single, critical claim regarding one passage of your choosing from the first two
weeks’ readings. By a “critical claim,” we simply mean a statement that interprets or clarifies
the meaning of the text in a way that would be helpful to other readers. It must be possible for
other intelligent readers to disagree with your claim, or mistake what you see in the text for
something else. You then should use details in the imagery or language of the primary text to
illustrate and support your main claim.
You may quote your passage in full as a block quote or divide it into a series of shorter
quotes. Set up and announce your claim (your thesis statement) in the opening paragraph, then
use the body paragraph(s) to analyze your passage in support of this claim. Conclude by
restating your thesis in bolder terms in the last paragraph. Make sure to restrict yourself to only
one passage for analysis and only one critical claim—the more specific the better.
Technical Requirements:
• Write about 350-400 words (about one double-spaced page). A Works Cited page is
NOT required here.
• Quote from the literary text, citing the page number from one of our pdfs or the chapter
and verse from the Bible in support of your assertions.
• Submit this assignment through our course site on Blackboard (See “Assignments”→
“Close Reading Assignment” to access the submission page) as a Word or pdf document
by 11:59pm on Friday, 9/9.
Grading Rubric:
C range and below B range A range
Argument Thesis is missing, Thesis is not very Announces a debatable,
(thesis inconsistent, or is merely a debatable, or is not insightful thesis in the
statement and common opinion. An announced in specific terms intro and revisits it in the
coherence) absence of topic sentences in the introduction. The conclusion.
or transitions in the body best thesis statement may All body paragraphs
makes the argument be buried somewhere in the relate clearly to the thesis,
difficult to follow. body. Or the thesis is with topic sentences
insightful, but irrelevant making the relevance
materials in the body known along the way.
distract from the argument.
Support An absence of quotes and Quotes are employed but Essay makes apt and
(use of details leaves us, for the are used merely to review revealing associations
primary and most part, listening to the the plot or to support between its writer’s ideas
secondary writer’s ideas in the common knowledge. Or the and the source passage(s).
research, abstract. The essay makes writer’s main claim is The main claim is well
MLA format) merely common-sense insufficiently supported. supported by details from
associations or restates the the text.
obvious.
Mechanics Frequent, significant Enough sentence-level The prose is clear and
(grammar, sentence-structure problems to distract the correct. Very few, if any,
punctuation problems, along with a reader. But the essay is mistakes mar the reading
and spelling) disruptive level of readable overall. experience.
punctuation/spelling
mistakes, make reading
difficult.