HIST 10613
Kerstetter
Final paper (20% of semester grade)

THIS VERSION FOR GRADUATING SENIORS ONLY

This assignment serves as the final evaluative exercise for this class.  It asks students to show their command of history as a discipline and their familiarity with U.S. history after 1877.

Write a speech to deliver at commencement in which you discuss the merits of a liberal arts education as encapsulated in the craft of history.  Use Paul Johnson’s A History of the American People and Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States to illustrate the speech.  The speech should analyze how each historian interprets U.S. history including case studies representing each of three eras:  1877-1914; 1914-1945; and, 1945 to the present.

The speech should contain 1500 words (no more than 2000) and should follow the guidelines for formal writing used in this course’s essay assignments.  Submit a hard copy of the essay before noon on May 5.