Course Final Activity:

Humanities

Students will submit a final exam at the conclusion of this course. The exam (worth 100 possible points) will be comprised of answering a series of essay questions surrounding a reading of selected primary source documents and submitting your responses through SafeAssign on the eCampus course site. Specific formatting requirements and other details relating to the final will be provided at least one week prior to the due date on the course site. Once the deadline for the final has passed, the assignment will no longer be available to submit on eCampus and students will receive a zero (0) for this grade.

Instructions:

Complete the attached questions in a separate word file. Please pay extra attention to the instructions in this file to complete this assignment. Since this is the end of course, no late submissions can be accepted for any reason.

Based upon your reading of these selected primary documents and incorporating such secondary sources as your textbook and lecture notes, I would like you to answer the following 5 Questions. Please provide specific examples from these documents that support your arguments.

There are FIVE questions to answer, I have listed them again below for you, but they are also on the file for download with all of the relevant documents.

1) Why do the authors of Document 1 and Document 2 believe it is necessary to strictly define Americans, and promote efforts to assimilate, or “Americanize,” immigrants in the United States? How do President Theodore Roosevelt and Senator Smith’s arguments differ? Do you find their arguments persuasive? Why or why not? Based upon Document 3, how might Woody Guthrie respond to each of those proposals?

2) In examining Document 4 and Document 6, how did the onset of the Cold War redefine what it meant to be an American? What role do these documents suggest loyal citizens play in waging war against Communism? In examining the political cartoon (Document 5), how does the artist critique the “anti-subversive” efforts that took place during the Second Red Scare? In what ways does the McCarthy era continue to influence American society?

3) The turbulent 1960s saw numerous attempts to identify the root problems within American society and the role of citizens in resolving them. In examining Document 7, Document 8, and Document 9, what common problems are identified within American society? What are some of the differences? What role did each of these documents suggest Americans should play in achieving social justice? Are their arguments persuasive? Why or why not?

4) The last several decades of the Twentieth Century saw the emergence of new groups of Americans claiming rights as citizens. To what extent does the failure of the Equal Rights Amendment (Document 10) to be ratified, but the signing of Title IX (Document 11) into law, signal about the changing role and rights of women in modern America? After reading President George H.W. Bush’s remarks (Document 12), why do you believe it took so long for the country to acknowledge and protect the rights of the disabled?

5) How does Maya Angelou’s inauguration poem (Document 13) reflect upon the identity of “hyphenated Americans” by the early 1990s? In reading Document 14, how does PresidentElect Barack Obama define Americanism? Looking back over documents 1-13, did his election, as the first person of color to become President of the United States, resolve the questions and crises surrounding the definition of an American citizen? In a post-9/11 world, has America progressed in its inclusiveness? Why or why not?