Assignment 7 (30 points): Final Paper, due December 15

Your final assignment requires that you reflect on the broad sweep of our course experience. In a 3,750 to 5,000-word formal paper, you must revisit the process of writing your initial 50-word object caption and demonstrate how a fuller engagement with the object does/does not expand our ability to understand its history. More specifically, you must:

• Assess your initial 50-word First Person Museum caption and the process of writing it. As an object history, is it effective? Why, why not?

• Based on our readings and class discussions, propose a methodology for expanding your preliminary object study into a broader investigation that is unbridled by the challenges of exhibit development.

• Implement your proposed methodology by writing a second history of your object. This new history must reflect considerable use of primary and secondary sources and should constitute the bulk of this paper.

• Explain how your second history differs from your first. Word count aside, in what ways does the second history represent a different kind of intellectual product than the first? What are its strengths? What are its weaknesses?

• Finally, having written and reflected on your second object history, indicate how—if at all—you would revise your first object history. Include a revised 50-word history if applicable.

Recognizing that access to your First Person Museum object may be limited (if possible at all) you may choose to substitute a similar object as the focus of your second object history. In all cases, physically interacting with your object is a prerequisite for this assignment—you must be able to interact with the object.

Otherwise, this paper must also:

• Be double spaced;
• Be typed in 11-12 point font;
• Have 1-inch margins;
• Include page numbers;
• Include a title page or heading with your name, date, paper title, and course number;
• Include proper citations (Chicago style preferred) and a bibliography or works cited page;
• Be thoroughly proofread, edited, and must adhere to proper grammatical conventions;
• Be handed to me—I will not except email attachments.