What makes a location a place

In Unit 2, your goal is to learn about what makes a location a place, and to learn about a physical place that is important to you. You will also learn about the research process, including asking research questions, finding local resources, and learning to compare sources. The results of Unit 2 will serve as the foundation for your Unit 3 work.

Stage 1: Choosing a Location

You should select a location that has made a significant impact on your life or your self-identity. The location you choose for this assignment must be one in which you have spent significant time; somewhere where you are a “local” or where you have lived there for long enough that you know it as a resident would.

When selecting a location, ask yourself the following questions: What makes this location unique? What are the physical, cultural, and social characteristics of this location? How has it been described by others? What were your attitudes towards this location before, during, and after the time you spent there? How did this location affect you and how did you affect it?

Stage 2: Ask A Question About Your Place

Once you have selected a location, you will then define it: learn about and describe what makes a specific somewhere a somewhere instead of a nowhere. This will require you to think about place as a concept as well as the world you inhabit and make claims about both place as a concept and this place in particular.  You should choose one or two specific placemaking practices or elements of place to focus on: what makes this a specific place?  For example, if I chose my small hometown of Marshall, Minnesota, I might think about how it is a small farming town with “midwestern” values.

Next, come up with a focused research question, something to guide your learning.  My question is “How does Marshall, MN’s agricultural history and surroundings shape the lives of the people who live in town today?

Stage 3: Learn about Your Place and Write Annotated Bibliography Entries

Now you will do research on your place and the aspects of place you are interested in.  Your goal is to find 4 research sources about your place and the specific aspect/s of it you are interested in.  I suggest that the sources that are the most useful to you will be substantive and local. Academic sources may be too challenging; commercial or entertainment sources may be untrustworthy.  Click here for more information on using the library!

In each annotated bibliography entry, you will do the following:

• Give the Works Cited entry for your source using proper MLA or APA formatting.
• Summarize the key ideas explored in the source in clear, concise language.
• Make statement/s of relevance: discuss how the source will help you answer your research question. This is key because it tells both you and your reader why reading this is important.
• Making bridging statements: explain how one source relates to another source you are using.
• Arrange your entries alphabetically by Works Cited entry.

Each annotated bibliography entry should be approximately 100-200 words in length (not including the Works Cited entry), making the annotated bibliography section of your paper between 400-800 words long.

Stage 4: Answer Your Question

The final section of your paper should answer your question, and should use all 4 of your sources to do it.

• You should include a clear claim at the beginning: a 1-3 sentence statement that is the clear answer to your question.  A clear claim is not the same as a perfect solution or a total answer! Most answers will just give us an introductory look at the subject, and may include secondary questions or suggestions for further research.
• After you make your claim, you should explain your answer by referencing your resources to show why you believe your answer is correct.  You may copy and paste from your annotated bibliography entries here, but should use appropriate signal phrases as well as MLA or APA in-text citations whenever you do.

Here is an example of what a final version of this paper will look like, correctly formatted.

Things I will evaluate you on:

• Place and Question: Do you choose a place that conforms to our definition of place and the limitations of this assignment?  Is it clear why you chose it?  Is the question that you ask clear, appropriately narrowed, and based on our discussions of place elements and placemaking practices?
• Sources and Annotations: Do you find 4 sources to help you answer your question, two of which are local to your place and two of which are substantive? Do your annotations include summary, statements of relevance, and bridging statements?
• Answer and Explanation: Do you have a clear claim that answers your question? Does your answer rely on what you’ve learned from your sources? Do you effectively use material from your annotations to explain your answer?
• MLA/APA: Are your Works Cited entries present and correct? When you discuss your sources, do you use signal phrases, quotation marks as required, and parenthetical citations?

Cannot-Accept Conditions:

• The paper is less than a total of 1,250 words
• You do not include required citation elements for your sources: in-text parenthetical citations, a Works Cited page, etc.
• You plagiarize (you did not write this paper yourself)
• You do not include 4 sources
• You did not share your assignment with me as a Google Doc