Historical Analysis

Consider how your audience might influence the information you include in an historical analysis about the Women’s Suffrage Movement.

What audience would be most interested in reading about the women’s movement? How would you tailor your presentation to that audience? What message would be most appropriate for this audience?

 

Short Responses Questions

Instruction for the following questions

Consider the examples of different audiences below. For each one, describe how you would adjust your writing for that particular audience. Be sure to respond to the question in four to six complete sentences, using proper grammar. Specifically address the following points

• How formal should your tone be?
• What level of detail should you provide?
• What is this audience looking for in your essay—basic information or detailed arguments?

Short Responses – Question 1

1. Your best friend
2. People reading a newspaper editorial you’ve written
3. Your professor
4. The audience at a conference where you are presenting

Short Responses – Question 2

Consider how your audience might influence the information you include in an historical analysis essay about the Women’s Suffrage Movement.

What audience would be most interested in reading about the women’s movement? How would you tailor your presentation to that audience? What message would be most appropriate for this audience?

Short Responses – Question 3

Let’s say the intended audience for your historical analysis essay about the legal battle for women’s suffrage is a group of civil rights lawyers. How would you explain the legal background of the Constitution and the Nineteenth Amendment? How would this approach compare and contrast to an audience of high school students?

Instruction for the following questions

Reference: The Fight for Equal Rights, 1923-1972

The following exercises, you will be presented with a research question that addresses the idea of causality, as it relates to the women’s movement for equal rights. 

For each exercise, craft a thesis statement based on that research question, using the information presented in this case study. Be sure to respond to the question in one to two complete sentences, using proper grammar.

 

Short Responses – Question 4

Was President Kennedy’s decision to support the Equal Rights Amendment a necessary cause for the amendment’s passage by Congress?

Short Responses – Question 5

Was the social tumult of the 1960s a necessary cause of the women’s liberation movement?

Instruction for the following questions

In each of the following exercises, you will be presented with a basic thesis statement about the women’s movement and the ERA, as well as a particular audience. For each one, craft a two-sentence message tailored for that audience, based on the material you have read in this learning block

Short Responses – Question 6

Simone de Beauvoir was the intellectual founder of the women’s liberation movement. Tailor this thesis statement into a message suitable for an audience of high school history students.

Short Responses – Question 7

The women’s movement’s focus on issues related to sexual freedom, including reproductive rights, galvanized support among many younger women, but it cost the movement support among many older and more socially conservative women. Tailor this message for an audience consisting of students in a Women’s Studies class.