Condition of Minorities

Frederick Douglass and Harriet Jacobs were famous writers who championed for the rights of slaves and women. Today in our own culture, there are many social issues for which people advocate strongly. In this assignment, step into the shoes of Douglass and Jacobs by writing your own narrative about a social issue or problem that you care about. Your main purpose is to help effect social change for an individual or a group of people by relating your first-hand account in the style of Realism. Your social issue does not have to be on a global scale; it can be on a small scale such as the cellphone policy at your school. In fact, the more typical and everyday the theme of your narrative is, the more it resembles the themes of Realism. Recall in the readings of Douglass and Jacobs that the writers did not incorporate techniques of persuasion; they simply related their ordinary experiences to bring to light the problems of their times.

Remember to choose the topic of your narrative carefully and write about experiences that you feel comfortable sharing with others. In the event that you cannot select a topic which you feel comfortable relating as your personal narrative, for the purpose of this assignment, it is acceptable to write the personal narrative of another person as if it were yours, but you may need to conduct additional research. Plagiarism is never acceptable, so if you choose to write someone else's narrative, be creative and make it realistic yet all your own. Feel free to change the names of people and use pseudonyms if necessary, just as Harriet Jacobs had to change the names of everyone, including herself, in her narrative.

Because you will be writing this narrative in the style of Realism, it is a good idea to incorporate elements of the Realist movement such as dialect, colloquialism, and Regionalism in your writing. Your narrative should be at least one thousand words long and composed in the first-person point of view. As always, remember to use correct grammar, spelling, and punctuation where you are not deliberately manipulating the grammar and spelling to reflect regional dialects and colloquialism. You may need to use resources outside of this course to complete this assignment. If so, please submit a Works Cited document. If you need assistance, visit the Developmental Module for information on citing resources. Before you begin, review the Realist Narrative Checklist to make sure that you include all of the items required for full credit.

Once you have completed your Realist Narrative, please submit your work to the dropbox.