The document provides instructions for writing an essay in response to one of two prompts. The first prompt asks students to analyze the 1976 film All the President's Men about the Watergate scandal and assess whether Watergate revealed a system that works. Students are asked to consider the immediate and long-term impacts of Watergate on American politics, government reform, and culture. The second prompt asks students to analyze a film about the Vietnam War in light of an article about how Vietnam films of the 1980s rewrote the war's memory. Students are asked to discuss the cultural and political impacts of Vietnam. The instructions provide guidelines for structuring the essay with an introduction, body, and conclusion and using sources.

1. Instructions:
Choose
one
of the following prompts to write Essay 3. Your essay should
be 3-4 pages in length, double spaced, and in Times New
Roman, size 12 font.
Alan J. Pakula’s film
All the Presiden’ts Men
(1976) depicts the groundbreaking investigative journalism of
Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward during the Watergate fiasco.
In the film, Nixon is the corrupt power that needs to be removed
while the press or the “fourth estate” emerges as a check on
Washington corruption. One scene shows Nixon’s unwilling
cameo as he accepts renomination at the Republican convention
while Woodward works away at his downfall. The irony
conveys the message that ultimately, the American system
works. One interpretation of the final scene, which shows
newspaper headlines of the indictments of important men
involved in criminal activities, suggests that Watergate was an
aberration and that once the “bad guys” are in jail,
normality
—understood as American exceptionalism with its virtuous
history, political system and values—will return to Washington.
Do you agree that overall, Watergate revealed a system that
works or what is your assessment of this event? What was the
immediate and long-term impact of the scandal? In your answer,
consider American politics, government reform legislation, and
culture in the post-Watergate period. Use the film, chapter 30
of your textbook, and
Kutler's article
to support your answer.
Read

2. D. Desser's and G. Studlar's article "Never Having to Say
You're Sorry: Rambo's Rewriting of the Vietnam War"
and watch one of the Vietnam films discussed on page 11. Do
you agree with the authors’ assessment of the “memory” of
Vietnam in American films of the 1980s? Does the war
constitute a cultural trauma and suppressed collective guilt that
has been rewritten as victimization? Explain why or why not. In
your answer, discuss the impact of Vietnam on American
politics, society, and culture using the article, your selected
film, and chapter 29 of your textbook as sources.
Additional guidelines:
Be sure to structure your essay with an
introduction
,
body
and
conclusion
.
The
introductory paragraph
should include three parts:
Provide a
context or background
(2-3 sentences) to the material you will be discussing. In the
words of Dr. Darden Pyron, it should “set the scene” by
providing the what, the where, the when, or the who of the
material. There should be no argument here, just general
historical data to set up your historical question and thesis

3. statement.
State
the historical problem
(1-2 sentences). This should be the essay question reintroduced
as the historical problem you will be addressing in the paper.
Try to find a flow between the background information you
provide and the statement of the historical problem. Why should
we care about the historical facts you just discussed in the
preceding background section of the introduction? What is their
significance?
Provide your
thesis statement
for the paper (1-2 sentences). The thesis statement should have
2 PARTS
. The first states your
position
or answer to the historical problem above, and the second
provides a
blueprint
for the paper (or approximately three elements that will support
your position in the body of the paper). The blueprint should
directly correlate to the topic sentence or main idea in each
body paragraph.
Body paragraphs
and topic sentences:
Body paragraphs should have topic sentences describing the
main idea of the corresponding paragraph. They should echo
one of your thesis elements.
Sources:

4. You may ONLY use the primary or secondary sources provided
on CANVAS or specified in the prompts above. Absolutely no
outside internet sources should be used for these assignments.
The specific number of sources required for each essay question
is provided in the prompts above.
Quotations:
Limit quotations to 1 sentence per page or one longer quotation
of 3 to 4 sentences for the whole essay.
Citations:
Cite any quotations or paraphrased content. Use the Chicago
Manual of Style. See this link for some examples:
http://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/tools_citationguide/citatio
n-guide-1.html