This document provides the prompt and guidelines for a research paper on trickster characters. Students are asked to analyze whether modern characters meet the criteria to be considered tricksters. They must also address whether tricksters relate to gender and ethnicity, and if they help people understand themselves. The paper must be 5-7 pages, cite at least 3 new secondary sources, and meet formatting requirements. Students are provided tips on best practices like using examples and metaphors, and traps to avoid like relying on too many sources or failing to support their argument. They are given potential starting points to consider definitions of tricksters and trickster tales.

1. Essay #4: The Research Paper: The Modern Passer as Trickster Character
Objectives
To Lean to Write a Clear and Cohesive Research Paper
To Learn Rhetorical Strategies: Definition, Division and Classification, Process Analysis, and Persuasive
Argument.
To Learn to do Library Research
To Learn MLA Documentation Style
Prompt Introduction
Trickster characters have existed in stories from most cultures since the earliest times. The long-lasting
appeal of this archetype (recurring symbol of a recurring model) emphasizes the cultural need to
acknowledge that all is not what it seems to be, that we need to be on the lookout for those who would fool
us. It is not hard to account for the appeal of tricksters—they are fun in their radical assault on the status
quo, yet their trickery also strikes a deeper chord for most people.
Famous Tricksters from the past include Puss in Boots—a magical cat who tricks a king into raising a low
born miller to the station of a great noble—and Jack—a boy best known from the story “Jack and the
Beanstalk” who uses his wit to outsmart characters in many stories. In some interpretations of Christianity,
Satan can be seen as the ultimate trickster whose job is to test humanity.
As societies have evolved, the cultural function of the trickster has been reinvented: who or what are they
in a modern society? When and why do they appear?
Helen Lock, in her essay “Transformations of the Trickster,” writes,
Contentious issues include the status of the archaic archetypal tricksters (were they
mortal or divine? can a god be a trickster?), the relation of tricksters to gender and to
ethnicity, and the vexed question of whether modern tricksters exist at all. In one sense it
does seem entirely appropriate that these embodiments of ambiguity (no dispute there, at
least) should remain so elusive. However, it is still important to address these tricky
questions, because the trickster performs such fundamental cultural work: in
understanding the trickster better, we better understand ourselves, and the perhaps
subconscious aspects of ourselves that respond to the trickster’s unsettling and
transformative behavior.
Topic:
For this research paper, consider trickster tales and trickster or trickster-like characters from our
reading. Do they meet the criteria to be categorized as “tricksters”? Which measuring stick do we
use to determine if they are or not? Who or what are they in a modern society? When and why do
they appear? Is there a relationship between tricksters and gender and ethnicity? Do these modern
tricksters, as Lock asserts, help us “better understand ourselves, and the perhaps subconscious
aspects of ourselves that respond to the trickster’s unsettling and transformative behavior”? How?
Or, do these trickster tales and trickster or trickster-like characters serve another purpose? Which?
Due Dates:
Last day of class.
Submission Requirements: Please submit electronically to
https://kaizena.com/palmoreessaysubmissiongmail
Format Requirement: MLA-style formatting and citations
Length: Your finished text should be between five and seven pages, excluding the Works Cited page.

2. Research Requirements
Works Cited Page
A Works Cited page names all of the sources that were used in an essay or research paper; it credits the
source or sources for the information you present, evaluate, analyze, and synthesize to support your thesis.
A Works Cited page also serves as a reference to the sources that were used so that a reader or writer can
quickly refer to the original text.
The Works Cited page for this research project must contain at least three NEW secondary source entries.
These cannot include articles we read in class. Two of these must be from either a book or article from a
scholarly journal; the other may be a website or an article from a popular magazine or periodical, such as
Time, National Geographic, or the LA Times. You must also cite any primary or secondary texts you use
that we read in class. Remember, you can also draw on your own experiences and knowledge to discuss,
explain, and analyze the texts you choose to support your assertion.
Expected Student Learning Outcomes
 Demonstrate outlining and brainstorming abilities
 Demonstrate an awareness of the time needed to plan, search, and write an essay
 Demonstrate increased awareness of strategies for organizing ideas and structuring essays
 Demonstrate an awareness of sentence structures
 Demonstrate an understanding of multiple rhetorical strategies: Process Analysis, Cause and
Effect, Compare and Contrast, and Classification and Division
 Learn to apply active reading strategies in order to identify main ideas
 Learn basic library research skills
 Learn to integrate quotations effectively and correctly
 Demonstrate an awareness of the value of self-assessment
Previously Learned Skills Required to Complete this Assignment
 The ability to summarize sources
 The ability to use multiple rhetorical strategies: Narration, Description, Exemplification
 An awareness of plagiarism issues
 The ability to write grammatically correct, clear sentences.
 The ability to write a clear and concise thesis.
 The ability to brainstorm material for an essay.
 The ability to organize an essay
Best Practices
 As you reread the primary texts that you choose to use, keep in mind your argument; highlight
specific passages, lines, or scenes that support your thesis.
 Write a thesis that helps readers understand the point of the essay as well as enables them to
understand the reasoning behind your assertions, examples, and explanations.
 Avoid telling the reader that something is “interesting,” or “exciting”; instead create images or use
examples that show it.
 Use metaphors to make the reader see the intensity or scope or depth of the trickster concept in
modern literature.
 Come to my office if you are unsure, confused, or behind.
Traps to Avoid:
 Using too many primary sources. You only have a few pages to make your point. Cluttering your
essay with examples from too many sources will make your paper seem superficial and
undeveloped.
 Failing to assert a clear and strong argument.
 Failing to sufficiently describe the concept of trickster for readers who may be unfamiliar with it.
 Failing to accurately convey how the primary texts and characters qualify as trickster tales or
tricksters.

3.  Seeking to present the subject from memory or hearsay.
 Failing to support the argument with evidence from appropriate sources.
 Citing Wikipedia as a source for your research paper.
Ways to Begin:
Consider the answers to the following questions for your research:
What is a traditional trickster? Start your research here: Can you find a definition or list of criteria
against which to measure our modern tricky characters? Can you provide multiple definitions? Can you
find one (or several) that supports your assertion? Can you modify a definition based on what you believe
to be an evolution of the trickster character?
What is a trickster tale? Can you provide multiple definitions? Can you find one that supports your
assertion? Can you modify a definition based on what you believe to be an evolution of the trickster tale?
Which, from our reading, are clearly identifiable as trickster tales? Can you include others, or parts of
others, that are not so easily identifiable? What makes them trickster tales?
Which, from our reading, are trickster or trickster-like characters? What characteristics make them
tricksters?