GROUP PROJECT: REL 444/544 Medieval Japanese Buddhism
* Four Paragraphs: Not more than two pages (You may use
parenthetical notation to indicate page numbers for textual
references.)
* You will form groups on your own, not more than 4 students per
group.
* Be sure to write your names, the name of the class, and
title of group project at the top of the page.
* I also strongly encourage you to read the essays on my Writing web
pages, especially "Four Keys to Writing in the Humanities," "Paper
Writing Guidelines," "Checklist for Papers," "Writing: The Bridge
between Consciousness and Unconsciousness," and "Clauses and Commas."
The main ideas of this project are collaborative research and
writing.
Instructions: Each student will sign up to be part of a group by Week 3 (October 13), with not more than 4 students per group. Each group will select one of the topics listed below. Each group member will find one scholarly article or book chapter related to the topic the group selects. You can go to the library or look up an article online through the library article search: library.uoregon.edu. Then, your group will meet to discuss (either online through Zoom or in person) the article or chapter you found. As a group, you will decide to focus on between 2 and 4 of the articles you brought to your group. Then, each of you will write one paragraph each about one of the articles your group selected. Specifically, you will discuss how that article helped you to further, deepen, or enrich your understanding of another reading from the course that is part of the required reading list.
Thus, if there are four people in your group, then you will jointly submit a four-paragraph document (not more than 2 pages total) that discusses how the articles/chapters you read helped to further your understanding of another reading from the course. For example, if your group chose two articles from among the four that each of you brought to the group, then perhaps 2 will write one paragraph each on one article/chapter, and 2 will write one paragraph each on the other article/chapter. Don't worry if the four paragraphs flow together as a whole. However, after you have composed your four-paragraph document, you will discuss any edits that you as a group would like to suggest to the whole document and finalize the document. This will function as a peer review for each group. There is no problem if two or more groups select the same topic from below.