Final Exam
Choose three questions and write brief essays (roughly 3 paragraphs for each) that address the questions that are posed about these texts. Be sure to thoroughly analyze the texts by addressing specific moments/quotes while you answer the questions about the underlying themes that these authors are trying to express.
- The idea of “home” in relation to working (or not working) has been a part of several pieces we have encountered this term. Choose two and discuss how they deal with this aspect of the working life.
- The Panopticon is a prison model that Michel Foucault used when he considered how individuals are disciplined in other walks of life. Discuss this idea in terms of at least one reading (poem, story, play) or film from the term.
- Leisure can be viewed as the sole purpose in life or the moments outside of one’s sole purpose in life. Of course, there are many places in between those viewpoints. How would Ben Franklin view leisure? How does that line up with our working world of “permanent availability”?
- How can white collar work be viewed as similar to blue collar work? Use at least two readings/films that support your point.
- Much of how we view work has to do with the work of those who are around us, especially our parents. Analyze two readings/films that deal with this aspect of our working lives.
- Eugene O’Neill (“The Hairy Ape”) and Diego Rivera “Detroit Industry”) depict industrial work in very different ways. Cite specific moments/aspects of each work of art to show how industrial workers are depicted differently. What seems to be the goal of these artists, in terms of how the worker is being depicted?
