Western Genre

Literary and Cultural Analysis Essay

Using your reading and class notes, compose an essay that analyzes one of the examples of the Western
genre and makes an argument about what the work is critiquing in contemporary society.

Assignment Goals
 Utilize textual evidence to make an interpretation of a work
 Demonstrate ability to conduct a close reading of short segments of a text
 Use close readings as support for an argument about the broader meaning of a work
 Make connections between literature and contemporary cultural issues

Basics
 Times New Roman 12 pt. font, 1” margins all around
 MLA format (work titles should be italicized, quotations should have page attributions, etc.)
 1000-1250 words; Longer quotations should not be included in the word count.
 Conducts a close reading of short passages from the work
 Works Cited page
 Outside research—you must cite at least two sources aside from the text (including, but not
limited to: historical accounts, literary analyses, interviews with authors, etc.)

Organization
 Introduction: introduce the text, summarize plot points that are relevant to your thesis, and
state your thesis
 Each body paragraph should have a topic sentence that connects to a particular part of the
thesis. Never begin a paragraph with a quote.
 After your topic sentence, contextualize your evidence, then quote.
 Explain in several sentences why this quote supports your thesis.
 Conclusion: make a broader claim about what the work says about a current issue/event or
about contemporary life and what lesson we should take from it.

Possible Prompts
 Examine the role of one major historical context in relation to one of the works.
 Consider how masculinity functions in the context of one of the works. Each considers how
different roles as men affects their choices and actions. What might the authors be saying about the
changing nature of masculinity in America?
 Address how the representation of violence in the work might connect to a particular historical
event or political issue in the recent past.
 Space, the landscape, and maps play a significant role in Westerns. Using a passage that depicts
space, place, the use of a map, or some other type of navigation, alongside of a scene that depicts
this usage, make an interpretation of how the work frames the relationship between the characters
and place.
 Make an argument for how a particular symbol or motif relates to the values embodied by the
Western genre.
 Explain how a work embodies different aspects of subgenres of the Western, and how the
subgenres affect meaning.
 General Advice on Writing Literary Analyses

Write on your topic for at least 15 minutes before actually starting your paper. How you do this pre-writing
is up to you, but never simply sit down and start your paper. If you do, the first page or two will consist of
you searching for ideas and your topic, and the remainder will be disorganized. Pre-writing helps you get
your ideas out so you can organize later, as you’re composing the paper.

Method
 Your introduction should include a short summary of the work, including only relevant plot points.
You should pose questions about the text, and show why your questions are significant. Finally, it
should have a clear, arguable thesis that lays out an interpretation of the text and makes a claim
about its meaning.
 Body paragraphs need a general topic sentence that connects to the thesis. Then, provide evidence
from the text (usually a quote), then explain its meaning. See the model below.
 Your conclusion should instead take the evidence/interpretations from your essay, and use your
thesis to make a broader point about the value of the text for understanding a particular issue.
 Rule of thumb: any time you quote, you should spend twice as long explaining and interpreting that
quote.
 You need a Works Cited page.
 You should have at least two other people look over your paper prior to submission. You may want
to use the Writing Center as one of these, and you may want to get your workshop partners’ e-mail
addresses to confer on the paper after they give you initial comments during class.