Writing Assignment 1: Earwitnessing
In his essay on “The Soundscape,” Murray Schafer defines an earwitness as someone “writing about sounds directly experienced and intimately known.” Though Schafer says that this is “a special talent” that has something to do with “authenticity,” this assignment is based on the assumption that almost anyone anywhere can be a valuable earwitness—including you. As Schafer shows, the notion of earwitnessing actually involves two steps: a primary author writing about sounds, and a reader/listener who can compile and evaluate those accounts.
This assignment asks you to pick a location—a park, building, city, region—and construct its history in sound. You will construct an argument, and, much like an attorney, call on your earwitnesses to help you make your claim. You should have no less than three primary sources, and your paper should be 1000–1500 words.
Process
Your writing process may differ from mine, but if I were to do this assignment, here is how I would tackle it:
- Choose a location. This can be nearly anything in the built or non-built environment in any historical period, but it has to have actually existed. (If you want to brainstorm with me, feel free to come to office hours or email me.) This part will involve some preliminary research: once you think of an idea, fish around and see if you can find anything interesting about it—even doing some basic Googling at this point makes sense.
- Once you have your location/time/idea dialed in, get some really good sources. They don’t have to come from great works of literature, but they should be interesting and substantial accounts. I think the historical newspaper collection would be a good place to look. You are required to have three sources cited in your paper, but at this stage I would gather as many as I could get my hands on.
- Once you have these elements, look at your sources for interesting themes or connections. This is where your argument will come from.
- Make an outline.
- Write a paper.
Evaluation
This paper should, first and foremost, meet the basic requirements: correct number of sources, within the word count, free of typos and spelling errors, and submitted on time. After meeting this baseline, your paper should demonstrate two things: 1) that you have done original research, and 2) that you have used that research to support an original argument about your location. This assignment, like all of the others, rewards creativity, enthusiasm, and critical thinking. Have fun with it!