Assessment #1 requires you to design an Essay Plan, providing you with solid preparation for your major essay. Instructions and submission details below

Assessment 1: Instructions and details

Completion requirements

Assessment #1 requires you to design an Essay Plan, providing you with solid preparation for your major essay. Instructions and submission details below.

To start, please review the Essay Topic options below under "Assessment #3: Major Essay/Research Proposal". Then select either Option One or Option Two.

Submit this plan via LMS by Monday 29 April 2024 11.59pm.  All essay plans submitted by due date will receive feedback.

NOTE: at this stage it is not essential to go beyond any of the weekly subject materials, and it is fine to use one or two of the case studies that we have examined to support your argument. Remember that one of the main aims of the major research essay/ research proposal is to assess your understanding of the range of materials we have examined in this subject - if you ignore the subject materials it will be very difficult for us to pass the essay! Of course you can also draw upon other sources, but the subject materials should form the "backbone" of your essay, and this Essay Plan should reflect that.

Essay plan: Option One

• Your essay plan needs to address the following:

(1)    What particular environmental issue do you aim to research?

(2)    Briefly outline what you think an anthropological approach offers to our understanding of the issue and how anthropologists might assist in addressing the issue.

(3)    What ethnographic case study do you intend to use to support your argument?

• Your plan should be approximately 600 words in length.

• You can make a list of dot points under each of these headings OR if you prefer you use the headings to write a series of essay-style notes indicating how you will structure your essay (again using the headings 1-3 above).

• Also consider: what particular environmental anthropological approach you intend to adopt (i.e. political ecology, cultural ecology, ethnoecology, historical ecology etc)? You may opt to adopt more than one approach, or use them in combination. Most importantly you should give some justification for the approach(es) you plan to use.

• It would also be useful at this stage to give an indication of the sources you will draw upon in your essay plan (in the form of an indicative bibliography). At this stage provide a minimum of 5 key sources. The bibliography is not included in the word count (for the Essay Plan and the Major essay).
• In terms of references/sources for this task, you do not need to go beyond the weekly subject materials, and it is fine to use two or more of the case studies that we have examined to support your argument. Remember that one of the main aims of the major essay is to assess your understanding of the range of material we have examined in this subject - if you ignore the subject materials it will be very difficult for us to pass the essay! Of course you can also draw upon other sources, but the subject materials should form the "backbone" of your essay, and this Essay Plan should reflect that.

Research Proposal Plan: Option Two

• Your Research Proposal plan should be approximately 500 words in length and contain a series of responses under each of the headings below:

(a)    Background (What is the problem?):

(b)    Aims of the research (What do you hope to achieve?):

(c)    Brief outline of the theoretical / methodological approach you will use (How will you do it?):

(d)    Significance of the research (Why is it important to do this research?):

(e)     List of indicative references.

• You must indicate at least one of the sub-fields in environmental anthropology that you intend to use in your research proposal (and justify why you believe this approach is appropriate to your research. You will also need to clearly indicate the ethnographic case studies you will draw on to situate your own research proposal and/or to argue for a gap in the knowledge that then justifies your proposed research.

• In terms of references/sources for this task, you do not need to go beyond the weekly subject materials, and it is fine to use two or more of the case studies that we have examined to support your argument. Remember that one of the main aims of this final assessment is to assess your understanding of the range of materials we have examined in this subject - if you ignore the subject materials it will be very difficult for us to pass the essay! Of course you can also draw upon other sources, but the subject materials should form the "backbone" of your essay, and this Research Proposal Plan should reflect that.