Modern Latin America

History 367/567

Dr. Solá

Reading Summary Assignment

The purpose of the reading summary assignments is to measure your progress and understanding of the materials assigned for each week The  summary will be at least TWO TO THREE pages long, typed due in class during the week of the assigned reading.

It begins with the bibliographic identity of the readings:

Stuart B. Schwartz. “Resistance and Accommodation in Eighteenth-Century Brazil: the Slaves’ View of Slavery,” Hispanic American Historical Review 57-.1 (Feb. 1977): 69-81.

A reading summary is not a difficult task.  You must focus your attention in the theme, thesis, and goals of the writer you are reading.  You should keep the following questions in mind when you are reading the text(s):

What is the thesis or argument of the book/article?

What is the author hopping to accomplish?  Is he/she trying to present a different or new interpretation of an old theme?  How successful is he/she?

What kind of sources is the author using to prove his/her argument?  Are these sources adequate or sufficient?  For example, the argument is based on trade/commercial statistics and the author is trying to explain an economic trend on a particular Latin American country but his/her sources are based on a particular region of that country, not reflecting the nation as a whole, is that acceptable?

Does the author provide enough examples to support his/her argument?  Arguments cannot be based on one or two examples.

When writing your assignments please use the first paragraph to provide the theme of the reading and what the author is trying to explain or proved.  Please refrain from summarizing the entire work, what happen in each chapter or section of the readings.