PROMPT:  For this assignment you will recall a person, place or event from your past and write a memoir.  You will need to use details and sensory impression to re-create the moment for your audience.  Your job is to reveal the meaning of the past so that readers understand the significance the memories hold for the present.  Through your writing your audience should be able to visualize the moment.  You should chose to revisit a memory that you have some distance from (not a recent break-up say, or a current family crisis).

• Consider tensions or conflict from high school or adolescence (Caldwell)

• Focus on a past job, special place you used to live, or beloved item you lost (Bragg)

• Pick a photo that holds emotional associations and explore a detail that recalls a moment

• Select a family ritual or tradition that might be especially important to you

• Consider an aspect of your own cultural ancestry (language, food, heirloom) and explain how it has entered your life and what it reveals about your relationship to your culture.

• Focus on some special aspect of your educational experience, a teacher or event (Landry)

• Focus on a childhood incident or injury (Walls)

• Explain a memorable life lesson or revelation (Yim)

• Look through an old journal to find moments when you had your values challenged, had a difficult decision to make or were disappointed; use the memory as a starting point in which you reflect and put it in a larger context.

DETAILED ASSIGNMENT

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