the Civil War

The impact of the Civil War was far reaching. Every town and community was affected, and hundreds of thousands of soldiers died during the war. Your discussion will focus on any aspect of the Civil War based on the reading you select for this assignment

Required Readings
You will choose ONE reading from the following website:
http://www.civilwar.org/education/history/primarysources/#Most_Popular

You will find dozens of documents to choose from: letters, acts, amendments, maps, cartoons, etc. Find ONE that interests you and it will be the basis of your discussion posting. If you have any questions about choosing a document, please contact me. This is your chance to choose your own discussion topic!

Instructions
A) Once you have chosen your document, you will upload a POSTING that answers the following questions:

1. What is the title of your document, and who is the author?
2. What are the main themes and points expressed in your document?
3. Why did you choose this document? Why do you think it is significant?

As to your posting, feel free to be as creative as you’d like in writing your posting. Here are some examples of what you could do:

1. post a traditional written response (2-paragraphs minimum – at least two substantive paragraphs for your posting)
2. create a Word/Publisher document that creatively answers the above questions (ex: poster, website)
3. create a PowerPoint/Prezi presentation
4. create a YouTube video that incorporates your answer
5. other (not sure what else you can do with today’s internet and software, but go for it as long as your posting – in whatever form it takes – answers the questions per the guidelines and is accessible to everyone in the class)

The main focus for your postings is on questions 2 and 3: what are the key points and themes of your document, and why you think it is significant. The key here is effort: minimal effort = low grade. I want your posting to be insightful and reflect your critical thinking about the document. Most of your posting should be in your own words. If you do use the exact wording from the sources, please be sure to put the quoted words in quotations.

B) For your RESPONSE, I want you to think about why the Civil War occurred. Consider what you have read in the textbook, documents, and online sources. Once you have had a chance to reflect on what you have read, I want to you to answer this question: Was the Civil War inevitable? If so, what do you think is the fundament cause of the Civil War? If not, why not?

You can choose to respond to any posting in the Unit 8 discussion folder since your response is not tied to a particular posting. However, you might want to respond to a posting whose document reflects your opinion (but this is optional: it isn’t necessary to connect your response to any particular document).

You should base your response on what you have learned in the class and not personal conjecture. Effective responses will make direct references to materials covered in the class. Responses that are not based on evidence (ex: no connection materials you have read in the class) will receive a lower grade. Hopefully one thing you have learned in this class is that all assertions or interpretations should be backed up with evidence.

As you can imagine, the class might have very different perspectives on this subject, which is fine. As you read through the responses, feel free to respond to any postings that you agree/disagree with. But please make sure that all responses are respectful and based on evidence that you have encountered in the class. The goal for the responses is not to prove who is right or wrong, but rather, provide perspectives based on evidence (after all, that is what historians do in every book and article that they write).

The deadline for your posting and responses is 11:59pm on November 30. All postings will be hidden until you upload your initial posting (this is to make sure that everyone contributes an original posting before responding).