Explore One Conflict Per American Drama Project

By /

Explore One Conflict Per American Drama Project

For this project, you will be writing a conflict analysis essay. This should demonstrate everything you have learned in both the American Drama Unit as well as the entire course.

The audience for this paper should be an imaginary classmate, a student your age, who has read the story through once but has not yet studied it to understand it on a deeper level.

Your paper will be analytical in purpose. This means that your ultimate goal is to choose significant moments, quotes, or techniques from the play, present them, and explain how they work together to create larger meaning. Your paper will analyze three related conflicts from The Crucible by Arthur Miller.

Your three conflicts must be related. (Do not just choose the first three conflicts you can think of.) For example, you could write about three conflicts within one character, such as Proctor’s conflict with the court or “justice” in general, Proctor’s interpersonal conflict with Abigail, and Proctor’s internal conflict of guilt. Or, you could write about three characters (perhaps Mary, Elizabeth, and Proctor) who conflict with the court. You will explore one conflict per body paragraph. Each paragraph will:

  • Summarize: Explain the conflict.
  • Discuss the scope: Is the conflict between two people? A person and an idea? Or between the person and their conscience?
  • Interpret: What does this conflict mean? What is Miller using this conflict to say or show about life, truth, humanity, paranoia, or another theme?
  • Relate: How do these conflicts relate to and build on the others?
  • Support: Use at least two quotes from the play.

Your conclusion will tie all of these conflicts together. Your body paragraphs should build into an insight, or an overall message or theme that Miller conveys through The Crucible. Your conclusion will vary depending on what conflicts you choose. Do all the conflicts relate to one theme, like “justice” or “paranoia”? Or do they show how a character changes over the course of the story? A summary of your paper will not be sufficient for your conclusion ­ you must discuss what the conflicts mean.

This essay should be between three and five pages (750-­1250 words) in length. Your final draft should be saved and submitted as .doc or .pdf file. It should be in 12­-point font in Times New Roman.