The White Elephant!
A Unique, Thought-Provoking Major, Major Writing Assignment
Requiring Description, Research, Exposition, plus all the Usual Compositional Skills!
from Don Gerz
750 to 1,500 Word Research Paper
(That will be 3-to-6 pages in MLA style, not including the Works Cited page.)
What is a white elephant? What is the white elephant? What is this white elephant?
Unbelievably, there are many levels of reality at issue here with the white elephant you see before you. In fact, there are at least five (5) levels of reality! You will, no doubt, discover more when you write about the phenomenon of the white elephant!
To get you started, I want you to describe and explain these five (5) levels of reality, plus any others that may occur to you as you write about the marvel of the white elephant:
1. The Objective Level (an actual elephant, pale and lacking the usual grayish, “elephantish” color) Do such animals exist, or are they imaginary?)
2. The Representational Level (You’ll have to describe, in every detail, what this statue of this particular white elephant sitting on my desk looks like and is. You could write an entire descriptive essay on this alone!)
3. The Imaginary Level (Well, if you imagine it, it has a certain existence, a certain “isness,” doesn’t it? I imagine so!)
4. The Symbolic Level (You’ll have to do some research here. The term, “a white elephant,” symbolizes something...a specific concept or idea. What is it? You will have to explain to your reader what it means when someone gives another “a white elephant.” Use your Writers Inc for research ideas, search engines, dictionaries, books in this room, and online dictionaries and encyclopedias to solve the mystery of what it means on a symbolic level to give or receive a symbolic white elephant.)
5. The Personal and Psychological Level (This particular white elephant in my classroom now belongs to me. Before that, it belonged to my father. Before that, it belonged to my grandmother. You will have to interview me to find out what this particular white elephant means to me. Page 330 of Writers Inc will prove to be essential to you in order to do this correctly.)
Soon, I will give you instructions and guidelines that are more detailed on this major, major assignment, as well as its due date. For now, however, I want you to begin this major compositional project by starting the prewriting process as found on pages 41-52 of Writers Inc.
Begin the writing process (pp. 41-79, Writers Inc) NOW! I will be checking your work periodically. Remember, it is up to you to ask for any extra help you feel you may need.
- Mr. Gerz