English 101: Protests and Riots: Composition

Technical Stuff:

• Word Count: 700 – 1000 words
• Sources: three to four sources; no Wiki pages
• MLA formatting and style – double spacing, Times New Roman, 12 pt font with one inch margins.
• It needs to have more than five paragraphs following the guidelines we set in class: Introduction paragraph complete with the thesis statement as the last sentence, body paragraphs (for your argument, counter argument, rebuttal, counter argument, rebuttal, and so on until you have examined your topic fully), and a conclusion paragraph.
• No second person pronouns, or contractions
• A word count that has two counts: 1) The title and body of the composition only, and 2) all the words in the whole document. Situated like this: Word Count: 108/115
• A Works Cited page

The Topic:

In the course of Los Angeles’ history, we have seen many things. She was first established in 1781. That was 105 years before the Civil War. She has gone from being populated by indigenous peoples who migrated from southern Mexico to Canada, to Europeans, to gold miners, to Hollywood. She has seen many movements, protests, and riots. She has been burned to the ground and rebuilt. It seems though that every time the peoples of Los Angeles had to rebuild; it was in direct response to racial injustices. There are the Zoot Suit Riots in 1943, the Watts Riots in 1965, and the Rodney King Riots in 1991. And now, we will rebuild after the George Floyd Riots in 2020. Los Angeles’ landscape may stay the same, but the people here are forever changed one more time.

The Writing:

For this composition, please pick one of the eras from the four times above (1940s, 1960s, 1990s, or 2010s). You will need to do some preliminary research about the decade, but you need to explore what was the lead up to the riots in the first place. Considering the time in history, was there anything that could have prevented the riots? Also thinking about the era, was there anything that could have been done afterward to help prevent the next riot? If there are ways to prevent them, what are they, and how can we implement those changes today to help stave off another one in the future? Although the answers seem simple and clear, we are dealing with imbalanced institutions complicated by human ignorance and emotion. When you are addressing the solution, make sure that you are also looking at other possibilities. For example, defunding police departments. What exactly does that mean? Does it look like anarchy? Or moving the funds to other services that would seem more beneficial for various societies? Or is it something in the middle?

Dates:

First Draft – 6/20: Please submit your first draft to the assignment if you want feedback

Final Draft – 6/21: Submit your final draft to the assignment before 11:59 p.m.