A week from today the first draft of my sophomore essay, a 15 to 20 page paper required by the Honors Program, is due to my adviser. I'll admit that I am not as far into my work as I want to be. The fact that I'm going off-campus this weekend for the religious life retreat (which I am really excited about) means I may be even more behind than I'd hoped.
Still, I've actually been enjoying working on this essay--much more than most of my homework, anyway! Recently I've been gathering all of my research. I've found some fascinating articles. For my topic, representation of religious doubt in contemporary Young Adult fiction, I've not only been researching religion's role in YA literature but, more generally, conceptions of doubt by religious communities, methods of dealing with doubt, and the role of religion in the lives of teenagers. These articles, coming from the religious rather than literary angle, have been especially interesting to me. A few of them have been about how youth ministry should deal with teenagers questioning their faith. It may be a slight challenge to make the application of these articles clear when talking about YA, but with some effort, I think they can work well.
At the start of the sophomore essay program, students are always encouraged to pick a topic, outside their major or not, that is of interest to them. That's the difference between having a fun, or at least satisfying, experience and the whole thing being a drudgery. I'm really glad that I followed that advice and think that it's true.
Working on this project has made me consider bumping up my religion minor to a major; I would be a double major in Creative Writing and Religion. I don't think I'm going to decide that any time soon, but I'm definitely not ruling out the possibility. College is busy enough as it is, and I'm not so sure I could handle trying to complete the requirements for two programs. However, it is very, very enticing.
No comments:
Post a Comment