Choose one primary source related to Middle East history between 1700 and 1914. Examples of primary sources are those created during the period under investigation like documents, state papers, laws and legal treatises, speeches, travel accounts, census data, diaries, memoirs, autobiographies, literary works, photographs, paintings, and other cultural artifacts. Leave a photocopy of the source under the essay, if it is a lengthy text provide only the citation.
Present this source in your paper by answering the questions: What is the genre? Who is the author? When was it composed? Who is the intended reader? Why was it composed? The last question is the most important and should entail a discussion of the context in which this source was generated.
The paper is a presentation of the source, and therefore need not state a thesis and argue a particular position. Rather, the source itself is the subject of the paper and you want to provide the reader with the information necessary to understand the source and suggest how this information influences how we should interpret the source and what it adds to our historical understanding.
The essay should be 4-5 double-spaced pages (not including the source itself), with endnotes fully citing any reading that you quote or to which you refer. Please use the Chicago Manual of Style as the preferred citation method.
The primary source should be related to Middle East history and only between 1700 and 1914, examples of topics include in that period include: The Gunpowder Empires, European Encroachments, Reforming the State, The Great Eastern Crisis State and Society, Young Turks, Constitutionalists, and the Great War, Colonial Experiences, The Emergence of Independent States, The Cold War (the U.S., Arab Socialism and Authoritarianism, The Case of Palestine, Political Islam
