BorderlandsWalls, fences, barriers: historical perspectives, case examples, political questions

Writing strategies

✤ summary: key words and ideas

✤ commentary: explanation and analysis

✤ case examples: specifics from history and current news

✤ your proposal or position: take a stand and give reasons

✤ enduring questions: complexity, further thought

01

Ellis Cose

✤ Author of The End of Anger: A New Generation’s Take on Race and Rage, 2011

✤ “Red, Brown, and Blue” essay in Newsweek, 2010

01

Richard Rodriguez

✤ Author of Hunger of Memory: The Education of Richard Rodriguez (1982) and Brown: The Last Discovery of America (2002)

✤ “The Great Wall of America” 2010 essay in the Los Angeles Times

http://www.history.com/topics/great-wall-of-china/videos/seven-wonders-the-great-wall4-min video

Recent case examples

✤ Berlin Wall http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fK1MwhEDjHg

✤ Israel-West Bank Barrier http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/spl/hi/guides/456900/456944/html/nn1page1.stm

✤ U.S.-Mexico Border http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexico–United_States_barrier

✤ Syrian refugees in Sweden and EU countrieshttp://stream.wsj.com/story/syria/SS-2-34182/SS-2-314965/

Take a position and give reasons

✤ Should the U.S. patrol and enforce a U.S.-Mexico border?

✤ And what about Central American refugees from drug wars, especially children?

✤ Immigration policy? Amnesty? Anchor babies?