For this assignment, you have two options.
For the first option, you are to defend the position of one and only one of the speakers. As you can see, each speaker in the symposium is given an opportunity to discuss love. Using your own rhetoric and wisdom, convince the reader that these two thousand four hundred (or so) years have not changed your position. In fact, they’ve made you all the more certain of your theory!
For the second option, you are to answer the question about FRAMING. Plato carefully constructs a series of frames around this text (e.g. I wasn’t there but I heard it from so-and-so who heard it from so-and-so that Socrates was there…). He also makes most of Socrates’s dialogue come from a conversation he’d had with Diotima. What literary considerations might Plato have had? What do these frames add to the text?
Guidelines: You should type not more than 3 pages but no less than 2.5 pages, using either Garamond, Times New Roman, or Helvetica fonts, size 12, double-spaced. Do not stretch your margins to more than 1 inch. Do not use 11.5 or 12.5 font. Do not cross “Go.” Do not… &c.
Research: No outside research is necessary. In a rare circumstance, it will be necessary. Email me if something pops up. MLA is the acceptable format for citations in such circumstances.
Heading: Your heading should include your name, my name, the date, and “Symposium Assignment.” Your paper should have a title.
Format: This assignment has a very open format. However, I would like for you to include a thesis statement to keep you on track. This statement, also called the argument, is very important, as it is the one idea that you are trying to prove.
Plagiarism: Don’t do it. Copying another person’s ideas is plagiarism. If you are unsure about anything, just ask me what the rule is, and I will be more than happy to help you out.
Grading Criteria: You will be graded on the three criteria below.
• Strength of Your Ideas
• Analysis of Evidence
• Grammar, Mechanics, Spelling, and Clarity of Argument
*Of these, the strength of your ideas is the most important.
Citing the Text: You may quote the text, and I encourage you to do so. If you adopt the “voice” of a character in the text, just put quotations around what they actually say and provide the page number (8). Obviously, the same goes for a quote written from the third person (e.g. Pausanias asserts “blah blah blah” (8).)