History 307 – Latin America – October 22, 2003

 Dictators & Revolutions

 

Imagine that you’re now the historian.  You’re trying to understand what happened in Latin America in the aftermath of the Wars of Liberation, from, say, 1825 – 1875.  Your evidence is the selections from Keen, and the overview in Chasteen.  You’ve studied the materials, now you want to sort out what you’ve read.

 

1.        List the key 5-10 things you’ve learned from the material.

 

2.       Now rank order these 5-10 things; which is the most important finding? 

 

3.       Now rearrange your findings into a thesis/evidence statement.  Make a claim: “the key to understanding Latin America in the years after the Wars of Independence is … and the Reasons why I say this are …

 

4.       Sketch out your argument:

 

THESIS:

 

Reason 1:

 

Reason 2:

 

Reason 3: 

 

       5.  Congratulations!  You’ve just constructed a genuine “historical argument!”

 

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Modified by:  H.  Kamerling