African American Autobiography
Instructions:
(A) Content
This essay consists of two parts: (1) an abstract (critical writing) and (2) an autobiographical piece (creative writing). It is recommended you read the details for part 2 before you read about part 1.
Details
Part (1): Abstract (1 page):

The overall purpose of this portion of your essay is to lead your reader into your life story and prepare your audience for the issue that your story deals with. So provide a brief summary of your piece identifying the struggle/challenge. Furthermore, keep in mind the following: As you know from part 2, you are writing this piece for an imagined anthology of autobiographical pieces by student authors. So imagine you are submitting your paper to a publisher (not a college professor), hoping that they will include your piece in their anthology. Thus, as with any abstracts of papers, you will need to identify the goals of your piece piece. Who is your targeted readership? What do you hope they will get from it? In a nutshell: make an argument why your piece should be included.

Part (2): Autobiographical Piece (4 pages)
Prompt:

From the diverse African American autobiographical texts we have read, we have learned about the authors’ various pains and struggles they experienced as they pertain, for example, to race, class, gender, or sexuality. But what’s more, many of these autobiographers have provided us with their vision of how to deal and live with these issues. For this essay, you are asked to write your own autobiographical essay for an (imagined) anthology of autobiographical writings by soon-to-be college graduates. Write about one watershed event or any struggle that you have experienced in your life and about the way and process in which you have come to terms with