Analyzing a play, researching secondary sources, and preparing to write a full-length essay on Trifles

Type of Assignment: Low-stakes, in-class writing and researching exercise

Adapted From: Final exercise of Drama Unit available on OER Commons

Required Reading / Watching: Susan Glaspell’s Trifles

• Text of Trifles accessed from Internet Archive
• Video of “A Jury of Her Peers” posted on YouTube

Learning Outcome(s) Addressed:

• Analyze and interpret works of drama 
• Document use of literary sources in MLA style 
• Select and integrate research from a secondary source 

Skills:

• Reading comprehension
• Critical thinking
• Researching secondary sources

Knowledge:

• This assignment helps students practice finding and applying research sources.

Task:

To complete this assignment students will:

1. Identify a small detail in the play that the male characters overlook
2. Write one paragraph discussing the dramatic context of the detail
3. Conduct research about the labor involved in the detail they selected
4. Write a second paragraph that incorporates their research
5. Cite the research in M.L.A. style
6. Include a Works Cited page

Short Writing Assignment: Understanding Historical/Cultural Context in Trifles

In this short writing assignment, you will use research and writing skills to analyze a specific detail in Trifles. The men in the play overlook all of the clues that indicate Minnie Foster’s reason for killing her husband. The women, on the other hand, pick up on seemingly insignificant details (“trifles,” according to the men) that point to Minnie’s motive. Below are some of the details from the story that indicate how difficult early-20th century farm life was, particularly for farmers’ wives:

• dirty towels (laundry)
• unwashed pans
• bread “set” 
• table half-cleaned
• preserved fruit
• quilt in progress 
• using a wood stove to cook and heat
• isolation of the typical Midwestern farm

For this short writing assignment, you will write two (2) paragraphs:

In the first paragraph explain how one of the details in the list above is overlooked by the men in the play. Here are some issues you could discuss:

• The context or dramatic situation in which the detail comes up
• The character who notices or mentions the detail
• The tone does the character uses when talking about the detail
• How the men’s view of the detail differ from the women’s view
• How the actors in “A Jury of Her Peers” interpreted the scene and brought it to life

Use at least one quotation from the play to illustrate or support your point. 

In the 2nd paragraph conduct some research on the topic/detail you discuss in the 1st paragraph and write a fully-developed paragraph explaining the process. Highlight the difficulties and laboriousness of the chore or detail you selected. Keep in mind that farms did not have electricity, running water or indoor plumbing. Here are some questions you might ask yourself about your topic:

• What specific steps would have been involved in preserving fruit in the early 1900s? How labor-intensive was the process?
• Consider the laundry situation without a washing machine, dryer or even electricity. How would a farmer’s wife wash clothes, towels, and bedding?
• How did farm women make quilts? What material did they use? How did they “piece” the quilt?
• Farm women made all the bread a farm family ate. How did they make bread?
• How did they cook and heat the house with a wood stove?

Your goal in this second paragraph is to reveal how much work an early 20th-century homesteader had to do on a daily basis, so be sure to use vivid and specific details. Use the Google keyword skills we practiced to look up
information. Here’s a sample:

• How to [bake bead in a wood stove, clean laundry without a washing machine, make a quilt, preserve fruit] in 1900

Use at least one quotation from the source.

Write an MLA Works Cited entry for it.