Rural versus Urban Paper.

Short Essay Being Urban in Africa

Due: Paper Copy, In Class, Wednesday, February 15, 2017

Five weeks into the term, we have begun to get a handle on rural-urban interactions. We have read chapters 1 and 4 of Kenneth Lynch’s Rural-Urban Interactions. We have screened an African film, Zan Boko, on urbanization. We have read the first eight chapters of The Joys of Motherhood. We have completed a learning exercise on life in Sub-Saharan Africa’s largest urban milieu, Lagos, Nigeria. And, we have referenced sources that discuss issues of relevance to rural-urban interactions. We have learned that cities, large and small towns, and villages, although distinct in terms of spatial extent, are difficult to “define”. There is the rural-urban continuum. We also know that cities grow partly due to rural-to-urban migration, a process which makes some rural dwellers into urban dwellers. Moreover, city dwellers and rural dwellers interact with each other on many levels and for many reasons. We should now be ready to write a short essay on being urban in Africa. This assignment provides the opportunity to write and submit your essay on time.

Download this assignment statement to your computer or, print it. Read the instructions carefully and ask questions, if necessary. Then, follow the instructions to do assignment. After you have completed the assignment, print your completed assignment/essay and bring to class on Wednesday,. Note: Late essays are downgraded by 20%.

Short Essay:

You are required to prepare a short essay on “Being Urban.” Your essay should explore what you understand by the term “being urban”. This involves an understanding of the lives of rural (new urban migrants) and urban dwellers and explaining what it means to be “urban” in an African country context.

The essay should be type-written, double-spaced and no less than 4 but no more than 5 pages in length, excluding the bibliography. (Always provide a title for your essays). Graduate students’ papers must include a bibliography. The use of appropriate Internet sites must be limited to 10% of your citations.

You are granted an automatic extension at a cost of 20% of your score.

Winter 2017