The Three

1.	Identify	the topic you plan to address in the paragraph. In other words, make a specific claim that you must proceed to defend and that supports your thesis. (The Identify serves as your topic sentence. It should function as a mini-thesis, which always dialogues with your main thesis. If it does not dialogue with your thesis, then you may be off topic.)
2.	Illustrate	*by providing detailed, concrete examples that help to support your Identification.*
3.	Interpret	the function of your illustration/example. Give a detailed analysis as to how your Illustration supports your Identification. Develop probing and provocative interpretations.

(from Gwen Davidson's website: http://www.westga.edu/~gdavidso/writing/paragraphsfor1101.htm)

Kipling's description of the Lahore Museum reflects an Eastern culture controlled and reinterpreted by an imperialistic British discourse.

In the entrance-hall to the Museum, the exhibition of Buddhist heritage enforces the idea of British ownership and reinterpretation. The Museum's ancient pieces are removed from their native Eastern landscape and possessively contained inside a Western environment: "There were hundreds of pieces, friezes of figures in relief, fragments of statues and slabs crowded with figures that had encrusted the brick walls of the Buddhist stupas and viharas of the North Country and now, dug up and labeled, made the pride of the Museum" (6). In the Museum habitat, the British have arranged and grouped the artifacts. However, the exhibition comprises hundreds of fragmented pieces from various ruins, and its disconnected nature suggests that such Western translation and representation of the East is an imperfect science, artificially rearranging history to fit within a British ideology. The pieces are labeled in English, which further distances them from an authentic Eastern origin. The act of describing the artifacts in English captions has veiled their raw, cultural identity in English discourse. The translation of Eastern identity into the English language also reflects a process of Western possession, where native culture is captured in British terms—reinterpreted and anglicized.

In the entrance-hall to the Museum, the exhibition of Buddhist heritage enforces the idea of British ownership and reinterpretation. The hall's spectators are immediately presented with ancient pieces removed from their native Eastern landscape and possessively contained inside a Western environment:

"There were hundreds of pieces, friezes of figures in relief, fragments of statues and slabs crowded with figures that had encrusted the brick walls of the Buddhist stupas and viharas of the North Country and now, dug up and labeled, made the pride of the Museum" (6).

In the Museum habitat, the British have arranged and grouped the artifacts. However, the exhibition comprises hundreds of fragmented pieces from various ruins, and its disconnected nature suggests that such Western translation and representation of the East is an imperfect science, artificially rearranging history to fit within a British ideology. The pieces are labeled in English, which further distances them from an authentic Eastern origin. The act of describing the artifacts in English captions has veiled their raw, cultural identity in English discourse. The translation of Eastern identity into the English language also reflects a process of Western possession, where native culture is captured in British terms—reinterpreted and Anglicized.