In his famous work, The Sociological Imagination, C Wright Mills discusses the relationship between “private (or individual) troubles” and “public issues”.

The writing exercise will introduce you to some of the important conventions of academic writing at university.The task:
In his famous work, The Sociological Imagination, C Wright Mills discusses the relationship between “private (or individual) troubles” and “public issues”.
1. In your own words, explain what Mills meant by this, along with some of the examples that he gives. Thinking about your own experiences of growing up, identify a particular ‘private trouble’ you have observed in someone else’s life experience – it could be one experienced by a friend, a fellow student, a relative, someone living in your street etc.
2. Provide your own account of this trouble and then discuss how you see it relating to a broader ‘public issue’, of the type identified by Mills. To help you identify a suitable experience/issue, think about some of the broad themes we will be covering in the course: ethnicity, gender and sexuality, religion, class etc.
requirements:
• You should include at least three ‘academic’ references in the work. One should be C Wright Mills; the others can be from any source that is relevant to or provides support for the issue you have decided to focus on.

• Your work should be well structured with an introduction, body, conclusion – and with the use of clear paragraphs, topic sentences, signposting etc.
• All work should be carefully edited with correcting of any grammatical/spelling errors etc.

Your writing will be marked based on the following criteria:
– Clear summary of C Wright Mills’ article
– Effective identification and discussion of an issue – both as a private trouble and public issue
– Effective structuring of the work (use of paragraphs, topic sentences, signposting)
– Effective use and referencing of source material
– Careful editing of work, including sentence structure, spelling, punctuation