Essays & Term Papers

• Publisher: QuickStudy Reference Guides
• Year: 2009
• ISBN:
  9781423212119
• Topic: Lingue e linguistica
• Subtopic: Linguistica

Writing from the planning stages through completion. Any student at almost any level can improve his/her writing skills.

Draft

Now it is time to put your outline into action by turning your words and phrases into complete sentences that connect with one another to form logical and persuasive paragraphs.

• Methods of persuasion: Earlier in this guide, you were asked to consider the demographic characteristics of your intended audience. This information becomes crucial during the drafting process, as you must use language and choose reasons and evidence that this particular audience will find persuasive. For example, how are men and women persuaded differently? How are older and younger people persuaded differently? How are people with college educations persuaded differently than people with high school educations? It is time to assess the persuasive appeal of the information you will include in your draft:
  • Emotional appeal: Anecdotes or descriptions that appeal to readers’ feelings, such as love, anger, or outrage—for example, an advertisement regarding puppy adoption.
  • Ethical appeal: Quotations or graphics that appeal to readers’ sense of right or wrong, fairness or unfairness—for example, a bumper sticker regarding one’s constitutional right to bear arms.
  • Logical appeal: Facts or statistics that appeal to readers’ sense of logic, such as cause and effect, comparison and contrast, or problem and solu­tion—for example, a television commercial that says four out of five den­tists recommend a particular toothpaste.
• Reasoning style: Consider how you present your reasoning process to readers:
  • Deductive style: Moves from general statements to specific information. For example, a general thesis is followed by specific and narrow evidence. This style is preferable for most research papers.
  • Inductive style: Moves from specific statements to general conclusions. For example, the evidence appears first and leads the reader to a reasoned thesis or conclusion.
• Logic: Avoid errors in logic or reasoning, such as the following, as they undermine your credibility with readers.
  • Assumption: A belief that a writer takes for granted or a general attitude or belief system that underlies an argument.
    Writers are born, not made. (The writer assumes the ability to write well is an inborn trait and cannot be taught.) Women should not take jobs outside the home. (The writer assumes women do not belong in the workforce and ignores the situations of single parents or the needs of two-income families.)
  • Logical fallacy: A mistake in how a writer sets up an argument or some support of that argument.
  • Ad hominem: An attack on a person’s character or habits rather than an issue.
    Mr. Wilson admitted to a tendency to overeat. Therefore, we cannot trust him with foreign policy.
  • Bandwagon appeal: The presentation of a desire to “go along with the crowd” as fact.
    Surveys show that a majority of the people want only family-oriented programming on television. Therefore, this must be our goal.
  • Card-stacking: A neglect of counterarguments (e.g., a gun rights paper that cites only people who have used guns to protect themselves from danger or one that cites only accidental deaths caused by guns).
  • Circular argument: An assertion that is repeated.
    Most people like gardening because it is something they enjoy.
  • Either-or: The presentation of only two alternatives when more exist.
    Young people either plan to get married and raise a family or resign themselves to a lonely adulthood.
  • Non sequitur: A statement that does not follow logically from the stated premise.
    Edward was over six feet tall, so he always wore blue on Sunday.
  • Stereotype: A positive or negative generalization.
    Being a woman, she was more compassionate than a man.
• Text structure: Note that within the body of your argumentative research paper, you may incorporate other text structures as needed, such as cause and effect, comparison and contrast, problem and solution, or description.
• Incorporating source material: Each time you add information from a source to your draft, whether it is a quotation, paraphrase, or summary, you need to create a sentence frame for the material. In other words, the source information should be part of an original sentence; it does not stand alone between original sentences. A list of potential frames follows. Note that the direct quotation of a complete sentence should begin with a capital letter and be framed within quotation marks.
  As (the author) explains, _____. According to (the author), _____. In (the title), (the author) claims _____. Recalling _____, (the author) notes _____. As (the author’s) study on _____ shows, _____. When interviewed about _____, (the speaker) confirms _____. Some may argue that _____, but _____. (The author) focuses on _____, but _____. Although (the author) says _____, _____. Although some argue that _____, _____. While (the author) emphasizes ____, (another author) focuses on ____.
  When a quotation exceeds more than four typed lines, set it as a block quota­tion by beginning a new line of text and indenting the full quotation one inch from the left margin and maintain double-spacing. A block quotation does not need outer quotation marks. If you are quoting multiple paragraphs, indent the first line of each paragraph 1.25 inches. As with shorter quotations, introduce the block quotation by using any of the above sentence frames.
• Manuscript format: Follow any formatting directions given by your instruc­tor. Otherwise, follow standard formatting as outlined by MLA.
  • Type and print your research paper using black ink on 8.5” by 11” paper. Staple multiple pages together before submission.
  • Set all margins to one inch.
  • Use Times New Roman or a similar font, double-space the text, and use 12-point font.
  • Leave one space after end marks.
  • Use the Tab key to indent paragraphs one-half inch from the left margin.
  • Create a header one-half inch from the top of the page and flus...