Homework answers / question archive / ENGL 101/A: Introduction to College Writing Instructor: Matthew Decker   Essay #4: Comparison and Contrast w/ Documentation (150 points)   Learning Objectives: Continue to fine-tune your formal academic voice; Master the use of transitional language to establish paragraph coherence throughout a comparison; Develop an academic conversation around two narrative pieces; Refine your knowledge of MLA Citation Strategy (quoting/paraphrasing/Works Cited Page Creation)

ENGL 101/A: Introduction to College Writing Instructor: Matthew Decker   Essay #4: Comparison and Contrast w/ Documentation (150 points)   Learning Objectives: Continue to fine-tune your formal academic voice; Master the use of transitional language to establish paragraph coherence throughout a comparison; Develop an academic conversation around two narrative pieces; Refine your knowledge of MLA Citation Strategy (quoting/paraphrasing/Works Cited Page Creation)

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ENGL 101/A: Introduction to College Writing

Instructor: Matthew Decker

 

Essay #4: Comparison and Contrast w/ Documentation (150 points)

 

Learning Objectives: Continue to fine-tune your formal academic voice; Master the use of transitional language to establish paragraph coherence throughout a comparison; Develop an academic conversation around two narrative pieces; Refine your knowledge of MLA Citation Strategy (quoting/paraphrasing/Works Cited Page Creation).

                                                                                             

 

 

 

 

 

Essay Prompt: 

The stories we will address and discuss in the next couple weeks explore the often uncomfortable and humiliating experiences of cultural “outsiders.” Marginalized on the basis of race, these authors search for deeper meaning in an unforgiving world, yet their personal quests of self-realization fortunately lead to meaningful revelations worthy of discussion and analysis. For the purposes of this essay, you will utilize either the point by point or subject by subject organization (reviewed in class and available on Blackboard) to analyze one or two of the issues bulleted below in a balanced coherent essay that discusses two of the following: Maya Angelou’s “Champion of the World,” Junot Díaz’s “The Dreamer,” Firoozeh Dumas’s “The ‘F Word,’” Amy Tan’s “Fish Cheeks,” Brent Staples’s “Black Men and Public Space,” or Master Lee’s “Chink.”

Your thesis will be a claim centered on one or two of the bulleted issues listed below, and it will aim to compare how Angelou, Díaz, Dumas, Tan, Staples, and/or Lee treat those issues in their stories:

• What it means to be a cultural outsider and/or what one can gain from or learn from this experience;
• The importance of self-love;
• What it can mean to have a hero, especially for people who have experienced oppression;
• The impact of breaking barriers for minority groups;
• The influence of setting and tone on a story and on how these things impact readers

Finally, in writing this piece, remember to think about your audience: Why should they care, and how can you show them that this issue should be meaningful to them? What context will they need to understand this issue, and what can or can’t you assume they know already?

 

Length: 3-4 double-spaced pages (900-1,000 words) in MLA document format + Works Cited

Due Date for Peer Review: April 22, 2020 (Drafts will be exchanged on Blackboard Course Mail.) 

Due Date for Final Essay: April 29, 2020 before midnight

What will I be looking for?

• Consistent awareness of purpose and audience

 

• Your paper should be controlled by a stated broad thesis or a blueprint thesis (or a thesis that presents your main idea and subtopics that will appear in your body paragraphs).

 

• • Your paper must forward an arguable purpose. You should logically and succinctly present that purpose/claim in the thesis of your essay and develop it throughout. 

 

• • Your paper must compare and/ or contrast two of these stories according to at least three points of comparison (your three subtopics).  You will use these three points to structure the development of three body paragraphs.

 

• • • Detailed description and examples from the stories should be employed to develop the similarities and differences you recognize between them.

 

• A recognizable C&C Organization Pattern. You should employ either the Point by Point or Subject by Subject method. See page 174-175 in The Brief Bedford Reader.

 

• Varied sentence structure (This means you shouldn’t write the same type of sentence over and over again.  I’m looking for variety and style.). Be sure to avoid sentence fragments, run-ons, dangling modifiers, mixed constructions, use of the passive voice, and other previously discussed grammar snags.

 

• Organization and flow. Your paper should logically flow from one sentence to another and from one paragraph to another without choppiness issues or awkward jumps in topic. You should be mindful of paragraph coherence by incorporating conjunctive adverbs, transitional phrases, and repetition and restatement for clarity (see Rules for Writers pgs. 276-277 or Section 32f). 

 

• • Strong, seamless transition sentences must connect each body paragraph (see Rules for Writers pgs. 51-54).

 

• This essay requires documentation. You must appropriately summarize, quote, and paraphrase the two stories you have chosen to compare/contrast. You must also provide a properly-formatted MLA Works Cited page.  

 

• Your paper should be proofread before it is turned in. There should be little to no distracting grammar, punctuation, and spelling errors. 

 

 

Useful Tips and Templates!

Use Strong Transitions for the Comparison and Contrast Essay: like, unlike, same as, more, different from, similar to, similarly, less, likewise, whereas, and, as well as, however, also, too, but, just as, as do, as did, as does, as opposed to, both, on the other hand, in addition, instead of, another difference between, despite these differences, despite these similarities

 

• Both X and Y deal with the subject of Z, and both of their stories do M.
• Z and Y write stories that make similar claims about R, but with the difference that
• Where X does A, Y does B.
• Like X, Y ACTIVE VERB
• X does A; however, Y prefers B.
• Instead of taking X’s approach, Y does ACTIVE VERB