Documented Essay
(Notes in
Progress for Writing in My Classes)
Robert
W. Hill, Professor of English
Kennesaw State University
In most of my undergraduate
literature classes, “the documented essay” is NOT a full-scale research paper.
Often 2000-2500 words long, it is the final product in a process that usually
begins with an in-class, open-book writing assignment, often a test, such as a
midterm essay examination.
It is intended (1) to
emphasize the value of revision over “rewriting” or “just starting all over
again” and (2) to teach (or confirm) fundamental techniques of incorporating
others’ materials into one’s own text.
For the documented essay, I
require a standard documentation form—e.g., MLA, APA, Chicago, whichever is
used by each student in her or his own particular academic discipline, MLA
being the default:
In a
1991 article on style manuals, Booklist cited MLA documentation style as
one of the "big three," along with the guidelines published by the
American Psychological Association and the University of Chicago Press.
For an authoritative explanation of MLA style, see the MLA
Handbook for Writers of Research Papers (for high school and
undergraduate college students) and the MLA
Style Manual and Guide to Scholarly Publishing (for graduate students,
scholars, and professional writers). (“What Is MLA Style?” http://mla.org)
A few notes
for MLA documentation of online sources can be found at http://www.mla.org, where you can click on “MLA
Style,” then on “Frequently Asked Questions about MLA Style.” You may, of
course, employ Google or A9.com for additional MLA Style information. To be
safe—that is, authoritative—, be sure you conform to official MLA publications
(see paragraph above) and/or Professor Hill’s direct advice (10/19/04).
“Frequently
Asked Questions about MLA Style.” 19 Oct. 2004 http://www.mla.org/style_faq.
(ENGL 2160-01: American Literature to 1914,
2/28/03):
Using one of the following sentences as your
single-sentence first paragraph, with specific reference to at least four
authors from our pre-February 18 reading list, compose a unified, coherent
essay.
You may refer to any books or notes you have with
you. Budget your time carefully to allow for roughly equal treatment of the
four authors; you have 75 minutes (until 3:15pm). Write in ink, double-spaced,
on one side of a sheet of paper. Feel free to insert or to revise, as long as
your intentions are clear. A “pretty” manuscript is not the point here:
1.
While
most serious writers such as Melville, Equiano, __________, and __________
display the ambiguities inherent in our assumptions about black and white,
they generally persist in using them as conventionally defined.
2.
Serious
American writers such as Melville, Jefferson, __________, and __________ all
struggle with the dynamic of individual freedom in contest with the necessities
of social order.
3.
Despite
the unity that religion sets out to promote, American writers such as Melville,
Rowlandson, __________, and __________ reveal that it does divide people.
4.
Whether
in a context of fate or “God’s will,” American writers such as Melville,
Thoreau, __________, and __________ persistently depict the efforts of
individuals to make their own way.
5.
While
the idea of the Other is held in a positive light by Melville and __________,
Rowlandson and __________ see the Other as negative.
6.
While
Melville, Emerson, __________, and __________ employ similar images, their
dominant philosophies as Yea-sayers and Nay-sayers produce different effects.
7.
While
it strains too much our stipulated definition to call Nature a protagonist in
literary narratives (viz., the protagonist is the character whose pursuit of
goals engages our attention), its ready availability for metaphor and symbol
sometimes makes it appropriate as antagonist in works by authors such as
Melville, Edwards, __________, and __________.
Some Typical Notes in Advance of a Midterm
(ENGL 3220: Films of Italy, 10/16/01):
1.
You
will have three-five choices of “questions,” all of which will require you to
write about at least three movies. Choose thoughtfully but quickly; you have
only an hour in which to complete your essay. Once you’ve chosen, don’t look
back—forget that the others exist.
2.
Each
“question” will be phrased as a thesis sentence. Copy the one you choose as
your first sentence-paragraph, and go forward as if you had written that
sentence yourself. In your second paragraph (following your one-sentence first
paragraph, which I give you), write about the movie you feel most confident to
discuss, then to the next, then the next, etc.
3.
When
you are ready to move to your second movie, pause (very) briefly to remember
that this exam is an essay and that its parts should be coherent, one with
another. So think about what you’ve just said about movie #1—in that very last
sentence you just wrote—and consider how your first remarks about the next
movie will be connected to that previous idea.
4.
Write
in ink on one side of a sheet of paper, double-spaced. You may use blue books if you like. No
white-out stuff. Just draw a line through your changes and slip-ups, and keep
moving. The clock ticketh.
5.
Leave
at least ten minutes at the end of your hour for final proofreading and
revisions. I will be available for you to ask composition-type questions.
6.
Don’t re-copy for beauty of
presentation. Just be clear enough for me to read.
7.
Espérance!--RWH
(ENGL 2160:
American Literature to 1914, 3/13/00):
With specific reference to
at least three authors--one from Group I (above), one from Group
II, and one from anywhere in our list--compose a unified, coherent essay on one
of the following topics:
1.
Aesthetic
Values of "Simplicity" in American Literature
2.
Ways
to Power in American Society
3.
Romanticism:
The Ayes and the Nays Have It
4.
Work:
Good/Bad for the Soul?
5.
The
Lyric in Poetry and Prose
6.
"Otherness":
Its Threat and Promise in American Literature
7.
Get
a Grip on Lit: Historical and Psycho-Cultural "Handles"
Students’
Questions (FAQ), Listed in Order as Received:
1. “Can you
reiterate what FS, WW, SU and FR mean in the grading system used for the
Mid-term? Also, can you clarify with examples, problems identified through
their improper use?” (10/25/01)
a.
FS = fused sentence, sometimes called “run-on” or “comma splice
without the comma” = two or more independent clauses jammed together (fused)
without benefit of punctuation or proper conjunctions. CS
= comma splice, sometimes called “comma fault.” See handbook. (10/25/01)
b.
WW = “wrong word,” a notation I often follow with a question mark,
asking, “Are you sure this is the word you mean to use?” Without the question
mark, I mean that you’ve just used the wrong word, by definition.
c.
SU,
I suspect, is actually my bad handwriting for SV
= subject-verb disagreement. See handbook. (10/25/01)
d.
FR,
I suspect, is actually my bad handwriting for TR
= transition. Usually, I am referring to the movement of your ideas
from one paragraph to another. I see good transition as a thought-structure
that tends both forward and backward. That is, whatever you just said at the
end of one paragraph should make some thoughtful gesture in the direction of
what’s immediately to be said in the next. Simply noting “transition” by the
use of “transition words” such as ”first,” “secondly,” or “finally”—although
they can be helpful—does NOT ensure actual transition. Rather, you may be
engaging in perfunctory enumeration or even hiding the fact that there really
IS no thoughtful connection between your two adjacent, or consecutive, ideas.
(10/25/01)
e.
As
for examples, they should be evident in your text, which is why I marked them.
If not, see me for specific directions. (10/25/01)
2. “On my midterm
there are several spots marked ‘W.’ What does this mean? Did I understand that we can use exactly the
same thesis statement given for the midterm? Concerning the 5 sources and the
Anthology, I wanted to be certain about counting the references to various
authors/works in the Anthology. Are all the Anthology sources counted
cumulatively as one of the five required? Or does each Anthology
author/source count individually toward the five required? What are your office
hours? I might want to make sure I'm on the right track when I begin this
documented paper” (10/27/01).
a.
W = wordy, not always just “too many words,” as in REP (repetition) or RED (redundancy). Wordiness
can mean that you spent time perfunctorily introducing a quotation when it might
instead have been handled with a colon. (10/27/01)
b.
You are free to use exactly the same thesis
sentence, or, if you have reconsidered the ideas implicit in that sentence, you
could take an opposing position with one or more of your authors in the essay-discussion.
(10/27/01)
c.
Entries
from class texts such as The Norton Anthology of American Literature or
from Moby-Dick count as one source—all together. Be sure to use the
“cross-reference” form (at
link to Works Consulted sample, see items for Addison, Anderson, Baym, Bryant,
and Wordsworth) to cite multiple sources from an anthology. (11/15/02)
d.
Office
hours are posted on the for your course, including “by appointment.” It’s a
good idea to let me know in advance that you’re coming by because I often am
called to other tasks even during those theoretically sacrosanct times.
(10/27/01)
3. “Re: Edit
comment ‘pa val’/ On our midterm, what does comment this mean?” (11/5/01).
a.
The
cryptic “pa val” is almost certainly my bad handwriting for paral = error in parallelism. You may recall
an evening when I asked for the class’s definitions of parallelism, which led
us into concepts from subplots, themes, and motifs (one idea, image, or action
being parallel to another in a story) to rhetorical, grammatical, and syntactic
“pa vals.” Often I mark “paral” (1) when two parts of a compound verb aren’t
equal in one way or another; (2) when two parts of a compound sentence are disproportionate
or of unequal value (meaning that one might work better as a subordinate
clause); (3) when items in a series aren’t really equivalent; etc. See
handbook. (11/5/01)
4. “After what we
talked about in class Monday about looking at the original thought process,
etc. I went back and typed up my Midterm Rough Draft in its entirety. I also
had a couple of questions: (a) *If I want to quote within a sentence and then
continue the sentence, do I cite after the quote, or at the end of the
sentence? Example: So-and-so said that blah blah blah when ‘blah blah blah’
(cite here?), and therefore blah blah blah (or here?). (b) *Also, when you
corrected my paper you wrote ‘WW’ over a word and ‘TV’ next to a sentence: what
do these mean?”
a.
Notice
that the citation appears correctly outside your quotation mark: “blah blah
blah” (citation). If both your quotations come from the same page, feel free to
delay the citation until after the second one. (11/15/02)
b.
See
#1b for “W(rong)W(ord)” and #1d for “Tr(ansition).”
5. “you say that
using an author from the second half of the semester is not required but
suggested. I also remember you saying that if we did not use an author from our
own list on the mid-term, we should use that author as our fifth on the paper.
Do we have a choice whether the 5th author is from the personal list or from
the second half of the semester? Or, if a personal author was used in the
mid-term, do those people then have the option to use an author from the second
half of the semester?” (Re: ENGL 2160)
a.
Well
said, I think . . .
b.
You
must use an author from your personal list if you
have not yet done so.
c.
It
is suggested, not required, that you add an author
from the second half of the course. (11/26/01)
6.
“What does the abbreviation PT mean?” (Re: ENGL 3220): Usually, PT = Present Tense, meaning that you have
probably been writing about events within a work (story/film/poem/play/novel)
in past tense when, instead, anything within in the work should be written in
present tense, even if one event happens before another in the
narrative chronology: Guido falls in love with Dora; Guido is
killed at the end; Guido is goofy the first time we see
him. It feels awkward until you try it a few times, but it makes sense:
everything in a story is in there now, you see.
(12/1/01)
7.
“a question in reference to the Works Consulted
page. In terms of the anthology I just want to confirm that we cite the
anthology as well as the works we use in the anthology and alphabetize the
whole list. (we don't place the works from the anthology under the
anthology listing?)” All items in the Works Consulted
are alphabetized as one big list. The item for the anthology simply falls in
the list wherever the name of the editor falls. In the MLA Style reference
texts, this practice is concealed in the indices as “cross-referencing.”
(12/08/01)
8.
“Dr. Hill: Do you think that you could post a message that
has what your markings on our papers mean. The ones that you use for
general corrections like TV or TR I don’t know which one it is but if you could
do that it would be very helpful in the revision process. Thank you.” See FAQ items 1d and 4b,
above. (11/15/02)
9.
Thesis?—This item is not technically a question but good evidence that some
students do listen carefully when we have a conference. Too often, conferences
become little more than an occasion to find out EXACTLY THE ONE SECRET THING
the student can fix that will give him or her the higher grade s/he, in a just
world, truly deserves—that is, everything but how to become a better reader and
writer. I have omitted the student’s name, but the unedited text here is from
an email sent to the student’s study group:
I went to see the old man [that’s me—RWH] about my thesis. Contrary to my belief and to the Regents, a
thesis is not developed by choosing one side and defending it.
The meat of the thesis is the argument you have with yourself
on both sides of the issue. You may have made a decision as to which side you
believe—this is your hypothesis. Start out by presenting your evidence. Next
present evidence on the other side of the issue. Take the reader on a trip with
you. Walk down both sides of the street. Talk about what is on both sides.
You may feel as though you are defending both sides. You may
go from one side to the other and back again. This is what will make an
interesting paper.
Your conclusion may be a surprise to you. (11/15/02)
10.
“Can we use each
individual story as a source or does our world literature book count as one big
source.” See
FAQ item #2c, above. (11/15/02)
11.
“I am still unsure about the specifics of what we are
supposed to do with the papers and how that relates to the documented essay”
(ENGL 3220).
In thoughtful, serious consultation with your study group, revise your midterm
essay to 1500-2000 words, with at least four MLA-, APA-, or Chicago-style
documented sources beyond the movies themselves. Include “some reference” to at
least one additional movie since our midterm: that would be The Mexican,
Cronos, El Mariachi, Mimic, Y Tu Mamá También, Reed:
Insurgent Mexico, or Cabeza da Vaca. (11/19/02)
12. “About the Works
Consulted—it was to my understanding that we only include the sources that we
consulted, not every single thing we have read this semester. I thought that if I used something in Essay
1, but didn't in Essay 2, I am still suppose to include it in every works
consulted that I've done (1, 2, 3 and revisions)” (ENGL 1101). Works Consulted,
to include anything read during the class this term, cumulative as one big Works
Consulted to the last essay in your portfolio. This Works Consulted should have
been "accumulated" by each student in the class through the whole
term. (11/26/02)
13. Notes on “Thesis” excerpted from several
Nicenet and WebCT postings (10/19/04):
a.
Thesis:
a sentence that gives direction and impetus to an essay, generally containing
within itself elements of opposition or potential argument; viz., not a
topic, which is static.
b.
Be
careful to devise theses that open out your possibilities for thinking rather
than stop you cold. Some interesting ideas aren't good theses because they are
immediately self-answering, or they lead you into areas that would require much
more research than you have time for. For example, without a strong foundation
in the history of certain periods, you could offer little more than slight
opinions (however eloquently or forcefully you might express them).
c.
Simply
to say "Compare and contrast" is to set a task, not to set an essay
in motion. It's still a topic. So, if you were to "compare and
contrast," what would be some of your points, some of your arguments?
Looking at those in more detail, you could devise a thesis rather than a topic.
d.
Revision:
“[Although they may appear to be simply decorative, or even go unnoticed,]
colors in films are often used thematically to enhance our understanding.” ßIntroductory subordinate clause gives
something for the main clause to play off against. The essay can spend a little
productive time talking about the way we take color too casually or even don‘t
notice it at all; that leads to a stronger case for the intentional use of
color by moviemakers. I’d ask for a little different language than “enhance our
understanding” because color affects our emotional, nonrational perceptions as
well as our rational “understanding.” Of course, when we analyze the whole
thing, we do bring the nonrational somewhat to the surface, for rational
apprehension and public discourse. (You know . . . this sort of thing: “I didn’t realize how much the music was
affecting me until I saw the movie the second time!”)
e.
We
might have a thesis that reads something like this: “In La belle et la bête,
Le charme discret de la bourgoisie, Le fabuleux destin d'Amelie Poulain,
and La Reine Margot, dogs appear as realistic pets, playthings, or even
tools; but they also serve their moviemakers' aesthetic and philosophical
purposes.” ßThis sentence, you see, is
different from a "topic," as it means to give direction and impetus to
the essay as a whole.
f.
Brent
Bausser’s extended WebCT on-the-money entry on the subject (10/7/04):
So I guess we need a topic to compose a thesis--or at least a
premise. What do you guys think?
We could start with discussing concurrent themes or elements in these
films, or perhaps we could discuss the nature of filmmaking itself. As per the second offering: it seems to me that films construct
characters around their own construction of their world. Maybe in building a film—lighting, blocking,
editing, sound, script, on and on and on—filmmakers are building around
characters, and characters are projecting on all of this building. I see some sort of dialectical feedback here
(whether intentional, [implied], inferred, or else) that both explodes and implodes—that
is, works both out of the characters and into the characters. What do you guys
think about this?
Also, as a note, Doctor Hill likes his theses to contain some sort of
contradiction. I should say that I also
like this. It helps when constructing your paper because it gives you some
tension to build off.
With all of Doc Hill's talk of postmodernism, frequently referencing
Charlie Kaufmann, I'll say that having theses given to you to build a paper
around is a very postmodern style of writing.
I envisioned the films we're going to discuss as tribes warring together
over who most perfectly worships/glorifies the thesis we'll be using. My mental image was entirely more funny [“more
funny”?] than my description, but I do think it important that we discuss
the problems in writing this way, so we can turn them into advantages.
14. Notes on “Transition” excerpted from several
Nicenet and WebCT postings (10/19/04):
a.
Need
to construct transitions so that one idea helps develop as well as lead into
the next. Good transitions have a backward-and-forward rather than only a
forward motion to them.
[This page created 25 Oct.
2001; last revised, 19 Oct. 2004—RWH]