African American female influencers in todays time.

ENG 802 Unit 2

Essay Two: The Research Essay

Introduction

For this assignment, instead of answering a pre-configured prompt, you are going to come up with your own writing prompt. What this means is that you will first develop your own research question based on the unit topics and seek potential answers to that question yourself via research. Ultimately, you will argue for your answer, or answers, to that research question, supported by your own research.

Researching and presenting the findings of your research is a skill that you will utilize throughout your college career, and likely your professional career beyond. The ability to locate and evaluate credible sources is also a skill that we, as citizens, clearly need now more than ever. This hard truth will be demonstrated repeatedly as you research one of the two topics of this unit.

The Work

First, you will need to decide which topic—the spread of far-right extremism online or online public shaming—is of interest to you. Then, you will need to do some self-directed reading on the topic (starting with the texts found in the Unit 2 Library module on Canvas) to get a sense of the various concerns writers are discussing. It is important to look at a variety of source types from scholarly publications to news sites to social media posts.

After you’ve done some cursory research, you will develop a research question. Essentially, what do you want to know about the topic? Once you’ve developed a workable research question (a process which will be discussed in our modules this unit), you will do research extensively to see what answers you can find. Keep in mind that there are likely to be multiple potential answers to your question, and none of them definitive. We are not seeking simple, concrete answers—they don’t exist for the problems we’re examining.

Finally, you will write a 4-6-page essay in which you argue your answer to the question. Your thesis statement will be the answer to your research question. Develop a point-by-point argument in support of that thesis, using sources to back-up all your claims. Again, you might have found multiple answers. You might not even feel your answer is 100% correct, 100% of the time. That’s fine. You can even say so in your essay—responsible scholars always do.

Requirements

• Your essay must be a thesis-driven argument in response to your research question • You must use a minimum of three sources—at least one must be an article from a

scholarly publication. • All sources must be cited via MLA style in-text and on a works cited page • Page length is 4 pages minimum, no more than 6 • Include an MLA header, original title, and page numbers.

I will use the following rubric to provide feedback on your draft. The criteria may not cover all of the things you need to address in revision, just the things I’m focusing on at this point. Please feel free to contact me with questions.

Criterion Essay Match Does the introduction provide adequate contextualization of the topic via background info and source summary, while avoiding overly-broad and meaningless filler?

Does the thesis present a debatable, narrowly-focused answer to the author’s research question?

Is the thesis statement successfully developed via body paragraphs that adequately explain individual argument points?

Is each argument point fully developed and supported via relevant source material?

Are the required amount and type of sources used?

Has the author used transitions and other organizational strategies to create a coherent essay?

Are all sources cited correctly via MLA style in-text and on a works cited?