English Research Argument Essay.

The Argument Essay

The argument essay is the most common type of writing assignment that college students will encounter throughout their academic careers.  While there are different variations of the argument essay, the overall foundation is always the same: the writer is tasked with investigating an issue, taking a stand on the issue, and finding and incorporating a multitude of evidence in a logical manner to support the overall claim.

Most of us have experience with arguing, but an argumentative essay is quite different than a verbal argument that arises out of the blue.  Verbal arguments often become heated and unreasonable, while the goal of an argumentative essay is the opposite: the argument must be specific, reasoned, detailed, and supported with a variety of evidence.  Furthermore, a verbal argument often focuses on who is right regarding a specific issue, while a well-written and researched argument essay focuses on what is the right side of a particular issue.  In short, an argument essay must be logical from beginning to end.

The source material you use should enhance, not dominate your paper. Most of your text should be your own words and ideas, discussing, explaining, and developing your argument. A good way to check that your paper is not over-using source material is to temporarily remove all quotes and paraphrases. The support should, obviously, be weaker, but the paper should still make sense, and it should still make its point

Topic[footnoteRef:1]: Explore issues concerning identity (e.g. sexuality, race, class, politics, etc.), and how the various themes/concepts work within a society that advocates conformity. We have seen journals and talked about many of these during this semester. For your research project, you will continue with this theme. The topics you are to choose from are: [1: I left the topics broad enough for you to feel comfortable to explore a specific subject you are interested in within any of the topics. However, you are to focus on one topic and come up with a question that you will be able to find sufficient information and create a well-structured and documented paper. ]

1. Business & Economics: How do we earn our keep?

· Globalization

· Social Class Structures

· Professions for women and/or minorities

2. Philosophy, Ethics, & Religion: What do we believe?

· Religious Case for Gay Marriage

· Religious Fundamentals

· Politics & Religion- Separation of Church and State

3. Health & Medicine: What are the challenges?

· Normalcy of AIDS

· Globalization of Eating Disorders

· Self-Medicating/Virtual Doctors

4. Family Life & Gender Roles: How do we become who we are?

· Responding to Marriage

· Family Values

· Corporal punishment

5. Education & Society: How, what, and why do we learn?

· Academia & Ethics

· Human Sexuality in the Classroom

· Education & Economics

Essay should be 3-4 pages long

MLA format with 12 point Times New Roman font

4 sources and a Works Cited page

At least one of the sources should be Youtube clip of at least 10 minutes long

Another should be Rye Barcott’s it happened on the way to war.

Peer review May 1

Final Copy May 3