Due April 6 BY EMAIL ATTACHMENT
On Monday, April 6, students will submit a 3-5 page typed, double-spaced essay on a topic connected to the coming of the Civil War provided to them in class during the previous week. All essays must include quotations from Louis Masur’s Civil War and from material at the course website, properly cited using Chicago-style footnotes. Outside research is allowed but not encouraged. Additional information will be available on the assignment guidelines at the course site. Essays will be graded on depth of analysis, use of evidence, and quality of prose. Late essays will be penalized up to 5 points each day.
Please choose ONE of the following topics:
[Questions will be distributed in class on Tuesday, March 31]
- Please open your paper with a descriptive title, byline (name), and a clear, engaging introductory paragraph with analytical thesis statement. Don’t just restate the question and consider using opening tactics such as thoughtful narrative vignettes or striking quotations or statistics to help focus the reader’s attention.
- Organize your essay in a way that respects chronology and historical context.
- Use past tense except when describing modern scholarship
- Avoid first person pronouns, including “our”
- Prof. Pinsker is available to review drafts by email (before Tuesday) and you may utilize the Writing Center
All essays must include both primary and secondary source material from the assigned readings properly cited using Chicago-style footnotes. Outside research is allowed but not required.
- Make sure to use a variety of sources from the course syllabus to support your claims, properly cited using Chicago-style footnotes.
- Outside research is not encouraged, but students should always consider consulting discussion topic pages from the course site syllabus and any of the additional primary source or Yawp chapter readings.
- Make sure to devise a thesis statement that can be effectively argued in a short paper. Consult the Methods Center handout on How to Write a Thesis Statement
- Make sure you are formatting your footnotes correctly (see some of the samples below). For further guidance, see this methods handout on How to Use Footnotes and consult as needed with the library’s Chicago-style guide, but make sure to use sample footnote models for formatting and NOT bibliography examples.
Sample Footnotes
[1] Louis P. Masur, The Civil War: A Concise History (New York: Oxford University Press, 2011), 23.
[5] Masur, 46.
Essays will be graded on depth of analysis, use of evidence, and quality of prose. Late essays will be penalized up to 5 points each day.
- Don’t underestimate the importance of integrating your quoted evidence with some degree of fluidity. Awkwardly inserting quotations is one of the hallmarks of mediocre undergraduate essays. Consult this handout from the methods center for a range of good tips.
- Also, please guard against plagiarism. Remember our discussion from early in the semester. Never write your own words while looking directly at your sources, especially secondary sources –unless you are quoting them.
- And finally, always remember to proofread your work by printing it out and reading it aloud, slowly. See our methods handout on How to Proofreed [sic]