Stuff…
Here’s some stuff I promised to upload, and some stuff I didn’t mention but which is worth looking at.
First off, here’s an EXCELLENT explanation about the basics of college essay-writing. I meant to post it here a while ago, but I kept forgetting. This is a lot of the stuff I’ve been working on teaching you, but boiled down into a simple, straight-forward explanation.
Here’s a good explanation of how to use quotes in your essay, and another on appropriate use of sources. It’s worth having a look. Notice that the focus is always on developing your ideas, and saving words for that purpose.
The University of Dartmouth has an excellent site on citation and sources, titled Sources. There’s a lot of great information there on internationally accepted rules on plagiarism as well as Bibligography Citation formats, such as for “a book with one author,” or “a journal article,” or “a newspaper article,” or “a web page.”
You can find more examples like these on the right side of the main Sources site, linked above; it’s a list of links under the word “Examples” on the right side of the content.
Personally, I prefer the MLA format for English Language & Culture students, and I expect you to learn it, though you’re free to use the “Footnotes” format if you prefer, or the APA or Sciences format if your major is in that field. We’ll take a brief look at the site, and I’ll be giving you an assignment as well.
Part of your homework for next class is the following: bring five “sources” to class. These can be of any of the types listed in the Source Types subpage. The requirements for this assignment:
- You must bring five sources
- Four of the sources you bring must be in English
- You must bring at least three different types of sources.(For a webpage, a printout of the page or a copy of the URL will be sufficient.)
You might wish to print out some of the example source pages from the Dartmouth page linked above. You don’t have to, but it will make your assignment on Monday that much easier…
And last but not least, here’s a terribly difficult essay which you don’t need to try to read (though you can try if you want to go crazy, though personally I think it’s not worth it for you). All I want you to pay attention to is how quotes and paraphrases are used, and how they are cited. We’ll talk about this too, next week.
(And yes, this essay has headings. I don’t like the use of it here, but I think headings can be used well, sometimes.)