Thursday, June 20, 2013Melissa Gunby

ENGLISH 370

Freewrite• Today is National Vanilla Milkshake Day. Tomorrow is Go Skateboarding Day. If you could dedicate a day on the calendar to anything, what would it be, and why?

Agenda for Tonight• MLA formatting and how to use quotes• Setting Up Introductions and Conclusions• The Princess Bride Discussion

MLA FORMATTING

MLA

• The MLA is the Modern Language Association. It is a group of professionals that meet annually and make decisions for formatting documents, etc, that are used in the Humanities fields.

Other Documentation Styles

• APA = American Psychological Association• -ologies

• Chicago Style• History

Basic Rules for MLA Format

• See MLA tab in Hacker Handbook• 1” margins all around• Name, professor, class, date in upper left corner (NOT in the header)• Last name, page number in the upper right (in the header)• Title: centered• Full document should be double spaced• Indent each new paragraph

Sample 1st Page

USING AND SUPPORTING QUOTES

Why Use Quotes

•We use quotes to show that we have experts who agree with what we have to say in our writing.•We also use quotes to say things that other’s have already said better• Or we use quotes when writing about literature to make a reference to a particular line, phrase, etc.

Example (research):

• My syllabus reflects a very mixed philosophy of teaching. I believe in free-writing to develop ideas, and that it doesn't need to be graded. It should be collected and used for participation points, but not for evaluation. I wouldn't want my notebook graded on the random thoughts I generate in class, so it would be unfair of me to expect different of my students. I also believe very strongly in the revision process, but also of giving grades. As Lad Tobin writes, "[e]ven the most process-oriented teachers acknowledge that a meaningful profess ought to lead eventually to some sort of written product" (Guide, 7).To that end, I have created a syllabus that allows time for multiple drafts for each major assignment, with the provision that the grade received on a "final draft" my be improved by further revision in time for the final portfolio project.

Example (literature):

• In J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, the modern romantic epic, the main group of nine heroes follows a code of friendship to hold them together and see them through the dark times that they are trying to bring to a close. “Faithless is he that says farewell when the road darkens” (Tolkien, 274). Their friendship is one of undying loyalty to each other and the mission they have taken up. The Fellowship of nine is brought together with a common purpose and soon develops a close bond among the nine. But when one member of the Fellowship allows himself to be lured by the power of the Ring, the Fellowship crumbles and the members go on their separate ways to see to the ultimate goal of destroying the Ring the fighting the growing darkness spreading over Middle Earth. Though the Fellowship was reunited at the end, it wasn’t the same. The journey had cost the remaining eight members so much, that none of them were the same. The fault of one member caused the Fellowship to break, because he couldn’t uphold the unwritten code that they all agreed to live by.

How to use quotes

• Easiest thing to remember is this:• Set up the quote• Give the quote• Cite the quote

• Support/explain the quote

• You don’t want to just drop a quote in• It has to be supported and tied back to your thoughts

Example:

• Shakespeare’s Hamlet is a character of much indecision. He waffles constantly over his courses of action. “To be, or not to be, that is the question,” may be one of the most famous lines from the play, but it also sets up Hamlet’s frame of mind (3.1.55). Throughout this soliloquy, Hamlet is questioning his decision to act, and reveal his uncle/step-father’s guilt in the death of the King.

Formatting Short QuotationsIn-text Examples:

According to some, dreams express "profound aspects of personality" (Foulkes 184),

though others disagree.

According to Foulkes's study, dreams may express "profound aspects of personality"

(184).

Is it possible that dreams may express "profound aspects of personality" (Foulkes 184)?

Cullen concludes, "Of all the things that happened there / That's all I remember" (11-

12).

Formatting Long QuotationsIn-text Example:

Nelly Dean treats Heathcliff poorly and dehumanizes him throughout her

narration:

They entirely refused to have it in bed with them, or even in their room,

and I had no more sense, so, I put it on the landing of the stairs, hoping

it would be gone on the morrow. By chance, or else attracted by hearing

his voice, it crept to Mr. Earnshaw's door, and there he found it on

quitting his chamber. Inquiries were made as to how it got there; I was

obliged to confess, and in recompense for my cowardice and

inhumanity was sent out of the house. (Bronte 78)

Adding/Omitting WordsIn-text Example for Adding Words:

Jan Harold Brunvand, in an essay on urban legends, states: "some individuals [who

retell urban legends] make a point of learning every rumor or tale" (78).

In-text example for Omitting Words:

In an essay on urban legends, Jan Harold Brunvand notes that "some individuals

make a point of learning every recent rumor or tale . . . and in a short time a lively

exchange of details occurs" (78).

Summarizing or Paraphrasing

• Sometimes you don’t want to use a whole quote but you want to explain someone’s ideas in your own words. This is paraphrasing or summarizing. • Example: Hamlet’s indecision shows in his soliloquy in the first scene of the third act. When he questions whether or not to take action or suffer the consequences of inaction, he is struggling with ideas of not only justice, but loyalty to his mother and being a hormonal teenager (3.1.55-88).

Formatting Quotes and Paraphrase

• The period for the end of the sentence always goes on the outside of the ( ). • If you follow up the quote with more words before the end of the sentence, put a comma before the close quote punctuation.• “To be, or not to be, that is the question,” may be one of the most famous lines from the play, but it also sets up Hamlet’s frame of mind (3.1.55).

AVOIDING PLAGIARISM

Citing Sources

•Whenever you quote in an essay, you must cite your source, that is, give credit to the original author.•Whenever you reference an idea by another author (summarize or paraphrase), you must also give credit to the author.• You must cite in two places: in text and at the end• Each documentation style (MLA, APA) has its own way of documenting•We’re going to focus on MLA, but your handbook has information on APA which maybe handy in other classes.

In text citation

• In MLA format, we use parenthetical citation. This means that after a quote, we put the source in parenthesis ( ) at the end of the sentence.

Author-Page StyleIn-text Example:

Wordsworth stated that Romantic poetry was marked by a "spontaneous

overflow of powerful feelings" (263).

Romantic poetry is characterized by the "spontaneous overflow of

powerful feelings" (Wordsworth 263). Wordsworth extensively explored

the role of emotion in the creative process (263).

Corresponding Works Cited Entry:

Wordsworth, William. Lyrical Ballads. London: Oxford

U.P., 1967. Print.

What to put in the ( )

• If you use the author’s name in the sentence (signal phrase), just put the page number in the ( )• If you just quote, put the author’s last name and page number in the ( )• If you use more than one source by the same author, include the title in the ( )

• See page 191 in green book

Print Source with Author

In-text Example:

Human beings have been described by Kenneth Burke as "symbol-using animals" (3).

Human beings have been described as "symbol-using animals" (Burke 3).

Big Tip!

• Don’t try to memorize the way all this formatting should be done. There’s too much to try to remember.• Keep your handbook handy when you’re writing.• I have a Master’s in English and I still have to look this stuff up.

• Orenstein, Peggy. “I Tweet, Therefore I Am.” What Matters in America. 3rd ed. Ed. Gary Goshgarian. Boston: Pearson, 2012.40-43. Print.• Collins, Suzanne. The Hunger Games. New York: Scholastic, 2008. Print.

THE PRINCESS BRIDE

LET’S START WITH YOUR QUESTIONS OR IDEAS

EFFECTIVE INTRODUCTIONS AND CONCLUSIONS

INTRODUCTIONS

What is the purpose of an Introduction?

• An introduction is the first thing people read when they read your essay.• It should get the reader’s attention• It should give the reader an idea about the topic of your essay.• It should connect to your thesis statement.

Okay, so how do I start one?

• My big tip for introductions is to leave them for the end of the process. • I can’t tell you what I’m going to write about until after I’ve

written it, so my introduction is always the piece I end with.

Narrative

• You can always begin with a narrative or story, drawn from your experiences, or something seen in the news or other media.

On Sept. 11, 2001, terrorists crashed two airplanes into the twin towers at the World Trade Center. Ignoring the danger to themselves, hundreds of firefighters rushed inside the buildings to try to save as many lives as possible. Their actions enabled thousands of people to get out, but half the firefighters – over three hundred– died when the twin towers collapsed. Although I have never faced a catastrophe like the one in New York, as a volunteer firefighter I am read – day or night, whenever an alarm sounds – to deal with a dangerous situation.

Thesis statement

Begin with a question

• Asking a question can be useful, because it will keep the reader reading, expecting you to answer the question you pose.

Imagine this scene: A child is sitting under a Christmas tree opening her presents. She laughs and claps her hands as she gets a doll, a pair of shoes, and a sweater. What could spoil this picture? What information could cause the child’s parents to feel guild? The answer is that children from developing countries probably worked long hours in substandard conditions so this child could receive her gifts.

Be careful with questions, though; try to avoid posing a “you” question (like “have you ever wondered…?”) because you’re not addressing a specific audience, and we try to avoid using 2nd person in academic writing.

Begin with a background statement

• A broad statement that provides some background to the topic can catch your readers’ attention and focus them immediately on your topic.

English is the most widely spoken language in the history of our planet, used in some way by at least one out of every seven human being around the globe. Half of the world’s books are written in English, and the majority of international telephone calls are made in English. English is the language of over sixty percent of the world’s radio programs, many of them beamed, ironically, by the Russians, who know that to win friends and influence nations, they’re best of using English. …

Start with an interesting quote

• Some witty or related statement by someone else can catch your readers’ attention

According to the comedian Jerry Seinfeld, “When you’re single, you are the dictator of your own life…when you’re married, you are part of a vast decision making body.” In other words, before you can do anything, you have to discuss it with someone else. These words kept going through my mind as I thought about asking my girlfriend to marry me. The more I thought about Seinfeld’s words, the more I hesitated. I never suspected that I would pay a price for my indecision.

“In my day, only sluts had tattoos,” Liz’s mom said to me on our first day back at college our sophomore year. I had gotten a tattoo over the summer, an outline only, feminine stamp of a bee circling over a flower on the inside of my left ankle. This was her way of telling me she didn’t approve of my ink. Since then, I’ve gotten a second tattoo, an Amy Brown fairy on my right shoulder, and am considering a third on the inside of my right wrist, to read in script “not all who wander are lost,” a line from Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings. My parents do not understand my desire for ink, the need to express myself through modifying my body. To them, tattoos are something for thugs or lower-class people, not a college professor, a middle-class white lady, a straight A honor roll student. What my parents fail to realize is that the presence of ink on my body doesn’t discount all those parts of my personality; it is simple another facet of it.

This sample incorporates both a quote and a shocking statement.

Using a surprising statement

• Start with something that takes your reader by surprise.

Some of the smartest people I know never went to college. In fact, some of them never finished high school. they still know how to save 20 percent on the price of a dinner, fix their own faucets when they leak, get discounted prescriptions, get free rides on a bus to Atlantic City, use public transportation to get anywhere in the city, and live on about twenty-two dollars a day. These are my grandparents’ friends. Some people would call them old and poor. I would call them survivors who have learned to make it through life on nothing but a Social Security check.

Writing a Summary• Particularly if you’re being asked to write in response to another text (see CME), it can be effective to use a summary of the primary text as an introduction. This way, the reader gets the background if they haven’t read the primary source, and you don’t have to think too hard about how to get started.

Practice: which of these is the better introduction?

CONCLUSIONS

What are conclusions supposed to do, anyway?

• Your conclusion is the last thing a reader sees, and therefore, the last thing they are likely to remember. • It should be a full paragraph• It should, in some way, restate your main idea/remind the reader of your main point• Give the reader a sense of closure, and not leaving them hanging like the end of a bad movie.

Ending with a narrative

• Ending with a narrative or story can be particularly effective if that’s how you began.• After twenty years, the tree began to bear. Although

Grandfather complained about how much he lost because the pollen never reached the poor part of town, because at the market he had to haggle over the price of avocados, he loved that tree. It grew, as did his family, and when he died, all his sons standing on each other’s shoulders, oldest to youngest, could not reach the highest branches. The wind could move the branches, but the trunk, thicker than any waist, hugged the ground.

Concluding with a prediction

• Ending with an idea about the future can be especially effective in certain types of essays, particularly arguments.• On that little street were the ghosts of the people who

brought me into being and the flesh-and-blood kids who will be my children’s companions in the twenty-first century. You could tell by their eyes that they couldn’t figure out why I was there. They were accustomed to being ignored, even by the people who had once populated their rooms. And as long as that continues, or cities will burst and burn, burst and burn, over and over again.

Concluding with a recommendation

• Once you’ve convinced readers that there’s a problem, it’s sensible to put your solution or recommendation into the conclusion. • Every effort should be made to ensure that the yew tree is

made available for the continued research and development of taxol. Environmental groups, the timber industry, and the Forest Service must recognize that the most important value of the Pacific yet is as a treatment for cancer. At the same time, its harvest can be managed in a way that allows for the production of the cancer drug taxol without endangering the continual survival of the yew tree.

Wrap up with a quote

• A well-chosen quote and be effective, depending on the type of essay. • If you’re writing an argument or analysis, you don’t want to

end on someone else’s words. A narrative, however, would be an appropriate place to use this technique. • It was 4:25 am when the ambulance arrived to take the body of

Miss Genovese. It drove off. “then,” a solemn police detective said, “the people came out.”

Tip!

• It’s always a good idea for your conclusion and introduction to reflect on each other. • You don’t have to use only one of the above methods of development.

Samples

Intro Conclusion“In my day, only sluts had

tattoos,” Liz’s mom said to me on our first day back at college our sophomore year. I had gotten a tattoo over the summer, an outline only, feminine stamp of a bee circling over a flower on the inside of my left ankle. This was her way of telling me she didn’t approve of my ink. Since then, I’ve gotten a second tattoo, an Amy Brown fairy on my right shoulder, and am considering a third on the inside of my right wrist, to read in script “not all who wander are lost,” a line from Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings. My parents do not understand my desire for ink, the need to express myself through modifying my body. To them, tattoos are something for thugs or lower-class people, not a college professor, a middle-class white lady, a straight A honor roll student. What my parents fail to realize is that the presence of ink on my body doesn’t discount all those parts of my personality; it is simple another facet of it.

As I’ve been on the job market since finishing my MA in 2008, my mother constantly reminds me that I need to cover up my tattoos when I go in to an interview. Lately, my response has been ‘why should I?’ I don’t have to take out my 5 piercings in each ear. I don’t have to necessarily hide the fact that I dyed my hair bright pink or purple (well, now I do, since I work at a technical school with a dress code). I am by far the least inked member of the faculty at several schools I have taught at, and my tattoos are nothing that I am ashamed of. Yet, people still don’t understand the drive some people have to need to outwardly modify their body as part of self-expression. As Ryan quotes in her essay “the last taboo is the body,” and some people just aren’t ready to accept that artistic canvas goes beyond paper and clay.

Intro ConclusionWhen I was a junior in high school we read The Grapes of Wrath in my Junior Literature and Composition class. As part of our months long assignment, we were required to interview someone who had lived through the Great Depression. Instead of calling up my grandparents (who were only in their mid 60s at the time and therefore were very young children during the Depression), I interviewed a co-worker of my mother’s, a man in his 80s, who gave me a lot of good information about what it was like in California at that time. His experiences showed me, like the old family photos in Josh Rittenberg’s essay “Tomorrow Will Be a Better Day,” that although hardship may befall a generation, subsequent generations can move forward and survive new trials and horrors and become great because of the successes of those who came before them. I agree with Rittenberg that the current generation of young people of the world will help shape the world into a better place than it is today.

• As Rittenberg’s dad liked to tell him “tomorrow will be a better day.” I believe that, given all the advances that humans have seen in the past three decades of my life, that this is absolutely true. Even out of the horror of the nuclear bomb that was dropped on Japan came the ability to power homes and business through harnessing that power. The horrible destruction of Chernobyl in Russia from nuclear melt down at a power plant led to greater safety standards world wide. I believe that the current generation will make advances that mine hasn’t even conceived of yet, which will lead to a better life for future generations.

Just one more…

Intro ConclusionI rely on strangers every day. Strangers deliver

my news, make my coffee, and accompany me on my 150 mile round trip commute on I-5 and I-80 on Mondays. Strangers also rely on me every day. I teach at a couple of different colleges, and in some cases, that education is funded by federal or private loans, and as a taxpayer, I’m not only helping to pay for that education, but I’m responsible for making sure that other taxpayers get their money’s worth out of my students. I expect everyone, from my students, to those I share the road with daily to have a certain amount of personal responsibility to ensure they do what they’re supposed to be doing, from homework to obeying the traffic laws. In his essay “A Shared Moment of Trust,” Warren Christopher, former Secretary of State, writes about how he not only believes in personal responsibility but also “to believe that there are moments when one must rely upon the good faith and judgment of others.” Quite frequently in our daily lives, people must have faith that those around them will make the right decisions to allow for cooperative decision making, whether it’s on the road during a commute, or as Christopher points out, during tense negotiations to release hostages.

Warren Christopher, with the aid of the Algerian foreign minister, safely brought home 52 American citizens who had been held hostage by the Iranians. Throughout this ordeal, Christopher had to rely on the good faith of the Algerian foreign minister to relay messages accurately in order to secure the lives and safety of those hostages. While there is nothing I do on a daily basis that is as high stakes as these negotiations that took place in the 80s, I rely on others to act similarly. If a fellow driver chooses not to use a turn signal, for example, lives are put at risk. If I do not adequately prepare a lesson plan, I am wasting the money of taxpayers who are funding student loans and ultimately paying my salary. In the end, as Christopher states “we must recognize that our fates are not ours alone to control,” and in this increasingly globalized society we live in, this grows more and more true. The college I attended had this motto: Not unto ourselves alone are we born. None of us live in a vacuum, and we all rely on the good faith of those around us.

Any Questions?

Homework• “As Bullies Go Digital, Parents Play Catch Up” pg 30-36• Rough Draft of Essay 1• Bring 2 hard copies to class

• Submit one copy to Turnitin