WRITING

THE PRIMARY & SECONDARY FEATURES OF WRITING

Each writer has various features and characteristics that make their writing unique,
interesting, and clear. However, good writers use three primary features:
1. Focus & Thesis: Good writers have a narrow focus on their subject so they
are writing more about a smaller topic. For example, you could choose to
write about The Great Gatsby, or you could pick a tighter focus by choosing
to write about the use of the color white as a symbol of class within The
Great Gatsby. A good piece of advice on this note: Select one small detail (or
set of details) to focus on; then connect that detail (or set) to one larger
theme of the story.
2. Development: Good writers develop their ideas through claims, evidence,
and analysis. They begin with their personal and original claim or idea that
explains their thesis. They use textual evidence to support their ideas
whether through the original text and/or secondary sources. Lastly, they
never allow the textual evidence to stand on its own, so they analyze and
explain how this evidence supports both their claim and their overall
focus/thesis.
3. Organization: Good writers organize and connect their ideas word-by-word,
sentence-by-sentence, and paragraph-by-paragraph. A good way to decide
how to organize the information is to organize it as if you are going to present
it to an audience: what questions would they have on the subject? Is there a
specific order required to understand specific concepts?
While these are the primary features of good writing, two other secondary features
are key for personalizing an individual style of writing:
1. Grammar: There are many grammar rules that good writers follow for clarity
and form sake; however, there are several rules that, when taken out of a
stricter context, are optional. This is what makes narrative, poetic, fiction, or
other forms of creative writing different from a technical/instructional manual,
research paper, or annual report. Creative writing opens doors for breaking
the rulesonly if you know and understand the rules first.
2. Style: Good writers have their own personal style. With this understanding of
rule breaking within creative writing, each writer has their own style by the
rules they have chosen to keep or break. Style also includes using a variety of
dashes (ideaidea), hyphens (word-word), parentheses (phrase), and ellipses
(). This is a signature or fingerprintand in many ways, very similar to the
way each of us naturally speaks when we are with our close family or friends.
This personal style creates our voice. A good exercise for finding your own
voice is to write in the style of someone else. Find a writer you admire, and
read enough of their work to hear their voice; then, write a paragraph, poem,
or chapter in that voice. When put to the challenge, it may become much

more difficult than expected. A good example of this is Emily Dickenson, who
is famous for her use of dashes.
Personal Examples: Dorothy Dunnett (The Lymond Chronicles), Markus Zusak
(The Book Thief)

THE 6 ELEMENTS OF LITERARY ANALYSIS

Because most of what we do in the humanities is analytical, understanding literary
analysis is crucial to individually succeeding in building a well-written literary
analysis essay. While this is a great framework for literary analysis, this is also a
good framework for scientific and other types of essays. Here is the hierarchal order
of literary analysis elements:
1. Narrow Focus: again, one detail related to an overall theme
2. Clear Thesis: includes a focus, authorial strategy, and purpose. Do not
confuse this with a statement of intent: In this essay, I intend to focus
on.. We know you intend to focus on this; you are writing it. These become
fluff words to take up word count.
3. Body Development: persuasive with claims, pertinent evidence, and thorough
analysis
4. Critical Context: credible, trustworthy secondary sources
a. Humanities: keep sources within the previous 10 years to stay within
pertinent and recent analytical conversations.
b. Math & Science: keep sources within the previous 5 years to keep
accurate information.
5. Fulfilling Conclusion: answers the So what? of your topicWHY is it so
important that you spent the time and effort writing this essay?
6. MUGS: mechanics (& citations), usage, grammar, and spelling
As you can see, the first two primary features of good writing are also the first and
most important three elements of good literary analysis. Without these, the whole
essay will crumble. Organization, as the third of the primary features, is important
for each of these six elements. Without organization, how will your focus and thesis
stand? How can you fully develop each body idea without organizing the ideas
themselves? How can you use critical context to support your ideas without
organizationyou may sin further and simply use your ideas to support the critical
context without organization. How can you answer the so what? of your
conclusion without acknowledging the analytical journey you have taken your
audience on? Organization is the paper upon which we write our literary analysis
elemental roadmap.
Because we have already discussed how to make a narrow focus, we will now
discuss each element in detail.
CLEAR THESIS STATEMENT
Your thesis statement should include a focus, authorial strategy, and thematic
purpose.
When selecting a focus, maintain the same focus of the essay within the focus of
the thesis. If you are analyzing a piece of poetry, select a specific line, stanza,
symbol, color, sound, etc. If it is more than 12 lines, do not focus on the whole thing.
If it is shorter, using the whole poem as your focus may be sufficient. If you are

analyzing a play, select a character, act, scene, or set of specific scenes, etc. Lastly,
when analyzing a short story or novel, select a specific detail or set of details.
Authors may use a variety of strategies to accomplish their goals. Here are a few
examples that authors may use, but the list is, of course, infinite:

Allegory (of a single and specific

character, object, or actions;
not all of them)
Alliteration, dissonance, etc.:
mostly within poetry; however,
sound patterns do see use
within other forms of literature
Archetype: these are the easiest
and most common to identify
and use for literary analysis
examinations.
Concrete details

Connotative vs. denotative

language & diction
Dialect & vernacular- Example:
The Adventures of Huckleberry
Finn
Figurative language
Flashback & Foreshadowing
Juxtaposition
Malapropism
Narrator & point of view
Personification
Foils & Character development
Symbolism

Lastly, the purpose should relate to a theme of the overall story. While the
author generally applies this theme through a number of different strategies,
you must be careful that you do not lose yourself and your time on a tangent
of these other strategies. This purpose should not be a general message
about humanity; this strategy should help us, as readers, understand a
specific theme better to read the work differently. If you include anything
about humankind, humanity, society, religion, etc. you have probably lost the
point of why the author wrote the work in the first place.

BODY DEVELOPMENT

Each body paragraph should contain a claim, a piece of evidence, and

thorough analysis. As a general practice, at some point in the writing process
you should highlight or change the font color of your writing so that each
claim is one color, evidence another, and analysis yet another color. After
doing this, it should give you a better idea of what you may need to edit or
change. You may want to ask yourself the following questions:

Does the paragraph contain all three elements: claim, evidence, & analysis?
Are they in order?
Are the claims clear?
Are they located in the first or second sentence of each body paragraph?
Is the evidence specific?
Do I clearly explain how the evidence supports the claim of each paragraph
or thesis of the essay?

Am I analytical enough? Do I pull apart the evidence and examine it piece by

piece?
Does each body paragraph clearly match up with the thesis statement?

A good rule of thumb is to ensure you have twice as much analysis as you do
evidence. Analysis should take up at least half, if not more, of each body
paragraph.

CRITICAL CONTEXT

Some essays do not require secondary sources to support your claims and
ideas. However, secondary sources will always make your writing more
credible because it shows you acknowledge all other opinions and arguments
in the current analytical discussion. Consider what Neil Aitken describes when
he analyzes the nature of literary analysis itself:

It seems to me that the current state of literary criticism is like being at

a very large cocktail party. Everyone is engaged in their own
conversations, largely motivated by the need to seem intellectual,
witty, and different. No one is really paying attention. Sometimes you
might catch a word or two from someone elses conversation and
incorporate into your own, completely oblivious of the actual context of
that reference. (http://blog.boxcarpoetry.com/?p=35)

It may seem very important to you, as a student, to sound as hoity toity as

the adults in the conversation. However, do not become so desperate that
you become the little fiver-year-old who only wants to talk about how your
favorite color is pink and you want a pet unicorn. No one will listen to that. If
you want to the analytical adults to invite you into the conversationbecause
your opinion matterslisten to the current conversation topic. It is only after
listening that will you be able to add appropriately and concisely to the
current conversation.

In this spirit of timely conversation, keep your sources recentwithin the

previous 10 years. This period will help narrow your research efforts so you
do not use outdated conversations or pieces of a different conversation in a
wrong, inappropriate context. When doing scientific research, the field
changes so rapidly that you must keep your sources within the previous 5
years.

In terms of actually incorporating these secondary sources into your writing,

here are some rules:

1. Establish how your argument relates to the previous commentary. Are you
expanding on their idea? Are you opposing their idea? Establish what you are
doing on a macro scope with a They say___, but I say ____ or They say ___,
and I think they are right, but missed ______. On a microscopic level, use

secondary sources as evidence to analyze. When agreeing, state your claim,

their quote, and then analyze how their evidence supports your claim. When
disagreeing, state your claim (so-and-so says ___, but I say__), explain the
relation between the two arguments, and then analyze the strength of your
argument with claim, evidence, and further analysis.
2. Never quote when paraphrasing will suffice.
3. Avoid long quotationsparticularly block quotes. Be honest- you should know
as a reader that you generally skip over block quotes anyways. So will your
reader.
4. Never let a quotation stand in a sentence on its own. Always introduce it in
some way.
5. Never end a paragraph with a quote, paraphrase, or summary. You always
want to have the last word for every idea. If you have outside sources ending
your paragraph, it also means you have not analyzed it in any way.
6. Refer to authors by their first and last names the first time you mention them;
however, in every sequential use of that author, only use their last name.
Also, when you first mention them, introduce them with their article, journal,
etc. so they are credible to your reader.
7. DONT rely on one source too much
8. DONT spend more time summarizing sources than analyzing and arguing
them.
9. DONT use outdated, inapplicable, or non-credible sources. The only time it is
okay to use older sources is if that is the most recent work on the title;
however, this puts you in danger of being outside the recent conversation
topic.
10.DONT plagiarize or use improper citation

Refer to the Research portion for more instructions on how to do research.

FULFILLING CONCLUSION

The introduction and conclusion are the most important parts of your essay.
Like a performed piece of music, the audience will walk away remembering
the beginning and the end the most. Here are the rules for writing a fulfilling
conclusion:

1. DONT repeat and altered thesis statement.

2. DONT introduce new claims that require a new set of evidence. Doing this
simply creates the start of a new body paragraph.
3. DONT make generalizations about humankind, humanity, society, religion,
etc.
4. DONT go beyond the bounds of the text. Help your reader interpret how to
read the text differently, NOT what the idea should teach us about the world.
5. DO remind the reader of your introduction and/or thesis by tying it back to
the beginning.
6. DO connect your idea to a larger theme in the work. The theme represents
the purpose.

7. DO make observations that emerge naturally from analysis and connect

firmly to the text.
8. DO explain why your argument is important: the SO WHAT? question.

Many of these rules should also apply when forming your thesis.

POLISHING YOUR WRITING

A few tips and hints for polishing and refining your writing:

1. Always write in the present tense, even if the content takes place in the past.
2. Refer to the teller of a short story or novel as the narrator; refer to the teller
of a poem as the speaker; when writing about plays, distinguish between the
narrator, characters, and playwright. Always distinguish between the speaker
and the author; the author always takes on a persona when writingthis is
the point of view. This does not mean that is the authors personal story or
opinion.
3. Make sure you do not duplicate information.
4. Find the subject and verb of each sentence:
a. Upgrade your verbs by ridding your writing of be verbs. Delete There
[be verb] phrases, passives, and dangling participles.
b. Avoid unnecessary commas, which as a nonrestrictive relative clause
intro, and word echoes. Make sure your modifiers are modifying the
intended subject.
c. Do not nominalize verbs.
5. Dont be afraid of using personal pronouns, including I. This is your way of
separating your argument from the critical context argument.

For ways to improve your editing and revising methods:

1. Wait 2 days between the last time you looked at it and the next time you
revise. This requires some planning and time managementand not
procrastinating.
2. Change the font (size, color, style, line spacing, etc.) and background paper
color.
3. Underline thesis sentence
4. Underline claims
5. Print and cut paper into paragraph segments. Reorder into the most logical
order for the ideas. Even betterhave someone else do this. You know what
order you have put them in a way they will not.
6. Read aloud to yourself or a friend for grammar. Even betterfind a friend to
read it. Find the obstacles within the grammar and sentence structure.
7. Read aloud to yourself or a friend for whole structure, using rubric. Again,
even better is having someone else read and grade you.

DOING RESEARCH

Research can be daunting because it seems difficult and time consuming;

however, by creating a narrow focus, using credible databases, and properly
citing, we can make research infinitely easier by the time you get to actually
writing and finalizing your essay.

DATABASES

The general rule of thumb is that for each page of text, you should have an
equal number of sources. For example, if you have a 10-14 page essay, then
the expectation is that you have 10-14 secondary sources, in addition to your
primary textual source.

While finding 1,000 articles related to your text might sound great at the
start, it also means you have 1,000 sources and articles to look through
before finding the 3 of them that may be helpful and credible. Use database
advanced research tools to narrow your search. Ideally, you should pull up no
more than 25 sources on your topic per database.

JSTOR: Useful, but it serves as a movable wall where the most updated are
kept out of the database until individual journals deem them out of print to
put online. This is an issue when we are trying to use current arguments.
However, JSTOR is good for internal text searching for specific or quoted
phrase commentary.
MagillOnLiterature (EBSCOHost): basic info, context. This source is good to
read prior to reading the text itself. In terms of research, use this for the
Further Reading section of the source.
Literary Criticism Online: Gives the top 20 further reading criticism articles
based on individual work, authors, etc.
MLA International Bibliography: This is a great source. You can do a general
search for the work originally, or you can do a tighter search using advanced
search to use your text as the subject work, or you can find a matchup of
literary themes similar to yours that may tie in. You can also narrow the time
frame so you are getting the most recent items.
Digital Dissertations & Theses: Use this when you start getting desperate.
This is a collection of dissertations and theses that you can do an advanced
search for your text and/or theme of choice within the abstracts.

In terms of finding books, GoogleBooks is good for finding ebooks and online
texts of works. Use this a search for the number of times a word or idea
shows up within the text. The World Catalogue is another good resource for
this.

If you are struggling to find sources, you may need to broaden your search.
Do this by doing a general search, limit by the period, and then use
categories to show anything that may pertain to your topic at all. Another

option is searching through the references for the articles you have to see
who they researched and cited.

CITATIONS

Each research paper should include some sort of reference page. There is a
distinction though: Bibliography is a reference page for useful sources that
pertain to your topic, though you may not have used all of them within your
text; Works Cited is a reference page limited to simply the sources you used
within the text. Again, for each assigned page of text, you should have an
equal number of sources.

WHAT NOT TO CITE:

Dont cite common knowledge. The boundary line: Did you know this prior to
this class or essay?
Dont cite your own language or ideas. Now, there is a boundary on this: you
cannot use your own words from another work or writing without citing it.
Within the educational form, you must use original work for each assignment.
This should bar you from using the same work twice, doing half the work of
all of your classmates. The only time there is an exception is if you have
previously discussed it with your professor and they specifically allow you to
use your own words twice.

WHAT TO CITE:

New information that you didnt know before. If you didnt know it before,
where did you learn it from?!?!?! This boundary can be very difficult to
determine because after reading through so many sources, and reading their
assumptions, it can be difficult to find original sources of the information and
not confuse it with your own knowledge. However, if you cannot divide this
information, this situation can teeter very close to plagiarism!!! BE CAREFUL!!

HOW TO CITE:

When quoting, summarizing, or paraphrasing, at some point you must include

the authors last name and page number. Whether this is in your authorial
introduction (which separates the end of your idea from the beginning of their
ideas) or at the end of their idea in parentheses, you must have this
information. If it is the first time you mention the author, use the authors
first, last name, and include some sort of credibility note. If there is no author
on the work, include the next piece of biographical information.

Here are some samples:

Smith ________________ (pg).

_________________ (Smith pg).

Smith __________________ (pg).

Smith ___________word? (pg).

Smith __________ (pg), but I say

_________.

If your source is quoting someone else, you have a few options. If you can
find the original work, your preference should be that. If you cant find the
original, then you can do it this way:

Lee says in Smith, _________ (Smith pg).

Lee says, ___________ (qted in Smith pg).

If you need to shorten your quote, you must notate that within the quotation.
Use ellipses [] when you are skipping multiple words within the quote. Use
a lacuna [.] when you are skipping multiple sentences between portions of
your selected quote. You must use [brackets] when you add the ellipses or
lacuna yourself to distinguish your style from the authors. If you are starting
or finishing the quote midway through a sentence, you can omit the ellipses
or lacuna.

WRITING AN ABSTRACT

Many research papers will require an abstract. There are two types of
abstracts: descriptive & conference. A descriptive abstract is written postessay as a summary of the work as a whole. A conference abstract is written
pre-essay completion as a proposal.

Abstracts, no matter their purpose, are approximately 200 words. Within the
abstract, you should situate your argument in the current research using one
or two sentences (potentially with quotes). Then, you should describe your
argument with about two pieces of evidence. Finally, use about one or two
sentences to discuss why your argument mattersyour so what?

In addition, a good abstract will contain a good title in a Catchy Phrase:

Clinical Description form. A good abstract contains a focus, thesis, and
concluding sentence that fit the criteria of good elements of literary analysis.
It will contain summaries of uncommonly read works, but will omit the
summary for well-read works. Whether it is descriptive or conference in
purpose, it will use verb tenses that suggest the paper is already written,
suggesting authorial confidence in the argument. The author is not afraid of
using personal pronouns, such as I, to develop and separate personal
argument from critical context arguments. They also write in the present
tense, as they would with the essay itself.

When writing an abstract, AVOID:

Summarizing
Using personal opinion rather than literary analysis
Losing critical context
Using too much evidence and thesis ideas.