CONTEXT FOR WRITING
For Essay 4 you will be asked to utilize these four sources in order to construct your own analytical argument about what “happiness” or “the good life” is and how it may be achieved.
In your essay include the following:
An introduction that sets up the major ideas of your topic by using a relevant personal experience presented in academic language
A discussion of how various other sources / authors have defined and/or imagined “happiness” or “the good life”(either explicitly or implicitly or both) and discussed how it may be achieved.
An analytical discussion of what is persuasive and/or problematic/weak about these sources’ presentation of “happiness” or “the good life” and how it may be achieved.
A developed presentation of your own argument about what “happiness” or “the good life” and how it may be achieved.
A conclusion that returns to the personal experience discussed in the introduction to usefully connect the main ideas presented in your essay as whole.
An MLA-format Works Cited page
In your essay, when you use sources:
clearly and thoroughly identify sources when you introduce them
include quotations to support your thesis and main ideas and quote properly and efficiently
use summary where you think it would be helpful and appropriate
establish clear links between the evidence and the claims by showing the reader how and why the textual data you provide supports your claims
rely on MLA format appropriately and provide a Works Cited page with your final draft
Successful essays will appropriately use all of the major elements of paper writing we have been working on throughout this semester. Actively read the texts. Provide an arguable, specific, and complex thesis. Then, develop your thesis in well-constructed paragraphs with analytical topic sentences that control the supporting details of each paragraph. Provide concrete details, textual evidence, and sufficient explanation throughout your body paragraphs. Your body paragraphs should be unified and developed. Moreover, you should use effective transitions to help “guide” the reader through the paper and create effective coherence.
