Your paper should include the following:
Introduction: in which you state the focus and goals of your paper. For instance, your focus might be something like the representation of teacher/student relationships in Freedom Writers and Mean Girls or the portrayal of the role of parents in children’s opportunities and identities in Pariah and A Better Life. Whatever your focus, you should make your thesis clear in the introduction and provide a written ‘map’ for readers of what you plan to discuss in the paper. Use first person.
Discussion and Argument: The bulk of the paper should argue your thesis, drawing on specific examples and illustrations from the movie(s) to provide evidence for your arguments. You should also include a “so what” paragraph that explains why someone should care about your argument/claim/thesis.
Conclusion: Be sure to end your paper with a concluding paragraph that circles back to your thesis and provides the reader with a sense of future directions/questions that could be explored or that you will explore more in other papers/courses.
The purpose of this essay is to:
State a clear, solid thesis about the film or films
Support that thesis with thoughtfully chosen examples and discussion
Make your argument both logical and well-organized
Write clearly, employing careful revision and proofreading
Papers should be double-spaced, with one inch margins, and in a 12-point font such as Times New Roman or Garamond.
How to Approach this Paper: Tips and Guidelines
Your goal in this paper is to write an essay that argues a point you wish to make about one or more of the films. You need to formulate an argument (a.k.a. claim or thesis) and then support that thesis with evidence (examples and specific points that give us a reason to take your argument seriously).
Use course readings, if they are supportive of your argument and work to support your writing process; however, citing research is not required.
Finding Your Argument
Your analysis notes are full of potential thesis statements and arguments around which you might build this paper. My advice is to read through your notes and find a few of your questions and/or analytic points about which you feel particularly strongly or find especially intriguing. You can also revisit our “lenses for viewing” to find potential questions and elements that might be helpful to your analysis. Once you figure out what you want to explore in your argument, you willidentify 3 or 4 main points in support of your big claim and then determine which specific scenes or elements in the film will serve as your illustrations/evidence for the argument. Once you decide on your focus and formulate a thesis, ask yourself: What sort of main points do I need to make in order to support my overall argument? What scenes or details from the film seem particularly appropriate to use as examples?
Another important thing to remember is that you don’t want to summarize the plot of the film. This can happen if you follow the plot closely, from beginning to end, in your analysis. What happens then is that your ideas can get lost in the background. Instead, stress your interpretation of the film and organize your discussion in terms of that argument (and you have great ideas!). Organizing your paper by categories or themes related to your thesis will allow you to be more concise and to resist the temptation to simply provide a plot summary. Get right to your analysis and your interpretation of the film, referring to plot elements only to illustrate and/or situate your examples within the film. How does the film convey the ideas that are related to your critique or argument?
