This is what the paper is about:
One might make the argument that the most key passage in Locke is section 50, near the end of Chapter V, in which he concludes his discussion of gold
(money) and the obtainment of a “disproportionate and unequal possession of the earth.” Read this passage very carefully. Do you agree that “men have agreed to a disproportionate and unequal possession of the earth” through “tacit and voluntary consent”? Or was this imposed upon most men by the strongest among them? Can “a man fairly possess more land” than he can use “without injury to anyone”? Does money (i.e. gold and silver) represent real wealth in goods and services? What is, or should be, the role of government in securing the right to and protection of “disproportionate” wealth? To what extent is this, indeed, the key or core of Locke’s Second Treatise? This option invites, perhaps, critique of Locke or discussion of wider political-philosophical issues raised by or in the Second Treatise. (Remember: just don’t answer the previous questions … use them to brainstorm, not to organize your essay!!! And, if you entertain “wider political-philosophical issues” don’t lose sight that your primary goal is to demonstrate that you understand Locke’s text!)
This is how the professor wants it:
TITLE: Your title is the first chance to make an impression. A vague title (e.g., “John Locke’s Ideas” or “Locke’s Second Treatise”) that could fit any other paper written on the same author or text gives a vague impression, indicating that the essay to follow likely lacks a focused main point.
AUDIENCE: Assume an audience much like your fellow students–familiar with the work, but unfamiliar with your particular approach, and therefore requiring specific examples (textual evidence, i.e., quotes) to understand, appreciate, and accept your analysis and argument. Avoid plot summary or tedious repetition of an author’s points without higher level analysis, however. It is very easy, especially with the Equiano topic, to end up just summarizing his life rather than analyzing the way he presents himself and the context within which he presents himself.
IDEAS: Good ideas come not from your abstract memory of a text, but from your close reading and paying attention to details that might radiate out into larger patterns of meaning. I do not expect you to come up with something “new” from my perspective, but something “new” from your perspective. If you don’t make a discovery in the process of drafting the paper, it probably will not be very satisfactory.
THESIS/DEVELOPMENT: Good essays unfold a major, focused idea or argument (your thesis) stage-by-stage, in a manner that will be compelling and convincing to the reader. This means that the old, boring high-school strategy of breaking down your basic idea into three (more or less disconnected) sub-points may not be the most suitable arrangement. Instead, for example, an essay (depending upon the thesis, of course) could in the first fourth highlight some intriguing contradiction or tension in a text (note that in the topic options # 1, #2, and #3 above I’m directing you to investigate complexity, perhaps even inconsistency, in Locke or Equiano); the next fourth might frame the tension in terms of a larger moral, literary, philosophical, religious, or historical debate or issue; and the last two fourths would illustrate the ramifications of the tension for the text you’re exploring (tensions resolved? and if so, by what means? tensions not resolved? and if so, how does the author/narrator cope with irresolution?). An essay can be thoughtful and well-organized, and yet still be confusing to the reader. Most often this occurs because the essay writer needs to provide clearer sign-posts to the overall argument. At crucial junctures (the topic sentence for a paragraph introducing a new stage of your argument), try to foreground analytical points rather than just something about character or the plot or the page-by-page sequence of a text’s ideas.
There are two basic patterns of development:
Deductive: here, you state the thesis of your argument (your main point) directly up front (i.e., by the end of your introduction) and proceed to provide evidence for your main point. For example: you could make your main point “Equiano’s obsession with status is not defensible” or “Equiano’s obsession with status is justified.” And then the subsequent paragraphs would present aspects of your position and your evidence for those aspects.
Dialectical/inductive: here you proceed to make successive more complex discoveries through a thesis–antithesis–synthesis pattern. For example: the first third of your paper would explore how “Equiano is obsessed with status”; the second third would explore “how Equiano is in fact filling in a void with status seeking”; and the last third would pull the two ideas together through a more complex observation, that “Equiano fills in his grief of being exiled from his native country by seeking to emulate the status values of European culture” (note how what seems to be a negative point about Equiano–that he is a sell out by seeking status–ends up to be a more complex positive point). Rhetorically, in your introduction you would still need to state your overall point as (for example) “Equiano fills in his grief…” or you might want, without being vague, to state the thesis as a problem that your paper in effect solves, but without giving the solution immediately: “Clearly, Equiano’s eagerness to obtain status makes his character a vexing one if we assume he should remain consistently loyal to his native country or identity.”
Here is another example from Locke. Say you had to write a paper on Locke’s chapter on property/money, but were given broad latitude by your professor. Your ultimate thesis might be something like “Locke advocates equality politically, but in the process allows for inequality in wealth acquisition”. Notice how the argument/stages of argument below get unfolded:
1–Locke begins with anti-hierarchy and a labor theory of value; nobody subordinated/everybody has an equal chance to obtain property.
2–But problem of irrational punishment etc. and spoiling/hoarding: so consent to gov’t and money.
3–1 and 2 come together in your entrepreneurial freedom for a contract b/w employee/employer, based not on labor value but on “market” value (Locke implies, but does not directly make these points).
4–No longer a “fair” correspondence between labor and the fruits of one’s labor results.
INTRODUCTIONS: Keep us focused on the text or author or main idea. Do not start off with weighty generalities about morality, the human condition, and so on. Avoid the “funnel” opening paragraph if possible. If your introduction is more than a single paragraph (it might be two paragraphs if, for instance, you were setting up an author in terms of especially pertinent historical or cultural background), give an extra line space between the introduction and paper proper.
QUOTES: Depositing too many long quotes in a paper wastes space. Too few or no quotes, however, suggest inattention to the text or texts. You should probably have one or two longer, inset quotes, which you set up and analyze; the purpose here is to indicate that there are especially key or symptomatic passages that warrant lingering over because they are so revelatory. Quotes, besides helping to anchor/prove your points, often lead to analytical discoveries as you ponder/unpack them.
Grading scale (Turnitin will indicate your numeric—100-0—grade score; the grading scale is the traditional equivalents: A- = 90+; B- = 80+; and so on):
A = Focused, interesting main idea suggesting that you read, re-read, and probed around the text at hand. Prose is not merely correct: it is compelling and sophisticated. Organization makes sense given the topic and argument of the paper. The paper is of sufficient quality that it could be put online as a sample paper.
B = Main idea and development are clear, but the organization is weak in a section or two, or there are a few sentence or punctuation glitches that suggest careless editing.
C= Paper has a main idea, but not thought through by attending to the text or author actively. Organization falls apart at key moments. Sentence construction, although usually correct, is often imprecise or wordy. Nearly every page shows signs of careless editing.
D = The thesis is vague, and the organization is very chaotic. The paper indicates little insight about or basic understanding of the author/text. Or the prose/grammar suggests the need to go to the Writing Center.
F = The paper was not turned in. Such will receive (on a 0-100 scale) a “0”.
