Government is instituted for the common good; for the protection, safety, prosperity, and happiness of the people; and not for profit, honor, or private interest of any one man, family, or class of men; therefore, the people alone have an incontestable, unalienable, and indefeasible right to institute government; and to reform, alter, or totally change the same, when their protection, safety, prosperity, and happiness require it.
– John Adams, Thoughts on Government, 1776
I object to violence because when it appears to do good, the good is only temporary; the evil it does is permanent.
– Mohandas K. Gandhi
Fighting this boss will take more than merely exploring the level. You will need to propose (or oppose) a change and convince your audience that its the best course of action. Fight the power.
For this essay, your audience is entirely local. They want to know how any issue affects them and their lives. To convince, them, you will have to make that connection.
Stake a claim of change that relates the local with the national or global. Answer the questions: What can we do in our local community (or local organization, like a business or college) to deal with larger-scale changes? Make it practical, utilitarian, and specific. What actually works?
Use credible facts, deliver details, and write in interesting and creative ways support your claim.
Consider the positions of those who disagree with you and address their concerns.
For the time being, this is still a democracy. This means you not only should not, but also cannot stand idly by and let others set the tone for you. Its time to stand up.
Establishing Your Territory or Protect the Towers
Start with what you know and work out from there. Its easy to grab the latest headline, do a few web searches, slap that down and call it an essay a boring essay. Instead, get real and get local. If you cant make it concrete and practical, choose a different topic.
First, let your ideas flow. Dont worry about self-criticism until after you have lots of ideas and, perhaps, until you have a rough draft.
Look for the unexpected. If you have a perspective on an issue that has been talked to death, you will struggle to grab your audience. Avoid the false assumption that the stand you take must be either-or. Look for issues with a lot of complexity and be willing to take a complex stand. Often, life is not one-sided or even two-sided, but multi-sided.
If you have a good idea, write about it using your own experience before you research. Start with how the topic affects you, those close to you, and others like you. Then build until you need outside sources. This is a good method for developing your idea, but dont feel that youre restricted by this order. Sometimes you need to research your idea for a while, even if that means simply asking people who are involved in your issue what they think.
Heres a sampling of national and international issues that we could link to our daily lives: Balance of powers in our democracy, state vs. federal control, access to health care, competence & experience in government, rising college tuition, sea level rise, income inequality, energy conservation/cost/use, levels of violence in comparison with other industrialized countries, free & open internet, government and/or corporate intrusion into our personal lives, religious freedom issues, national & local incarceration rates, rising food costs, local k-12 success vs. other modern countries.
Im sure that you can think of even more, but remember that you must make it clear how the issues that plague the U.S. and/or the world affect local peoples lives.
Battle Strategy Assignment 3 = 100 Gold
MUST BE TYPED – THIS IS A SEPARATE ASSIGNMENT THAN THE ESSAY ITSELF
Read the entire Boss 3 assignment sheet before working on Strategy 3. After writing your name, the title of the essay, and the section number of your class, you will need to do ONLY the following:
Claim: Read about what makes a good claim on pages 356-57. Write your claim. Then answer the following about the claim. All answers should be Yes. If they arent, adjust your claim:
Is it debatable (Y/N)? If almost no one would disagree with you, dont use it. (i.e. claims like, littering is bad is too obvious. What should we do about it?)
Does it matter (Y/N)? Claims like, Coke is better than Sprite are personal preferences.
Does it focus on systems (Y/N)? Avoid appealing to the general public to change individually. Claims like, you should eat better end up being life advice instead of arguing a point.
Does it either propose a solution or oppose a proposal (Y/N)? Too often, claims that simply identify problems end up being mostly informational. Make sure that you are arguing.
Is it either local or connected locally (Y/N)? If its a national issue, plan to use examples from the local area when designing your essay.
Sources: Cite three correctly documented potential essay sources on a works cited page in MLA format. One of your sources must express a viewpoint that differs from your own.
Audience: Write a one-to-three sentence statement that describes a specific primary Be as specific as possible, using traits and demographic categories when you can. Your audience must be adults.
Ordering and Outline or Values First
Research has proven that you cant convince anyone with the facts until after you convince them that you value the same things they do. Might I suggest starting with the core value that drives your claim? Use the whole toolbox of appeals: logos, ethos, and pathos. You could approach this paper with a combination of emotion and facts. You might bowl the audience over with your knowledge of the subject. Use data, but also personal stories to humanize the numbers. Do you want to use your most important information right away, or save your most convincing emotional story or hard-hitting statistic for the kicker at the end? The choice is yours.
At some point, however, you must explain an opposing viewpoint and refute it by addressing those concerns. To do so, youll need one source that disagrees with your proposal.
Research & Audience or Diablo is in the details
Research is good before, after, and during your development. If the audience doubts your information, or sources, your entire essay is thrown into question. You can use sources to back up your ideas, as an extension of your ideas, as a springboard, or as something to push against. You might be tempted to use easy-to-get sources that dont take the larger view. Know the difference between fact and opinion, where possible, and find statistics from in-depth analysis. Sources that have several different perspectives on the same issue help.
Now that youve read the above paragraphs, read pages 398-401 and pages 511-518 in your book. Go. Do it. Right now. Are you done? Good.
You are likely to choose a local primary audience. You do not have to consider everyone who might like your essay. One strategy is to look at magazines, newspapers, blogs, and other publications. Who do they cater to?
Determine some audience identifiers and how much they agree or disagree with your stand. If your audience already likes your ideas, likely you intend to reinforce their perspective and rally them from I agree with you to lets take action! For those on the fence, pull them over to your side. You might inspire them to action, but thats harder than getting them to be concerned about the issue as you see it. Convince and coax, but look at all sides. If your audience disagrees with you, they are probably not going to change easily. Put yourself in their shoes and use values to bridge to your ideas. Mention your own path of exploration into the issue. Humanize the group they disagree with and get your hostile audience to concede some issues.
Anticipate counter-arguments. Find out the arguments against your perspective; then refute those arguments. You might have more than one, different perspective that agrees or disagrees with you. Despite what much of our media conveys, there are often many sides to an issue.
First Full Draft and Guidelines or It all comes down to this.
Amazing. Every word of what you just said was wrong. Luke Skywalker, The Last Jedi
Following Directions & Assignment Fit:
Propose an identifiable local change and back up that stand with evidence.
Include at least three (3) sources correctly cited using MLA guidelines.
Have at least four (4), but no more than six (6) double-spaced, typed pages using Times or Times New Roman 12-point font and one inch margins. This page requirement is in addition to the required header information and the works cited page. (See Field Guide pg. 588 for a header example.)
You MUST submit your essay to Canvas//TurnItIn.
Have all items on the attached checklist completed. Check each item off on the actual checklist page as you verify it.
Complexity & Credibility:
Write about a subject that matters to the reader, and help them understand why it matters. Use your sources as support, but your ideas drive the essay.
Your tone must match the audience, including reaching out to convince them to move closer to your position. You also must show that you can consider counter-arguments and address those issues. Avoid leaving holes in your argument.
Have a mix of long and short sentences. (Solving grammar errors by making short, choppy sentences will not help you.)
Structure & Flow:
Have a logical structure. Your information can be ordered in many ways, but the structure has to make sense.
Your secondary sources must blend into your essay in the appropriate places and ways (i.e. correctly cited and supporting the text/ideas of the point youre making).
Have paragraphs that hold together as paragraphs, with topic sentences and paragraph breaks when the topic changes.
Correctness:
If you use dialog, break the paragraphs correctly when a new person speaks and use punctuation correctly.
Have no more than an average of three grammar errors or citation errors per page.
– – –
All, too, will bear in mind this sacred principle, that though the will of the majority is in all cases to prevail, that will to be rightful must be reasonable; that the minority possess their equal rights, which equal law must protect, and to violate would be oppression.
– Thomas Jefferson
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Accessing the Boss 3 Fight: Accomplishments Checklist
Name: __________________________________
In order to even unlock battle the boss, you need to have certain accomplishments under your belt. This means you must complete all of the items on the checklist below. Check off each item to verify that you have them in the paper, and turn this sheet in with your essay the first time I see it.
IF YOU DO NOT COMPLETE THESE ITEMS, AND DO IT COMPLETELY, I WILL NOT READ AND GRADE YOUR ESSAY!
MLA Header Information on first page
MLA Header information:
Example:
<Your Name>
Professor Springer-Woods
ENG111<term initial><year> <Section Code>
Boss 3 Essay <Date>
General Leia Organa
Professor Springer-Woods
ENG111 F19 N##B
Boss 3 Essay 27 Dec. 2016.
A title, centered, at the beginning of the essay
Double-spaced
12-point Times New Roman font
1 margin on all sides
Secondary sources cited in MLA format, including:
A Works Cited page titled Works Cited at the end of your essay
A Works Cited entry on that page for every secondary source you actually used in your essay
Every smaller piece title (like articles, pages inside a website, etc.) is in quotation marks
Every bigger piece title (like books, entire website titles, magazines, etc.) is in italics
An in-text citation inside the essay in every place that you used a source that includes the first thing in the works cited entry (usually, but not always, the authors last name)
Also submitted to Canvas for the TurnItIn check
Dang it, Final Fantasy! Now I have to find the mystic key.
