Explaining a Concept

Requirements:

Length: at least 1000 words (probably 3 to 4 pages with double-spaced lines and paragraphs; up to 1300 words is acceptable, but closer to 1000 is ideal) excluding the header, the heading, and the works-cited page

Formatting Style: MLA, which includes the general format as well as in-text citation and a works-cited page

Source Use: at least 3 secondary sources, including at least 2 that are college-level, as defined later in this document (a good goal, not a requirement, is to use at least 1 that’s scholarly)

Purpose:

This assignment gives you practice with something we have to do throughout our lives—not just in school and at work but for our hobbies and in our relationships—namely learning about concepts and then passing along our knowledge in an engaging way.

Concepts may be conditions (such as shyness), theories (such as postcolonial literary criticism), principles (such as antiracism), processes (such as the Socratic method), recently coined terms (such as safetyism), jargon/specialized language (such as negative split), behaviors (such as multitasking), practices (such as social distancing), or other things. A concept can be expressed as a single word (such “scapegoat”) or phrase (such as “admissibility of evidence”) that many people can’t easily define without some help.

Just finding and repeating definitions doesn’t necessarily hold your attention, let alone your readers’, and doesn’t give anyone a thorough understanding of your concept. So, for this paper, you instead focus on a significant, intriguing, perhaps lesser-known or unmapped aspect of your concept. For example, if your concept were social distancing, you could focus on a new, inventive method of social distancing, such as virtual racing. Or you could focus on a potential unintended negative consequence of social distancing, such as the stalled socialization of toddlers.

Whatever you decide to do, you incorporate plenty of information from relevant, reliable secondary sources. For example, if you wrote about socializing kids, one of your sources could be an article in Psychology Today written by a woman who is a mother, an author of books about children, and a professor of child psychology. You likely wouldn’t refer to a rant from a non-expert’s blog or YouTube channel. If your concept is controversial, you summarize, paraphrase, or quote what various experts with different opinions have said. Focused on free-range parenting, for instance, you could relay the ideas of both proponents and critics of that parenting style.

Throughout your essay, especially in the introduction and the conclusion, you show how your concept could matter to humanity at large and particular communities to which you and your readers belong or perhaps will eventually. For example, you could explain why virtual racing could matter to the running community during the covid-19 pandemic: it gives runners a reason to keep training, it helps them stay sane and fit, and it prepares them for when regular races return. You could also explain why virtual racing could matter to non-runners: it suggests that, with a little inventiveness, people can often still do what they love while social distancing, and it reminds everyone that an active lifestyle is important and possible in most circumstances.

To explain your concept, you employ various strategies, such as providing examples and making comparisons. For example, if you focused on shyness, you could compare it with introversion. You could compare a definition of the former with a definition of the latter. You could give examples of behaviors that fit into one or both of the two categories. You not only inform but also entertain your audience by using a bit of narrative and perhaps humor or stylistic flair. “The Myth of Multitasking” is a title with stylistic flair. It has a nice ring to it because of the alliteration (two M-words). In that article, the author, Christine Rosen, shares the humorous finding that a person’s IQ drops more while multitasking than it would after smoking strong marijuana. Rosen could have also included an entertaining anecdote about a time when she tried multitasking and ended up doing something horribly.

Most writing, even an expository essay for a college course, need be neither boring nor uncreative and rarely falls into just one category. Most writing employs multiple modes of communication, and one of them is often well-researched explanation. Maintaining the right ratio of one mode to another is a big part of writing with a purpose. The task is akin to baking with a good combination of ingredients. You can cook according to tried and true principles without being a slave to a recipe.

You are free to use secondary modes in this paper, but whatever they are, explanation should remain primary. Assignments in this class are supposed to build on each other, and you must understand and be able to explain topics before you can more fully analyze, compare, evaluate, and make arguments about them, as you must do in your next three papers. Like every other assignment in this class, this one is an opportunity for you to grow as a student, reader, writer, and individual.

Directions:

To learn about this type of writing and generate content for your paper, do all of the readings and assignments. Participate in our discussions and other activities. When you’re ready, follow this prompt from our textbook: “Explain an important and interesting concept, one you already know well or are just learning about. Consider what your readers are likely to know and think about the concept, what they are likely to find interesting about the topic, what you might want them to learn about it, and whether you can research it sufficiently in the time you have” (Axelrod 134). Your paper should have the features described in chapter 4 of our textbook: “A FOCUSED EXPLANATION,” “A CLEAR, LOGICAL ORGANIZATION,” “APPROPRIATE EXPLANATORY STRATEGIES,” and “SMOOTH INTEGRATION OF SOURCES” (109-11).

E1 Hints and Tips:

· Model your paper after the exemplary concept explanations that are required reading for this class, as well as any others that I share with you during class. Just avoid emulating them to the point of plagiarism. Also, realize that some of the examples aren’t college essays, so they follow slightly different conventions in terms of tone, paragraph length, and citation—all of which we’ll discuss during class.

· Maybe you’ve had to write something like this essay for a different class. You can’t use prior writing as the basis for this essay without my permission. I may give you permission, but you’ll have to rewrite the paper from start to finish. Don’t miss out on a chance to grow by writing something new.

· Start your paper with an introductory paragraph. It should begin with an attention-grabbing hook, a creative way to identify your concept and the aspect of it that you’ll explain. “Love: The Right Chemistry” by Anastasia Toufexis begins with a clever metaphor as the hook; it poses the question of what people with Ph.D.s see when they look at love, and then it says, “Let’s put love under a microscope.” That hook tells readers that the concept is love and that the aspect of it to be explained is its function according to science and highly educated experts.

· At the end of your introduction, state your thesis, which is your paper’s main definition of or idea about your concept. Toufexis’s thesis says that, according to experts, love “rests firmly on the foundations of evolution, biology, and chemistry”; it’s “part of nature’s master strategy—a vital force that has helped humans survive, thrive and multiply.”

· After your introduction, include paragraphs that support your thesis by providing relevant facts, information, and ideas. Often, you need to summarize, paraphrase, or quote your secondary sources. Each paragraph should include a topic sentence that identifies your new focus, which clearly ties back to your thesis. Typically, this sentence starts the paragraph and not only identifies the topic but states an idea about it. One of Toufexis’s paragraphs begins, “Romance served the evolutionary purpose of pulling males and females into long-term partnership, which was essential to child rearing.” It doesn’t just identify the new topic (the evolutionary purpose of romance); it states an idea (that the twofold purpose was couple formation and child-rearing).

· Finish your paper with a conclusion. It should rephrase your thesis, leaving readers with your main idea but not simply repeating it in a monotonous way. Your last paragraph should also be creative, just like your first. One approach is to echo your hook from paragraph one. Toufexis does so when her last paragraph says, “To most people—with or without Ph.D.s—love will always…” Your conclusion should also highlight the broader significance of this discussion, what it reflects about something larger than the concept itself. Toufexis concludes that despite the science of love, many humans want love to remain inexplicable, at least in part. The broader significance of this concept explanation, then, is how it reflects humanity’s conflicting impulses, especially when it comes to what we cherish: we want to learn all about it, yet we like when it’s shrouded in mystery.

· Be careful not to slip into argument mode. The goal is to explain your concept—not to take a position on an issue related to your concept, not to propose a solution to a problem related to your concept. That said, summarizing others’ positions and solutions may help you provide context or highlight what makes your concept significant and intriguing. You just want to stay objective by not revealing if you agree or disagree with the positions and solutions.

· Remember to include some narrative as a way of explaining your concept in an engaging way. You can tell an anecdote about an experience of yours that relates to your concept, or you can include someone else’s story, which comes from your source material. Your narrative can use description, sensory details, dialogue, and figurative language. Whatever form your narrative takes, make sure it’s not too long. You’re not writing a short story or play or novel. You’re using an anecdote to illustrate your concept. So limit the narrative to several sentences, two short paragraphs, or one substantial paragraph.

· At the bottom of this document, you see the rubric I use to grade your essay. Use it as a to-do list while you write and rewrite your essay. Consider using it to evaluate your writing one last time before you submit the final draft on Blackboard.

General Hints and Tips:

Minimum Requirements to Earn a 70% or Higher:

Meeting these requirements doesn’t guarantee a passing grade, but you can’t earn a passing grade without meeting them. Your paper must:

1. be at least 750 words to earn a C (1000 to earn an A or B), not including the header, the heading, and the works-cited page

2. incorporate information from at least 1 secondary source

3. include in-text citation and a works-cited page

4. obviously be your attempt at writing a concept explanation

Definition of College-level Sources:

College-level sources include not only scholarly and peer-reviewed journal articles and university-press books but also well-respected news magazines and newspapers, books, and websites. College-level sources should be reliable; in other words, they should be research-based writing from credentialed, unbiased authors. Tertiary sources, such as dictionaries and encyclopedias, including Wikipedia, are acceptable only for background information and aren’t counted as college-level sources.

E1 Grading Rubric

How well did you do the following (R1-10)?

R1: Write a paper about one concept (condition, theory, principle, process, bit of jargon/specialized language, behavior, practice, or something else expressed as a word or phrase that many people can’t easily define without some help)

-0 (A-level)

-1.5 (B-level)

-2.5 (C-level)

-3.5 (D-level)

-4.5 (F-level)

R2: Focus on a significant, intriguing, perhaps lesser-known or unmapped aspect of the concept

-0 (A-level)

-1.5 (B-level)

-2.5 (C-level)

-3.5 (D-level)

-4.5 (F-level)

R3: Write at least 1000 words (around 3 to 4 pages with double-spaced lines and paragraphs; up to 1300 words is acceptable, but closer to 1000 is ideal) excluding the header, the heading, and the works-cited page

-0 (A-level)

-1.5 (B-level)

-2.5 (C-level)

-3.5 (D-level)

-4.5 (F-level)

R4: Write an introduction, a first paragraph that begins with a hook, connects that hook to your topic, and then states your thesis (your paper’s main idea)

-0 (A-level)

-1.5 (B-level)

-2.5 (C-level)

-3.5 (D-level)

-4.5 (F-level)

R5: Write a conclusion, a final paragraph that rephrases your thesis, comments on the broader significance of this discussion, and does all of this in a creative way (perhaps referring back to your hook and/or using figurative language)

-0 (A-level)

-1.5 (B-level)

-2.5 (C-level)

-3.5 (D-level)

-4.5 (F-level)

R6: Make sure your paper has an appropriate ratio of explanation to persuasion so that it remains a concept explanation and doesn’t feel too much like a position or proposal essay

-0 (A-level)

-1.5 (B-level)

-2.5 (C-level)

-3.5 (D-level)

-4.5 (F-level)

R7: Explain the concept using a variety of strategies (examples, comparisons, anecdotes, visuals, statistics, headings, etc.), including a reasonable amount of narrative (at least several sentences, up to two paragraphs)

-0 (A-level)

-1.5 (B-level)

-2.5 (C-level)

-3.5 (D-level)

-4.5 (F-level)

R8: Incorporate information from at least 3 secondary sources, including at least 2 that are college-level

-0 (A-level)

-1.5 (B-level)

-2.5 (C-level)

-3.5 (D-level)

-4.5 (F-level)

R9: Follow the rules of MLA format and citation (8th edition)