ENGL 150: Writing and Research
Guidelines for the two short essay assignments
Your essays should be 750-1000 words in length--about three to four pages, 12 pt. Times Roman font, one-inch margins. Choose one of the citation formats in Hacker to cite your research (MLA, APA, Chicago). Do not use colored ink, unconventional fonts, or images.
See the Calendar for due dates. Please consult Strunk and White and Hacker for questions about grammar, usage, and style. Other writing aids are available here.
Essay 1: Definition
See Great Writing, chapter 8, for guidance on this topic.
Write a short essay in which you define love, or use a definition of love as a point-of-departure for praising or criticizing love. Feel free to draw on, and respond to the speeches and comments on love in Plato's Symposium. It would be a good idea to draw on some of the techniques you learned in the short writing assignments as you develop your paper.
Essay 2: Argument
See Great Writing, chapter 9, for guidance on this topic.
Write a short essay in which you argue one of the following positions:
(1) Longwood University is a great place to get a college education because . . . . [your thesis goes here].
(2) Longwood University is a poor place to get a college education because . . . . [your thesis goes here].
Make sure you use clear, specific, and detailed examples to support your claims. Make sure your argument is logical.