HOW TO WRITE YOUR ANALYTICAL ESSAYS: THE GUIDELINES READ ME! Reading this document fully and carefully will save you a great deal of stress and will help you write a better essay. Follow these guidelines carefully for all analytical essays for this course. Essays must be submitted through Blackboard. Be sure to follow proper naming protocol and submit as a pdf. file

The bottom line: You will be marked down if you fail to follow the proper format. Refer to the rubric for Analytical History Papers for more information concerning expectations. There are many useful online sites that will provide information on how to cite properly using the Chicago Style (often referred to as "Turabian"). The Consortium Library has online resources for proper citation methods. I have placed some resources on how to write essays under Materials. I recommend these selections to help organize your thoughts. I also highly recommend creating an outline for your essay (and make it as detailed as possible). It is important that you have control of your essay and that your essay does not break free of your control. An outline "tames" an essay and helps to keep the writer focused and on-track. It is one of the writer's most invaluable tools. Trust me on this.

There are three analytical essays throughout the semester. The first one is worth 15% of your total grade. This assignment is an analysis of assigned selections from Lualdi's Sources of The Making of the West: Peoples and Cultures.

?The essay is to be five pages, typed and double-spaced. Margins should be set at around one inch for all sides. There should be 23-25 lines of text per page. Use a 10 to 12 point font and a standard, simple, nonscript typeface. Do not use headers. Make sure that the pages are numbered and give your paper a title. Put your name on your paper. The title page does not count as page one and should not be numbered.

?A well-crafted essay starts with a strong thesis paragraph that clearly states an argument. Your essay needs to begin with a well-constructed thesis paragraph that clearly states what your essay is about, why it is important, and how you will demonstrate its importance. In your opening thesis paragraph provide what your main themes will be and briefly defend them. The "Rule of Three" is typically used to organize an analytical essay. Use three main themes to develop your essay and establish these three themes and their significance in your thesis paragraph. The body of your essay will develop these themes.

Paragraphs need to be well developed (that means no one sentence paragraphs!) and need to clearly express a theme. After introducing the theme in each paragraph, develop the idea fully, explain its significance, and provide supporting evidence. Another key is to have strong topical sentences for each paragraph. Make sure that you end your paper with a concluding paragraph.

? Words are important. Precise, active and vivid language provides clarity of ideas.Proper word choice helps the writer to communicate his or her intentions and meanings. Avoid weak or vague words (like "thing" or "felt"). Strong writing is clear writing. A passive sentence lacks the confidence of an active sentence. Your paper should convey the confidence of your ideas.

?Use the Chicago Style format of citation. Footnotes or endnotes are required. If you are using someone else's words or ideas you must indicate this by using proper citation methods. When citing words directly (word for word), it is necessary to use quotation marks. Paraphrasing or indirect quotations (when a passage from another source has been used with only a few words changed) also requires footnoting/endnoting. It also is necessary to footnote/endnote if you have stated someone else's interpretations or ideas. Each paragraph should have, on the average, at least one footnote/endnote and you will probably have more than one. You are striving to balance concrete, supporting examples with your own insightful interpretation.

Your own ideas need to come through in this essay (so you do not want to have every sentence coming from another source), but you need to have your ideas adequately supported. PLAGIARISM WILL NOT BE TOLERATED. Refer to the readings on plagiarism.

? PROOFREAD your work carefully and then read it again. Use a variety of selections from the readings to support your views and use primary sources to support and illustrate your themes and argument. Your paper is an analysis of this material and not merely a description of the accounts; do not "retell" what happened-analyze its significance. Develop your ideas in grammatically correct, concise writing. Do not use lengthy quotations (keep quotes to under three lines), do not use contractions, and italicize book titles. Its is a pronoun--there is no apostrophe. Proper nouns need an apostrophe when indicating possessive. Sloppy grammar and spelling detracts from the ideas of your paper. First Analytical Essay: The intent of this essay is for you to develop a sustained historical analysis based on the documents from chapters 14-18 in Lualdi's Sources of the Making of the West.

When using these documents or primary sources from Lualdi, be explicit about historical context and authorship (who is writing what and when) and consider the motivations and intentions of the authors of the sources used (why are they writing these sources?). Address the issue of change and continuity through time and, with this issue in mind, be sure to use a wide range of sources from throughout these chapters. Use the textbook for historical context where necessary, but remember that the objective of this essay is the analysis of these primary sources. Avoid over-referencing Lualdi's introductions to the sources-this essay is your analysis of the sources

Choose one of the topics listed below. Use this topic to analyze and interpret the transformation of European society from 1560-1776. You must use at least 4 different selections from a variety of chapters.

1. European society was in a state of upheaval and searching for order after coming out of the Age of Religious Wars. Based on Lualdi's sources, what were three ways states and societies attempted to create order in this disorderly time? How successful were these efforts and what were their limitations? Consider political, cultural, intellectual, scientific, and social ordering of society.

2. European society was in a state of expansion at this time. Based on Lualdi's sources what were three ways states and societies were expanding at this time? How successful were these efforts and what were their limitations? Consider the various means and motivations of expansion in terms of political, economic, cultural, intellectual, and scientific endeavors.

3. Choose three central Enlightenment ideas and discuss how these ideas and their applications reflect the making of a modern society. What happened to these Enlightenment ideas when put into practice?