<p>When I write papers, the intro is always the longest and well thought-out, and the subsequent paragraphs get shorter regressively?</p>
<p>Anyone else? Anyone have a solution to this problem?</p>
<p>I would love to see one of your essays Jeffery :). Could you post a sample essay that you have written?</p>
<p>LOL. Perhaps if I finish mine… :-). You’re probably a much better writer than I am. I absolutely abhor English right now. I’m getting a solid B. Gah… I hate the subjective nature in English.</p>
<p>I used to do that with my debate cases. I would write a huge opening statement and not have much room for my contentions (essentially paragraphs in an English essay). It looks as if you’re doing the most of your thinking early on and just getting your ideas out there. If I were you, though, I’d transplant those ideas to your body paragraphs. I think a succinct opener is the way to go. It should simply introduce your topic and explain what you’ll be covering. It shouldn’t go in-depth like the body paragraphs are supposed to.</p>
<p>However, if you’re writing an unconventional essay (like a college essay or creative writing piece), then it really doesn’t matter how long each paragraph is. My advice pertains only to standard analytical/persuasive essays in high school English classes.</p>
<p>Yea, I see what you mean. When you have a long intro and it turned out to have shorter body paragraph. Now it is the opposite.</p>
<p>I absolutely love digressing from the given topic. It seems that the intro and conclusion paragraphs are the only places where I can actually go off tangent and get away with it by calling them “insights.”</p>
<p>Digressing off topic is frowned upon, especially if you can’t make any relevant connections. Try limiting yourself to 6-8 sentences in the intro. One topic sentence to grab the readers attention, 5-6 sentences that provide essential background information, and, of course, a thesis.</p>
<p>I never know what I’m going to write about, so I usually write two/three disjointed paragraphs, find a common thread and exploit this as the underlying theme of the commentary/essay/paper. Maybe attempt the intro at the end?</p>
<p>In addition to what The Kongo said (although 5-6 sentences for background information might be too much…), you’ll want to address how you’re going to prove your thesis at the end. I usually say something like “I will first conduct a close analysis of [A], followed by a consideration of **, concluded by an explanation of the relation between them.” Obviously it doesn’t have to be one sentence, but you get the gist.</p>
<p>^ I’d actually shy away from using personal pronouns like “I.”</p>
<p>I agree. In fact, unless you’re talking about an investigative type of paper, I wouldn’t say how I’m about to answer the thesis at all.</p>
<p>@Jeffery, does you teacher care more about the format of your essay, or does he/she care more about what the actual essay says? My teacher marks grades down a considerable amount if we do not have the correct format (in my case MLA). Maybe this is the case with your teacher?</p>
<p>I don’t think that’s a problem, unless the body paragraphs fail to flesh out your argument.</p>
<p>Guys, listen. Your high school teachers lied to you…Academic writing uses “I” all the time–it only makes sense, since you’re just expressing your opinion and what you think legitimizes that opinion. No, don’t go sprinkling I into every sentence, but using it in the right contexts really frees up your writing and gives it a more commanding tone.</p>
<p>^ It’s a given that an essay is expressing one’s opinion, which is why “I” is unnecessary. Furthermore, I’d argue that using “in my opinion,” “I believe,” and the like actually weaken one’s position and certainly don’t make one’s writing more “commanding.” Also, I’m not quite sure why one of your college professor’s opinions or something gives you the impression that you can be condescending and refer to our views as lies.</p>
<p>francaisalamatt, listen. Your college teachers lied to you … when you do real academic writing (that is, publish scientific papers) there is no I feel or any of that subjective nonsense. No, when you publish scientific papers you have coauthors, so the pronoun is “We”. But it is not the “we’s” that make the the paper commanding - it is the data and sound analysis and interpretation that do.</p>
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<p>Just saw these. You guys are mistaken. This is totally dependent on the field of the writing, the tone, and the subject. </p>
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<p>True, you would never use “I” in a scientific paper. In fact, in order to avoid it, the passive voice is recommended. This does not mean that a good literary analysis paper should be written exclusively in the passive voice, or with the royal “we.” </p>
<p>Tell me, what grade do you think an English, social science, or political science professor would assign to a paper written in the style of the following paragraph?</p>
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<p>I can see the red markups already. </p>
<p>Different papers have different tones and audiences. Francaisalamatt is not recommending a method for writing in the sciences. His method would be as inappropriate in the sciences as the method you advocate would be in literary analysis.</p>
<p>^ Would you say using “I,” “me,” “in my opinion,” “I think,” etc. is advised when writing literary analysis/polisci/history papers, then? I’m honestly curious.</p>
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<p>my perception is that one of the typical expectations in hs history/english is that you don’t use “I”. Why is that? I’m not sure, but it’s in the big book of rules that teachers have to follow i think. Maybe it’s there because people think it works for kids, encourages more reflection perhaps, who knows. maybe it is more a convention than anything else now, and no one really thinks about why the standards are what they are, or possible alternatives, but it has its roots in people who did come to those conclusions.</p>
<p>^The reason you don’t use I until college is because it’s generally considered that high school students don’t have the savoir faire needed to know when “I” is appropriate. I was really surprised when I found out it was okay hahah. I now love using “we” (ex. “Now that we understand the nature of [author]'s diction, we can see how that diction affects [x]…”), and I no longer feel afraid to use “I,” (although sometimes I write “This essay” in lieu of “I”). Just ask a professor in anything from French to political science to anthropology, and they’ll tell you that the first person is A-okay :)</p>
<p>It is my mistake that I didn’t distinguish between the different academic disciplines. As JimboSteve clarified, I’m speaking from a humanities-oriented writing style rather than a scientific.</p>