1. Structure
First, spend time pondering the question. The wording of even the simplest question will give some clues about an appropriate structure. So think: how many parts should the essay have? How many tasks does the question set you? How many major thinkers or topics will you have to cover? What reading will you need to do?
For example, take a question such as: Explain Aquinas’s view of Natural Law. Compare and contrast this with one other ethical theory. Does either view persuade you? Give reasons for your answer (1500 words). This might conveniently be broken down into the following structure:
Introduction = 1 short paragraph
Aquinas on Natural Law = approx. 3 paragraph
Second ethical theory = approx. 3 paragraph
Points of comparison or contrast = 1 paragraph
Statement of own view plus reasons = approx. 3 paragraph
Conclusion = 1 short paragraph
The above structure is derived purely from thinking about the question—before even beginning your essay research. So:
Adopt a basic structure through pondering the question—a structure you can work from, and perhaps revise, as your research proceeds.
2. Content
Undertake some serious research. Your research will have two main elements: notes taken during classes and notes taken from texts. No good student ever attends class or reads an academic text without taking notes. Failure to take notes from texts simply means you will have to go back, find the book, and read it all over again. For a major essay consulting 5 books or articles is usually too few, and 20 too many. Remember, your essay will include a full bibliography of the academic books and articles you have consulted. Remember too, your essay will include a referencing system of footnotes or endnotes in which you provide full reference to pages of academic texts you have consulted.
Note-taking has two elements:
Spotting the argument in the lecture or text & noting it down (good notes are not just lists of points but attempts to capture the logical shape or skeleton of someone’s argument)
Expressing the argument of the lecture or text in your own words (good notes are not direct dictation or quotation)
Once you have completed your basic research, you should try to fit the material you have noted down into the structure you have already clarified through thinking about the question (see Step 1, above). Naturally, what you learn from your research may suggest you should alter your original structure in some way. But you should not alter your structure without good reason and you should ensure that your new structure still answers the specific essay question asked. So:
Undertake research so you have notes on the essay topic from your reading that supplement the notes you have taken during classes.
3. Clarity
Clear communication with your reader is the most important consideration in preparing the first draft of your essay. Accommodating your research notes within your chosen essay structure is a difficult and complex task. To complete this task successfully you must prepare the first draft of your essay with clarity in mind: you need to be clear.
Being clear has two elements:
clear writing (‘good style’). This usually includes short sentences, simple grammar, no jargon terms, no unnecessary technicalities, no vagueness, no waffle or padding, no saying things you yourself do not understand.
clear thinking (‘good logic’). This includes ensuring each sentence plays a role in helping to advance the paragraph’s point; ensuring each paragraph plays a role in helping to advance the essay’s overall case; and ensuring your essay as a whole does make a case and argues to a clear conclusion. Good logic also means ensuring that when you use “therefore” this does indicate some argumentation and when you use “thus” this does indicate a conclusion. It also includes avoiding all fallacies—begging the question, circularity, appeals to emotion, assertions rather than arguments (see Philosophy Lecture 4).
Clear writing and clear thinking are among the great gifts of a philosophical education. So:
Spend time drafting and redrafting sections of your essay, testing for clarity by reading the essay aloud to yourself or to others
Good structure, relevant content, clear language and logic are not easy to achieve, but seeking them is always worthwhile. It is only in trying to write philosophy essays that you learn how to do philosophy—and learn too skills of argument and expression that will stand you in good stead whatever your career. The following practical tips are offered to help you follow the above “Three Step Plan” of Structure—Content—Clarity.
Most philosophy is argument. Your essay should not just present others’ arguments but should involve you yourself in arguing. Hence, the essay must be your own reasoned work, not just a report of the work of others.
Arguing about the arguments of others really means pondering the reasons they offer for their views—and then offering your own reasons for accepting or rejecting their reasons. Hence, make sure that you always do offer reasons for your views. You should not advocate views just because they are easy, popular, advocated by someone you admire, the only views you can understand: you should always have a reason for a serious view.
If you find it difficult to devise your essay’s structure, it may help to imagine yourself preparing a legal case on the topic. As you are the sole author of your essay, you must consider both the ‘defence’ of the ‘case’ (natural law or freedom or God’s existence or abortion) and the ‘prosecution’. You must also ‘cross-question’ each side fairly, and then ‘sum up’ clearly before a judge and jury (me!).
Take your research seriously. Seek out relevant books and articles early. Use reference texts to discover relevant sources that others may not have discovered. Do not think you can write a philosophy essay by avoiding the library and using a few Internet sites: that is not research and will not work. Leave sufficient time to take good notes. Do not substitute underlining with a highlighter pen for taking notes. The highlights may identify the skeleton adequately but they do not express the skeleton in your own words, so 50% of the task still remains: you will discover you will have to re-read the highlighted sections again (together with all necessary surrounding text) so as to complete your task.
Originality. Everyone ought to be original in working out their own presentation of the material relevant to their essay, even if most of that material is reworked from texts and classes. The ordering, the “story”, of the essay has to be yours. The case you make out must show signs of your own pondering, even if many philosophers have been there before you.
Everyone ought to be original too in using different examples and illustrations from those in the texts and lectures. This is not a trivial point: if you find yourself unable to think up an alternative example, that may indicate you have not really grasped the point of the example you are trying to replace.
If you think you can be original in more thoroughgoing ways—proposing completely new arguments, new theories, identifying serious flaws in great philosophers or in lectures—fine: so long as (especially in an introductory course) you also show that you have seriously thought-through the basic positions and criticisms that classes and reading have brought to your attention. Without this, you run the risk of repeating the blunders of your philosophical predecessors. Life is too short for that.
Needless to say, there are no special marks awarded for agreeing in your essay with the position supported by the lecturer, but neither are there special marks for daringly disagreeing with him. What counts is the quality of your argument and the reasons you offer for your views.
You are free to quote or paraphrase points you want to discuss from reading, where necessary, but acknowledge your sources scrupulously (you do not need to acknowledge my lectures as sources: I will recognise my own ideas! You are quite free to use any lecture thoughts that you find useful, making my words your own by putting them into your own words). Your essay will contain a number of footnotes referring to academic texts—not just two or three references to a free Internet encyclopedia. Take great care not to allow quotation and paraphrase to constitute an excessively large part of your essay. Where you absolutely must quote, make it brief, and keep it relevant.
Never mention an author’s views unless you can give reference to those views in a footnote (no “Aristotle thought that—” if you cannot support this claim with a reference to Aristotle in a footnote). Without proper references, I do not know that you have actually studied the author concerned, and I cannot locate the text you have used to check your interpretation.
The Internet is still the worst source for philosophical essay writing. You may think it saves hours of research in the library. In fact, the majority of the philosophy on the Net is there because no one would publish it in a good journal. By contrast, libraries are stocked by trained librarians on academics’ recommendations. Therefore, unless you already have existing knowledge about philosophy and can identify the (small) proportion of truly valuable philosophical work on the Net, leave it in preference for good library collections. That said, if you cite a good Internet source and use it intelligently, I will certainly not refuse to read your essay. But do not submit an essay constructed out of Internet encyclopedia and other supposedly ‘philosophical’ sites.
Reference books such as Companions, Encyclopedias, Philosophy Made Simple Guides, Very Short Introductions etc. can help to introduce you to a subject. But they are not main sources for your essays. Your main sources are (classic and contemporary) philosophical texts written by philosophers who are making an original contribution to the discipline.
The following style errors are very, very common in student writing: to write “it’s” (it is) when you mean “its” (belonging to it); to confuse “infer” (to draw out from evidence) with “imply” (to suggest); to confuse “refute” (to prove wrong) with “rebut” (to argue against); to spell “argument” with an extra “e” in the middle; to swap “there” (that place) for “their” (belonging to them); to rely on a spell-checker without chequing the checking.
Any instances of plagiarism are not only a serious breach of University rules but also a serious attack on academic collegiality and trust. The penalties are always severe.
Credit:ivythesis.typepad.com
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