Argumentative Essay for Södertörn Students

8/7/2019 Argumentative Essay for Sdertrn Students

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How to Tackle anArgumentative Essay

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...and succeed!!



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The Argumentative Essay is

a fundamental

part of university studies.



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Good for:

*Essays in a variety of academic

disciplines

(Tip:ask your tutor)



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It works best

if you are discussing a responseto an issue or examining a situation

or state of being



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Be clear what question you areanswering



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Dystopic fiction often relies uponsetting to illuminate and reinforce

the horrors of the vision presented.

How far and in what ways, in youropinion, do two novels you havestudied, support or refute this

statement?



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statement?



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statement?



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statement?



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statement?



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statement?



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In other words



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Dystopic fictionuses

settingsto

illuminate and reinforce the horrorsdepicted.

How and in what ways

do you think this is true or false?



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Does dystopic fiction rely upon setting to reinforce the horrorpresented?

Are the horrors illuminated and reinforced in both essaysthrough their use of setting? How?

Are the texts treatment of settings similar or diferent? How?

What have other readers said about the settings in the novels?(AO3)

How has the context in which the texts were created come tohave an influence on the presentation of settings in the novels?



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Now research the primary texts tofind evidence to support your ideasand opinions



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This in turn must be supported bysecondary research(essays, other books, reviews etc.)



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All of this research must be brought

together in a detailed plan thatfollows a logical order so you canpresent your ideas and conclusion



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The plan will consist of a series of

focused ideas(which will become topic sentences

that begin each paragraph)



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As the essay is written this plan must beconverted into a well composed essay using-

Controlled sentence structureTechnical accuracyTerminology appropriate to literary studies

Argument discourse markers(usually to connect ideas between

paragraphs)



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If it is well crafted, a reader should

be able to backward engineer youressay and arrive at your original

plan!



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The Bad Plan



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Paragraph 1

The arrangement of space is vital to dystopic literature

Both novels rely on spaces to define their respective worlds

Kaplan quotation (?)



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P2

Atwood compartmentalises spaces

The shops / Prayer Scrolls are examples of this

Orwell also does this in 1984

In contrast Hailsham students seem to have spatial freedom

A Clockwork Orange shows how human machines arent

machines and rebel when restricted (?)



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P3

Atwood presents a lack of personal space and the sense of

always being watched

C.S Lewis quotation (?)

Ishiguros characters also sufer from having a lack of personalspaces which shows they are controlled



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P4

Never Let Me Go is divided into 3 sections which causes us tosettle in with Kathy (?)

Cruelty is bad quotation (?)

The Handmaids Tale presents fragmented scenes that are non-chronological (?)



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P5The settings in Atwoods novel are aesthetically pleasing but atthe same time reflect the regime. (?)



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P6

Both novels contain a type of pressure (?)

Ishiguros novel is agoraphobic while Atwoods novel isclaustrophobic (?)



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Here is a well formed skeletal

structure for the same essay plan

Remember, the question is



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Dystopic fictionuses

settingsto

illuminate and reinforce the horrorsdepicted.

How / In what waysdo you think this is true or false?



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P1Setting IS important in illuminating and reinforcing thehorrors of dystopic literature although Atwood and Ishigurostreatment of setting is very diferent, yielding very diferent tonesand modes of feeling.

Gender equality is a key facet of an advanced modern society.

P2Atwoods presentation of Gilead focuses on a political andcultural landscape and so the range of settings is broader in its



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P3That having been said, Gilead is composed ofcompartmentalised spaces that are determined by the rigid rolesimposed upon the occupants which generates a claustrophobictone to the text.

In contrast Ishiguros characters operate in spaces with noclearly defined or personalised spaces which become looser asthe novel continues. The result of this is diametrically opposedto Atwoods treatment Never Let Me Go is agoraphobic andthe characters are consequently vulnerable and have nowhere tohide.



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P4The settings arguably reflect the biographical and culturalinfluences of the novels. Both Gilead and the world of the

Hailsham students would be familiar to their respective targetaudiences although at the same time they are disconcertinglyaltered they become palimpsests and thus serve to reinforcedystopic literatures purpose to warn and force us to reflect onour own cultural experience.



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P5The authors treatment of setting is inseparable from their

use of narrative perspective and chronological structure. Itbecomes apparent that memory and the act of retelling serve tointensify and reinforce the sense of claustrophobia andagoraphobia established in the novels.



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P6In both cases the novels present ambiguous endings to theirnovels, making use of appropriately shaped settings. Atwoodavoids a reductive conclusion to Ofreds tale with the uncertaintyof the black van (before tearing us out of time and place in theHistorical Notes) while Kathy is left by the roadside in tearsbefore driving ofand leaving us there to watch her vanish on thehorizon beside the tree strewn with the abandoned detritus ofour disposable society.

In both cases the final settings serve to leave the reader with aresponsibility to continue to reflect on events an essential

quality of dystopic fiction.



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Moving from Plan to fullydeveloped argument



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Specific textual examples to support thepoints made

The use ofcritical opinions out of whichthe writer makes clear their OWN

position



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Here are 3 versions of the same extract

from the final essay using key markingcriteria. Can you decide which wouldreceive the best grade and why?



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P4The settings arguably reflect the biographical and culturalinfluences of the novels. Both Gilead and the world of the

Hailsham students would be familiar to their respective targetaudiences although at the same time they are disconcertinglyaltered they become palimpsests and thus serve to reinforcedystopic literatures purpose to warn and force us to reflect onour own cultural experience.

From planning



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Never let me go is set in Britain of now but its diferent whereas thehandmaids tail isnt quite as familiar because its set in the future but its stillin Massachussets which is where Atwood was from when she wrote the book.Ishiguro was originally from Japan but he moved to England when he was just5 witch maybe helps him to see things in a diferent way. Both books settings

are likely to be known by their readers and so they can connect to what ishappening in the stories unlike in sci fi where its harder to to see the pointthat the writer is trying to make. Both authors are basically saying that thesedystopic things could happen if you are not careful. In this way they are likepalimpsests because you can see the world you live in but at the same time itsnot the world you live in and so it throws you ofand makes you unsure. LikeWittgenstein says the aspect of things that are most important for us arehidden because of their simplicity and familiarity.

V.1



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Both authors use settings which contain biographical details and would befamiliar to their audience. Atwood says that Its set, not in a Britain-yet-to-come, but in a Britain-of-to-the-side., when talking about Never Let MeGo. The horrors of the book are horrible because its just like Britain now.

And Atwood puts Gilead in Massachusetts, which is also important and placeslike the wall and the library are not what they would be for readers who livedthere when the book was written and so its thought provoking. The writersuse familiar settings because they remind the readers that this could happento them and thats typical of dystopic literature which is designed to warn usof what might happen if we dont watch out.

V.2



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It is significant that both authors have elected to present their novels in settings whichare at once both biographically pertinent and at the same time likely to reflect theevery day landscape of their respective target audience. Indeed Atwood observes ofIshiguros text that Its set, not in a Britain-yet-to-come, but in a Britain-of-to-the-side., acknowledging that much of its resonance comes from its familiarity as acontemporary landscape. The horrors of the cloning project are made all the moreterrifying because the culture is otherwise closely aligned to Britain at the turn of the

new millennium. Kathy and her friends visit a Woolworths in Cromer, stand outside atypical oce block in search of Ruths possible and search for the lost tape in an alltoo familiar charity shop the world of the clones is haunting because it is our world.Likewise, Atwood roots the dystopic regime of Gilead in the heart of HarvardMassachusetts, her own university home town, and the series of palimpsest locationsincluding the terrifying wall and the library, once symbols of education and liberalism,become distorted into tools of propaganda and control. It is essential that dystopicliterature should not be dismissed as implausible Science Fiction and so both authorsforce the reader to be at once both oriented and disoriented within the worlds

presented, yielding an uncomfortable tension that is arguably mimetic.

V.3



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May the force be with you

Research

PlanningWriting & Rewriting



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Argumentative Essay for Södertörn Students