Writing Center

Matthew Fastow ’21 hails from Houston, Texas. He plans to concentrate in Astrophysics with a certificate in Creative Writing; as such, his interests lie in bridging the gaps between qualitative and quantitative fields of study. Matthew spends his free time competing on the Princeton Debate Panel, performing slam poetry with Ellipses, writing for The Nassau Literary Review, and peeling oranges. He wrote this as a freshman.

Annabel Barry ’19 is an English concentrator from Southport, Connecticut, pursuing certificates in Humanistic Studies, European Cultural Studies, and Theater. Outside of her work in the Writing Center, she is co-editor-in-chief of The Nassau Literary Review and a set designer for theatrical productions on campus. She wrote this as a junior.

Feature, Spring 2018

Eden on Earth: An Analysis of Piet Mondrian’s Later Works

BY Writing Center

In a Tortoiseshell: In this art history paper, Matthew explores the potential factors in Piet Mondrian’s decision, upon entering the United States, to shift his aesthetics towards the naturalism he had previously disavowed. Matthew’s roadmap thesis lays out the topics his paper will explore, without giving us all of his conclusions. By motivating not only his paper as a whole, but also individual arguments, paragraphs, and sentences, Matthew dexterously complicates his arguments; with a prose style that prioritizes rhythm and narrative, he makes sure we stay along for the ride.

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Rethinking Moral Luck: What Conditions are Necessary for Moral Responsibility?

BY Writing Center

In a Tortoiseshell: While the entirety of Katie’s “Rethinking Moral Luck: What Conditions are Necessary for Moral Responsibility?” is an excellent showcase of how to navigate key terms, this section is particularly special. Here, not only does Katie introduce her own key term (which skillfully arises from the specific problems she identifies with the key terms that already exist in the scholarly conversation) but she also goes on to give a carefully crafted analysis of the key terms that appear within that overarching key term she proposes! This section not only allows Katie’s readers to fully understand what her term means but more importantly allows us to really see how her “Revised Control Condition” is in direct conversation with the concerns she addresses in Nagel’s “Strong Control Condition” and Rosen’s “Moderate Control Condition.”

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Motive, Spring 2018

Boys Beyond Binary: An Exploration of the Non-Identitarian Nature of Relationships in Umberto Saba’s “Ernesto” and Luca Guadagnino’s “Call Me By Your Name”

BY Writing Center

In a Tortoiseshell: In her essay about the relationships of the protagonists in Umberto Saba’s “Ernesto” and the 2017 film Call Me By Your Name, Bes Arnaout navigates the difficulty of arguing for the existence of a relationship paradigm that the theory has not considered. In doing so, Bes creatively extends her motive, that the critics have gotten the relationship wrong, to ground readers as they move through the paper. She is therefore able to motivate close-readings at critical moments to extend her thesis, which would otherwise become amorphous. In doing so, Bes opens up a new avenue for writers who want to argue something but lack the language to categorize it in existing theoretical terms.

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Literature Review, Spring 2018

Student Reflections on Service: Cultural and Socioeconomic Variations in Motivations for and Valuation of Volunteering

BY Writing Center

In a Tortoiseshell: In her junior paper, Rebecca Kahn explores the influence of socioeconomic status and cultural context on undergraduate students’ conception of service work. One of the primary strengths of this paper is its literature review: by summarizing and pinpointing shortcomings in the research around her topic, Rebecca ultimately solidifies the importance of her contribution to the greater body of scholarship concerning service work.

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Orienting, Spring 2018

Modeling the Model Minority: Does the Immigrant Health Paradox Apply to Asian Migrants’ Mental Health?

BY Writing Center

In a Tortoiseshell: In her paper about the immigrant health paradox, the notion that foreign born, recent arrivals of a given ethnic group typically have better health than their American born counterparts, Diana Chao positions the reader to appreciate the nuances of her argument, that the immigrant health paradox does not apply to Asian migrants, by effectively orienting the reader. After first providing the reader with concise definitions for key terms which are necessary to understand her thesis, Diana proceeds to give a comprehensive outline of the scholarly conversation surrounding her topic, which feeds directly into her motive.

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Motive, Spring 2018

A Dangerous Affair: Lady Susan’s Seductive Power in Love & Friendship

BY Writing Center

In a Tortoiseshell: In this junior paper on Love & Friendship, a film adaptation of Lady Susan by Jane Austen, Megan Laubach’s motive is multi-faceted. Her introduction begins with in-text motive as Megan notices that Love & Friendship, despite being narrative in form, feels like an authentic adaptation of a novella written as a collection of letters. Then, Megan situates her in-text motive in a larger scholarly debate within film criticism about narration, leapfrogging from scholar to scholar in order to both disagree with them and insert her own voice into the conversation: this is scholarly motive. Taken together, Megan’s introduction is an excellent example of how to motivate a larger research paper topic on the orders of both primary and secondary sources.

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Methods, Spring 2018

Light and Fire in August: Violence, Body, and the Dichotomy between Spiritual and Savage

BY Writing Center

In a Tortoiseshell: In this paper on Light in August by William Faulkner, Nina Wang argues for a new reading of Christmas’s character that focuses on the dichotomy between the spiritual and savage. The strength of Nina’s argument lies in its effective structure, as she uses clear topic sentences to ensure that each body paragraph only argues one idea at a time, but links them together in an effective way that allows her to move through three complex sub-arguments in a short six-page essay.

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Conclusion, Spring 2018

Donelle Woolford: The Politics of Appropriative Parafiction – An Analysis of Craftsmanship and Collaborative Structure

BY Writing Center

In a Tortoiseshell: In this junior paper, Heather explores the multifaceted components of the Donelle Woolford project to interrogate the implications of race, authorship and ownership, and performance on the viewer’s experience of the artworks. This excerpt demonstrates a sophisticated, antithetical approach to effectively concluding a long research paper by wrapping up previous analyses and integrating a new theoretical concept.

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Literature Review, Spring 2018

Lit Review

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What makes for a good literature review? The literature review section is an opportunity for students to show their understanding of the research that they have undertaken. However, it’s also an opportunity to enter the scholarly conversation. A paper’s literature review is a way for a writer to craft the ballroom of conversation that they are entering. What existing scholars are talking? Who agrees with who? Where are the disagreements? By establishing what dynamics exist in the ballroom, the writer can then establish how they are going to enter this conversation.

The possibilities for entering the conversation are endless. The writer can piggyback off of existing academic arguments by extending them and examining them in a new context. Or the writer can enter an argument between two scholars, taking sides with one of the scholars or acting as a mediator. The possibilities are endless, but the direction that the argument will be taking is dictated entirely by how the writer depicts these scholars interacting with one another in the lit review.

Example: Student Reflections in Service: Cultural and Socioeconomic Variations in Motivations for and Valuation of Volunteering by Rebecca Kahn

Motive, Spring 2018

Motive

BY Writing Center

Motive begins with a question or a problem. This can be in the form of a gap in the evidence, a puzzling passage, or a new phenomenon. Thus, motive is the driving force behind an essay’s line of inquiry or argument. It is the question to which the author hopes to provide an answer.

Without a strong motive, it is difficult for readers to grasp the reason for a certain paper’s existence. Even the most brilliant points can seem meaningless without an understanding of the posed question. Even then, motive must extend beyond just this initial question. The motive of a paper has to be compelling enough to imbue readers with a sense of that paper’s significance. It ultimately helps answer the question, “Why does it all matter?” It helps readers understand not only why a paper was written but also why they should care that the paper was written at all.

Example 1: Boys Beyond Binary: An Exploration of the Non-Identitarian Nature of Relationships in Umberto Saba’s “Ernesto” and Luca Guadagnino’s “Call Me By Your Name” by Bes Arnaout

Example 2: A Dangerous Affair: Lady Susan’s Seductive Power in Love & Friendship by Megan Laubach