Anker Susan. Real Essays with Readings with 2009 MLA Update

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WRITING ESSAYS

Chapter 15 • Deﬁ nition 247

4. Evaluation. Using the four basics of good deﬁ nition as a measure,

which of the three selections in this chapter is the best example of a

deﬁ nition? Give speciﬁ c examples to support your choice. Is your choice

different from the one you ﬁ nd most informative?

Write a Deﬁ nition Essay

In this section, you will write your own deﬁ nition essay based on one

of the following assignments. Before you begin to write, review the four

basics of good deﬁ nition on page 236. Also, read the Tips for Tackling

Deﬁ nition in the box that follows.

TIPS FOR TACKLING DEFINITION

Read the assignment carefully, highlighting key words. An

assignment that uses deﬁ nition might ask you to deﬁ ne,

but it might also use words such as discuss the concept of

______________, what is ______________ and how does it work?,

deﬁ ne and give examples of, and what does ______________

mean in the context of ______________?

2. Figure out what word or concept you need to deﬁ ne.

3. Work out a simple deﬁ nition, and list examples that

demonstrate what the word or concept is in relation to

the assignment.

4. Give examples of your understanding of the word or concept.

ASSIGNMENT 1 WRITING ABOUT COLLEGE, WORK,

AND EVERYDAY LIFE

Write a deﬁ nition essay on one of the following topics or on a topic of your

own choice.

COLLEGE

• A term or concept from another course you have taken

• A good/inspiring/motivating teacher

• Cheating

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WRITING ESSAYS

248 Part Two • Writing Different Kinds of Essays

WORK

• Any term you use at work

• McJobs

• A model employee

EVERYDAY LIFE

• An attitude or behavior (such as assertiveness, generosity, negativity,

optimism, and so on)

• Morality

• Road rage

ASSIGNMENT 2 WRITING ABOUT AN IMAGE

What point is the woman in the following picture trying to make? How might

she deﬁ ne patriotism? Write a deﬁ nition essay presenting your deﬁ nition of

patriotism.

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WRITING ESSAYS

Chapter 15 • Deﬁ nition 249

ASSIGNMENT 3 WRITING TO SOLVE A PROBLEM

THE PROBLEM: Your company is putting together a new employee handbook.

To make the handbook both realistic and relevant, the company has decided

that the contents will come directly from the employees. Your department has

been assigned the section on communication.

THE ASSIGNMENT: Working on your own or with a small group, write a short

piece deﬁ ning good communication skills, giving detailed examples of how those

skills should be applied in your company.

RESOURCES: Review the chart on pages 868–69 for advice on problem solving.

You might also

• Set up an informational interview with a human resources worker to

ﬁ nd out about your subject.

• Type deﬁ nition of good communication skills into a search engine. Docu-

ment any Web sites or references you use.

ASSIGNMENT 4 WRITING ABOUT READINGS

The assignments that follow ask you to read one or more different deﬁ nition

essays and draw from them to write your own essay.

• Review Lindsey Tanner’s “Study Says Ads Trick Children’s Taste

Buds” (p. 240), and read Juliet B. Schor’s “Age Compression” (p. 811).

Deﬁ ne the terms branding and age compression. Then, explain how each

essay describes them. Give examples, too, from your own experience or

from other things you have read.

• Review Rebecca Skloot’s “Celebrity Teeth” (p. 245), and read Dave

Barry’s “The Ugly Truth about Beauty” (p. 817) and Amy L. Beck’s

“Struggling for Perfection” (p. 829). Drawing from these three selec-

tions to make your point, discuss the pressures that people who live in

this society feel to be young and beautiful.

Follow the steps in the Writing Guide on the next page to help you prewrite,

draft, revise, and edit your deﬁ nition essay. Check off each step as you com-

plete it.

■ RESOURCES

Additional Resources

for Teaching REAL

ESSAYS has visual

planning forms for

deﬁ nition and the

other essays covered

in Part Two. These

forms are also online at

bedfordstmartins

.com/realessays.

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WRITING ESSAYS

250 Part Two • Writing Different Kinds of Essays

WRITING GUIDE: DEFINITION

STEPS IN DEFINITION HOW TO DO THE STEPS

Focus.

■

■ Think about why you are being asked to deﬁ ne

a term or concept and what you need to show.

Review the four basics of good deﬁ nition on page

236.

Prewrite to explore your topic.

See Chapter 4 for more on prewriting

(including clustering).

■

■ Make a list of some topics you would be interested

in deﬁ ning — for example, a type of person, a belief

that is important to you, or a term that you think is

often misused.

■

■ Choose one of the topics, and prewrite to come up

with ideas about what you are deﬁ ning. (Clustering

works well for deﬁ nition.) What does it mean to

you? Decide on the meaning that you will develop

in your essay.

Write a thesis statement.

A thesis statement in deﬁ nition can

follow one of these patterns:

Term + Means/is + Deﬁ nition =

Thesis

Binge drinking is a killer.

Term + Class + Deﬁ nition =

Thesis

Yoga is an exercise that helps

people relax.

Or, write a thesis statement that

names the term and indicates what

your essay will say:

I am a geek and proud of it.

See Chapter 5 for more on the thesis.

■

■ Review your prewriting about what your topic

means to you.

■

■ Write a working thesis statement that includes the

term. It also should include either your deﬁ nition

of the term or some idea of what your essay will

explain.

■

■ Think about your readers, and revise your thesis

statement to make it either clearer or more

interesting to them.

Support your thesis statement.

Support in deﬁ nition explains what

terms or concepts mean by providing

speciﬁ c examples.

See Chapter 6 for more on supporting

a thesis statement.

■

■ Prewrite to ﬁ nd examples that explain how you are

deﬁ ning your topic.

■

■ Review the examples, and get rid of any that don’t

show your meaning of the term. Choose at least

three good examples.

■

■ With your readers in mind, add details to the

examples that show your readers what you mean by

your deﬁ nition. Think about the kinds of examples

and details that will make sense to them.

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WRITING ESSAYS

Chapter 15 • Deﬁ nition 251

STEPS IN DEFINITION HOW TO DO THE STEPS

Make a plan.

See Chapter 7 for more on planning.

■

■ Choose an order for your support points. A

deﬁ nition essay generally uses order of importance

and builds up to the example that readers will ﬁ nd

most powerful.

■

■ Make a written plan that includes the major

support points (examples) and supporting details.

(See the diagram on p. 239.)

Write a draft.

See Chapter 8 for more on drafting.

■

■ Write an introduction that includes your

thesis statement. See if you can use one of the

introductory techniques in Chapter 8.

■

■ Write topic sentences for each of the examples.

■

■ Write body paragraphs that give detailed

explanations of each example.

■

■ Write a concluding paragraph that makes an

observation about the term based on the examples

you have given.

■

■ Title your essay.

Revise your draft.

See Chapter 9 for more on revising

a draft.

■

■ Ask another person to read and comment on your

draft.

■

■ See if your thesis statement and introduction could

be clearer or more interesting to your readers.

■

■ Reread the body of your essay to make sure that

the examples explain your deﬁ nition and the details

explain the examples. Add other examples and

details that help explain what you mean by the term.

■

■ Reread your conclusion to make sure it reinforces

your deﬁ nition.

■

■ Add transitions to connect your ideas.

■

■ Make at least ﬁ ve changes to your draft to improve

unity, support, or coherence (see pp. 127–40).

■

■ Check to make sure the draft follows the four basics

of good deﬁ nition.

Edit your draft.

See Parts Four through Seven for more

on editing.

■

■ Use the spell checker and grammar checker on your

computer, but also reread your essay carefully to

catch any errors.

■

■ Look for errors in grammar, spelling, and

punctuation. Run-ons and punctuation errors are

common in deﬁ nition, so check for those ﬁ rst. Then,

focus on sentence fragments, errors in subject-verb

agreement, verb errors, and other areas where you

often make mistakes.

■

■ Ask yourself: Is this the best I can do?

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252

You Know This

You already use

comparison and

contrast to make

decisions.

• You compare

and contrast fea-

tures of several

cell phones.

• You compare

and contrast the

prices of various

goods.

Comparison and Contrast

Writing That Shows Similarities and Differences

Understand What Comparison

and Contrast Are

Comparison is writing that shows the similarities among subjects —

people, ideas, situations, or items; contrast shows the differences. In con-

versation, we often use the word compare to mean either compare or contrast,

but as you work through this chapter, the terms will be separated.

FOUR BASICS OF GOOD COMPARISON

AND CONTRAST

It uses subjects that have enough in common to be usefully

compared and contrasted.

2. It serves a purpose — that is, it expresses a main point that

helps readers make a decision or understand the subjects.

3. It presents several important, parallel points of comparison

and contrast.

4. It is organized either point by point or whole to whole (see

pp. 255–56).

In the following paragraph, which contrasts the subjects, each number

corresponds to one of the four basics of good comparison and contrast.

■ IDEA JOURNAL

Write about some

differences you see

between the movies

that men and women

like.

Source: Consumer Reports Money

Adviser, October 2004.

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WRITING ESSAYS

Chapter 16 • Comparison and Contrast 253

1 My current boyfriend 2 is a major improvement over 1 my ex-

boyfriend 2 in terms of how he treats me. 3 One difference is that my

current boyfriend opens the door when I get in the car as well as when

I get out. In contrast, my ex-boyfriend never opened the door of the car

or any other door. 3 My current boyfriend likes to tell me that he loves

me. For example, we went to the beach, and he screamed that he loved

me to the four winds so everyone could hear. My ex, on the other hand,

always had a ready excuse for why he couldn’t say that he loved me, ever.

However, he wanted me to tell him I loved him all the time. 3 Another

difference between the two is that my boyfriend spends money on me.

When we go out to a restaurant, he pays for the meal. My ex just never

seemed to have money to pay for dinner or anything else. He would say he

forgot to bring his wallet, and I would have to pay for the food. 3 To me,

the most important difference between the two guys is that my current

boyfriend is honest. He never lies to me about anything, and he makes

me feel conﬁ dent about our relationship. In contrast, I never could tell if

my ex was lying or telling the truth because he often lied about his family

and other things, and I never knew what to believe. 2 To sum it all up,

my current boyfriend is a gentleman, and my ex was a pig.

— Liliana Ramirez, student

Many situations require you to use comparison and contrast.

COLLEGE In a business course, you compare and contrast practices

in e-commerce and traditional commerce.

WORK You compare and contrast two health insurance options

offered by your company in order to select the one that

is best for you.

EVERYDAY Before choosing a telephone plan, you compare and

LIFE contrast the rates, services, and options each offers.

Main Point in Comparison and Contrast

A comparison and contrast essay shows readers how two or more subjects

are alike or different. The purpose of a comparison and contrast essay

may be to have readers understand the subjects or to help them make a

4 Uses

point-by-point

organization

(see p. 255).

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WRITING ESSAYS

254 Part Two • Writing Different Kinds of Essays

decision. For example, you might compare and contrast two characters

in a book to show that you understand them, or you might compare and

contrast breeds of dogs to help a potential owner choose among them.

In comparison and contrast, your main point expresses similarities or

differences in your subjects. For example, in the paragraph on page 253,

Liliana Ramirez contrasts the different ways that her two boyfriends

treated her. Her purpose is to help readers understand why one became

her “ex.”

Typically, thesis statements in comparison and contrast essays present

the central subjects and indicate whether the writer will show similarities,

differences, or both.

Subject 1 + Subject 2 + Indication of similarity or difference =

Thesis

statement

While on the surface Facebook and MySpace are similar, a recent

report indicates that they attract very different kinds of users.

To determine your thesis in a comparison and contrast essay, decide

whether you want to show similarities, differences, or both. To make

this decision, you need to think about what your purpose is — what you

want your readers to understand — and what will be meaningful to those

readers.

Support in Comparison and Contrast

The support in comparison and contrast demonstrates your main point

by showing how your subjects are the same or different. To ﬁ nd support,

many people make a list with multiple columns — one for the points that

will serve as the basis of the comparison or contrast and one for each of

the subjects.

For example, one student, Daniel, wrote the following thesis statement,

which indicates that his essay will focus on the differences between the

ages of twenty and forty:

■ RESOURCES

For online writing and

grammar resources, go

to bedfordstmartins

.com/rewritingbasics.

The ages of twenty and forty are both enjoyable, but they represent

very different stages in life.

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WRITING ESSAYS

Chapter 16 • Comparison and Contrast 255

To support this thesis, Daniel needs to ﬁ nd several points of contrast

between twenty and forty. He generates this list:

DIFFERENCES BETWEEN TWENTY AND FORTY

appearance

place in life

perspective

AGE TWENTY AGE FORTY

APPEARANCE smooth skin some wrinkles

trendy haircut classic hairstyle

rounded features well-deﬁ ned features

PLACE IN LIFE just starting out established

single, no children married with children

living at home own home

PERSPECTIVE self-centered more thoughtful

choices to make many choices made

uncertainty wisdom

Then, for each point of comparison, Daniel lists some details that

explain the differences:

Organization in Comparison and Contrast

A comparison and contrast essay can be organized in two basic ways:

A point-by-point organization ﬁ rst compares or contrasts one point be-

tween the two subjects and then moves to the next point of comparison

or contrast. A whole-to-whole organization ﬁ rst presents all the points

of comparison or contrast for one subject and then all the points for the

second. To decide which organization to use, consider which of the two

will best serve your purpose of explaining similarities or differences to

your readers. Once you choose an organization, stick with it throughout

the essay.

■ TEACHING TIP

Remind students that a

whole-to-whole essay

must include a strong

transition to move from

subject 1 to subject 2.

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WRITING ESSAYS

256 Part Two • Writing Different Kinds of Essays

The two organizations look like this:

Thesis statement

Sets up the comparison

and contrast

Point 1

Subject 1

Subject 2

Point 2

Subject 1

Subject 2

Point 3

Subject 1

Subject 2

Conclusion

Reminds readers of the

main point and makes an

observation based on it

COMPARISON

AND CONTRAST:

POINT-BY-POINT

Thesis statement

Sets up the comparison

and contrast

Subject 1

Point 1

Point 2

Point 3

Subject 2

Point 1

Point 2

Point 3

Conclusion

Reminds readers of the

main point and makes an

observation based on it

COMPARISON

AND CONTRAST:

WHOLE-TO-WHOLE

Common Transitions in Comparison

and Contrast

COMPARISON CONTRAST

one similarity one difference

another similarity another difference

similarly in contrast

like now/then

both unlike

while

Using transitions in comparison and contrast essays is important to

move readers from one subject to another and from one point of compari-

son to another.

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