EGL 101ssay #3, Part 2: The Essay
Assignment: You¥ already completed the first part of this assignment; you¥ written emails
to friends or family, explaining a food-themed problem, and integrating ideas from two sources
as you work to construct an argument in response to that problem. Now, it is time for the second
part: drafting the essay.
For this final assignment, you will write a synthesis essay that expresses an argument. Synthesis
writing brings together multiple voices and perspectives. You already have these voices
assembled: the voices of each of the authors from your two sources and, most importantly, your
own voice.
You¥ also already started shaping these three perspectives into one coherent structure in the
emails you¥ written. You should see your emails as stepping stones to the longer, more
complex essay. The pieces are there, but now the rhetorical situation is changing.
You are no longer writing an email; you are writing an essay. Your audience is no longer a friend
or family member; your audience is me (your professor) and your classmates (your peers). Your
purpose is no longer just to informally introduce the topic; your purpose is now to formally
support an argument, using both your own ideas and the ideas of the writers whose articles
you¥ chosen. All of these rhetorical factors will, as we¥ discussed in class, change the final
product.
It is important that you don see your emails as the first drafts for this essay assignment. You
should not be copying and pasting anything from one to the other. Instead, think of your letters
as the prewriting necessary to help inspire the drafting process. Use them to help you articulate
your claim, your reasons, and identify your evidence. That is, use the ideas in your email when
drafting your essay, but don use the actual text.
Before you begin drafting, you should identify all of the parts of your argument: your claim
(which will be your thesis), your reasons (which will be drawn both from your own ideas and
from the ideas in your articles), and your evidence. Once you have all of these puzzle pieces, and
have them organized in an outline, you know you are ready to start writing! (Don forget that
your synthesis grids should help with developing your argument.)
Finally, remember that you must work to establish your ethos in the essay. You can do that in a
few ways.
First, you can do that by making sure that your ideas are not lost in the paper. This isn just
about what author X and author Y have to say about the topic; this is also about what conclusions
you have come to after thinking deeply about the various perspectives.
Also, you can build your ethos by proving to us that you fully understand the sources that you
are referring to in your paper. How can you do this? Well, for one, you can rely on paraphrasing
and not direct quotation. The more you quote a source, the more you admit that you can
actually explain the ideas without relying on the original authoràwords.
Finally, you can show that you are accountable for where the ideas in your essay come from. So,
when you do use ideas from a source, whether you are paraphrasing, summarizing, or directly
quoting, make sure to use author tags regularly (Janet Sanchez argues). This will help your
readers know whose ideas we are reading, and it will help keep you honest.
If you haven already had your sources approved by me, you MUST do that before this first
draft is due.
Requirements: MLA format; typed, double-spaced
5 page minimum

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