Changes in Women’s Roles in Society

Instructions

English 1301 - Causal Analysis Essay

Assignment: Explain the causes of a situation (an event, a phenomenon, or a trend) that concerns you. Narrow your topic enough to treat it in some detail and provide more than a mere list of causes. When seeking causes, you will have to decide carefully how far back to go in your search for remote causes. Moreover, you must be sure to distinguish between the immediate causes and the remote causes of the situation you are analyzing.

Sources: You must include at least two sources and incorporate at least three in-text citations from that source into your essay. You can use that source in a couple ways. For example, you could use a quotation to begin your essay as a point of departure because you may disagree with the idea, or you want to quote a source and then clarify what the statement means. Another use of a quotation is to lend support to an idea you have. This use of a quotation lends credibility to your own writing. Finally, you must add a Works Cited page at the end of your essay. All documentation must be in MLA 8th edition format.

Audience: academic; assume they’re not knowledgeable about the event you are writing on.

Length: 750 words, excluding the works cited page.

Format: Double spaced in 10 or 12 point font. Indent all paragraphs at least five spaces. Use third person.

Work to narrow down your topic to a specific phenomenon or problem whose causes or effects can be addressed in 3 to 4 pages. For example, attempting to discuss the possible causes of domestic violence would be way too broad for this assignment. Instead of focusing on domestic violence as a whole, you might narrow down your topic to examining the reasons why women convicted of violent crimes receive longer prison sentences than men, for instance, or the results of batterer rehabilitation programs.

Below are some sample topics in case you have trouble thinking of one:

Why relationships start or break up

What causes friction between two roommates, or two friends

Sources of pressure on students to get good grades

The steady increase in college costs

The fact that more couples are choosing to have only one child, or none

The fact that most Americans can communicate in no language other than English

Preparing the Essay:

Brainstorm for a while until you come up with at least 10 different topics you could write on.

Once you have chosen a subject, create two columns: one for remote causes and one for immediate causes. These causes should be somewhat broad so that you can elaborate on them in your essay. You should have 3 to 4 immediate causes and about 2 to 3 remote causes. Depending on your topic, the amount will vary, but be sure you have more than just 2 or 3 causes altogether.

Next, create an outline. The simplest method is to start with the immediate causes. Take each immediate cause and write some notes about it. Then repeat this process for the remote causes. Be aware of any causal chains in which one event causes another event, which causes another, and so forth. Never assume your reader knows as much as you do about your subject and explain your causes fully to your reader.

Start drafting your main body section of the essay and filling in the specific details.

Your essay needs to be written in the third person point of view. Avoid using the second person point of view.

Organizing and Structuring the Essay:

Introductory Paragraph:

Begin your expository essay by arousing the audience’s interest in the introductory paragraph.

This is the paragraph that must clearly establish the subject of your essay and that must identify the purpose for writing the essay. In this assignment, your purpose is to explain what has given rise to a particular phenomenon.

Create a thesis that is one sentence long and that appears in the very last sentence of the introductory paragraph.

Main Body section:

In the main body of your essay, create a paragraph for each of your causes, whether it is a remote or an immediate cause. In the form of a topic sentence, be sure the reader knows what type of cause you are writing about. (E.g. Probably the most common cause for the breakdown of friendships is that the two people have a communication breakdown.) Notice that my main idea in this paragraph will be to explain how communication breakdowns can ruin a friendship. I will have to give at least a couple examples of real or hypothetical situations to illustrate the claim.

Consider how to order the main body paragraphs. For example, within the immediate causes section, you might arrange the 3-4 paragraphs by the most serious reasons to the least serious causes. Alternatively, you could order the paragraphs according to what is the most common factor in friendships breaking up. You will have several main body paragraphs, but the number will vary depending on your subject. Each paragraph, though, should start off with a topic sentence that indicates the next cause you will be explaining.

Remember to add the analysis part to each of the paragraphs. You cannot merely write about what causes X to happen; you have to explain why it happens.

Don't stray from your topic; stay focused.

You must use transitions between paragraphs to signal that you are writing about a new cause, whether it is a remote or an immediate cause. Your objective is to link the paragraphs together smoothly.

Conclusion Paragraph:

Your conclusion paragraph should clearly bring the essay to a close. While you do not need to restate each of the various causes, you might want to reiterate your essay's purpose that was stated in the introductory paragraph. You might want to predict what the future holds if the event you are examining is not the end result of some previous events. What are the implications of the event now that it has occurred?

Remember to title your essay uniquely. Don’t call it the "Causal-Analysis Essay" or "Essay #2".

The point of view for this essay will be in the third person, so you will be using the “he/she/it/they pronouns frequently. You must consistently maintain this point of view. Use first person sparingly (only when quoting from a source that is using first person) and avoid the second person point of view