Speculation Essay.
Assignment: In this essay, you are going to speculate on a problem on the local level; this can be a problem from your hometown or here in Bloomington. Go through a local news source (The IDS and Herald Times for Bloomington, for instance) and choose a problem to analyze. Due to the limits (primarily space and time) of this paper, the problem you select must be a local one. It would not be possible to discuss the causes of homelessness on the national level in a 4 page essay. However, it would be more reasonable to analyze the causes of homelessness within Bloomington. select a problem that you already know something about (either from another class or from personal interest). One of the goals for this assignment is for you to speculate on causes of an issue and therefore argue your position based on research. Do not simply report what other people have said, or just repeat the known causes of some issue. To make the analysis that this assignment asks for, you’ll have to address the following points: 1. Early in the paper (in the introduction and first body paragraph) you’ll need to introduce your reader to the problem you’ve selected and establish why your issue represents a genuine problem. Your thesis statement should address the effects of the problem on the local community (i.e. who is impacted by this problem, and in what ways?). 2. To avoid generalities (that plague of vague writing!), focus on concrete examples in the body paragraphs. Use your topic sentences not only to let the reader know what’s coming in the paragraph, but also to show how that example relates to your thesis. In your explanation of the examples, make sure to show the reader how this example relates to the problem as a whole. 3. Since you may not know for certain what the relationship between cause and effect is, you will have to make educated guesses, search out non-obvious or underlying meanings or relationships, and use appropriate evidence and reasoning to convince your readers. Avoid the obvious subjects and speculations—offer something new and imaginative to your reader and try to offer something significant (which will build up to your answer to the “So What?” question in the conclusion). 4. Finally, since multiple perspectives are certain to exist on your issue, embrace complicating evidence and counterarguments (the second source) by either refuting or accommodating them. Criteria for Evaluation: • Strong, clear thesis statement that states both the local problem (the cause) and its and local effects • Logical, well-described connection between cause and effects • Specific use of sources • Consideration of background assumptions and description of how they work into the problem • Accommodation or refutation of complicating evidence (rebuttal) • Correct grammar, spelling, punctuation and MLA citation (both in-text and in Works Cited Page)