Consider the meaning and implication of the following passage from Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales, written in the 14th century:“Three of my husbands were good and two bad. The first three were old and rich and I picked them clean. One of my old husbands, emboldened with drink, would come home and preach against women; but I got the better of him. My fourth husband was young and he had a mistress. I pretended to be unfaithful and made him burn in his own grease. I already had my eye on young Jankin, pallbearer for my fourth, and he became my fifth and favorite husband. He beat me. Once when he was reading aloud from his Book of Wicked Wives, I tore a page from his book, and he knocked me down (so hard I am still deaf from it). I pretended to be dying, and when he leaned over to ask forgiveness, I knocked him into the fireplace. We made up, and he gave me full sovereignty in marriage; thereafter I was kind and faithful, and we lived in bliss.”This passage on the nature of romantic relationships in medieval times is connected to modern day in sentiment, if not in direct messaging. In your essay, explain what this passage is stating and how that meaning relates to modern-day relationships in the 21st century.Make sure your writing has a thesis statement that is expressed early and clearly in your paper. Also support your thesis with specific evidence and examples as you see fit.You are NOT to write in singular first-person. Please write approximately 750 words. Make sure you proofread, too. Remember the Six Elements, in terms of your structure and organization as the grading rubric in this course!The Six ElementsThis is the answer key to passing this class! Learn it.
Know it. Live it.6E_2019.docxI’d like to go over The Six Elements of Essay Writing posted above. These are basic core elements of good essay writing, but also the basis of all argumentative/persuasive presentation. Please make sure you learn these six elements; your course grading for essays will be done on this six-point system as follows_6=A5=A-4=B3=C2=D1=FThese are the ceilings for your grades. For example, if I find all six elements in your writing, you could get an “A” grade. However, mistakes in proofreading, spelling, grammar, etc., can drop your grade from the “A” level even if you do have all six elements. It is very rare someone only gets one or two elements into their writing. If so, it is usually because the thesis statement is nowhere to be found, and as a result, the other elements have nothing as an anchor for their existence. So make sure you start with the thesis!Plan your writing; everything in this class will be formal writing assignments/essays, unless specifically noted by me (like the discussions; they’re not “essays”, but they should feature elements #3-5, for example). Make sure you are aware of this. If you have any questions about the Six Elements, we can discuss them in the “Discussion” section. Treat this opportunity as you would the chance to raise your hand in class and ask a question. We will do a lot of exercises in this class revolving around the Six Elements, so you’ll learn to apply them as both a reader and a writer.
That way, they will become a part of your thought process as you move forward in college and in the professional world. I’ve had so many former students come back and tell me how successfully they have used these same elements in real-world jobs. I know they work, so learn and remember them forever!Brief addendum on “critical thinking”, in terms of this course’s writing and these elements:Critical thinking involves creating a detour around a mental roadblock, literally. Try explaining ideas in alternate ways, after you’ve explained it the first way. Metaphors work well, and they are critical thinking if they are seemingly off-topic, too.An example I like to give is wordy, but here it goes: I once heard my older nephew explain the concept of a basement to his little brother using the analogy of a hamburger. His little brother had never seen a basement, so he didn’t know what it was. When the initial explanation of “it’s a room beneath the rest of the house” didn’t work or make sense to his little brother, my older nephew came up with an idea that would work for his audience to understand: he said the top bun was like the “kitchen”, the burger patty was both the floor of the kitchen AND the ceiling for the basement, and the bottom bun was the basement.
Does that make sense? It did to his little brother, who understood the concept because his brother explained it to him in a different way that he could understand. Now, what do hamburgers and basements have to do with each other? Nothing. But the use of critical thinking made a connection between the two, and the mental roadblock was overcome.(By the way, this moment occurred in December 2004, and my nephews are now both in their 20s. One of them just graduated from the University of Washington and is now a lieutenant in the Air Force on his way to flight school, and the other is a Resident Advisor at UC Santa Cruz … time flies!!)Here is a visual example from an Oscar-winning film, A Brilliant Mind. In a bar, a social interaction moment dealing with dating dynamics inspires John Nash to create what ended up being a Nobel Prize-winning theory (view the clip here):
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