W2LK to PS1—Topics for the First Essay
Your first essay is due Friday, October 29 by 4:00PM in the mail
slot in my door, 1310 Girvetz Hall. It must contain the following elements:
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Five to six, typed, double-spaced pages, between 1250 and 1500 words (your
word processor probably has a word count function) in Times/Roman or equivalent
typeface
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A clear, arguable thesis with a strong subject-verb-object core
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Three secondary sources in addition to Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics,
well introduced and discussed, and with proper MLA citation style
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A clear, identifiable, and logical structure based on a sound structural
principle
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Sound, logical, and identifiable transitions between paragraphs
Topics: These are suggestions for possible directions of inquiry,
not prescriptions or formulae. Your essay will undoubtedly be more narrowly
focused. I will add more topics as they come up.
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Choose a central proposition or claim from Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics
about the good, political science, pleasure, virtue, or any other major
term. Then identify how Aristotle defines the term, provides support for
his claim about it, and how it fits into the work as a whole. Use your
three secondary sources to support your claim by referring to other scholars’
commentaries or analysis of the work, or to its historical and social context.
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Aristotle lived at the end of one era and the beginning of another: the
end of the age of the Greek city-state and the beginning of the Alexandrian
Empire. Using Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics and three secondary
sources, discuss the effect of Aristotle’s historical context on his view
of civil society. Your thesis should make a specific claim about either
Aristotle’s intentions in writing the Nicomachean Ethics, the effect
of Aristotle’s background on the views expresed in the work, or the ways
in which the work anticipates the problems inherent in the growth of an
empire.
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Your own topic involving Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics and three
secondary sources.