Some quick notes about expository essays

1. Some quick notes about expository essays Hang in there- some YouTube videos coming up!

2. Discursive vs. Argumentative • What is the key difference between discursive and argumentative essays? • “Why is it important to have a good grounding in your mother tongue” vs. “ ‘It is important to have a good grounding in your mother tongue.’ Discuss.”

3. Discursive Essay Topics • Specific questions (What, Why, How) • “What are the qualities of a good student?” • “What makes a good teacher?” • Broad topics • College teachers, governments, education etc. • Questions that already have a stand embedded in them • “Discuss the value of Mathematics” • “Why should students wear school uniforms?” • Questions that explicitly prevent you from having a stand • “Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of wearing school uniforms”

4. Argumentative Essays • Demand that you take a stand • “Do you agree that the young today is a spoilt and dependent lot?” • “Is it true that language is more than a tool of communication?” • “Do you think that the rise of the internet has benefited mankind greatly?” • General questions that require an opinion • “The Humanities is of less value than the Science” Discuss.

5. So how does this affectthesis statements? • For discursive essays, the thesis is already embedded in the question (e.g. Discuss the value of Mathematics). • You will probably reiterate that Mathematics is valuable but you don’t have to say if you agree or not. (You cannot disagree.) • Your thesis statement could be about summarising your argument, e.g. “… most of the professors here at State fall into three categories: the positive teachers, the neutral teachers and the negative teachers.” • Or it could be the answer to the direct question. E.g. For “What are the qualities of a good teacher?”, the T.S. could be “A good teacher should be one who cares for the holistic development of his or her student.”

6. So how does this affectthesis statements? • For argumentative essays, you must have an explicit stand from the outset • E.g. “It is definitely myopic to say that the Humanities are of less value than the Sciences when they both actually complement each other and makes a person’s education more complete.”

7. Phew. Now that that’s over…

8. Media and Identity We are what we see?

9. Why do they feel this way?

10. Where does our notion of an ‘ideal’ body come from?

11. How does the media affect our perceptions of body image?

12. Some Questions… • According to the videos, where does our notion of an “ideal” body come from? • What is the ideal image of a woman’s body? • Why is there so much focus on body image in our society? • In Singapore, are we similarly bombarded by images that distort our perception of what is an “ideal”body image? Think of examples in your daily life.

13. Battle of the Sexes How does the idealised image of a woman compare to the idealised image of a man? Are teenage girls especially vulnerable to such pressures? Do teenage boys face similar pressure?

14. What’s wrong with this picture? Nearly every single image featured in magazines has been tampered with in some way. Should this be allowed?

15. In December 2009, a French legislator named Valerie Boyer proposed a draft law that would require all digitally altered photographs of people used in advertising to be labeled as retouched. Discuss why magazines should let readers know if images have been retouched

16. Discuss why magazines should let readers know if images have been retouched • Watch the NYTimes Op-Ed video, “Sex, Lies and Photoshop” • Read the two articles on media and female identity • Surf online for relevant sites, like http://www.about-face.org and jessedoc’syoutube channel for documentaries like “34x25x36” • Craft an introduction by the next lesson. We’ll then move onto body paragraphs (i.e. the juicy meat patty of the hamburger essay)