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EXPECTATIONS and
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HOW TO WRITE A FIRST PERSON ESSAY
A first person essay asks you to "be" someone answering the question from a particular point of view. You can put in your own understanding, but make sure you take the point of view that is asked for in the question and carry it out throughout the essay.
There are three reasons for first person exams:
1. To stretch your understanding, not only of the facts, but the ways that different people see issues. We tend to think of our own point of view as "objective," unlike others that are "quaint," "naive," "mistaken," "wrong," or even "evil." Historical situations are rarely so clear-cut, and we are rarely so virtuous and pure.
2. To put some interest into what otherwise might be rather mundane questions. "Compare and contrast, blah blah blah..." A first person questions allows (and sometimes demands) more creativity than a more routine question.
3. On take-home exams, to lessen the temptation to simply download (cut and paste) your answer from the web or copy out of a book. Unless you find a novel paralleling the question, you aren’t likely to get a first person point of view quite like the question. Plagiarism thus becomes a bit harder.
Note that by refusing to write from a particular point of view, you are condemning yourself to a low grade and raising the suspicion on the part of the grader that you are plagiarizing your answer.
A variant on the first person question is the two person debate or argument. In this form of question, you need to look at different points of view.
This kind of question can be done successfully by dialog as in a novel. (Note that each person’s discussion should start a paragraph and be accompanied by open quotation marks. If the person continues for a second paragraph, each paragraph is opened by quotation marks, but the final quotation marks don’t appear until the end of that person’s speech. Not every sentence, and certainly not every paragraph needs to have "Bob said" or the equivalent, although occasional references like this help to keep the speakers straight.
Another format that works well is script format (speaker 1: blah blah...speaker 2: blah blah).
Less successful is the "he said that" format (converting this to third person).
In any format, as in any comparison, it is best to do the discussion issue by issue or even back-and-forth on each issue rather than just two long speeches. The two-speech approach does not allow for interaction, agreement, disagreement, concession of a point, or whatever might be put into the question. It also lends itself to deliberate or inadvertent plagiarism (a very bad side effect).
If the question gives the name(s) of the speaker(s) use it (them). If not, then make up names to make your writing more interesting. In making up names, try to be more creative than Bill and Ted.
Extra credit was invented to motivate otherwise bright children to work to capacity instead of playing video games. You are not children. "Surely there must be something I can do to improve my grade!" Yes there is: read, study, see the prof, attend class, study harder.
Return
to one of the following
| GenEd 110 World Civ | Hist 440 Early Middle Ages |
| Hist 340 Greek History | Hist 441 Later Middle Ages |
| Hist 341 Roman History | Hist 341-DDP Roman History Distance Degree Program |
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