#5 - PARAGRAPH ORGANIZATION

June 14, 2020

PARTS OF A PARAGRAPH

Academic writing is a very broad term that can include a great number of different genres, such as research articles, essays, abstracts, papers, among many others. Academic genres imply the use of formal English: words of Latin or French origin, no contractions, compound or complex sentences and well-organized paragraphs. A paragraph is a set of sentences that begins with a TOPIC SENTENCE that is enlarged with examples, explanations, quotes, paraphrasing, statistics, and other instances of SUPPORTING MATERIAL. These sentences are placed in general, at the beginning of the  paragraph, although INTRODUCTION and CONCLUSION pargraphs are exceptions to this rule.

Characteristics of a well-written paragraph.

A well-written paragraph contains:

-1-   A TOPIC SENTENCE: What are you writing about?
 To deal with a good topic sentence, it is necessary to come up with:

• Interesting topics.
• A personal opinion on it. An interesting comment about it.

-2- BODY: "The heart of the paragraph". It carries the supporting details for the topic sentence.
There are two ways to order these details:

• Order of importance
• Chronology (sequence of the events)

-3-  A CLOSING SENTENCE: It has two functions:

• To restate the topic sentence, you remind the audience what you have been writing about.
• To keep the audience thinking.

* Let´s have a look at the following paragraphs and their suggested TOPIC SENTENCES.

• I saw around Velva a release from what was like slavery to the tyrannical soil, release from the ignorance that darkens the soul and from the loneliness that corrodes it. In this generation my Velva friends have rejoined the general American society that their pioneering fathers left behind when they first made the barren trek in the days of the wheat rush. As I sit here in Washington writing this, I can feel their nearness. (from Eric Sevareid, "Velva, North Dakota"

T.S: Many politicians deplore the passing of the old family-sized, but I´m not so sure.

•  The first is the wear-and-tear hypothesis that suggests the body eventually succumbs to the environmental insults of life. The second is the notion that we have an internal clock which is genetically programmed to run down. Supporters of the wear-and-tear theory maintain that the very practice of breathing causes us to age because inhaled oxygen produces toxic by-products. Advocates of the internal clock theory believe that individual cells are told to stop dividing and thus eventually to die by, for example, hormones produced by the brain or by their own genes. (from Debra Blank, "The Eternal Quest" [edited]).

T.S: There are two broad theories concerning what triggers a human´s inevitable decline to death.

•  The strictest military discipline imaginable is still looser than that prevailing in the average assembly-line. The soldier, at worst, is still able to exercise the highest conceivable functions of freedom -- that is, he or she is permitted to steal and to kill. No discipline prevailing in peace gives him or her anything remotely resembling this. The soldier is, in war, in the position of a free adult; in peace he or she is almost always in the position of a child. In war all things are excused by success, even violations of discipline. In peace, speaking generally, success is inconceivable except as a function of discipline. (from H.L. Mencken, "Reflections on War" [edited])

T.S: We commonly look on the discipline of war as vastly more rigid than any discipline necessary in time of peace, but this is an error.

• In Montreal, a flashing red traffic light instructs drivers to careen even more wildly through intersections heavily populated with pedestrians and oncoming vehicles. In startling contrast, an amber light in Calgary warns drivers to scream to a halt on the off chance that there might be a pedestrian within 500 meters who might consider crossing at some unspecified time within the current day. In my home town in New Brunswick, finally, traffic lights (along with painted lines and posted speed limits) do not apply to tractors, all terrain vehicles, or pickup trucks, which together account for most vehicles on the road. In fact, were any observant Canadian dropped from an alien space vessel at an unspecified intersection anywhere in this vast land, he or she could almost certainly orient him-or-herself according to the surrounding traffic patterns.

T.S: Although the interpretations of traffic signals may seem highly standarized, close observation reveals regional variations across this country, distinguishing the East Coast from Central Canada and the West as surely as dominant dialects or political inclinations . 


Metacognitive analysis.
 
 Writing is a way of communication that allows us to share our thoughts, feelings and experiences. It is necessary to organize our pieces of work through well- structured texts so that our ideas can be clearly conveyed. Thus, relevance, coherence and cohesion are essential features to take into consideration.
So, the question is... are we really aware of all these issues every time we put our ideas on paper? I must admit I often skip some of the steps required as I write what I long to. I generally go over the text many times to reformulate and reorganize it,
   All the research and the reading I have been going through to accomplish the tasks suggested, made me reflect on the importance of a well- written text. No matter the type it is, whether it is formal or informal, we cannot forget the value of the message it carries, since writing is a precious way to express our beliefs.