Knowing how to write an academic essay is crucial for students in both senior high school and college. It is a formal writing skill that requires practice, intelligent reading, and concentration.
This is especially true in an environment of AI-generated content. The more you’re able to write original academic essays without the use of AI, the more you will progress in your academic career.
Competence in writing academic essays is required of college students who have to do course work where academic essays are part of the. Senior high school students who have to AP exams also have to acquire skills in academic writing.
An academic essay is a more challenging writing skill than other forms of professional writing such as business emails or job applications. Knowing how to write an academic essay competently will equip you with critical thinking and communication skills that are applicable in a wide range of fields.
This includes business communication, journalism, grant writing, and other professional areas. In this article, we discuss the following:
What is an academic essay?
What is a five-paragraph essay?
How to use the five-paragraph essay
An example of an academic essay
Read on to learn more.
What is an academic essay?
An academic essay is a critical piece of formal writing that presents a topic or argument in a logical and convincing manner. An academic essay can take many forms. It can cover one of the four different types of academic writing:
Descriptive
Analytical
Persuasive
Critical
To learn more about the different types of academic writing, check out this previous article — Types of Academic Writing. An academic essay has a number of general characteristics that you should adhere to. It should be formal. This means not using the casual language you use with your friends or on social media.
It also means being highly structured. Most academic essays have an introduction where you explain the background of the topic and the thesis statement. This is followed by the body, where each paragraph expands on each point in the introduction.
Another characteristic of an academic essay is relying on evidence. This means ensuring that you support your argument with facts that you can prove and sources that are reliable.
How to write an academic essay
To write an academic essay well, you should follow these three steps: 1. Write a proper thesis statement; 2. Prepare a proper outline; and 3. Use the five-paragraph essay format.
To learn about how to write a thesis statement, please check out this prior article: How to Write a Thesis Statement. An essay outline provides you with a roadmap to follow when writing your academic essay.
Many students think that just jumping into an essay without a format will save them time; however, this is far from the case. Writing an essay outline gives you time to think and order your thoughts. After doing so, the writing process will be much simpler and easier.
The five-paragraph essay is a way to structure your essay. It is closely linked to preparing an outline for your article. It tells you where to place your thesis statement and how to relate it to the rest of the academic essay in terms of background and paragraphs. Below we describe what the five-paragraph essay is and how to follow it.
What is the five-paragraph essay format?
The five-paragraph essay format is a specific structure used to write brief academic essays. This essay format includes five paragraphs as the name suggests. The first paragraph provides the background and the thesis statement. Paragraph 2 elaborates on the first main point; Paragraph 3 on the second main point; and Paragraph 4 on the third main point.
Lastly, Paragraph 5 is the conclusion, which restates the thesis statement and summarizes the essay. Now, remember this is only a template. If you have more than three main points, obviously your article will be more than five paragraphs. Nonetheless, the principle can be easily understood and followed.
The table below provides a breakdown of this format:
Part of the Essay | What’s Included | Purpose |
Paragraph 1 |
| It introduces the topic to the reader and states your position. |
Paragraphs 2—4 |
| It elaborates on each main point to support your thesis statement. |
Paragraph 5 |
| It rounds up your essay and brings closure |
An example of a five-paragraph academic essay |
Here we provide a five-paragraph essay example. It is a rhetorical analysis of Abraham Lincoln’s famous Gettysburg Address:
Lincoln's Gettysburg Address works rhetorically by connecting the sacrifice of Union soldiers in the U.S. Civil War to a greater cause — namely, the democratic founding principles of the US, which was antithetical to the concept of slavery. The speech was delivered by President Abraham Lincoln on November 19, 1863, at the dedication of the Soldiers' National Cemetery. It was given in commemoration to Union soldiers who died fighting in the Battle of Gettysburg — a battle that was fought from July 1 to July 3, 1863, and which became a turning point in the Civil War. This battle was one of the bloodiest in the conflict, with an estimated 51,000 casualties, including over 7,000 soldiers killed, 33,000 wounded, and many captured or missing.
The speech relies primarily on pathos and repetitive rhetorical devices. Lincoln completely rejects the use of ethos in the speech and instead humbles himself in the presence of “the honored dead.” He goes as far as saying “The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract.” Instead, in his appeal to pathos, Lincoln portrays the soldiers as models and examples for the rest of the country to follow in fighting for the democratic values of freedom.
Lincoln, in this short two-minute speech, uses a wide range of rhetorical devices. The most memorable is epistrophe (i.e., repetition at the end) in the famous phrase, “government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth.” However, there are several others. He uses a combination of anaphora (repetition at the beginning) and polysyndeton (a lack of conjunctions) in the following sentence: “But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate, we can not consecrate, we can not hallow, this ground.” The repetition and lack of conjunctions service to give power and energy to the speech, especially after the opening of the speech, which is somewhat subdued.
Another noteworthy sentence is the following: “The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here.” The rhetorical device used here is symploce (i.e., repetition at the end with a small change in the middle). The symploce is used here to compare and contrast the magnitude of the contribution of the soldiers who fought and died in battle with the relatively insignificant contribution made by combatants. This should be paid attention to as Lincoln is preparing the way to say that all citizens of the U.S.A. have a role to play in promoting Democratic values, even if it doesn’t include combat roles.
Lastly, Lincoln makes skillful use of polyptoton (repetition of a variation of the root of a word). with variations of the word dead and connects it to the wider theme of a collective national rebirth that is introduced in the second paragraph of the speech. At the start of the speech, Lincoln uses a subtle metaphor describing the cemetery as a portion of a great battlefield. This sentiment is extended where the cause that the soldiers fight for is a national struggle that all should participate in. Lincoln says, “we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom.” The polyptoton with the word “die” can be seen as a transition from death to the theme of rebirth. Lincoln first mentions the noun form of the word “dead.” Then, it changes to the active verb form “died,” before ending with a reference to “a new birth of freedom.”
Read the essay carefully and see how it follows the five-paragraph format that has been discussed.
EminentEdit's academic essay editing services
EminentEdit provides premium copyediting services for academic essays. We are a small group of professional editors with extensive experience editing and proofreading a wide range essays.
Our services include academic editing for journal publications and research papers, as well as editing essays meant for coursework.
EminentEdit provides editing and proofreading services that are:
More importantly, we are adaptable to your specific needs. | Get in touch with one of our representatives for help in editing your manuscript We know what you want to say. We help you say it better. |
Our services don't just start with proofreading the final essay. It also includes help from the very beginning. Our editing services include:
Proofreading for grammar and style
Substantive editing to improve the quality of your writing on a sentence level
Extensive commentary and recommendations to improve your writing
Suggestions for better sources
Get in touch through our contact page here: CONTACT US AT EMINENT EDIT.
Cite this EminentEdit article |
Antoine, M. (2024, November 24). Writing an Academic Essay. https://www.eminentediting.com/post/writing-an-academic-essay |
Comentarii