English 2150 Spring 2018
Exploratory Narrative Essay

Your exploratory narrative essay begins your formal process of providing your distinct answer to this question:

What specific topic can I write about that will help me better understand myself and the world I live in?

To write this 3-4 page essay, you will make these 3 moves:

• 1. Like Descartes, you will first investigate your own thought process about your topic. Why is this topic important to you? When did it start becoming important to you? Has anyone or anything influenced you to become interested in this topic? Why should others care about it? Describe your topic and hold it up to reflective scrutiny. (≈350 words)
• 2. Next, you will analyze evidence from 1 book chapter/academic article/essay/short story/etc. that helps you continue to hold your topic up to scrutiny. How does this evidence prove that your topic is important? How does the evidence help you better describe your topic? Put yourself in conversation with another writer who is also interested in your topic. (≈400 words)
• 3. Finally, you will reflect on how your own thought process has developed now that you have written about your topic for approximately 3 pages. What have you learned about your topic after all of this writing? Is it too big? Too small? Did you discover a sub-topic that you hadn’t thought of before? Most important: now that you’ve explored your topic in some detail, why do you think an audience of your peers should be interested in your topic? Why should they care? (≈150 words)

  Please see the other side of this sheet (page 2) for suggested templates that might help you make these 3 moves.

  A final thought to guide your writing:
  All day you are thinking about topics that are important to you because they give your life meaning. Yet you rarely take the time to try to explain to yourself why these topics gives your life meaning. The process of writing gives you a rare opportunity to do so. If you can describe to yourself why your topic is meaningful, then it becomes much easier to describe the significance of your topic to a larger audience.

  Due Date: March 21st at 11:59PM

  Other requirements:
  -Must have a creative title. This means you will lose points for writing “Essay 1.”
  -Must have your name, class title, my name, and date on the upper left-hand side of the first page. -Must be 3-4 pages double-spaced (800-1000 words). Pages must be numbered.
  -Must use MLA citation style for in-text citations and a very brief Works Cited page.
  -Must be typed, double-spaced, and in 12 point font.

Suggested Opener Templates for Each Section*

Part 1 (Investigating your own thought process)

• I’ve always wondered why___________.
• In the 21st century it has become increasingly important for us to_____________.
• When I was younger, I always thought_________. However, lately I’ve been thinking_______.
• I’ve never spent that much time thinking about why I am interested in_________. But now I’m starting to understand that I am interested in _________ because ____________.
• Some years ago I was struck by how many false things I had believed_____________. (You would have to give Descartes credit for this template or you would have to reword it)

Part 2 (Analyzing related evidence)

• The author ________ has also been writing and thinking about this topic. One particularly interesting insight this author has made note of is_________.
• Another way to think about this topic is to look at it from_________’s perspective. She argues that______.
• I was surprised to find out that this author ______ told a story about his childhood that related directly to my topic.
• Some authors do not think this topic is important. Authors like______ claim that_______.

Part 3 (Your final reflection)

• After reflecting on my topic, I’m beginning to think that other people should care about this topic because______.
• Now that I’ve thought long and hard about this topic, I think what matters most is not_____but rather_______.
• When I began writing this essay, I had very clear idea of what my topic was. Now that I’ve analyzed a secondary source, I’ve realized that I need to tweak my topic so that it addresses________.
• Through the process of writing this essay, I’ve discovered that in order to do justice to my topic, I will need to write about these three issue:_______, _________, and _________.

*Remember that you can also consult They Say/I Say to find many more useful templates.