Essay Analysis Guidelines

Thesis Statement

The first thing you need to do in your structural analysis is to identify the thesis statement in the essay. A thesis statement covers the main topic of the entire expository essay. It usually appears in the opening paragraph of a well-written expository essay as the first or last sentence, and you can always find keywords that matches (or are synonyms to) some words in the title of the essay.

Essay Outline

In your own version of the expository essay, you have tried to merge shorter paragraphs into larger ones, perhaps following your intuition. But what intuition did you follow exactly? It turns out the body paragraphs of a well-organized expository essay are always constructed based on logically ordered subtopics. Thus, for each section on your "Essay Example" page, you should use one brief sentence or phrase as the section header to summarize the subtopic of that section, and extract the keywords or key phrases in that section that are the cues of the subtopic. Note that since the outline is the summary of each section, the header should not be directly copied from the texts in the paragraph; it represents your own interpretation.

Coherence

A good (expository) essay is written coherently, meaning that different paragraphs are well-connected and built around each subtopic and the main topic. The connection between two paragraphs is dependent on the opening of the second paragraph. For example, two paragraphs might support one idea together by discussing various aspects of the idea. In an essay with global warming as the main topic, two paragraphs may discuss the effects of greenhouse gas emission and deforestation. Both aspects form a subtopic (the factors) related to the main topic, so when the paragraph about greenhouse gas emission ends, the next paragraph about deforesting must be connected to the previous discussion:

[Para. #1] One major influence on the rising of the global temperature is an increase in the emission of greenhouse gas...[Para. #2] The negative effect of greenhouse gas emission on global warming is exacerbated further with deforestation...

In the above example, the first paragraph begins with One major influence on the rising of the global temperature... to make the subtopic explicit. Then, the second paragraph supports the previous paragraph firstly by repeating the main point of the previous paragraph at its beginning, that is, The negative effect of greenhous gas emission on global warming..., and this first sentence also uses the adverb further to tell the readers that an extension from the previous paragraph will be made.

Alternatively, the following paragraph might open with a statement showing a transition into a new subtopic. The statement might either use a different set of keywords that are still related to the main topic but not to the previous subtopic. For instance, following the discussion of deforestation, the next paragraph simply brings up another issue about global warming:

In recent years, the global warming has contributed to an impact on the world's economy...

In the above statement, you can still see the key phrase of the main topic global warming, but you also see other new keywords unrelated to greenhouse gas or deforestation, which are impact and economy. This statement thus implies a transition into a new subtopic (probably the consequences of global warming), and that's the reason why you somehow think that a paragraph is the beginning of a new section.

If you're lucky, you will see linkers that mark an explicit transition into a new subtopic, which save you some time inferring the author's intention, such as:

Despite these warning signs, no progress in alleviating the problem has been made...

Fortunately, green technology has evolved remarkably and become a viable solution to the problem...

In the first opening statement above, the linker despite suggests a contrast made with a transition into a new subtopic discussing the lack of effort to fix the problem, which of course refers to global warming in this context. In the second opening statement above, the linker fortunately indicate a transition into a new subtopic, which is about green technology and a solution to the problem. Again, the problem links back to the main topic, so the coherence is not only for locally connected paragraphs, but also for the entire essay.

This analysis is thus a practice for you to see the logic applied in English expository essay writing.

Cohesion

Cohesion is very similar to coherence, which is about the logical connection between different parts of writing, but cohesion focuses on the connection between sentences within a paragraph. There are many techniques at one's disposal to make proper connections between sentences, including:

• Repetition - Repeat keywords or phrases related to the currect topic.

  In recent years, global warming has been one of the major issues remained to be solved. Global warming is threating since its impacts can be observed everywhere in our daily life.

• Synonyms/Paraphrasing - Use different wordings for the same key concepts.

  In recent years, global warming has been one of the major issues remained to be solved. The substantial rise of global temperature is threating since its impacts can be observed everywhere in our daily life.

• Pronouns - Replace keywords or key phrases that have just mentioned with a pronoun to show the immediate connection.

  In recent years, global warming has been one of the major issues remained to be solved. It is threating since its impacts can be observed everywhere in our daily life.

• Demonstrate Adjective (this/these) + Summary Word - This is a useful way of cohesively emphasizing the focus in the current writing.

  In recent years, global warming has been one of the major issues remained to be solved. This problem is threating since its impacts can be observed everywhere in our daily life.

• The Former/Latter - When the first statement makes a comparison between (or a list of) two things, the following sentence could use former or latter to refer back to one of the two local focuses and build the proper connection.

  There are two primary factors that lead to global warming, namely greenhouse gas emission and deforestation. The former is correlated with industrial development, and the latter is tied to the growing world population.

• Linkers - There are different categories of linkers to establish a logical transition between sentences, and of them the most important ones could be those highlighting cause-effect relations, such as thus, therefore, as a result, and consequently:

  As the size of the world's population continues to grow, more food is in need. Consequently, large-scale deforestation would be inevitable to convert primitive areas into farms.

In this project, you will have to analyze cohesive writing for each section of the article by identifying sentences that are connected follwing the above strategies.

Take-home Message

By the end of an expository essay, the author usually hopes that readers have learned a lesson and take something away with them to remember for the rest of the life. This is the take-home message implied in the writing of the last few paragraphs (usually just the last one). Sometimes the take-home message is not made explicit, and as a reader, you must try to infer the message from the author’s writing. It could be a warning or an encouragement. It might express either optimism or pessimism. It can also be a piece of advice, or it demonstrates the author’s uncertainty. For example, imagine a concluding remark like this:

For years to come, the issues of global warming are only likely to become worse. Actions have to be taken immediately for us to have a chance, albeit fairly low, to win the battle. The key to success is whether we can eradicate bureaucracy and unite nations across the world, and hopefully this is at least a reachable agreement.

In the above concluding remark, we can sense a negative attitude as the author suggests that the problem is getting worse and it is perhaps not possible to solve the problem, given the expressions like become worse, a fairly low chance, and hopefully this is at least a reachable agreement (which implies that the agreement may not be reachable). To summarize the take-home message in one sentence, it could be The author predicts a bad future given the current state of global warming and suggests the problems may not be solved at all.

Occassionally, an expository essay might end with someone's opinion, and the take-home message might not be made extremely clear. But we can still infer the take-home message. The opinion is cited at the end of an essay because the author also shares the same opinion. Below is one example:

In the coming years, researchers will continue to find new ways of alleviating the global warming. "We couldn't say that we have tried everything", says Dr. Billings of the University of Minnesota. "But we are still not sure what we can do more to really slow it down. The clock is ticking and we're running out of time."

In the above concluding remarks, the author begins by giving hopes, saying that researchers will continue their effort. This seems to be a reasonable take-home message, but it's not. What Dr. Billings says is the real message that the author hopes to deliver, which is a bit pessimistic since there is really not much time and we still don't have some effective way to battle the rise of the global temperature.

For your essay, try to figure out the take-home message, and summarize it in one sentence and explain why you have such an interpretation.