THE H-J GUIDE TO WRITING GOOD HISTORY PAPERS

Grading criteria   **   Rules   **    Tips and checklist    **    Mechanics of quoting     
 Documentation formats    **    What's wrong with these sentences?    **    Writing workshop guidelines

Grading criteria: argument, evidence, expression

ARGUMENT/ INTERPRETATION
Your paper needs to provide an analysis of the material.  Do not just describe events or summarize other people's ideas.  Frame your paper around a problematic (a question or issue for analysis).  Over the course of the paper, develop a logical, well-substantiated argument in response to the problem you lay out in your introduction.  Provide an interpretation that has breadth, coherence, and insight.

EVIDENCE
You should back up your argument with evidence from authoritative secondary sources and/or primary sources.  You must cite every idea you borrow from another author.  You must cite every time you quote a primary or a secondary source.  Most historians prefer footnotes (see Guide to citation formats).  You also need to include a Bibliography or Works Cited page at the end of your paper.

EXPRESSION
Writing in clear, well-organized prose is crucial to effective rhetoric (the art of making an argument).  If a reader cannot understand your meaning, then s/he will certainly not be convinced by your argument.  Think about your writing in both global (the paper as a whole and its component paragraphs) and local (the sentences and their elements) terms:

A.  OVERALL ORGANIZATION/ PARAGRAPHS

    1. THESIS STATEMENT:  you should state your argument clearly and forcefully in one or two sentences that come at the end of your introduction.

    2.  PAPER MAP: either in your thesis statement or in a subsequent sentence, you should give the reader some idea of the main sections of the paper that correspond to the main points of your argument.  

    3. TOPIC SENTENCES:  the topic sentence is the first sentence of every paragraph or, in a longer paper, every paragraph group.  They should be analytical rather than descriptive and push your argument forward in a step-by-step manner.  A reader ought to be able to read the first sentence of every paragraph and come away with an overall picture of your analysis.

    4. TRANSITIONS:  the glue that holds the paragraphs together.  You need to cue the reader (without being redundant), as you proceed from one point in your argument to the next.  Through both topic sentences and transitions, you should provide THESIS HOOKS, which connect the point you are developing to the overall argument of the paper.

B.  SENTENCES:  RULES OF CLARITY, GRAMMAR, AND PUNCTUATION.

    1. BE CONCISE.  TIGHTEN WORDY SENTENCES.  STRIVE FOR AN ECONOMY OF WORDS.

    2. WRITE IN THE ACTIVE, RATHER THAN THE PASSIVE, VOICE.
            Passive voice:  The slave was beaten by his master.
            Active voice:  The master beat the slave.

    3. BE CAREFUL AND CONSISTENT IN YOUR USE OF TENSE.
            Avoid shifts in tense.
            Stick to the past tense in writing history papers.
            Avoid the conditional tense (would, should, could). 

    4. AVOID MISPLACED PHRASES AND DANGLING MODIFIERS.
            Misplaced phrase:
                The report described the robber as a six-foot-tall man with a mustache weighing 150 pounds.
            Dangling modifier:
                Opening the window to let out a bee, the car accidentally swerved into an oncoming car.

    5. AVOID SPLIT INFINITIVES.
            The infinitive form of a verb: to avoid.  Do not separate "to" and "avoid" by other words.

    6. VARY SENTENCE OPENINGS.
   
    7. MAKE SUBJECTS AND VERBS AGREE.

    8. MAKE PRONOUNS AND ANTECEDENTS AGREE.

    9. REPAIR SENTENCE FRAGMENTS (also called incomplete sentences).
            A sentence consists of at least one independent clause.  An independent clause has a subject and a verb (e.g. Europeans searched high and
            low for gold.).

            Fragments are:
                1) clauses that contain a subject and a verb but begin with a subordinating word (But Europeans searched high and low for gold.), or
                2) phrases that lack a subject, a verb, or both (e.g. Here searching high and low for gold.).

    10. REPAIR RUN-ON SENTENCES (also called fused sentences).
            Run-on sentences are composed of two independent clauses that are not connected by an appropriate mark of punctuation or a coordinating conjunction.

    11. CORRECTLY INTEGRATE QUOTES.

    12. AVOID EXCESSIVE COMMA USAGE.

    13. USE SEMI-COLONS CORRECTLY.
          Only use semicolons to separate independent clauses not joined by a coordinating conjunction or between items in a series containing internal
          punctuation.
          Europeans searched high and low for gold; they found relatively little.

    14. DO NOT END SENTENCES WITH PREPOSITIONS.

    15. ELIMINATE COMMON ERRORS:
            who and whom (used for people) /that
            their (possessive adjective)/ there (adverb)
            its (possessive adjective)/it's (it is)
            affect (verb) /effect (noun; occasionally a verb, as in "to effect change")
            using contractions (e.g. "isn't") in expository writing

Writing tips and checklist

• Your paper needs an opening that grabs the reader's attention:  try to interest your reader in your topic from the first sentence of your paper.  Convince your audience that you have a keen interest in the issue at hand.  Make them want to keep reading!

 
• Be attentive to your audience: always think about who is reading your work and how you should go about persuading them.  Find ways to help your audience relate to the issue under consideration.

 
• Use images and metaphors: readers respond to well-chosen images that help illustrate the main points of the argument and establish connections between the writer and the audience.

 
• Make sure your paper is well organized, but not formulaic.  For expository writing, this means having an introduction with a clearly stated thesis, a logically flowing set of proofs (with topic sentences and evidence), and a thoughtful conclusion.

 
• Use evidence to make your argument: a paper without evidence (illustrations, direct quotes, etc.) is like a sieve.  It is much easier to persuade someone to accept your argument when you provide evidence as well as commentary.

 
• Read your draft out loud to make sure it flows smoothly.  Try not to cram too many ideas into one paragraph or make illogical jumps from one point to another.  Try to make your sentences to the point.  Avoid rambling.

 
• Use effective vocabulary: having "good vocabulary" does not mean using big or obscure words, but using words precisely.  Expanding your vocabulary can help you if you have trouble communicating exactly what you think.

 
• Write a conclusion that reflects back on the main points of the paper, but is also suggestive.

• Final checklist:

Using a colon to introduce a quote
Plumber describes the Walpole administration in terms that remind one of the patronage system in U. S. cities:  "Sir Robert was the first English politician to understand how to use the loyalty of people whose only qualification was his sponsorship.”¹

NOTE:  If you quote a complete sentence, you must capitalize the first word in the quotation.  Also, the MLA citation comes after the quote, but before the period.

Using a comma to introduce a quote
According to Booth, “Regardless of your field, you have to rely on the research of others and report what they have found.”¹

In an article in the Educational Record, Brenda Wilson points out that making information available “on command" could reshape "the traditional role of educational institutions . . . in forms far richer than classroom discussion, and in an order totally unrelated to a syllabus or course outline” (9).

NOTE:  When weaving quotes into your own sentence, you must be sure that the grammar of your part of the sentence matches the grammar of the quotation.  Use square brackets and ellipses to indicate the changes you make to the quotation.  The Latin term sic (“thus”) is traditionally used inside brackets to indicate an obvious error in the original sentence, although sometimes it is more helpful just to give the correct form inside brackets.

Setting off a block quote (for quotations of three or more lines)
Chicago style
Lee expresses many peoples' confusion about the superhighway in “The Information Interstate:  Superhighway or Superhype?”:

             It's here now.  It's not here yet.  It's cable t-v.  It's fiber optic,
             500-channel, full-video, couch-spud nirvana bulldozing
             virtual asphalt to a home near you.  It's the information
             superhighway! . . . or is it?¹

NOTE:  When using indented quotes, DO NOT use quotation marks, and single space the quote.  Put the MLA citation outside the sentence's punctuation.

Using ellipses
I disagree with the argument that the “students of the twenty-first century . . . will rarely use pencil and paper.”¹

NOTE:  Use ellipses when you want to omit material from a quotation.  Use ellipsis points only in the middle of a quote.  Take care not to distort the meaning of the original text through the use of ellipses.
 

University of Chicago footnote format:
1) Book
¹Ronald Hyam, Britain’s Imperial Century, 1818-1914: A Study of Empire and Expansion (Lanham, MD: Barnes and Noble Books, 1993), 300.

2) Chapter in book
¹David Fitzpatrick, “Ireland and the Empire,” in Oxford History of the British Empire Volume 3 The Nineteenth Century, ed. Andrew Porter (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 1999), 518.

3) Article in journal
¹Simon Cordery, “Friendly Societies and the Discourse of Respectability in Britain, 1825-1875,” Journal of British Studies 34 (January 1995): 35.

4) Website
¹author, title of article or site (place of publication: publisher, date, date accessed); available from [provide URL].

Bibliography format:
1) Book
Hyam, Ronald.  Britain’s Imperial Century, 1818-1914: A Study of Empire and Expansion.  Lanham, MD: Barnes and Noble Books, 1993.

2) Chapter in book
Fitzpatrick, David.  “Ireland and the Empire.”  In Oxford History of the British Empire Volume 3 The Nineteenth Century, ed. Andrew Porter, 500-520.
Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999.

3) Article in journal
Cordery, Simon.  “Friendly Societies and the Discourse of Respectability in Britain, 1825-1875.” Journal of British Studies 34 (January 1995): 35-58.
 
 

Writing workshop guidelines