Academic Writer
academic writer: organization: introductions: getting attention
Getting your reader's attention
You might find an attention-seeking start useful. Such
papers often stick out in the teacher's mind - especially if a class has produced a whole
set of boring essays! So you lose nothing by making the beginning as interesting as
possible.
EXAMPLE 1 In the search for quality, a lot of educators probably are looking for the
'perfect' items that the writer mentions in the first line. This is an
introduction designed to make you stop in your tracks and think! Do you think it
is successful?
Style note: Notice the repeated use of the word 'perfect'
In higher education, we
do not need a vision of the perfect curriculum, the perfect textbook, the perfect Website,
the perfect classroom, the perfect campus, the perfect home study, the perfect carrel, the
perfect combination of media. We need a
vision of improvement and change – how to keep moving forward, how to know when
we’re making mistakes, and how to correct them. Teaching and learning are
not problems that have solutions. They are
processes; they are fundamental modes of
human behavior and endeavor. People have been
teaching and learning longer than we can remember, and they will continue long after we
are gone. Teaching and learning can be
improved and we can and should continue to do whatever we can to improve them –
wherever, whenever, and however we can. A New Vision Worth Working Toward, Connected Education and Collaborative Change, Steven W.
Gilbert |
EXAMPLE 2 Style note: Notice the colourful
choice of language (in bold).
| Deregulation in financial markets: the way
forward? In February 1995, Barings Bank, the oldest Merchant Bank in London, went under with losses in excess of $1 billion. The scandal rocked the international banking world and a 28-year old trader, Nick Leeson, whose derivative trading activities were blamed for the disaster, is now serving a six-and-a-half year jail sentence in Singapore. In this paper I would like to look at the circumstances of this well known case, and the implications for wider financial markets. In particular I would like to address the question, are our financial markets too deregulated? |
EXAMPLE 3 You can also start your essay with a contentious statement (one that not everybody would agree with).
| Teaching Engineering as a Social Science Today’s public engages in a love affair with technology, yet it consistently ignores the engineering at technology’s core. This paradox is reinforced by the relatively few engineers in leadership positions. Corporations, which used to have many engineers on their boards of directors, today are composed mainly of M.B.A.s and lawyers. Few engineers hold public office or even run for office. Engineers seldom break into headlines except when serious accidents are attributed to faulty design. While there are many theories on this lack of visibility, from inadequate public relations to inadequate public schools, we may have overlooked the real problem: Perhaps people aren’t looking at engineers because engineers aren’t looking at people. |
EXAMPLE 4 Another example of a contentious statement (Not everyone would agree that "We live in a strange and precarious time that resembles ... the witch trials."
| Child abuse: a Modern day witch hunt? We live in a strange and precarious time that resembles at its heart the hysteria and superstitious fervor of the witch trials of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Men and women are being accused, tried, and convicted with no proof or evidence of guilt other than the word of the accuser. Even when the accusations involve numerous perpetrators, inflicting grievous wounds over many years, even decades, the accuser's pointing finger of blame is enough to make believers of judges and juries. Individuals are being imprisoned on the "evidence" provided by memories that come back in dreams and flashbacks -- memories that did not exist until a person wandered into therapy and was asked point-blank, "Were you ever sexually abused as a child?" |
Find out about other types of Introductions
Academic Writer 2000