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Dissertation-ENDissertation, Doctoral thesis. Academic essay, school essay, five-paragraph-essay: This is the conceptual equivalent of the French dissertation in the United States. It is a form of persuasive writing that is equally structured and canonic. The “academic” essay can be in response to texts read in class, texts that are explicitly or implicitly approved, texts and discussions from class, from the exterior world or the school institution, general conversations, and so on. Students are often expected to cite, paraphrase, summarize; in this case the essay might be called a “documented essay.” For the “social constructivists” in particular, the academic essay is a key genre because it is the currency of the academic discourse community (without suggesting here that there are homogeneous definitions of this genre, in particular since it is seen quite differently by theorists vs. practitioners. The “school essay” appears before university studies, but influences the structure of university essays. The particular form most often taught is the five-paragraph-essay, made up of:
Note that there is considerable tension between the expectations in secondary education (and the need to teach the five-paragraph-essay) and post-secondary education (with its tendency to reject the five-paragraph-essay). |