POSITION PAPERS

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• Position papers consist of 70 to 90 e-mail lines
• sent to papers@english
• prior to the beginning of class on the day the paper is due.

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• Position papers don't fiddle-faddle with general introductions or conclusions,
• but rather get rather quickly to the point, which is
• a contention - or interpretive position - about the reading (or film) in question,
• and can perhaps productively be thought of as your position on what you take to be the text's position, the latter being contentious in itself (your opinion as to what the text's position is).

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• Don't summarize what's in the text (assume your reader knows the text well).
• Use textual evidence to support your contention or position.

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• A good rule of thumb for knowing if you have a remarkable position: ask yourself, "Might others be capable of disagreeing with me?" If not, then consider that your "position" is truistic or obvious or too agreeable.

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SAMPLE position papers.
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