The Funnel Introduction
Purpose: To draw your reader into your writing, let readers know why you are
making an argument, what texts or topics you are analyzing, and to present
your argument in your thesis.
Step 1: Common Ground:
Your WARRANT
Step 2: Text Connection:
What texts and/or topics
are you analyzing?
Step 3:
Thesis
&
Roadmap
Your warrant presents the reason why you
are making an argument in your essay. For
the good/evil essay, your warrant should
explain, based on your observations of the
world, why you believe human nature is
good, evil, or circumstantial.
Introduce all texts and authors you will
be writing about, but do not make an
argument yet.
Your thesis is your argument. Your
roadmap outlines the reasons you
will present to defend your
argument in your main ideas.
Example:
Step 1:
Common Ground:
Step 2:
Text Connection:
Step 3:
Thesis
&
Roadmap
Human goodness is displayed by the majority
of people on earth each day. Human goodness
is shown when a mother sacrifices her desires
for a child's need, when a friend listens to a
friend, and when one acquaintance thanks
another for caring. Human goodness can be
grand or simple, but the majority of human
action shows the natural propensity for
goodness in humanity.
Intimate interactions in William Golding’s novel, Lord of the
Flies, LeAlan Jones and Lloyd Newman’s nonfiction account
in Our America, and Art Spiegelman’s MAUS also explore
both major and minor acts of human kindness.
Humans are inherently good, and this is a quality that is born into most humans. In
literature, natural human goodness is demonstrated through Piggy's automatic,
unquestioning concern with the well-being of his peers in Lord of the Flies, through
the positive example LeAlan Jones and Lloyd Newman set through their work in the
Ida B. Wells housing project, and through the way Vladek sacrifices his own safety
even in the midst of the holocaust to protect his wife, Anja in Maus.