Late papers will receive a grade penalty of five points for every calendar day beyond the due date.  After two weeks the paper will not be accepted and a "zero" will be calculated into your final grade. Please be sure to keep your notes and a draft or photocopy of the paper until it is graded and returned.

Students are encouraged to meet with me to discuss their papers.  Rough drafts may be submitted to me for comments and suggestions without any formal grade.  In addition, I encourage you to make use of the writng lab at the ENC Center for Academic Services.

1. Citation: Your first citation must include the last names of the author(s) and the page number: (Johnson and Wilentz 122).  After that you will only need to provide the page number: (127).  When quoting a passage, make sure you place the period or comma inside the quotes and the citation before the period.  Like: "the soldiers never moved," Smith concludes (121).  Not: "the soldiers never moved", Smith concludes. (121)

2. Always avoid redundancy and repetition: "An African-American black man."; "A native American Indian"; "During this time period."  Simplify your sentences whenever and wherever possible.  If you can write the same thing in fewer words, then do so.

3. A work of history is not a "novel."  A novel is a work of fiction.  Hemingway's For Whom the Bell Tolls is a novel, whereas Stephen Ambrose's Undaunted Courage, a history of the Lewis and Clark expedition, is not.  Calling a work of history a novel is like calling a biography a phonebook.  It is like saying an elephant is a mouse.  Definitions do matter. 

4. When referring to events that took place in the past, use the past tense: "The Pilgrims ate a meal of thanksgiving with the Indians," Not: "The Pilgrims eat a meal of thanksgiving with the Indians."  Events in the past are not happening right now.  When recounting the arguments of a contemporary author, it is appropriate to use the present tense: "Smith describes the constitution as."

5. When you use words that are in any way pejorative or negative-stereotypes, terms of derision-make sure to put them in quotes.  Example: Locals called these Indians "savages."  In other words, be cautious.

6. A few abbreviations and terms I will use to mark your work: 

??? ---------- Convoluted writing or unclear meaning
----------- Delete
-------------- New paragraph
------------- Close up space
------------- Transpose, reverse order
^--------------- Insert
ACK---------- Acknowledge sources
AWK -------- Awkward, clunky, or otherwise poor sentence 
CASE------- Error in case
CL------------- Cliche
FL------------- Flowery language, wordy
INC----------- Incomplete sentence
REP---------- Repetition
RUN-ON --- A run-on sentence.  Example: "Some older Americans thought it impossible to land a man on the moon, it seemed no one could accomplish such a feat."  There should be a period after "moon" and "it seemed" should start a new sentence. 
T ------------- Improper tense
VAGUE ---- A selection that is not specific at all and provides no details 
WC ---------- Wrong word choice.  If you are not sure what a specific word means, avoid using it. 

1. The first paragraph of a historical paper, be it a research paper, short synopsis, or book review, should contain the author's central thesis or conclusions. The author must mention all important actors, as well as inclusive dates of coverage and basic concepts or historical developments in the first paragraph. 

2. Use vigorous, direct language. Short sentences work. Employ concrete, precise nouns and active verbs, being careful, for example, to find active substitutes for forms of the verb "to be" and "to go." Inexperienced writers often erroneously think that convoluted language, long sentences, and pretentious diction impress teachers. 

3. Use the active, not the passive voice, in your prose. The active voice places the subject before the action. Active voice: On opening day, Sammy Sosa blasted his 71st home run. Passive voice: His 71st home run was blasted by Sammy Sosa on opening day. (See the elaboration of this point below). 

4. Avoid all first-person or surrogate references. By "surrogate" I mean such terms as one, we, the current writer. 

5. Avoid discussion of method, intentions, and structure. There is no need to intrude explicit statements of authorial intention ("In the following pages, I am going to argue that. . . ."-just state the argument) or to deliver bulletins about the paper's structure ("This paper is divided into three sections. . . ."-just state your three central arguments or observations in a well-crafted opening paragraph). I agree with writer Samuel Hynes that "the less obtrusive the story-teller is, the better for the story, and . . . when an assertive narrating personality shoulders his [or her] way between the reader and the subject, biography [and history] suffer. . . ." 

6. Inclusion of frequent chronological references and their placement at the beginnings of sentences, paragraphs, phrases, and so forth contributes significantly to more accessible and dynamic prose. 

7. On a related point, an author must be careful in selecting the time boundaries for her paper but once having established them she must not extend them in the text. Authors should observe this rule on the level of the paragraph as well. For example: If the title of your paper is something like "Gainesville Goes to War, 1917-19," it is not appropriate to mention in the text any event or development that occurred after 1919, except possibly in an introductory paragraph. If the writer finds herself "stretching" the chronological boundaries of the paper to make points that seem important but falling beyond the original time limits established, she needs to adjust the paper's explicit focus and change the title. Thus, for example, "Gainesville Goes to War, 1917-1919" might be retitled: "The Impact of World War I Mobilization on the Citizens of Gainesville, 1917-1941." 

8. It is easy to fall into stuffy, pompous, trite rhetorical patterns. Double negatives, for example, often only lend inflated importance to commonplace observations. The gratuitous imputation of erroneous views to the reader is another bad habit (as in: "It would be unfair to conclude that Nixon was a homosexual. . ."; or "It would be a gross overstatement to say that the South won the Civil War. . . ." In both cases, the reader is being warned against making an error that the author is actually suggesting). 

9. Don't use lengthy block quotes. Always paraphrase and integrate into your own prose. Confine quoted words to short, distinctive selections, subordinating quoted material to your own purposes and your own language.  Of course, writers must be absolutely scrupulous in making proper attribution in quoting sources. 

10. There is much dismissive talk these days about so-called "political correctness." It is important for serious people to weigh carefully their language when referring to ethnicity, race, gender, and other politically charged subjects. Many complaints about the need to be "politically correct" reflect a desire on the part of politically or culturally dominant groups or interests to have license in the language they use to characterize or refer to minority, subordinated, or vulnerable groups. Language is a powerful tool. Use it judiciously, carefully, and with due respect for your fellow human beings. No one ever accused Adolph Hitler of being "politically correct." 

1. Run-on sentences. When in doubt, start a new sentence. 

2. Misplaced modifiers. ("Jumping out of bed, my shoulder hurt"; "Based on this evidence, Prof. Jones argues. . . "). 

3. Quotations and punctuation marks. Remember these lifetime rules: In American English -- Commas and periods always go inside quotation marks, Colons and semi-colons always go outside quotation marks, Question marks and exclamation points (which latter you have no need for in this paper) depend on the context.

4. Distinguish between possessives, which take the apostrophe, and plurals, which don't. There are specific rules for plural possessives (e.g., for nouns ending in s, add apostrophe s to make the possessive; but for pluralized nouns otherwise not ending in s, just add the apostrophe). Examples: Margaritas are made with tequila (correct). Margaritas' [or Margarita's] are made with lime juice (incorrect). The Margaritas' intoxicating properties turned me into a zombie (correct). 

5. Watch out for its and it's. Its is the possessive, as in "I liked the house because of its roominess." It's is the contraction for it is, as in "It's going to rain today."  Ronald Reagan never could get this straight and look at what happened to him. 

6. Adjectives and adverbs--get rid of as many as possible. In general, the higher the proportion of verbs in your writing, the more vigorous and effective it will be. Especially, strike the words "very" and "interesting" from your written vocabulary. 

7. Comparisons and parallels. Make sure that when you make or draw them, the terms are consistent with each other. ("In regard to onions, Harding's smelled stronger than Coolidge"-should be: stronger than "those of Coolidge" or "Coolidge's.") 

8. Be a "which" hunter, substituting "that" wherever possible. 

9. When dealing with human beings, "who" is the correct pronoun; "that" is never acceptable (as in: I met a man who [not that] once tended Sir Douglas Haig's horse).