Writing Sample

[Syndicatte]

I am a philosophy minor at a small college with no full-time philosophy professors. The one adjunct at our school has not responded after I've reached out to him. 

So, I am pretty much on my own as I try to come up with a writing sample. I am wondering if anyone could give me some direction and tips on how to do this? I have a general subject and topic in mind, I just don't know how to come up with a "prompt" appropriate for 10-15 pages. 

Thank you

[Nothingtown]

Hey there! Since you're on your own on this one, I think one of the most straightforward methods you could do is a comparison paper. For example, Author A has an opinion on a topic, Author B has another opinion on the same topic. Compare, contrast, and argue for which one you think is better. Use lots of supporting articles and literature to argue for your point. A paper like this will show your ability to analyze texts, identify key differences between texts, and utilize philosophical reasoning and argumentation skills to support your opinion. 

Are you working on a writing sample for grad school applications? I'd recommend applying to mostly MAs if your current program doesn't have full-time faculty--of course, you may have already considered this. Many MA applications do not require a writing sample, so that's something else to consider. Check out the schools you're interested in and see if a sample is required--you may not need to write one at all!

[Monk_Fudge]

I think @Nothingtown's advice is super solid.

Adding onto his/her advice.. One thing you can do to turn a good comparison paper into an excellent philosophy paper is to always have in the back of your mind, "what's at stake?" That is to say, "why is this debate even important? What are the implications of Author's A opinion? What does this have to offer the philosophical discussion moving forward? What are further questions that need to be answered?" etc. 

I think adding these threads are important so as to not turn your philosophy paper into a pedantic textual argument.

Edited March 18, 2019 by Monk_Fudge
Typo

[hector549]

2 hours ago, Nothingtown said:

Hey there! Since you're on your own on this one, I think one of the most straightforward methods you could do is a comparison paper. For example, Author A has an opinion on a topic, Author B has another opinion on the same topic. Compare, contrast, and argue for which one you think is better. Use lots of supporting articles and literature to argue for your point. A paper like this will show your ability to analyze texts, identify key differences between texts, and utilize philosophical reasoning and argumentation skills to support your opinion. 

Are you working on a writing sample for grad school applications? I'd recommend applying to mostly MAs if your current program doesn't have full-time faculty--of course, you may have already considered this. Many MA applications do not require a writing sample, so that's something else to consider. Check out the schools you're interested in and see if a sample is required--you may not need to write one at all!

I'm going to respectfully disagree here; I've never seen a comparison paper that works well. I won't say it's impossible, of course, but I think it's quite hard to write one that comes across as making a substantive argument rather than "lit review-y".

Edited March 18, 2019 by hector549

[Monk_Fudge]

22 minutes ago, hector549 said:

I'm going to respectfully disagree here; I've never seen a comparison paper that works well. I won't say it's impossible, of course, but I think it's quite hard to write one that comes across as making a substantive argument rather than "lit review-y".

I agree that comparison papers often do end up sounding like bad History or English papers, especially if the paper spends too much time on summary and not enough on evaluation. 

With that said, if @Syndicatte spends a decent amount of time reading current articles in academic journals, finds a current and lively debate between authors, does some research and takes a stand, all the while exercising scholarly caution and grounding themselves in the primary/secondary literature, a good paper could come from this. 

While a paper that essentially consists of "Summary of Author A, Summary of Author B, why I think Author A is right" can be a bit shallow, a paper that's more like "Author A has suggested X about traditionally held interpretation of text Z. Author B considers this flawed for reason Y. In this paper I will show that this disagreement is based on a fundamental disagreement over concept W. Furthermore I will offer some considerations why more attention ought to be paid to concept W in text Z in order to have a better understanding of what Philosopher means by Q in later works" could be a super solid paper. 

Edited March 18, 2019 by Monk_Fudge
Grammar...

[Marcus_Aurelius]

Maybe this is a bit cynical, but I recommend criticizing an argument. Pick a relatively recent paper in an area you're interested in, explain how it fits into the discourse, and critique it (by saying it doesn't prove its point or proves less than its point, must consider something that it doesn't consider, isn't valid because of a controversial suppressed premise, etc.).

Best of luck!

[Glasperlenspieler]

I'm with @hector549 and @Marcus_Aurelius.

Here's one good approach :Find a relatively recent but significant account/theory of something in the scholarship (ideally something related to your proposed area of interest). Give a (charitable) analysis of what the account argues and why it's important/compelling. Then provide a counterexample or objection to this account. If possible, reformulate the original account to allow for the objection. Ideally, you could do 2-4 iterations of this. This is a style you will see in lots of published articles. The benefit is that it doesn't require you to reinvent the wheel (you're building on someone else's work) and demonstrates some familiarity with the literature. But it also allows for you to make an independent contribution be refining something to better make sense of the phenomenon at hand.