ESS112 Politics and Environment – preparing your ESSAY

This is to assist you in preparation of your 2000 word essay. This is an argumentative essay where you take on a stance and justify that using the best available evidence and you counter argue alternatives.

Topic Theme: “Lessons from History” the sub-theme is how the political system has influenced the environment in Polynesia.

Submission date: 8 September by 12:00

Prepare a TYPED essay of no more than 2200 words (no less than 1800 words) summarising arguments and counter arguments for either of these stances.

A)The Rapa-nuians caused a pre-colonial ecological collapse through a monument building obsession (Diamond’s Ecocide Hypothesis)

OR

B)The Rapa-nuians were successful at adapting to a fragile and changing environment (Hunt and Lipo’s argument that they were able to adapt and succeed in living in a fragile environment and under changing bio-physical conditions)

The Hunt and Lipo research papers are a direct “counter argument” to Diamond’s “Ecocide”

In both situations, it was the political regime that influenced human behaviour and the environmental outcome.

You need to review this material for assignment 1 (

1)Jared Diamond’s Book Collapse: Chapter 2 Twilight at Easter

2)Terry Hunt and Carl Lipo Ecological Catastrophe and Collapse: The Myth of 'Ecocide' on Rapa Nui (Easter Island)

3)Terry Hunt and Carl Lipo Revisiting Rapa Nui (Easter Island) ‘‘Ecocide’’

Review the following videos:

1)Easter Island - A lesson for survival (Interview with Jared Diamond)

2)Big Heads, Small Brains: The Story of Easter Island

3)Lessons from Easter Island | Carl Lipo | TEDxBermuda

If you are still struggling to connect these different viewpoints please review this full length documentary that provides a recent and balanced view of various alternative views. The Hidden Secret of the Statues on Easter Island

Getting started with your Essay

In this essay, a significant proportion of the relevant text has been made available to you, plus we have covered various aspects of the topic in class where you were asked to take notes. All video links are provided in your course reader.

ALL ESS examinations are assessed on essay writing following the three-part essay structure of Introduction, Body and Conclusion. The typical examination instructions for all ESS courses include the following:

[Answers should be] “structured with an introduction, body and conclusion. Use headings, sub-headings and short connected paragraphs.”

These videos are part of the material in a MOOC (massive open online course) on academic writing offered by Lund University. You can find the course "Writing in English at University" at the course is offered for free and anybody can register.

Structuring a text around the three-part essay (Introduction, Body, Conclusion)

Longer essays such as this one, while you have the identified three parts, will need a minimum of THREE body paragraphs. These paragraphs should be as follows:

/ You need at least ONE paragraph to outline the main argument. If in your essay there is more than one line of argument, it is best you give each line of argument its OWN paragraph. To AVOID PLAGIARISM you should have taken your OWN notes from the readings or from listening to the audio-books and supporting videos.
In order to strengthen your “Arguments” you should look at possible objections (sometimes referred to as the counter arguments). If you have done sufficient reading, reflection and planning these will be less convincing arguments. If possible try to provide a counter argument to each of your arguments; however this is not always possible.
In your reply section you offset the strengths of the main arguments with the weaknesses of counter arguments. In this way you counter sceptics that did not originally agree with your main arguments. This approach strengthens the underlying analytical structure of your essay.

Extracted from How to Write a Good Argumentative Essay: Logical Structure by Kevin de La Plante

When you come to write up an experiment or the results from some form of survey you will use the IMRaD structure which is Introduction, Methods, Results and Discussion.

IMRaD
(it is not necessary to actually review this film as it will be covered in more detail at Second Year).

In the tutorial we will review the following videos from (Lund University’s massive open online course) on academic writing:

Structuring an argument (Shown in Class)

Structuring paragraphs (Shown in Class)

Structuring information (Shown in Class)

Even before you really start your essay make sure you have read the assigned articles and taken your own notes. Notes can either be prepared electronically or done by hand. There is no substitute for good planningand there is no one best method, however, depending on the nature of the essay requirements you can select the “Spider Diagram” a “Positive and Negative Attributes Table” or a “Flow Chart”. Mind and Concept Maps (including the Sketch Notes) are specific techniques that lead from a “Spider Diagram” and a “Concept Map” respectively.

For this exercise we recommend that you use the “Spider Diagram” as explained in the video “How to Write an Argumentative Essay – Planning” We do not require that you submit any notes and leave the note taking and planning schemes to whichever system is your preference.

Plagiarism
If you take your own notes, reflect on these and then organise these into a plan following the instructions above the chances of plagiarism are virtually nil. Plagiarism is most often encountered as part of poor and insufficient preparation and an approach where the student cuts and pastes text which is subsequently re-worked to avoid detection using Turnitin. The main issue is that even IF the text is reworked there is very often a paragraph or structural plagiarism. In class we will watch this fun video produced by the University of Witwatersrand. While their final words are to use Turnitin to check that the content is original, we DO NOT REQUIRE that you use it. We do, however, keep the option that we may scan any document, if we are suspicious that it has been plagiarised. See Plagiarism Film Wits Library

Please make sure you HAND-IN a completed plagiarism form (see Course Handout for the form to complete). Late submissions will only be accepted 3 days after the due date and each day late will be penalised with 5%.After 3 days no essays will be accepted anymore unless you have a valid medical certificate or made an arrangement with your lecturer.