The Humanities Essay

Humanities What are the Humanities? The Humanities are a group of academic disciplines that focus on the study of human culture. The Humanities include the study of languages, literature, philosophy, and performing arts. The Humanities also include social sciences like history and anthropology.

How to format a Humanities Paper 1. Modern Language Association (MLA) MLA helps build credibility by clearly referencing source material. MLA style provides writers with a system for referencing their sources through parenthetical citation. Parenthetical citations (a.k.a. in-text citations) mean that sources are directly integrated into the essay.

MLA Most often parenthetical citations include the author’s last name and the specific page number for the information cited. Example: Horgan explains that “globalization and communications” in modern society contributes to the decline of war because “[people] have become increasingly interdependent on—and empathetic toward—others” (Henderson 239).

Works Cited Page According to MLA style, you must have a Works Cited page at the end of your research paper. All of the parenthetical citations in the essay will direct the reader to the bibliographic citations which are listed in the Works Cited page. All entries in the Works Cited page must correspond to the works cited in the essay.

Works Cited Page Example

How to format a Humanities Paper 2. Chicago style The Chicago style allows writers to reference their sources using footnotes and endnotes. A footnote appears at the bottom of the page, and an endnote appears at the end of the paper. Using footnotes and endnotes allows writers to comment on the sources they are using.

Bibliography The bibliography provides an alphabetical list of all sources used in a given work. The bibliography is placed at the end of the essay. The bibliography includes all sources cited within the work and sometimes includes other relevant sources that were not cited but were referenced or will provide further reading.

Bibliography Example

Incorporating Direct Quotations in a Humanities Paper 1. Incorporating a direct quotation smoothly into your writing. Example: John Horgan explains his belief that war and violence is not an intrinsic part of human nature when he states that “the evidence of a decline in war-related deaths shows that we need not—and should not—accept war as an eternal scourge of the human condition” (Henderson 239).

Incorporating Direct Quotations in a Humanities Paper 2. Omitting unneeded works in direct quotations by using an ellipses Example: In his essay “Does Peace Have a Chance?” Horgan suggests that the “recent decline in war casualties […]has some scholars wondering whether […] war may be ending” (Henderson 237).

Incorporating Direct Quotations in a Humanities Paper 3. Using square brackets to indicate changes to a direct quotation Example: Horgan explains that “globalization and communications” in modern society contributes to the decline of war because “[people] have become increasingly interdependent on—and empathetic toward—others” (Henderson 239).

Present Tense and Active Voice When possible, always write in the present tense and active voice. When referring to a written work (i.e. an essay, novel, article etc…) always refer to it in the present tense. Example: John Horgan states that …. Not John Horgan stated that…

Active Voice Using active voice makes your meaning clear and keeps your sentences from becoming too complicated or wordy. Too much use of passive voice can cloud the meaning of your sentences.

Active Voice In a sentence using active voice, the subject of the sentence performs the action expressed in the verb. Example: The dog bit the boy.

Passive Voice Passive voice occurs when the subject of the verb receives the action instead of performing the action. Example: John rode the bicycle. Vs. The bicycle was ridden by John.

Active vs. Passive Voice If you want to change a passive-voice sentence to active voice, consider carefully who or what is performing the action expressed in the verb. Make that agent the subject of the sentence, and change the verb accordingly.

Active vs. Passive Voice Example (Active Voice): Most of the class is reading the book. Example (Passive Voice): The book is being read by most of the class. *The sentence written in the active voice contains eight words, whereas the sentence written in passive voice contains ten words.

Active vs. Passive Voice http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LEwBaFHTBQs

Sources Active and Passive Voice: Purdue OWL https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/539/01/ https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/539/02/

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