Plural Magazine

for writing original academic essays

Offer an idea

Essays are generally linear, which means that you offer one idea at a time, per paragraph. This means that you have to decide the order in which you will present your ideas.


You can choose to present your ideas in whatever way you think makes the most sense to your reader, and whichever way will most appeal to their logic and sustain their interest.

Make It Count

The length of your paper should really be contingent upon the argument you're making. Teachers provide you with a broad range so make your argument and make it to its fullest capacity.

Get Creative

There are no strict templates for constructing a paper, nor is there a strict formula. That is part of the beauty and the difficulty behind writing a successful academic paper.

Writing Great Essays

If you are tasked with writing an academic paper and you want to make sure you earn an A on your next piece, use these techniques below:

Provide Context

An academic essay is one which requires you to put together a coherent set of concepts into one smooth argument. Give them the information they need to orient themselves. Answer their questions. You know that their questions will pertain to why this is important, when something happened, how it happened, who was involved, where it took place, and why it matters. Answer these questions before they have a chance to ask them. You can do this by providing your readers with the background on the topic or perhaps a summary of the literature that you were going to analyze. If you are going to use source text such as the First Amendment itself in order to review the idea of freedom of speech, you might very well "the first amendment so that your readers have a thorough understanding of where you're headed. If the text you are going to quote is quite long, you might be summarized just a few phrases which are integral to your argument.

Length and order

Many students question how long their essays must be. Teachers more often than not will give you arrange for the final paper. They will tell you that it must be between five and seven pages or that it must be between 10 and 20 pages. This is very broad for most students and can present problems. They might try and hit the bare minimum or they might try impressing their teacher by filling up for maximum. If you can make a more comprehensive argument in a matter of five pages, do not build your paper with unnecessary jargon and unrelated information just to exceed the maximum of seven pages. Do not do your argument and your grade the dishonor.

Your goal is to make your argument concise. If you find that in writing a draft the concise presentation you make does not fit your page length, then your topic is likely to narrow and you should expound upon it ever so slightly so that you can meet the minimum requirements. If you find in your first draft that the opposite is true, that your topic and final argument exceeds the maximum number of pages significantly, then your topic was far too broad and you need to narrow it down.


The focus of your paper will generally predict the structure that it takes. Your focus will dictate what the reader needs to know and what order is best for them to receive said information. The structure is unique to whatever claim you are presenting.

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