Fall 2005

Essay 1: Defining a Thesis

Sophocles' Antigone

Overview:

Professor Hart agrees with Hegel that conflicts between the family and the state are important to her intepretation of Antigone, but she believes that Hegel's thesis may still be incomplete in light of a careful reading of Sophocles' entire text.  Hegel sees in Sophocles' tragedy the opposition of family and state in Antigone's and Creon's positions respectively. In lecture, you heard arguments against such a stark opposition and arguments for Antigone's political role and Creon's vital connections to kinship. This essay is in part an exercise in definition, and we would like to suggest that the conflicts in the play have more to do with conflicts between one definition of family and another than with Hegel's family/state oppositions.

This assignment asks you to focus on one kinship relationship in the play and to develop two conflicting theses about that relationship that are specific, arguable, and complex.  Your essay will consist of a defense of only one of these theses that is supported by evidence from specific lines and passages. 

One way to think about the arguments Professor Hart presents is to consider how terms are defined.  For example, what interests in the play are associated with instutions of "family"?  To answer this question you will need to define where the boundaries that contain members of a particular immediate family would be logically drawn.  However, even within the play, individual characters disagree about who is and who is not closely related to them. 

Your section leader will probably chose a familial relationship that is discussed by the characters in Antigone from the following list:

Remember that kinship relationships in the play are complicated by the fact that Oedipus had an incestuous relationship with his mother Jocasta that produced offspring.

Although your section leader will choose the kinship relationship, it will be your job to look for passages in Antigone that are relevant to this relationship.  To define the relationship in the play, you will need to find every instance in which the relationship appears, either explicitly or implicitly, and close read each entire passage.  Use the Core Course Analysis Checklist on pages 46-47 of the Writer's Handbook to see how you will be expected to analyze quotations.

Do not choose the kinship relationship yourself!   Essays written about other topics will not receive credit!

Preparing for the Essay:

For background you should carefully read "Genre" (33-40), "Defining Terms" (41-43), "What is Analysis?" (44-47), and "Thesis Statments" (83-85) in the Writer's Handbook and the material on definition and writing a good thesis in Writing from A to Z ("defining terms" and "thesis").

Plan to re-read the play at least twice, even if you read Antigone in high school.  Otherwise you might miss valuable information contained in this translation and its notes.  As in real life, the characters of Antigone also rarely explicitly and precisely define their terms.  So part of your task in this assignment will be to do defining on their behalf, which is an activity that takes time and attention to nuances in the text.

You also may find it helpful to identify key terms that would be important for supporting a thesis about Antigone's family.  For example, words that appear in the play like "kin," "blood," "flesh," and "nature" may lead you to other clues.

Before you begin your essay, you will need to refine the language of two competing theses for public presentation to your instructor and your peers.  You may be asked to write these two competing theses on the whiteboard in your classroom and face tough questions about your precise logic and wording.

Your final essay should be 3-5 pages and will count for 30% of your writing grade.

A successful essay will do the following:

Thinking about audience . . .

You may want to consider what it was like to read Antigone in high school.  Do you know someone who might have read Antigone with you in your high school class who now attends another university?  How would this person view your essay?