Evidence Lead-Ins:

Adding Fluidity and Ethos to Your Argument

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Examples of Good Evidence Lead-Ins

• The legal settlements from the BP oil spill are, by any standard, a monumental task.“This thing has taken a life of its own far beyond what I thought,” says Patrick A. Juneau, the court-appointed special master who administers payouts from the BP fund. Juneau, 76, calls it a “Herculean task” and jokes, “I don’t know whether I’ll be alive” when it’s finished. He defends the process, noting that while his office has deemed 63,128 claims eligible for just under $5 billion in payments, 52,525 other claims have been denied as of Feb. 12. He points out that BP and the plaintiffs’ lawyers agreed to terms that don’t require those harmed to show direct links to the oil spill.

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Examples of Good Evidence Lead-Ins

In Kharkiv [eastern Ukraine], police stood by as protesters swarmed into a building occupied by activists who support the new government, beating their opponents before hoisting Russian and Ukrainian flags. Tens of thousands of people gathered in the morning to protest the Maidan revolution. The assault on the building was “completely spontaneous,” said Denis Levshinko, a sociology student who participated in the rout of the Maidan activists. “We are all fed up with them. We united, and we chased them out.”

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What is needed in this paragraph?

The question Beloved's emergence occasions is two-fold: is this young woman the ghost of the murdered child assuming human form? And, if she is the child returned from the dead, why has she returned, and what does she want? There is disagreement among critics concerning these questions, as well as the symbolic significance of the mysterious figure. While the majority agree that Beloved is a ghost, a visitor from the spirit world who makes visible the potent connection between the living and the dead, others believe she is indeed a living person. Furthermore, seeing Beloved as a connection between the living and the dead may offer the most meaningful reading.

Revised Paragraph: Add the Evidence

The question Beloved's emergence occasions is two-fold: is this young woman the ghost of the murdered child assuming human form? And, if she is the child returned from the dead, why has she returned, and what does she want? There is disagreement among critics concerning these questions, as well as the symbolic significance of the mysterious figure. While the majority agree that Beloved is a ghost, a visitor from the spirit world who makes visible the potent connection between the living and the dead, others believe that she is “a living being, an escaped slave who has been traumatized senseless,” and upon whom Sethe projects her wish of reestablishing a bond with her murdered daughter (Horvitz 4). Similarly, Beloved is centrally concerned with women's role in maintaining the continuity of family life, though in a much broader sense, "through the protection of their children, their men and the community" (Ferguson 112). Consequently, Beloved is more than the specific link between generations of women: "Beloved is above all a connection, the reconnection with

and restoring of all that was lost when [Sethe] was driven to kill her" (114). Ok. This is getting better since we are now actually

synthesizing some actual information to build our claim, but . . .

Who on earth said these things and in what context?

Revised Paragraph: Who Said It and In What Context?

The question Beloved's emergence occasions is two-fold: is this young woman the ghost of the murdered child assuming human form? And, if she is the child returned from the dead, why has she returned, and what does she want? There is disagreement among critics concerning these questions, as well as the symbolic significance of the mysterious figure. While the majority agree that Beloved is a ghost, a visitor from the spirit world who makes visible the potent connection between the living and the dead, Deborah Horvitz has argued in her essay that she is “a living being, an escaped slave who has been traumatized senseless,” and upon whom Sethe projects her wish of reestablishing a bond with her murdered daughter(4). Similarly, Rebecca Ferguson, holds the opinion that Beloved is centrally concerned with women's role in maintaining the continuity of family life, though in a much broader sense, "through the protection of their children, their men and the community" (112). Consequently, for Ferguson, Beloved is more than the specific link between generations of women: "Beloved is above all a connection," she claims, "the reconnection with and restoring of all that was lost when [Sethe] was driven to kill her" (114).

Nice additions, but why should I trust what these people say? Why are they worthy of being in your research essay as the piece of evidence chosen to develop your assertion?

You must add the speaker or writers credentials in a concise phrase.

Evidence Lead-Ins: Speaker/Writer’s Credentials

The question Beloved's emergence occasions is two-fold: is this young woman the ghost of the murdered child assuming human form? And, if she is the child returned from the dead, why has she returned, and what does she want? There is disagreement among critics concerning these questions, as well as the symbolic significance of the mysterious figure. While the majority agree that Beloved is a ghost, a visitor from the spirit world who makes visible the potent connection between the living and the dead, Deborah Horvitz has argued in her essay "Nameless Ghosts: Possession and Dispossession in Beloved" that she is “a living being, an escaped slave who has been traumatized senseless,” and upon whom Sethe projects her wish of reestablishing a bond with her murdered daughter(4). Similarly, Rebecca Ferguson, who has studied Beloved through the lens of feminist critique, holds the opinion that Beloved is centrally concerned with women's role in maintaining the continuity of family life, though in a much broader sense, "through the protection of their children, their men and the community" (112). Consequently, for Ferguson, Beloved is more than the specific link between generations of women: "Beloved is above all a connection," she claims, "the reconnection with and restoring of all that was lost when [Sethe] was driven to kill her" (114).

Quote Lead-Ins Much better paragraph: it includes

A direct quote or paraphrase in support of the assertion,

The speaker/writer and context for that quote or paraphrase,

And the credentials of the speaker/writer of the quote or paraphrase.