Tag Archives: bad writing

Throughout History, People have Begun Essays with Grand Generalizations

By Professor John McSnoot Throughout history, people have begun essays with grand generalizations. It’s one of the most common mistakes I see in student papers. These generalizations are often the same as the title of the essay, which should always be its own thought. There are three main mistakes I see in my students’ writing: Making a laundry list of reasons, sentence construction badness, and repetitive, redundant sentences of redundancy. Then, they do not provide adequate explanations for their reasoning.