My paper is called Originality: A Figment of Our Imagination, I need a little help...

So, I think I have a pretty good intro... but I need help with where I should go from here. My intro:

Students are conditioned to cite sources to avoid plagiarism. They arrive to college with the mindset, "When in doubt, cite", but "Who owns the words?" (Shields). Does citing sources really matter? Plagiarism is defined as taking someone else's words, thoughts, or ideas and using them as your own. In the digital age, we are inundated with information and ideas that help shape our own stories and beliefs. With a limited amount of words in the English language, there are few combinations of words to create without knowing if someone else has already combined them. The need to acknowledge the owner of original thoughts or ideas (citation) is superfluous because thoughts and ideas are recycled and reused from daily observations and encounters.

Now, I have read a few articles and books that support my ideas. My plan was to go through each book or article and show how it supports my ideas. The thing is, I do not know how to transition from the intro to doing this... Is my intro unclear? How should I transition? Please help ASAP.. :)

Tyler,

You bring forth an interesting point! Who is to say that the words that one uses in an essay were not used, in some fashion, before? Well, you are right -- and the words that you use to create a sentence were probably used a thousand times in the past. But, that is not the point. The problem arises when one uses the very "idea" from another source, calling it his or her own. The words are not always the problem(s).

There are thousands of ways to tell one specific story. The "idea" behind that story is the part that is protected under copyright laws. You can use the same words to describe a totally different story and not infringe on the rights of the other person. It happens all the time. But, you do a good job in bringing that problem to the forefront in your essay.

I would probably proceed to write an essay about the very concept of originality. See how it goes. You have a good intro so far. If you need any help with it, give us a shout.

Mark

Try this:

Make a bold statement that will be the main truth expressed by your essay. Put that at the end of paragraph 1.

Make 5 statements that support that main statement. Let these be the topic sentences (i.e. first sentence of the paragraph) of each body paragraph.

How do you know what to write for those supporting sentences? Write whatever you find out in the articles you read.

***If you find out something that does not support your thesis, maybe you should adjust the thesis.

For a direct quote give the page number:
"When in doubt, cite", but "Who owns the words?" (Shields 14).

Oh, ha ha, I see that you make an interesting argument here...very good.