PART 1:

Examples of Introductory Paragraphs in Student Essays:

"As a lifelong crabber (that is, one who catches crabs, not a chronic complainer), I can tell you that anyone who
has patience and a great love for the river is qualified to join the ranks of crabbers. However, if you want your
first crabbing experience to be a successful one, you must come prepared."
(Mary Zeigler, "How to Catch River Crabs")

"Working part-time as a cashier at the Piggly Wiggly has given me a great opportunity to observe human
behavior. Sometimes I think of the shoppers as white rats in a lab experiment, and the aisles as a maze designed
by a psychologist. Most of the rats--customers, I mean--follow a routine pattern, strolling up and down the
aisles, checking through my chute, and then escaping through the exit hatch. But not everyone is so dependable.
My research has revealed three distinct types of abnormal customer: the amnesiac, the super shopper, and the
dawdler."
("Shopping at the Pig")
"We watch baseball: it's what we have always imagined life should be like. We playsoftball. It's sloppy--the way
life really is. I figured that out a long time ago, on a soft summer evening when I was 13 years old and dying of
embarrassment in center field as our opponents touched us up for 17 runs in the top half of the first inning.
Now, beer in fist, gaping at a blank TV screen as I wait for the first major league game of the season, I'm trying
to define just what it is I'm waiting for."
(Lubby Juggins, "Watching Baseball, Playing Softball")

"I started to dread arithmetic back in the third grade because I didn't want to memorize the multiplication tables.
Unlike learning how to read, studying math seemed to have no purpose other than to give me massive
headaches and shattered nerves. The alphabet was a wonderful code that, when deciphered, entertained me with
stories and revealed all kinds of secrets about the world. Multiplication tables, on the other hand, just told me
how much six times nine was. There was no joy in knowing that. Although even in third grade I understood that
I shared with many other students a terrible fear and hatred of mathematics, I drew little comfort from that fact.
Since then, I have struggled with math for a number of reasons."
(Anne Miller, "Learning to Hate Mathematics")

"The music was composed as a drinking song for an 18th-century London social club. The words were written
in 1814 by Francis Scott Key to commemorate a battle. And on March 3, 1931, "The Star-Spangled Banner"
officially became the national anthem of the United States. Ever since then, people have been complaining that
the tune is unsingable and the lyrics are offensive. In response to these complaints, a bill was recently filed in
Congress to replace "The Star-Spangled Banner" with "America the Beautiful" as our national anthem. For a
number of reasons, this bill deserves wide support."
(Shelby Wilson, "Time for an Anthem the Country Can Sing")

"U2 have always produced rhetorically powerful songs. From the spiritually driven "I Still Havent Found
What Im Looking For" to the blatantly sexual "If You Wear That Velvet Dress," audiences have been
persuaded to examine their religious doubts as well as to give in to their emotions. Never a band content in
sticking to one style, their music has evolved and taken many forms. Their more recent songs show a level of
complexity so far unsurpassed in music, drawing heavily on the ambiguity of paradox in songs like "So Cruel"
while evoking sensory overload with the aid of the list structure in "Numb." But one of the most powerful songs
dates back to their early years, when their style was Senecan-like, seemingly simpler and more direct. "Sunday
Bloody Sunday" stands out as one of U2s finest songs. Its rhetoric is successful because of its simplicity, not
despite it."
(Mike Rios, "The Rhetoric of U2's 'Sunday Bloody Sunday'")

Introductory Paragraphs: Observations and Recommendations

"Many writers find writing an introduction a difficult way to start the process and instead work through the
body and conclusion first. . . .
"[S]ince the introduction gives an overview of your paper, an introduction is naturally easier to write once you
have developed your line of thought. Writing, or at least revising, your introduction as a last step gives you an
opportunity to incorporate upfront the insight that you gained as you worked through the body and conclusion
of your paper."
(Dona J. Young, Writing From the Core: A Guide for Writing. Writer's Toolkit Publishing, 2009)

Some Common Introductory Patterns

1. Begin with a general subject that can be narrowed down into the specific topic of your essay.
2. Begin with specifics (a brief anecdote, a specific example or fact) that will broaden into the more general topic
of your essay.
3. Give a definition of the concept that will be discussed.
4. Make a startling statement.
5. Start with an idea or statement that is a widely held point of view, and then surprise the reader by stating that
this idea is false or that you hold a different point of view.
(Sandra Scarry and John Scarry, The Writer's Workplace with Readings: Building College Writing Skills, 7th ed.
Wadsworth, 2011)

Reversing Expectations
"In March 2006, I found myself, at 38, divorced, no kids, no home, and alone in a tiny rowing boat in the
middle of the Atlantic Ocean. I hadnt eaten a hot meal in two months. Id had no human contact for weeks
because my satellite phone had stopped working. All four of my oars were broken, patched up with duct tape
and splints. I had tendinitis in my shoulders and saltwater sores on my backside.
"I couldnt have been happier. . . ."
(Roz Savage, "My Transoceanic Midlife Crisis." Newsweek, March 20, 2011)

"MENARD, Tex., Feb. 24--Here on a stony meadow in West Texas, at the end of 10 miles of unpaved road
through mesquite-covered, coyote-infested scrub land, several hundred bearers of a strategic commodity of the
United States of America are gathered.
"They are goats. . . ."
(Keith Bradsher, "'Strategic' Goats Gobble Up Trade Subsidy." The New York Times, February 26, 1993)

Introductory Paragraphs in Essay Exams

"Do not give any supporting information in your introductory paragraph. That will come later. Keep this
paragraph simple. On an essay test, especially, it is better to write one powerful sentence than to write several
that are weak and wordy. In any event, do not write more than just a few sentences. You really do not want to
spend too much time on this paragraph; move as quickly as you can into the main part of your answer."
(William H. Peltz, Dear Teacher: Expert Advice for Effective Study Skills. Corwin Press, 2007).
PART 2:

Examples and Observations:

"In addition to appealing to readers and helping them to anticipate tone and substance, the opening passage can
also help readers read by helping them to anticipate the structure of what will follow. In classical rhetoric, this
was called the division or partitionbecause it indicates how the piece of writing will be divided in parts."
(Richard Coe, Form and Substance: An Advanced Rhetoric. Wiley, 1981)

Methods of Introducing an Essay

Here are a few possible ways to open an essay effectively:

State your central idea, or thesis, perhaps showing why you care about it.

Present startling facts about your subject.

Tell an illustrative anecdote.

Give background information that will help your reader understand your subject, or see why it is important.

Begin with an arresting quotation.

Ask a challenging question. (In your essay, you'll go on to answer it.)

(X.J. Kennedy et al., The Bedford Reader. Bedford/St. Martin's, 2000)

Examples of Introductory Paragraphs in Essays

- "Bill Clinton loves to shop. On a March day in an elegant crafts store in Lima, the Peruvian capital, he hunted
for presents for his wife and the women on his staff back home. He had given a speech at a university earlier
and just came from a ceremony kicking off a program to help impoverished Peruvians. Now he was eyeing a
necklace with a green stone amulet."
(Introduction to "It's Not About Bill," by Peter Baker. The New York Times Magazine, May 31, 2009)
- "There were strangers on our beach yesterday, for the first time in a month. A new footprint on our sand is
nearly as rare as in Robinson Crusoe. We are at the very edge of the Atlantic; half a mile out in front of us is a
coral reef, and then nothing but 3,000 miles of ocean to West Africa. It is a wild and lonely beach, with the same
surf beating on it as when Columbus came by. And yet the beach is polluted."
(A.B.C. Whipple, "An Ugly New Footprint in the Sand." Life, March 20, 1970)

Introductions to Speeches
- "An effective introduction has four basic goals:
- Catch the audience's attention and focus it on your topic.
- Motivate the audience to listen by pointing out how your topic will benefit them.
- Establish credibility and rapport with your audience by creating a common bond and letting them know about
your expertise and experience with the topic.
- Present your thesis statement, which includes clarification of your central idea and main points.
(Cheryl Hamilton, Essentials of Public Speaking, 5th ed. Wadsworth, 2012)
- "'Websters Dictionary defines . . .'? Thats the Jim Belushi of speech openings. It accomplishes nothing but
everyone keeps using it and nobody understands why."
(Alison Brie as Annie in Community, March 2012)
- "How can you effectively capture attention, present your topic, establish credibility, and preview your major
points in just a few minutes? Try one of these eight tried-and-true techniques: (1) using a startling statement, (2)
asking a question, (3) telling a story, (4) using a quote, (5) using suspense, (6) talking about personal
experience, (7) referring to the audience, and (8) using humor. Not every one of these techniques is appropriate
for every speech or occasion. However, among these eight techniques you're sure to find at least one that will

work well for your next speech."

(Courtland L. Bove, Contemporary Public Speaking, 2nd ed. Collegiate Press, 2003)

Examples of Introductions to Speeches

- "The first thing I would like to say is thank you. Not only has Harvard given me an extraordinary honour, but
the weeks of fear and nausea I have endured at the thought of giving this commencement address have made me
lose weight. A win-win situation! Now all I have to do is take deep breaths, squint at the red banners, and
convince myself that I am at the worlds largest Gryffindor reunion."
(J.K. Rowling, commencement address at Harvard University, June 2008)
- "Africa is rich. Why then are Africans poor?"
(Mercy Amba Oduyoye, keynote address at the All Africa Conference of Churches in Addis Ababa, 1997;
quoted by Peter J. Paris in Religion and Poverty, 2009)
- "I would like to thank the Secretary General for inviting me to be part of this important United Nations Fourth
World Conference on Women. This is truly a celebration, a celebration of the contributions women make in
every aspect of life: in the home, on the job, in the community, as mothers, wives, sisters, daughters, learners,
workers, citizens, and leaders.
"It is also a coming together, much the way women come together every day in every country. We come
together in fields and factories, in village markets and supermarkets, in living rooms and board rooms. Whether
it is while playing with our children in the park, or washing clothes in a river, or taking a break at the office
water cooler, we come together and talk about our aspirations and concerns. And time and again, our talk turns
to our children and our families. However different we may appear, there is far more that unites us than divides
us. We share a common future, and we are here to find common ground so that we may help bring new dignity
and respect to women and girls all over the world, and in so doing bring new strength and stability to families as
well. . . ."
(Hillary Rodham Clinton, introduction to an address delivered in Beijing, China, at the U.N. 4th World
Conference on Women Plenary Session, Sep. 5, 1995)

Quintilian on the Appropriate Time to Compose an Introduction (or Exordium)

"I do not, on these accounts, agree with those who think that the exordium is to be written last; for though it is
proper that our materials should be collected, and that we should settle what effect is to be produced by each
particular, before we begin to speak or write, yet we ought certainly to begin with that which is naturally first.
No man begins to paint a portrait, or mold a statue, with the feet; nor does any art find its completion where the
commencement ought to be. Else what will be the case if we have no time to write our speech? Will not so
preposterous a practice disappoint us? The orator's materials are, therefore, to be first contemplated in the order
in which we direct, and then to be written in the order in which he is to deliver them."
(Quintilian, Institutes of Oratory, 95 AD).
PART 3: