The French revolutions of 1789 and 1848

[ceolstan]

Angel,Sep 22 2003, 05:30 AM]

The problem is as follows:
"A comparison between the revolutionary in the revolutions of 1789 and 1848 in France."

Obviously, I will be doing most of the work myself, but I thought I'd ask to pick your brains for some thoughts before moving on.

I've decided to start by defining "revolution" and "revolutionary" in order to better be able to extract the core revolutionary aspects of the two events, as I'm not supposed to compare the two revolutions, but the revolutionary aspects of them.

You're quite correct. Your assignment wants you to make a distinction between "revolution," i.e. the overthrow of a political system, and "revolutionary." You're also correct that you need to clarify that distinction in your introductory paragraph, probably near the very beginning.

While it is not a bad idea to look up those terms in a dictionary or an encyclopedia so that you become more comfortable understanding the differences, it is not a good idea to include sentences along the line of "Websters defines `revolution' as...." Stylistically, this is the kind of sentence that a high school student can get away with, but it isn't good academic style for college level papers. Information found in a dictionary or an encyclopedia falls under the aegis of "common knowledge." In other words, unless you need to use the exact wording of the definition, you shouldn't have to cite the source. Your instructor assumes that you'll be able to figure out the difference.

The bulk of the first paragraph should move toward the comparative thesis. Comparisons (similarities) also imply contrasts (differences). This paper asks you look at the similarities first, which means you'll have to establish broad categories in which to operate. For example, who were the key motivators? Did they come from similar sections of society? Were their goals similar? Again, these kinds of categories will allow you to address specific events/situations.

Hope this helps.

--ceolstan