Aphorisms on Terms

Establishing Terms: A major aspect of any argument is terminology. You must discuss the terms you will be using to interpret a text. Don't assume your reader knows your analytical vocabulary, or shares your understanding of key concepts.

Defining and Discussing: Often, when we hear “terms,” we think about words that need definition. In an academic paper, however, it’s usually about words that need discussion. That discussion should summarize the web of ideas and claims behind a key term, as well as establishing contrast with other terms to help give concepts clarity and distinctiveness. 

Defining Terms: There are four key strategies for defining terms: 

  1. Self-definition: “By irony, I mean…”
  2. Dictionary Definition: “The Oxford English Dictionary gives 1566 as the first instance of irony meaning…”
  3. Etymology: “The English word irony comes from the Greek eiron, meaning…”
  4. Theoretical Citation: “Richard Rorty defines irony as…”

Discussing Terms: Your discussion of terms need not be a definition of terms. Sometimes, it is absolutely necessary to define what you mean by a given term. Other times, however, what is really needed is a discussion of the concepts that are in play in a paper and their relationships. For example, if you were to address the question of mimesis in Shakespeare’s Hamlet, you would need to define what mimesis is, “the representation of reality,” but you might also need to discuss the relationship between art and nature; you would not need to give definitions of art and nature, because everyone knows what those are, but you would need to provide an overview of the conceptual situation, i.e. art is supposed to reflect nature, but it doesn’t do so exactly, and so forth.

Terms from Texts: As much as possible, draw your terms from your text. In other words, unless you can justify it, don’t import terms from elsewhere to interpret a text that might not be operating in those terms.

Terms from Contextual Sources: At the same time, one of the justifications for doing a multi-source essay is that bringing in an additional source provides a vocabulary for explaining what is going on in the initial source. 

No Big Download: Don’t do a big download of terms all at once: “Ahem, here are all the terms in play in my paper, even though they’re not all related, but I’m going to identify every term and define it because this is the section in which I’m defining my terms.” It feels too mechanical. Only introduce the terms that are needed to understand the next stage of the paper, usually the thesis.

Terms Before Thesis: The idea behind discussing terms is that those terms can then serve as shorthand: you can explain in detail what you mean by a given term, and then you can use that term whenever you need to, especially in your thesis, without having to explain yourself every time.

Terms Make Theses Brief and Meaningful: As such, one reason for defining your terms is so that you can provide a thesis statement that is both brief and meaningful: brief because its use of terms already discussed makes it sharp, clear, and concise, and effectively provocative and memorable; and meaningful insofar as the briefly stated claim in the thesis points back to a nuanced discussion of terms.

Terms as Keywords: Too often, we think of terms as big, important sounding words that need definition. Yeah terms are usually simply the concepts doing a lot of work in an argument. 

Keywording for a Thesis: to help figure out your key terms, write down the five words that you know will need to appear in your thesis. No more than five: less is more. Some of those words will simply be about your text (e.g., “ Shakespeare’s Hamlet”). But some of those words will be about the central claims you’re making about your text: these are the concepts doing a lot of work in your argument. Ask yourself if any of them need to be set up in a discussion of terms prior to being used in your thesis.

The Thesis that is a New Term: Sometimes, your thesis is the suggestion of a new term or terms. If so, then your discussion of terms should come after your thesis, not before.

The Term for a New Theory: A common move to make in conclusions is to theorize your argument outward into an abstract idea. If you do so, be sure to come up with a good term or phrase to capture your theorization. 

Terms for Literature Reviews: It is often helpful to narrate the previous scholarship on a topic by grouping arguments into "camps," and giving a name to each camp.