Biographical Essays

English 101    Biographical Essays

For this essay you will need to focus on a famous person—past or present—and concentrate mainly on some area of the person’s biography. For instance, you may focus on career highs and lows, early life and influences, defining experiences, etc. You do NOT need to focus on one event or one specific “moment in time” that was a changing experience. However, don’t try to do an entire “birth to death” biography.

You must refer to a minimum of 2 sources. If you use a web site, it must have an author. Anything from Infotrac (Academic Onefile) is fine. There is a specific biographical database that may help you get ideas as well as information. Remember that even if you do not quote the source directly, you must give credit to it. Use parenthetical documentation within the paper, and a works cited page at the end.

Example of parenthetical documentation     (Bosheep 12)      This is author and page number.

Example of entries for Works Cited page:

Book:   Bosheep, Billy Bob. One Day in the Life of an Imbecile. New York:

                    Noonday, 1998.

Magazine Article:    Eastwood, Bob. “Make My Day and Other Movie Tidbits.”

Time18 Jan. 1999:72-73.     

Internet Sites:

     Most general Internet sites will require the following information:

·         Author or sponsoring organization

·         Title of specific section or article

·         Date last updated or publication date

·         Number of pages or paragraphs (if fixed numbers are given)

·         Date accessed

·         URL address

Article in periodical/magazine

Burness, Howard, “Economic Forecast is Positive.” National Business Employment

      Weekly Online l5 Nov. 1999. 17 Nov. 2001http://business.com./article.ret/html.

Article in a Reference Database

“Douglas Fir.” Britannica Online. Vers. 98.1 1 Mar. 1998. Encyclopedia Britannica.

      21 Oct. 1999<http:.//www.eb.com:240>

Online Professional or personal site

Walker, James. Home page. 4 May 1998

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