Sample Contrast Paragraph

HOW TO ORGANIZE YOUR CONTRAST BODY PARAGRAPHS

 

SAMPLE BODY PARAGRAPH CONTRASTING MARY JACKSON AND STUDENT - IN THE WORKPLACE

 

Below is one section of a Contrast Outline. View how the details match the order of details in one body paragraph (below). This is how you can write your body paragraphs, using Transitions to help details flow together.

[sorry, Canvas wouldn't allow my copied A, B, C, D letters for some reason - changed them to 1, 2, 3, 4]

SAMPLE:

   II.  Differences at workplace:

Mary:

  1. Courage to complain about others' insulting behaviors
  2. Got promotion in her job
  3. Confident enough to stand by her work
  4. Discrimination for race and gender

Me:

  1. No courage to speak up for myself about coworkers
  2. Made small progress but no promotion
  3. Having self-doubt about my work
  4. No discrimination as I worked with women

Compare the outline to the order of details in body para. below

You do not have to "bold" your transitions in your paper- they are bolded here for emphasis. Also, a quote is inserted to show you how it can smoothly be a part of your point.

       Another way I am different from Mary Jackson is in the workplace. Mary dared to complain about her coworkers’ insulting behaviors. She did that when her colleagues laughed at her because she needed to find a bathroom for black people. As Margot Shetterly mentions, “Mary was a soft-spoken person, but she was also direct and forthright” (88).  Mary was also very good at her job and as a result, she got a promotion when she spoke up for herself.  Furthermore, it seems that Mary was so confident that she even stood by her work when her boss thought that she did the calculations wrong.  Another problem in the workplace was the discrimination that Mary faced. She was a black woman and she struggled a lot to work with white people and male engineers. Unlike Mary, my workplace experience was different. I did not feel confident enough to speak up for myself. For example, when I started my career, I had two awful colleagues. They made fun of me all the time. One day one of them threw my lunch in the trash can on purpose. I still can feel the pain I had experienced that day. But I did not even mention that when my manager asked me why I was feeling down that day. Also, I never really had a specific advancement in my job like Mary. Of course, I was making good progress and the number of my customers was increasing, but that was not like a big promotion or a great new job offer. Conversely, I never had that much self-esteem in my professional life. One day when I styled my customer’s hair, she was satisfied and I was happy, but my manager said that she did not like my work, so I lost my confidence. I started self-doubting and I could not defend my work like the way Mary did. I also never faced racial and gender discrimination like Mary particularly because all of my coworkers were of the same race and were all women.

Despite all these differences, we had some things in common.  [Student's next Topic Sentence is the last body paragraph on similarities]

NEXT is your Assignment for Essay #2