How to write a philosophy paper

A good philosophy paper will demonstrate mastery of the pertinent philosophical views, concepts, and arguments. To demonstrate mastery, you must do more than just regurgitate what you have memorized from the lectures and readings. Regurgitation doesn’t even demonstrate understanding let alone mastery. (This is why I suggest that you use quotes only sparingly, and that when you do use them you always explain what the quoted passage says in your own words—see the section entitled “Quoting” below.) Furthermore, there’s a difference between merely understanding a topic and mastering it. For you can understand some material without being able to convey that understanding to others. To have mastery is to have the ability to teach that material to others, to be able to explain the material articulately using your own words, descriptions, and examples, such that even someone with no prior knowledge or understanding of the material could understand it. Once you’ve mastered a topic, you should understand it well enough to go beyond what you have read about it. You should be able to present and defend your own views on the topic. The key, then, to demonstrating mastery is to show that you can explain things in an illuminating way, using your own words and using your own original examples and descriptions.