Page 379 - Wordsmith A Guide to College Writing

and the prima donna—you might begin each body paragraph
with a definition: “The drill sergeant is a professor who runs the

classroom as if it were boot camp.”

When you write a classification essay, it is important for the unity of

your essay that your classification have a single basis or underlying

principle. If it does not, then your categories of classification may be

so close that they overlap or so far-flung that they seem to have no
connection with one another.

In the example above, “sociology teacher” overlaps all three

categories since sociology teachers have a variety of teaching styles.

A single basis for classification ensures that your categories of

classification are separate and distinct.

Categories of classification that are too diverse can be illustrated with

a different example. A writer who has listed “airplane” and “bus” under

the heading “types of transportation” would not be likely to add “camel”

to the list, even though a camel can be a mode of transportation in
some parts of the world. The other two types are modern forms of

mass transportation, so “camel” does not fit in.

Exercise 9-2 Classifying Items in a List

Fill in the blanks with the appropriate words to classify each list of

items.

1. Kinds of Basis for classification:

a. Dalmatian