For this essay you will need to have come up with a specific claim for your final position paper. Once you have done that:

• Pick one of the terms that you will need to define in order to make your argument effective.
• Think clearly about the way in which you intend that term to be understood for the purposes of your argument.
• Conduct some research into the various definitions of the term. If applicable, use the dictionary (the best for this purpose is the multi-volume Oxford English Dictionary (COB Library)) to find out the range of definitions that might exist for the term; research the etymology (word origins) of the term; if necessary, consult textbooks and other publications in the specific discipline from which your term comes to find out how other writers have defined the term. Consider the connotations of the term, and decide exactly what you intend the term to mean when you use it in your argument. For an overview of different ways in which terms may be defined, check out the web presentation on definition. Collect relevant examples that might help you to clarify the term, and decide what the term does not mean to help clear up any confusion in your readers' mind.
• Write an extended definition (3-4 pages) of that term, using at least three or four different methods of definition. One of these should be stipulation, which will allow you to define the term to suit your purposes.
• This essay may be peer-edited. An html version of the peer editing form for the paper is here.