FAQ on written course certificates

"By when do I have to hand in my essay?"

Please hand in your essay at the earliest at the end of the lecture period and at the latest at the end of the current semester, i.e. on 31 March or 30 September. Exceptions are possible by arrangement. You should only start writing your essay after you have attended the entire seminar. This will ensure that you have a good overview of the topic covered. If you write your essay before the end of the lecture period, it can easily happen that you come across questions or problems that are only dealt with later in the course. With the start of the next semester, new topics will take up your time and concentration. It therefore makes sense to use the lecture-free period at the end of the semester to prepare written work.

"How long does my essay have to be?"

You can find the respective lengths of the written assignments in the module descriptions on Stud.IP.

I understand this information as a guideline, from which you can deviate if your writing style or the topic you have chosen makes it seem appropriate. With the exception of the basic modules, you do not have to submit a seminar paper in every seminar of the module, but only in the seminar in which you take the final module examination. In the other seminars of the module, you only need to have your participation confirmed by the lecturer. If you are required to write a paper or give a presentation for this "active participation", please contact your student body or the AStA.

"What formalities do I have to adhere to?"

You can design the structure and layout of your essay yourself as long as you observe the following:

The following must be at the front: Name, email address, seminar title, module. The footnotes/literature references must above all be standardised; please do not use different citation systems within one essay.

You can find a guide to academic writing on our institute homepage:
https://uol.de/philosophie/studienorganisation/leitfaden-zum-wissenschaftlichen-arbeiten

The bibliography should include all texts that you refer to directly in your work. If you only refer to one primary text, which is often the case, especially at the beginning of your studies, then your bibliography should only contain one title. You should not inflate it artificially; if your discussion of the one text is good, a short bibliography is not a shortcoming, if it is not good, a longer bibliography will not make your work any better. Please note that other lecturers may provide different or more precise guidelines for the structure.

"What is an essay?"

When done well, an essay is a very sophisticated synthesis of academic text, reflected personal statement and poetry; when done badly, it degenerates into drivel. If you are interested in the literary form of the essay, I would like to recommend Adorno's text The essay as a form (Theodor W. Adorno, Der Essay als Form, in: Gesammelte Schriften 11: Noten zur Literatur, Rolf Tiedemann (ed.), Frankfurt am Main 1997, pp. 9-33). But no one expects you to write an essay as a course certificate. In university examination regulations, the word essay merely refers to a shorter version of the classic seminar paper. This should have a clear topic and a recognisable central theme. When dealing with the topic, it should be clear that you have understood what you are writing about, that you are familiar with the sources given and that you are able both to comprehend a theoretical train of thought and to present it in writing in an independent argument and examine it critically.

"How do I write my essay?"

Once you have found your topic, think about how you want to present it. This will then result in an outline for your essay. This outline should help you to keep an eye on your central theme during the writing process. It may change several times over time and does not have to be identical to the table of contents (if you want to create one for longer papers). In a philosophical text, the outline usually results from and with the course of the argumentation.

"How do I avoid common mistakes?"

... not a biography

A philosophical text deals with a theoretical subject. Mentioning biographical data of deceased or living philosophers is only necessary to a very limited extent. If you relate the theoretical approaches of different philosophers to each other, it makes sense to mention the order in which they lived and whether they took or were able to take note of each other's writings. If you are writing about a representative of the French Enlightenment, it can be informative to mention the political situation at the time. However, without embedding it in the theoretical context of your work, a retelling of the life of the authors you wish to refer to is out of place and should be omitted.

... not from front to back

The following applies to every academic paper: The introduction is written last. You may know what you want to write about before you write your paper - but only after you have written your paper do you know for sure what you have written about. If you follow your subject in your writing, it can happen that it does not lead you where you originally thought it would. In such cases, it is better to do justice to the subject matter rather than a pre-written introduction. This is why the introduction should always be written last or revised last. The rest of the work should not follow the random sequence of your ideas and associations, but the inner logic of the development of the thought. It therefore makes sense to repeatedly check the thoughts you have written down to see whether they build on each other in order to put them in the right order.

... read aloud

The first attempt to capture a complex train of thought in a written sentence often goes beyond the possibilities of grammar - and together with the grammatical form, the coherence and stringency of the thought are lost. However, since you as the author of the text usually know what you wanted to express with what you have written, it can easily happen that you read over incomplete or nonsensical sentences (this also happens to native speakers with A-levels). In this case, it helps to read the text out loud to yourself or others. This makes it easier to notice any grammatical errors and overly bold leaps of thought than if you read the text silently.

Comma rules can be found at the front of the Duden!

"What secondary literature should I use?"

First of all, none unless it was recommended in the seminar. There are metres and metres of secondary literature on the classical authors of philosophy, both good and bad. However, you can only judge whether the book you have probably chosen at random is suitable or unsuitable for the topic if you are sufficiently familiar with the primary literature. Therefore, if you want to write about Hegel, then read Hegel and if you want to write about Aristotle, then read Aristotle. Only then does it make sense to deal with other interpretations. Secondary literature is therefore not suitable as an introduction, but is only something for higher semesters.

"Do I have to use gender-sensitive language?"

No, you don't have to - but according to the guidelines on gender-sensitive language and communication adopted by the University Senate and Presidential Board of Carl von Ossietzky University in 2022, you should, as striving for equal opportunities is part of our university culture. In doing so, it is important that you do not merely follow formalism, but actually deal sensitively with linguistic gender references. The phrase "Kant, Fichte and Hegel are the most important philosophers of German idealism" is just as nonsensical as talking about "free citizens of the ancient polis". Gender-sensitive language should make historical and existing sexism visible, not invisible.

"What to do when you have writer's block?"

Don't wash your windows and, above all, don't waste your time frustratingly reading endless motivational guides on how to overcome writer's block. At the end of the day, only one thing helps: writing. And that takes time. I don't mean the time it takes to technically put words on paper, but rather the time it takes to develop thoughts that are worth writing down. Write down the title of your essay (which will change in many cases), start with an outline, look through your seminar notes and collect key points that are important for your chosen topic. If you get stuck, go swimming, to parties or whatever else you feel like doing and continue working later. This is just as ineffective as staring blankly at paper or a monitor, but it feels better.

"How do I hand in the essay?"

You are welcome to email me your completed essay along with the fully completed cumulative course result sheet for the relevant module as a PDF file or drop both in my inbox at the university. Once I have received your essay, you will receive a brief re-registering student. After the correction, I will enter the grade in Stud.IP and inform you by email. You are then welcome to register for a personal discussion of your work during my office hours. This is usually helpful because it is impossible to tell from a grade exactly where your strengths and weaknesses lie.