AP English Language Argument Essay Examples and Format

AP English Language Argument Essay Examples: To write a unique AP essay, you must carefully go through the guidelines below.

AP English Language

The Advanced Placement English Language and Composition are also known as AP Comp, AP Lang, or APLAC.

It is a course and examination by the College Board as part of the Advanced Placement Program.

When AP exams first began, English Language and English Literature were initially combined. However, the two courses were disentangled in 1980.

Further, the AP English Language and Composition is a study of rhetoric in high school. Many schools offer this course primarily to juniors and the AP English Literature and Composition to seniors.

However, the College Board and urgent essay writing service FastEssay advise students to choose APLAC to write different kinds of persuasive essays on non-fiction topics.

Then, students who choose AP English Literature study different eras and genres and use this in discussing literary topics.

AP English Language Argument Essay Format

The APLAC exam consists of two sections: a one-hour multiple-choice section, and a two-hour fifteen-minute free-response section. The exam is further divided as follows:

Section I: Multiple-Choice

This section of the test consists of 55 questions, with the same number of questions varying from 52 to 55.

However, there are four (4) short passages divided between pre-20th century non-fiction prose and 20th and 21st-century non-fiction prose.

Further, these questions focus on rhetorical devices, features, and structures from passages, functions, and the relationships between devices used.

However, in 2007, questions about citation information were included in the passages.

These questions do not test knowledge of MLA, APA, etc, but, focus on citation references and information from the passage.

Finally, students have 60 minutes to answer all questions, and the section accounts for 45% of students’ scores.

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Section II: Free-Response Writing

The Free-Response section of the test consists of three instructions, each of a different type: synthesis, passage analysis, and argument. Each score is given on a scale of 0 to 9.

However, during reading time, students are to carefully read through the instructions before diving into writing their essays.

Synthesis requires students to consider a scenario and respond to the scene using three sources to support it.

Even though, there are about 6-7 sources given to guide you, using information from all is totally unnecessary.

The instruction differs, some ask about argumentative techniques, while others, the rhetorical elements, and the purpose of the passage.

AP English Language Argument Essay Examples

Before the arrival of Europeans, Native American societies had established diverse political structures. The villages in the northeast of North America practiced a mixture of agriculture and hunter-gathering and sometimes formed alliances among tribes.
The large-scale empires of the Mexica and Inca in Central and South America had centralized power in city-states and exacted tribute or labor from subjugated tribes.
However, these societies would experience political upheavals when Europeans began their quest for territory in the 1500s. Empire- building typically involved a combination of the processes of military conquest, colonization, and economic influence.
Where epidemic disease was also a factor, military and colonization strategies sometimes resulted in the total destruction of previous political structures in the Americas;
a combination of the three processes permitted empire-builders to gradually infiltrate, then supersede, the political structures in Asia and Africa.

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The extremes of military conquest sometimes resulted in the destruction of the native populations’ political structures. Document 2 references the Mexica people’s violent devastation at the hands of the Spanish, with a hundred falling “at each discharge of guns.”
While Cortes attributes his victory to God’s favor due to fighting for his faith and king, tangible factors gave him the practical advantage: horses (which were not native to the Americas), guns, the Mexica’s unfamiliarity with such weapons, and the support of local allies.
Cortes, perhaps seeking to impress the king, likely exaggerates in the claim that the victory was “without ourselves sustaining any injury”;
still, the claim indicates both the strength of the Spanish military technology and their attitude of superiority that they used to justify their takeover of the existing Mexica government.
Also using military technology and the support of other tribes, the Spanish under Pizarro took control of the Inca empire in the Andes.
In both locations, the Spanish essentially destroyed the empires and installed their own political systems, with viceroys who served under the Spanish crown and a hierarchical class system that gave preference to those of European ancestry.

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The effectiveness of military conquest for destroying political structures is also demonstrated in Document 6, an account of a battle in Sudan that demonstrates the awesome firepower of machine guns to leave the Sudanese fighters in “tangled heaps.”
Although the document, written by the British Churchill, might provide a glorified account of the battle that exaggerates the British advantage, the fact that Churchill expected their weapon technology would automatically give victory is indicated in the disbelieving sentence: “
It appeared to our cavalry commander that the [Sudanese fighters] would actually succeed.”
Countries sending large numbers of settlers was another effective method of empire-building. This process enabled European nations to replace native governments in the Americas.
For instance, Document 3 indicates that from 1530 to 1795, the proportion of Native Americans in the population of the colony of Puerto Rico dropped dramatically from 36.4 percent of the population to just 2.5 percent.

At the same time, Europeans as a share of the population rose from 10 percent to 51.5 percent by 1860. The increase in the proportion of Europeans and blacks corresponds with the Spanish overrunning the native populations and instituting plantations.
The spread of diseases among the native populations made it easier for the Spanish to do away with long-standing native governments and establish their own political structures in the Americas.
In India and Africa, Europeans utilized the old strategies of military force and colonization, but unlike in the Americas, newly introduced diseases did not have such a devastating effect on native populations.
Thus, the process of empire-building also involved longer-term economic policies that caused a more gradual build-up of political power.

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European merchants gradually expanded their power in India, aided by the decline of the Mughal empire, as explained in Document 4. A French physician describes the emperor’s practice of “nourish[ing] jealousies” among the local rajahs, many of whom commanded armies larger than those of the emperor, to distract the rajahs from ever threatening his power.

By describing this potential threat to the emperor, the document hints at the potential for outsiders to take advantage of the political instability, as indeed the British merchants extended their economic influence into political control. Indeed, in Document 5 a governor of the East India Company affirms that British control happened through “fortunate and unforeseen occurrences” rather than a “fixed plan.”

He also confirms the power of economics in gaining political control, praising the economic policies of the British and celebrating the “destroyed” economic policies of the “natives.” Eventually, the British government would take over the East India Company’s holdings and rule India as a colony.

Document 1 also affirms the potential of economics to provide inroads to political power: King Afonso I of Kongo in Africa appeals to the King of Portugal about the behavior of Portuguese merchants, who are undermining King Afonso’s power by enrich- ing his vassals, making them no longer “content and subjected under our control.”

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King Afonso’s highly submissive tone (“I kiss your hand many times”) may indicate not genuine submission to the King of Portugal, but rather an understanding of the threat that economic power has on his political power. His letter could be part of a calculated approach to get help restoring his political power by appealing to the Europeans’ attitude of superiority.

Overall, the empire-building processes of conquest, colonization, and economic influence allowed empire-builders to exert power over territories. When additional factors, such as epidemic disease, also played a role, as they did in the Americas, the empire-builders could sometimes briskly overthrow and replace the original political structures.

In locations such as India, empire-building involved a more complex interplay of economics with the pre-existing political structures, though the Europeans were still able to eventually gain control.

Finally, the AP English language argument essay examples have different instructions, are for specific techniques. But, students have the privilege to discuss their ideas freely.

CSN Team.