Arts government funding - GRE Issue essay. Review, grade, point out mistake or suggest improvements.

GRE Issue essay

Hello, please review, grade, point out mistake or suggest improvements on my GRE Issue essay. I timed myself and finished within 30 mins and submitted here without proof-reading, so you may ignore spelling mistakes or silly typos. Thank you.

PROMPT:
Some people believe that government funding of the arts is necessary to ensure that the arts can flourish and be available to all people. Others believe that government funding of the arts threatens the integrity of the arts.

Write a response in which you discuss which view more closely aligns with your own position and explain your reasoning for the position you take. In developing and supporting your position, you should address both of the views presented.

My RESPONSE:
Government funding of the arts is a point of contention in many academic and general circles.
On one hand government funding of the arts can help to revive a dwindling field of practice, which is day by day losing its charm in the mass market due to the question of its practicality, and as a result failing to raise and bring in other sources of funding. On the other hand, the mere idea of government funding is blasphemous to a group who believe it would sabotage the true beauty and integrity of the arts, its ability to reflect and project the unadulterated views and feelings of the artists, and will be used for an agenda. But the problem is neither black nor white.

Art itself is a broad and nebulously defined word. Art includes music, literature, sculptures, poems and even the occasional street paintings can also be considered as arts and government funding can certainly help to foster the growth and ensure the quality in at least some, if not all the fields of art.

For example government funding is imperative in the University level arts education. Many of the universities currently in the US are slowly focusing on the more practically oriented subjects such as business, management or science. While these are undoubtedly vital for the society but so are the Arts.

Government funding and encouragement of the Universities to maintain the Arts education will encourage the departments to develop the education, promote the arts and encourage more young people to pursue it as a career.

The view that government meddling in the arts will degrade the quality of the contents is somewhat misguided. The arts can be a way to promote an agenda of the government, but that doesn't necessarily detracts from the value of the work. Take for example the Sistine Chapel, which was commissioned by the Church which was no less powerful than the present day government. But still the work that Michelangelo did was and is universally acclaimed even though the art clearly bears an agenda of the church. Or consider the case of the Mona Lisa, which was also commissioned by a group to Leonardo Da Vinci. What their funding did in fact was to give the artists a platform to ply their trade and showcase their talent, and that is what they did.

On the contrary, government funding in certain fields of arts, that sway public opinions, like literary works, can indeed be harmful and perilous, and the concerns about this funding scheme is rightly justified. Literary works and other forms of art that has direct influence over the public opinion should remain free from the government's or any political group's influence, because these forms of arts have the power to both drastically affect the lives of the people and also change the world we live in in a direct manner.

Funding of the government in arts can both spur the arts and help it to reach the general mass and also be used as a tool to control or at least influence public opinion. But we shouldn't discard the possibility of funding just because of an associated negative aspect. Rather accepting government funding in some fields and keeping some form of arts independent we can indeed help develop art and help make it accessible to the general mass.

Riyasat, since I am not familiar with how the GRE is graded, let me just offer you some comments regarding the content of your work. As you requested, I will not look at the grammar errors since what is important in this essay is the message you are trying to convey and if you were able to successfully do that. The essay that you present is good enough for something written within 30 minutes. However, there are some aspects that you need to improve upon.

First of all, as per the essay prompt, you need to discuss the topic in alignment with your own stand. The way you wrote the essay portrays a more general rather than personal stand due to the lack of first person pronouns. In order to let the reader know that you are not discussing in generalized terms, you need to ensure that you use the words I or me within the essay. It is very important that you do that for this essay because you are being required to discuss your point of view regarding the topic. To be specific, you need to clearly state your stand in your introductory paragraph. Make mention of it after this sentence:


By stating your point of view immediately after that line, you will be able to clearly present the general discussion as you did in the second paragraph. Right now, your point of view is a gray area. You cannot stand in the middle of this debate. The prompt clearly dictates that you choose a side and support it while discussing the opposing side as well.

Second, it is very important that you properly develop your paragraphs in terms of supporting ideas, facts or figures. Most specially when discussing the general point of view. One of the portions that lacked adequate development and support is:


The above quote displays the lack of supporting facts meant to strengthen this discussion / belief of yours. Mentioning some ways that the continued support of the arts (by the government) helps improve society will help add credibility to your statement. I understand that you only had 30 minutes to develop, draft, and write this essay. Which is why you should only be discussing 2 sides to this issue: your stand and the one most important opposing stand (from your point of view). By narrowing down your discussion, you will be able to better develop the content and conclusion of your essay.

Thanks @vangiespen for your input. It does put things into perspective for me. I'll definitely take your advice on the "personal point of view" approach, and try to improve on that regard. I didn't mean you to ignore grammatical errors, I just requested to ignore typos and such. Feel free to point out any grammatical errors.

You're right in pointing out that one of the paragraphs lacked sufficient developments and supporting fact. I liked your idea that I should discuss to sides and focus on developing idea more rather than putting more ideas in my work.

I didn't take any concrete stand on either side, because the essays that support a more nuanced position, and doesn't take any extreme side tend to get better scores. The position I wanted to take was that - 'Government funding is required in some field of arts, where as other fields are better off without it". I tried to make it clear in the conclusion. But in retrospect I believe your suggestion of making it clear just after the "black or white" line might've been better.

Anyway, was it clear that I wanted to take this position???

Thanks for the input, though. Really appreciate it.

Hi Riyasat, now that you have mentioned it, there are some points where the grammar can be improved or corrected. I hope you won't mind if I go paragraph by paragraph for your reference. My comments will include suggestions and rewrites that will serve as samples for your future reference.


- Since you have not stated any previous facts or information, you should not use "On one hand" in this instance. "On one hand" connotes that previous statements have been made, that does not exist in this instance so don't use that term. Instead open immediately with "Government funding..."


- This is a second opinion that you are stating. "On the other hand" does not really fit the sentence. Rather, the best way to open the topic would be stating "However, the mere..." as the word "However" connotes a new idea being presented or in this case, a different side to the issue. This makes the presentation more formal and academic.


- - Remember, you need to present your stand on the matter because it is required in the prompt :


Therefore, you are required to clearly state, support, and discuss your position. I agree that there are some instances where being vague in your discussion is the best approach to take in discussing the topic unless, as in this case, the prompt clearly asks you to state and discuss your stand using other evidences to support your side.

Actually, your stand is not very clear in the essay because you never connoted ownership of any idea or side. Your essay comes across more as a well rounded discussion of the issue. In this case, not clearly stating or taking a position really hurt your discussion since it seems like you do not have a clear opinion regarding the matter.

If you would like to revise the essay and post it again in this thread, I'd be more than happy to help you develop your writing skill and work on the grammar issues with you :-)