UNIVERSITY OF GHANA

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SECOND SEMESTER, 2022/2023

UGRC 110: ACADEMIC WRITING I ASSIGNMENT ONE

Read the passage below carefully and answer the questions that follow it.

"Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already

devoid of stars" is a quote by the famous leader, Martin Luther King Jr., which underscores the

need to resort to less violent ways of reacting to or solving problems. Determining what

constitutes the best form of punishment for high crimes is a subject that has enjoyed cogent

debates since time immemorial. There appears to be no end in sight for such debates as, in

recent times, there have been public discussions about whether capital punishment or life

imprisonment is the more effective way to punish those who commit grievous crimes such as

murder, treason and rape. Different individuals and groups have taken varying stances and

given various reasons for their options. However, what appears to hold sway in contemporary

times is the view that life imprisonment, rather than capital punishment, is the most effective

way to punish people for perpetrating such crimes. As Martin Luther King Jr. (quoted in the

opening sentence) asserts, using violence to correct violence is futile by all standards and sends

out a conflicting notion about violence to people.

Paramount among the arguments advanced in support of life imprisonment as a better

alternative to death sentence is the utilitarian view that there is more use for life than death —

a standpoint that respects the sanctity of life and its prospects for betterment. As declared by

Laini Taylor, “As long as you are alive, there is always a chance that things will get better.” It

does not matter how grave a crime is, the perpetrator must be given a chance to live and learn
from his or her mistakes. While in prison, hardened criminals go through rehabilitation

processes that gradually change their ways of thinking and their actions in general. A research

report by Bush (2016), a co-developer of a prison treatment programme for Red Onion State

Prison, a US prison that held very notorious criminals, reveals that introducing an effective

treatment programme changed many of these criminals' lifestyle for the better and some later

became responsible and productive citizens, leading to a 68 percent reduction in the number of

inmates and 91 percent decrease in inmate grievances at Red Onion. Some researchers have

argued that keeping these criminals alive puts a strain on public purse but, in actual fact, while

in prison, these convicts also serve as a useful and ready source of labour to the state. Besides

this, the modern methods of killing them have been proved to be equally costly. Taking their

lives merely because they committed heinous crimes, which may even include taking the life

of others, is no more than an act of retribution, and as Mahatma Gandhi rightly puts it, "An eye

for an eye only ends up making the whole world blind." There is, therefore, enough reason to

conclude that life imprisonment is a more effective way to punish people who commit grievous

crimes because it is more beneficial.

1. Describe how information has been organised in the introductory paragraph of the essay

above. Be sure to comment on the opening of the paragraph and clearly state, in your

own words as far as possible, the writer’s main argument.

2. a. Analyse and describe the structure of the second paragraph (beginning Paramount

among the arguments advanced in support of life imprisonment as a better alternative

to death sentence is the utilitarian view …).

b. In addition to this, identify the strategies that have been employed to develop the

controlling idea in the paragraph.

c. Describe how the discussion in the paragraph has been closed.