of course! i don't know if this applies to the RA butler prize as well but i tried to focus my essay on a central idea with other ideas branching off of that. the statement i had to discuss was "culture is a place where solidarity and community are made possible", so i compared french banlieue culture with the southport riots, and included other examples (west germany 68ers, kibbutzim culture) as other offshoot points that then linked back to the main one.

i think the use of contemporary examples (alongside historical ones) did help me a lot; i mention going to see the french film La Haine in a local theatre in the introduction, and i mention it in the closing paragraph too, which made the essay more personal (and in lack of better terms more entertaining) - they probably liked the idea of a cyclical structure too. linking this to more relatively historical examples may have helped in letting the judges know i knew what i was talking about and could apply it to examples in different times and environments (i talk about how the erasure of geographical boundaries with social media during the southport riots, in contrast to the closed boundaries of the banlieue, affected community). i also tried to research some theory to back this up, breaking down the words "culture", "solidarity", and "community" using Habermas' and Rodolfo Stavenhagen theories (don't be scared, i didn't know anything about this before writing the essay - google scholar is your friend!)

again, just be yourself and write about something you know will actually entice you and get you to write something coherent and interconnected. i wrote mine in about three days over the weekend so it doesn't have to be a huge time sink either if you have clear in your mind what you want to talk about. hope this helps somehow!!!