Persuasive Essay

(aka rhetorical analysis; close reading; academic source analysis)

From our syllabus:

------

Project 1

In this two-part project, students will develop short, formal, persuasive essays demonstrating:

1. A perspective that believes (supports, agrees with, views favorably) a particular text. This essay should include rhetorical analysis of one, two, or all three of the rhetorical appeals (Ede 123) from our textbook: Logos (appeal to reason or logic); Pathos (appeal to emotion); Ethos (appeal to reputation or credibility).

2. A stance that doubts the same text, questions and criticizes its sources, logic, claims, and conclusions. As above this essay should also include rhetorical analysis.

Length: about 2 pages (500 words) for each part about 4 pages (1000 words) total.

Like all projects in this class, this page requirement does not include the mandatory Works Cited page at the end of the document (insert Page Break to put it on its own page).

------

Additional project requirements:

-- Thesis statement should be clear and persuasive, not merely informative or historical. It should also appear on the first page, if not the first paragraph.

-- Length: 5 pages (this includes at least 2 pages double-spaced of actual writing; other pages may be images or multimedia, Works Cited, etc.)

--Printed draft due Wed. Sept. 5; Second, electronic draft due (post to Blackboard in .docx format only) Fri. Sept. 7, 2018.

-- It is not acceptable to claim, "people say / people think" without source evidence to support these claims. (Without providing concrete examples of at least 1-2 such "people.")

-- Works Cited page: MLA format. Separate page from essay body. Using more than one source total is encouraged but not required. Additional sources should be appropriate for university and global audiences.

-- Other source rules: Sources must have the basic “who, what, when, where” details (author, date, etc.). For example, do not cite Wikipedia or your friend’s social media account.

Useful definitions

Some words used in English 101 and 105 have very different meanings for our purposes, compared to their real-world usage.

Rhetoric: Formal written argument, persuasion

Rhetorical: Using one or more of the three rhetorical appeals (logic, emotion, reputation)

Rhetorical analysis: Describing in writing, with detailed quotations, paraphrases, and summaries of the text, one or more rhetorical appeals that the author uses. This analysis may also include any logical fallacies you may find.

Logos: Appeal to reason or logic. (For ex. in math, A implies B.)

Pathos: Appeal to emotion. (For ex., advertisements for fast-food, cars/trucks, Geico…)

Ethos: Appeal to credibility, reputation, or credentials. (Ex., “Harvard professor of African-American Literature Dr. Henry Louis Gates, Jr., has stated that…”)

Logical fallacy: An error, flaw, oversight, weakness, or mistaken belief in a source that makes the author’s argument misleading, unsound, or invalid. For example, Ad Hominem, Red Herring, Slippery Slope, Cherry-Picking.

Source: A text, usually written, that for the purposes of English 101/105 has at least 5-10 pages, a credible and individual author, a well-known and peer-reviewed publisher, and a specific publication date. These texts should also have their own Works Cited or References page. They are usually 10-20 pages and either published in academic journals or chapters from a book.

Peer-reviewed*: A blind and competitive system of review by experts to determine which few articles are published in a particular journal each year or quarter. For example, JAMA or the Journal of the American Medical Association, gets hundreds of applications yearly of articles to publish. A review board sends the best articles to other medical professionals without the author’s name, to review it and critique it. After that, the top articles are chosen and published.

*Note this -ed ending and adjective form of the word, peer-reviewed, which for our purposes in describing university-level sources is different than the noun form of the word (peer review), that English 101 and 105 colleagues participate in throughout our semester class.

Works Cited

note, WC page title should

be centered and underlined

and on its own page

Craig, Iona. “Death in Al Ghayil.” The Intercept. March 9, 2017. https://theintercept.com

Ede, Lisa. The Academic Writer. 4th ed. Boston: Bedford St. Martin's, 2017. Print.