Read Chapter 4 and 5 and complete the review questions.

CHAPTER Types of Claims

. ou will be able to: After studying thzs chapter, y .

. . f ent types of clauns. L01 Describe the five dif er s of claims operate in written

h w these type ' L02 Identify and analyze o visual, and online arguments.

A rgument theorists categorize claims according to types, and these types suggest the fundamental purp~ses of given arg~- ments. Becoming aware of these categones and the special

characteristics associated with each helps you understand more fully the purposes and special features of the arguments you read and improves your writing of them. When reading, as soon as you identify the type or category of claim in an argument, you can predict and anticipate certain features of that type of argument. This technique also helps you follow the author'~ line of tho~ght more easily. When writing, knowing the types of claims can provide you with frameworks for develo in our purpose and strategy. p g y

When you begin to read argume t . h h and identifying it b t .. n wit t e idea of locating the claim

y ype, your ability to identif d ll he parts of an argument w·ll . Y an understand a t i mcrease To acco li h . d to learn the strategy descr·b d · mp s this goal, you first nee

i e next for anal . purpose, and its constituent yzmg an argument, its key parts.

<

Five Types of Claims 151

five Types of Claims . ually all arguments can be categorized according to one of five types of claims.

Vrrt can identify each argument type by identifying the questions the argument you 1 · t f · · vvers. In genera, certam ypes o orgamzat1on and proof are associated with an~ in types of claims, as you will see in the following discussion. There are no ce I-and-fast rules about using specific organizational strategies or types of proof har ·f· f 1 . I< · develop spec1 1c types O c aims. nowmg common patterns and tendencies, to wever, helps readers make predictions about the course of an argument and hO 1 d . h. lps writers pan an wnte t e1r own arguments. he f. . f 1 . 1 Here are the IVe categones o c aims, a ong with the main questions that they answer:

l. claims of fact: Did it happen? Does it exist? 2. Claims of definition: What is it? How should we define it? 3. Claims of cause: What caused it? What are its effects? 4. Claims of value: Is it good or bad? What criteria will help us decide? 5. Claims of policy: What should we do about it? What should be our future course

of action?

The sections that follow provide additional explanations of the five types of claims, along with the general questions they answer, some examples of actual claims, a list of the types of proof ( explained more fully in the next chapter) that are most typically associated with each type of claim, the organizational strategies that one might expect for each type, and a short written argument that illustrates each type as it appears in practice.

CLAIMS OF FACT When you claim that you turned a paper in on time even though the professor cannot find it, or that you were not exceeding the speed limit when a police officer claims that you were, you are making claims of fact.

Questions answered by claims of fact. Did it happen? Is it true? Does it exist? Is it a fact?

Examples of claims of fact. (Note that all of the "facts" in these claims need to be proved as either absolutely or probably true in order to be acceptable to an audience. All of these claims, also, are controversial.) The ozone layer is becoming depleted. Increasing population threatens the environment. American drivers are becoming more ·responsible. America's military is prepared for any likely crisis. The abominable snowman exists in certain remote areas. Women are not as effective as men in combat. A mass mur- derer is evil, not insane. The American judicial system operates successfully.

Types of support associated with claims off act. Factual support, as you might guess, is especially appropriate for claims of fact. Such support incl~des b th . . z d t tionsfrom relzable 0 past and present facts, statzstzcs, real examp es, an quo a authorities. Inductive reasoning, which cites several examples and then draws

1...n1 Describe the five different types of cla ims.

I

.~

152 Chapter s Types of Claims . 1 a conunon type of argument f h m IS a so d imil. . . or 1 • on from t e ' arisons an s an ties betw

a p_robable c~°:.n~~~gies that establish ~~:~onunonly accepted as true :en. clauns o~ fact d something else thaf past or present state of affairs re the subJect an . dence o a h are

f l Signs that present ~VI f f ct Expert opinion, w en used to support use u · r h claims o a · also useful to estab is d on fact. . claims of fact, is usually basi:s Chronological order, w~ch t~ac~s what has

n,..ssible or"9anizational strateg_ . ually in the order Ill which it occurred cv . . d of ume, us 1 h h' , occurred over a peno . f fact For examp e, t e istory of th

d 1 claims o · . h e can be used to ev_e op . b rovided to show how it as happened increase in populauon m1gh~ ~o;ical order may be used. In topical order in time, from then to no~- ar: identified and then developed topic by reasons to support a fac b . n for the existence of the abominable . might e give . topic. Thus, r_easons d loped at length. This chapter 1s organized snowman, with each one eve . according to topics: the five types of claims. . .

The claim of fact itself is often stated at or near the ~eg11:rung of the argument unless there is a psychological advantage for stating It a~ the end. Most authors make claims of fact clear from the outset, revealmg early what they seek to establish.

An example of an argument that contains a claim off act. The following essay argues that no less than seventy percent of students at community colleges plan to attain a degree at a four-year college or university. The article seeks to establish the fact that conventional assumptions about the students who attend two-year colleges are inaccurate.

BEFORE YOU READ: What is your view of the college admissions proc -, I experience, have you found it to be fair? ess · n your own

ESSAY #l 2-YEAR STUDENTS HAVE LONG HAD 4-YEAR DREAMS* Stephen J. Handel Stephen J. Handel is associate vice president for u d

st H . . n ergraduate ad · · . • ·a sy em. e wrote this article for The Chronicle of H' h m1ss1on in the University of cahforn1 '9 er Education.

Facts Last month the National Student Cl . h h eanngho . t at more t an 60 percent of comm . use released a report shoWJ11g

f . . . unny-colleg our-year un1vers1t1es ultimately earn db e students who transferred to f f e achelo ' d a ter trans er. I was pleased to hear th f· . r s egrees within six years

f. . . ese ind1ngs b 1rst-trme commumty-college students h ut not surprised New: ave alwa s b . , Y een ambitious.

*u2-Year Students Have Long Had 4-Year Dreamsu by Stephen J. Ha d 1 . . n e . from The September 23, 2013. Reproduced by perm1ss10n. Chronicle of Higher Education.

.,,,, of fact c1a1i,,

statistics

Quotation from Authority

Quotation from A Uthority

The baccal Five Types of Claims 153 aureate as irar

be refreshin to hi h ions and Ion -term 1 . to the ersistent ubtr-e:ucation leaders because at~s of thes_e stud~nts should develo in skills rath1c rhetoric insistin that toda 'set .drov1de a correnive

. er t an ai • s u ents are foe · with those people who nm an education. Still I ct· usmg on . so casually ct· • ' am 1senchanted eve1:1 _profligate, in light of the av . 1s:1:1ss th_ese intentions as unreliable certificates or associate degr allab1hty of Jobs that require short-t , h. h r ees. My arg . erm

ig -qua Hy pre-baccalaureate creden _m~ent is no~ ':ith the proliferation of economy. Rather, it is With the re t1al~, such trammg is essential for our teresred in an education ev b~ su_mption that these students are unin-

11 · · • ery It as mtense th f enro initially in four-yea . . . as at o undergraduates who . r mst1tut1ons Earning a four-year de . · .

most incoming commun}ree l: the pre-emment educational goal for Department of Ed . 1 y-co ege students. A 2009 survey by the U S

ucat10n mdicated th t h · · first-time commun·t a more t an 80 percent of all new was especially st i y-college students sought bachelor's degrees. The de~ire sented in hi her r;;g a~ong students f~om groups traditionally underrepre- 83 erce g ucat1?n,. such as Latmos (85 percent), African-Americans

( P ~t), and those m the lowest income quartile (84 percent). The desire to earn a four-year degree has a long history. Between 1966

and_ l 9~9, when the University of California at Los Angeles's Cooperative ~s~itut10nal Research Program surveyed the educational aspirations of JUnIO~-college, and then community-college, students separately from those entenng four-year institutions, the proportion of two-year college students whose education goal was a bachelor's degree (or higher) never dropped below 70 percent. Steven G. Brint and Jerome Karabel, in their classic book, The Diverted Dream ( 1989), quote survey results from the 1920s through the 1950s, all of which reported the intentions of two-year college students as largely directed toward a bachelor's degree.

s Despite their desire to earn a baccalaureate, however, few achieve that goal. Data indicate that only about one-quarter to one-third of students who wish to transfer actually succeed, despite the fact that-as the clearinghouse data reflect-their chances of earning a four-year degree after transfer are good. Perversely, the low number of actual transfers is used to justify the recalibration of student intentions toward pre-baccalaureate credentials. But higher-education observers like Richard Kahlenberg, writing in The Chronicle, argue the opposite: "Some look at these numbers and suggest community colleges should downplay the idea of transfer, but it makes more sense to improve and strengthen transfer paths." .

Few people seem concerned about the mismatch between what commumty- college students intend to do and what they actually achieve. A recently ~ub- lished monograph chastises community-college leaders by noting that while community-college "students will readily identify transfer and long-tennl this

. . . unfortunate Y academic goals, their ultrrnate goal 1s on employment. · · · if su·pulate in . 11 " Even we simple fact is overlooked by most commuruty co egescl .th jobs it is unclear the absence of evidence that students are concemeddoe.!,':es that future. . oals" un iu............ • how their focus on "transfer and acadermc g si·on has left us wondenng

f the recent reces hin It seems that the wreckage O will continue to signal somet g . a college degree whether the investment in

'II

154 Chapters Types of Claims d ·n a recent essay, "The ff s reflecte I b J ff

Inductive Reasoning

Statistics

Historical Analogy

Claim

Liberal Analogy

Conclusion

Restatement of Claim

1 bor-rnarket payo , aw; II Street Journal, y e rey J. Selingo other than a a_ hing Value," in The a , Diploma's Yams . · The Chronicle's editor at lar?e. e that the nation fill a g~ow1ng number of

In response, there is ins1sten~ skills. This is acc~m~an1ed ?Y data showing J·obs requiring pre-baccalaure~t d grees in certain fields will earn more · g associate e that individuals earnm . baccalaureate degrees. initially than those who ob~am d ·nging is a nod to the cost-

Embedded in this rhetorical han _wncolleges, as if those institutions, f . . and commumty h . effectiveness o Jumor tly matured into somet mg more than

around for a century, had only recen d d colleges that other people'~ kid~ _a~ten feor. the vocational aspects of a

d . h aise of pohttCians . . 10 Yet, esp1te t e pr . have been unable or unwilhng to community-college cr~dent1al, they letion rates. A recent report from the Provide the money to improve comp • ·d h b . B 'd · the Hiaher Education Dzvz e, notes t at etween Century Foundauon, rz :gmg v . . . 1999 and 2009, per-student support at private resea:ch mStitutwns went up $14,000, while public community colleges benefited from a per-student increase of just $1.

Of course, the pressure on college students to train for jobs has been around for a long time. Critics have complained since Harvard was founded that college learning yielded very little in the way of marketable skills. For a time in the late 20th century, however, Big Science, the cold war, and billowing middle-class incomes made the baccalaureate degree the accepted passport to Mad Men martinis and split-level suburban homes-assuming, of course, that you were not poor, a member of an ethnic minority group, or a person with a disability. Those folks went to community colleges to train for jobs, right? Then, as now, we comforted ourselves with the notion that such stud~nts'. as~uming they were exceptionally qualified, could transfer to four-year mst1tut1ons, perhaps even to elite universities. In reality, however, ver: fe~ were admitt~d th~re. Res~archers at the University of Southern Cahforma and the Umversity of Anzona estimate th b f f d . e num er o two-year trans er stu ents attending any one of the count 's 1 79 . • te and public campuses at fewer than 200 on av ry most ehte pnva . . , erage.

In a nat10n galvamzed around college com leti . students attending four-year institutions P on, we label tragic those earn four-year degrees. We seem satisfied e~en nonselective ones, who fail to students-working toward an identi 1 ' 1 owever, with community-college An enduring contribution of Ame cr~ ~oa -who similarly fail.

ica s commun·t 11 . ue to be the breadth of credentials they off 1 Y co eges will contm occupational certificates industry certi'f~rdstudents of all ages, including ' - 1e training · t degrees. But let's not forget that many n f . programs, and assoCia e students want something more. ew, IrSt-time community-college

They have always wanted more.

For Discussion: What are some of the cultural stereotypes used to d fin d

d h e e comm · 11 ges aJ1 community-college stu ents? In w at ways are th uruty co e 7 ese stereotypes inaccurate-

Five Types of Cl aims

11v1s Of DEFINITION cl)\ Iairn that an athlete who receives compensation for playing a sport is Wbefl Y?u \,, and therefore loses "amateur" status, or when you argu e wi.th a •professionahe' r or not any war can ever be considered a "just" war, you are making

dwhet friel1_ f definition. a cJai!Il

O ·ons answered by claims of definition. What is it? What is it like? How

aueshtt uld it be classified? How should it be interpreted? How does its usual s o . l eaning change in a parncu ar context? rnples of claims of definition. (Note that here we are looking at definition

exa~aims that dominate the argument in the essay as a whole. Definition is also used as a type of support, often at the beginning, to establish the rneaning of one or more key terms.) We need to define what constitutes a family before we talk about family values. To determine whether an art exhibition is not art, but pornography, we need to define what we mean by pornography in this context. To d,~termine whether the police were doing their job or were engaging in brutality, we need to establish what we mean by police brutality. To determine whether a person is mentally competent, we need to define what we mean by that designation. If we have established the fact that a young man killed })is wife, shall we define this killing as self-defense, a crime of passion, or premeditated murder?

Types of support associated with claims of definition. The main types of support used to prove claims of definition are references to reliable authorities and accepted sources that can be used to establish clear definitions and meanings, such as the dictionary or a well-known work. Also useful are analogies and other comparisons, especially to other words or situations that are clearly understood and that can consequently be used to shed some light on what is being defined. Examples, both real and hypothetical, and signs can also be used to clarify or develop definitions.

Possible organizational strategies. Compare-and-contrast organization can dominate the development of a claim of definition and serve as the main structure. In this structure, two or more objects are compared and contrasted throughout. For example, in an essay that expands the notion of crime to include white-collar crime, conventional crime would be compared with white-collar crime to prove that they are similar. . . Topical organization may also be used. Several special qualities, character- 1st1cs, or features of the word or concept are identified and explained as dis- crete topics. Thus, in an essay defining a criminal as mentally competent the chara t · · ' c e~1st1cs of mental competence would be explained as separate topics auct applied to the criminal. Another strategy is to explain the controversy over the te d . f A.n exam rm an gzve reasons or accepting one view over another. e pie 0! an argument that contains a claim of de-Finition. The following ssay argue th h P b h s at t e way the U.S. government defines "poverty" needs to c:I; anged. The author argues that the term "poverty" should be dramati-

struy expauded to include millions more Americans whose daily economic You ggles clearly qualify them to be defined as poor. Decide whether or not

agree. (Note the sources of the definitions used.)

155

156 Chapter 5 Types of Claims

I. ·n poverty in America? think ive I { BEFORE YOU READ: How many people do yo~ - --~ ---i----------..,..- ~·"'· . ' ----..,,,...,.....,..,... ____ ESSAY #2

Authority

Definition, Statistics

Definition, Example

MISMEASURING POVERTY* Mark Levinson . . . Mark Levinson is the chief economiSt of the Se . ·rvice Employees International Union. This article Was published in The American Prospect in 2012·

The "facts" about poverty can e eceivm · . . n b d · · g In her magisterial book Beh 1 • d

the Beautiful Forevers, Katherine Boo tells the stories of_ the mhab_,tants of~ Mumbai slum on the edge of a sewage lake who lack Jobs, housing, runnmg water, health care, education, and police protection. It is not unusual to see rats and frogs fried for dinner, feet covered with black fungus, and maggots breeding in wounds wrought by trash-picking. Yet, Boo writes, "almost no one in the slum was considered poor by official Indian benchmarks .... [They] were thus part of one of the most stirring success narratives in the modern history of global market capitalism." Some success.

Our government's own count of the poor, while not denying their exist- ence, also minimizes their number-not by undercounting them (though that's a factor, too) but by setting the poveny bar so low that tens of millions of poor Americans are not accounted for. This miscategorization not only pamts a picture of a more prosperous America than in fact exists. It also excludes a large number of the poor from assistance that th d d ffilg t ot erwise o tam. · h h · b · ey nee an

In fact, the poor are with us today in greater b h since we started keeping track over half a c t num erst an we have seen by the standards that most oth . d . _en ury ago. If we counted them

er m ustnahzed d . . numbers would increase by halft-from 46

.. emocrac1es employ, their understand how that can be it 1-s 1- lllllhon to roughly 69 million. To ' mportant to gr h . poverty and what that definition hast d . asp t e way we defme

The United States measures Poven ° b O With economic hardship. 50 years_ago by Mollie Orshansky, a locfar;ian~ard dev~loped almost __ At that nme, the tYPical family spent b ecunty AdlIUmstration offiaal. Orshansky calculated the costs of an a out one-third of its income on food. pro_vide adequate nutrition for only ::~~~ncy food budget, which would which would provide adequate nutr·t· ime, and also a low-cost budget, 1. d h l ion for th . I. p 1e t e cost of each budget by three t . e entire year. She then mun-

o arnve at two Poverty thresholds.

*uMismeasuring Poverty" by Mark Levinson from The American p rospect, Jun :2 . 'A p,evious version of this essay used a diffmm meth.od lo, mcasu,in ' '· 2012. Reprinted with pennOsmtt

g these nu,-,.,b = ers.

Parisons cofl'I

Statistics

Cornp . arison

Quotar ~llth ion frorn

Of!ty

Five Types of Claims 157

5 Orshansky wanted to use th 1 thresholds. It made e ow-cost food _budget to compute poverty Id

11 d sense to base the poverty lme on a food budget that

wou a ow a equate i:iutrition for an entire year. However, President ~yndon

1 Johnson and his Council of Economic Advisers decided to use a

figure c ose to the emergency f d b d h f 00 u get to set poverty-level income. Since then, t e igure ha: been updated annually for inflation.

The proble~s _with the official measure have long been recognized. Not only are_the ongmal thresholds too low, but they are based on outdated a~sumptions about family expenditures. Food now makes up about one- eighth of an average family's expenditure. At the same time the costs of housing, child care, and health care have grown. Thus, the ~fficial poverty level no longer reflects the true expense of supporting a family at the mini- mally adequate level. In addition, the current poverty measure is a national standard that does not adjust for variations in the cost of living from state to state and among urban, suburban, and rural areas.

The official poverty standard also fails to accurately tally family resources. When determining whether a family is poor, income is counted before subtracting taxes, resulting in an overestimation of how much families have to spend on basic needs.· On the other hand, the method understates the resources of families who :r:eceive some types of government assis- tance because the federal Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) is not counted, nor are in-kind government benefits such as food stamps and housing assistance.

Last year, the Obama administration released a new measure of poverty called the Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM), which does not replace the official measure but will be published separately. The SPM is based on an approach recommended in 1995 by the National Academy of Sciences. It adds in-kind aid such as nutritional assistance and subsidized housing and subtracts necessary expenses such as taxes, child care, and other work-related costs as well as out~of-pocket medical expenses. Its thresholds are calcu- lated by ranking households by what they spend on food, clothing, utilities, and shelter and setting the poverty threshold at the 3 3rd percentile of that ranking.

In 2010, according to the official poverty measure, 46.2 million people (15.1 percent of America's population) were poor, while 49.1 million (16 percent) were considered poor using the SPM. There were, however, some important differences between the two measures. Child poverty is lower under the SPM because it takes into account the EITC and food stamps. By contrast, the poverty rate for elderly Americans is higher because, unlike the official measure, SPM subtracts out-of-pocket medical expenses from income.

10 The SPM gives us a more accurate picture of the poor. Howeve~, it_doesn't fix the fundamental problem with the U.S. poverty threshold, which is, a~ Shawn Fremstad from the Center for Economic and Policy Research puts.lit,

. . down over the last severa "the extent to which it has defined depnvatwn . . I living standards decades because it has not kept pace with changes m typica

158 Chapter 5 Types of Claims . loW a level, and, as Frernstact SPM starts at too holds if consumer expenditur

Statistics

Comparisons

Quotation from Authority

Definition

im Based >efinition

"The thres 200Q es in the United States. 11 lower poverty h y have between o anct 2010 . n actua Y 1. e-as t e points out, it ca . nd food dee Ill . prices. on housing, utilines, a . and lower housmg rcent of median income Wh

f h recesswn 1 to 5 o pe en_ as a result o t was roughly equa . to about 36 percent. So today's The po~erty 1~;60s. It has now declme~ income-in a word, poorer-

it was set m the f ther behind the averag If we measured the number of official P?or arete~arts were 50 years afoh median income, 22.6 percent than ~helf couh~ are below 50 percent o . t e high as the official poverty rate Amencans w rly half agaIIl as (69.1 million) are poor-nea of 15. l percent. . use a measure of povert~ based on the

Most other developed countries 60 ercent of median income. Adam share of families below 50 percent 0 ~ . 1;,he Wealth of Nations. He defined the Smith explained the rationale for_ this IIlf being unable to consume "not only lack of "necessaries" _as the ~xp~ne:~::i necessary for the support of life, the commodities which are mdispe y ders it indecent for creditable but whatever the custom of the country ~en ,, people, even of the lowest order, to be without. ff what a family requires

Several organizations have attempted to quan 1 Y . . b · d The Economic Policy Institute has created Basic Famlly to meet as1c nee s. . ..

Budgets for more than 600 localities across the country. Wi~er Opport~mt1es for Women has developed a Self-Sufficiency Standard for different family types in more than 80 localities in 36 states, and the National Center for Children in Poverty has designed Basic Needs Budgets.

All of these efforts show that families must have an average income of at least twice the current poverty level to cover basic expenses. More than one-third of Americans-more than I 00 million-live beneath that more realistic threshold. These family budgets include only the most essential living expenses and are based on modest assumptions about costs. For example, the budgets assume that family members have access ~o employer-sponsored health coverage when not covered by public msurance, even though the majority of low-wage workers don't have employer coverage. The budgets do not include mo h 1·f d. b·1· • ney to pure ase 1 e or 1sa 1 1ty msurance or to create a rainy-day fund tha ·1 fund a child's education. In short, these bud ets . . t would h~lp a fam1 y family to cover their most fundamental r . g indicate what 1t takes for a but not enough to get ahead. iving expenses-enough to get by

rs In I 964 when the War on Poverty was 1 of the President explained: "By the p aunched, the Economic Report . . . oor we mean th h mamtammg a decent standard of livin _ h ose w o are not now

their means to satisfy them." g t ose whose basic needs exceed There are tens of millions of Americans toda 11

their means to satisf them" who are not 1 . whose basic needs exceed . . c ass1fied a cannot receive the assistance the need Th . s oor and who therefore . · at 1s the b define poverty. ro lem with how we

Five Types of Ua \rm

Discussion: for · th t A · . his author argumg a more mencans should be classified as "poor"? wbY 1d5 t

5 he think this change is necessary? Do you agree? Why or why n o t?

wbY oe .

,AIMS Of CAUSE CL . 1 . claim that staymg up ate at a party caused you to fail your exam the }len you . 1 b W or that your paper 1s ate ecause the library closed too early you are t~Y ' net. claims of cause.

n1akJI1g • stions answered by claims of cause. What caused it? Where or what is its auesource? Why did it happen? What are the effects? What will probably be

the results over the short term? Over the long term? examples of claims of cause. The United States champions human rights in for-

eign countries to further its own economic self-interests. Clear-cutting is the main cause of the destruction of ancient forests. Legalizing marijuana could have beneficial effects for medicine. DNA testing is causing courts to review some of their death penalty decisions. The long-term effect of inadequate funding for AIDS research will be a disastrous worldwide epidemic. A lack of family values can lead to crime. Censorship can have good results by protecting children.

Types of support associated with claims of cause. The argument must establish the probability of a cause-and-effect relationship. The best type of support for this purpose is factual data, including statistics that are used to prove a cause or an effect. Analogies, including both literal and historical analogies that parallel cases in history, are also used to show that the cause of one event could also be the cause of another similar event. Another type of support is based on the use of signs to establish certain causes or effects. Induction, which entails citing several examples as a cause, may be used to invite the inductive leap to a possible effect as the end result. Deduction is also used to develop claims of cause. Premises about effects are proposed, and a conclusion about the possible cause is drawn.

Possible organizational strategies. One strategy is to describe causes and then effects. Thus dear-cutting would be described as a cause that would lead to the ultimate destruction of the forests, which would be the effect. Or, effects may be described and then the cause or causes. The effects of censorship may be described before the public efforts that resulted in that censorship. You may also encounter refutation of other actual or possible causes or effects.

An example of an argument that contains a claim of cause. The following essay examines the role that new technology plays in encouraging stu- de~ts to cheat. More specifically, the author argues that the professors' reliance upon online teaching tools provides students with greater means aud impetus to break the academic rules. The author's conclusions are subjective, and so it is possible that not everyone will agree with this cause-and-effect argument. What do you think?

159

160 Chapter 5 Types of Claims _ - . 7 In your view, is this a

define academic cheati~~~ between what does and BEFORE YOU READ: _Ho~ do basis do we draw

th e

straightforward question: O~ v~:~--.------------~---s--- -......__ does not constitute cheating· _

ESSAY #3

Claim of Cause

Authority

Statistics

Authority

- S AND PROFESSORS

HIGH TECH CHEATING ABOUND ' ARE PARTLY TO BLAME* Jeffrey Young • d · Th Chronicle of Higher 6 ucat,on. Jeffrey Young writes the "College 2.0" column for _e

. . tl let slip a dirty little secret of large science A casual 3oke on Twitter recen Y . h • . .

5 d ts routinely cheat on their omework and

and engmeenng courses. tu en professors often look the other way. .

"Grading homework is so fast when they all cheat ~d use_the illegal ~olutions manual," quipped Douglas Breault Jr., a teaching ass1stan~ 1n mechanical engineering at Tufts University. After all, if every answer 1s correct, the grader is left with little to do beyond writing an A at the top of the page and circling it. Mr. Breault, a first-year graduate student, ended his tweet by saying, "The profs tell me to ignore it."

While most students and professors seem to view cheating on examinations as a serious moral lapse, both groups appear more cavalier about dishonesty on homework. And technology has given students more tools than ever to find answers in unauthorized ways-whether downloading online solution manuals or instant~messaging friends for answers. The latest surveys by the Center for Academic Integrity found that 22 percent of students say they have cheated on a test or exam, but about twice as many-43 t-have

d · " h . d percen

engage m unaut onze collaboration" on home k Ch

. . wor . eatmg on an engmeering problem set could b th rf . .

h · b d • . e e pe ect cnme, m

t at 1t can e one without leavmg a trace St d · b d b

. · u ents 1n a large lecture course ase on a est-sellmg textbook can often find th .

with all the math it took to get th e answer onbne, complete ere. s How can a professor prove that the cheat" out on their own? mg students did not work things

Enter David E. Pritchard a physics prof ' essor who t h . courses at the Massachusetts Institute of T h eac es introductory. laboratory devising new ways to use las ec nology (when he is not in his supercooled atoms). ers to reveal the curious behavior of

*HHigh-Tech Cheating Abounds and Professors Bear Some Blame,, b , Y Jeffrey R y , h Education, March 28, 2010. © 2010. Reproduced by permission. · oung from The ChronicleofHtg er

statistics

Data

Deduction

Data

Statistic

Data

Five Types of Claims 161

Mr. Pritchard did detective work on his students worthy of a CSI episode. Because he uses an online homework system in his courses, he realized he could add a detection system to look for unusual behavior patterns. If a student took less than a minute to answer each of several complex questions and got them all right, for instance, the system flagged that as likely cheating. "Since one minute is insufficient time to read the problem and enter the several answers typically required, we infer that the quick-solver group is copying the answer from somewhere," he wrote in a paper last month in the free online journal Physical Review Special Topics-Physics Education Research.

He and his research team found about 50 percent more cheating than students reported in anonymous surveys over a period of four semesters. In the first year he did his hunting, about 11 percent of homework problems appeared to be copied.

Mr. Pritchard has no interest in becoming a homework cop. What he really wants to do is understand the minds of the offenders. The issue, he says, is far more nuanced than a story of "Top Students Caught Cheating." He told me that the dishonesty reveals flaws in the very way science is taught, and indicates an unhelpful spirit of "us versus them" between professors and students.

10 · He believes that the most important part of learning physics comes by doing, and so students who outsource their homework learn little. His studies of his students prove his point. The cheaters generally perform far worse than other students come test time-students who frequently copied their home- work scored two letter grades lower on comparable material on the exam.

Why Students Cheat Here is what surprised me most when talking with people who have tracked college cheaters. Many students simply do not view copying homework answers as wrong-at least not when it is done with technology.

That is what Trevor Harding found. He is a professor of materials engineering at California Polytechnic State University at San Luis Obispo who has researched student cheating in engineering.

In surveys, he asked students if they viewed bringing a cheat sheet to an exam as cheating. Most did. Then he asked the same students whether they would consider it cheating to bring a graphing calculator with equations secretly stored on it. Many said no, that was not cheating.

"I call it 'technological detachment phenomenon,"' he told me recently. "As long as there's some technology between me and the action, then I'm not culpable for the action." By that logic, if someone else posted homework solutions online, what is wrong ~ith downloading them?

1 s The popularity of Web sites full of homework answers seems to confirm his finding. One of them, called Course Hero, boasts a free collection of "over 500,000 textbook solutions." The company set up a group on Facebook, where more than 265,000 people have signed up as "fans."

Drew Mondry, a junior at New England College, who recen tly trans- k ferred from Michigan State, is among them. "The feeling about homewor

162 Chapter 5 Types of Claims ,, he told me. (He said he does not cheat on is that it's really just busyworkd, a fan of the Course Hero site becau

k d only signe up as H d. se his homewor _an ,, . 11 our friend and say, ' ey, o you knovv th some friends did.) You JUSt ca Y e answer?"' . . es he has taken, professors did not put much effo . In the ~,g scrence Jo::: do not put real effort into learning, he says: •1 ha n mto teachmg, so fstu e h ally loves teaching an introductory course Ve yet to meet a pro essor w o re k b d f , and that translates," was how he put it. "If you 100 ore out

O your mind,

guess how much I care?" Some professors seem to believe that since stude~ts who c~t ~omer~ on homework end up bombing exams, students get a ki?d of built-in ~umshment for the behavior, says Mr. Pritchard. Poorly pe:form~ng students m~ght even learn a lesson from their laziness. So the cheating will take care of itself, right? That is the rationalization, anyway.

Definition Certainly, many professors put a lot of effort into their classes. And, to them, blatant student cheating can feel like a personal insult. Eric Roberts,

20

a computer-science professor at Stanford University who has studied aca- demic cheating, told me about a student in his course who went to a public computer lab, found some other student's homework assignment saved on a machine there, ·changed the name to his own name, and turned it in as his own work. Except he left the other student's name on one page by mistake. Busted.

"This is lazy cheating," Mr. Roberts said. "They're trying to put one over on us. And if they're trying to match wits with us, I'd just as soon win-if that's their game I'll play it."

For Discussion: How does this essay challenge our commonly held ass 1. b d . h · ? ump 10ns a out aca ermc c eatmg. How does a cause-and-effect explanat1·on th t . I d 1 1 d b t h h

. a me u es a ro e p aye Y eac ers c ange the way we typically th· k b .

the statistics presented here make an effect· m a out this phenomenon? Do · · 1ve case for t h I · · cheating? What are some of the bl a eac er ro e m causmg pro ems you see . h h. ? Does this claim accord with your own er ~t t 1s type of support. p sonal expenences in the classroom?

CLAIMS OF VALUE When you claim that sororities and fraterni·t· . f ies are th b . zat10ns or college students to join or that e est extracurricular orgaJll·

k . . one college m . . h r you are ma mg a claim of value. aJor 1s better than anot e '

Questions answered by claims 0 £ value I . . 'J • s it good b d? Of what worth is it? Is it moral or imm or ad? How bad? How goo · those people value? What values or c . ~ral? Who thinks so? What do ntena sh I ·ts goodness or badness? Are my values diff ou d I use to determine

1

or from the author's values? erent from other people's values

r Five Types of Claims 163

ovamples of claims of value. Online technologies are a val bl .b . µ,.. cl ua e contn ut1on to the modern assroom. Prayer has a moral funct1·on . th bl. h 1

. . . . . . In e pu IC SC 00 s. Viewmg teleVIs10n 1s a wasteful act1v1ty Mercy kill. • . 1

Th · mg 1s 1mmora . e con-tributions of homemakers are as valuable as those of f • 1 . . pro ess1ona women . .Animal nghts are as rmportant as human rights.

rypes of suppo': asso~iated with claims of value. Appeals to values are important in developmg claims of value. The arguer thus appeals to what the audi- ence is expected to value. A sense of a common, shared system of values between the arguer and the audience is important for the argument to be convincing. These shared values must be established either explicitly or implicitly in the argument. Motivational appeals that suggest what the audience wants are also important in establishing claims of value. People place value on the things that they work to achieve.

Other types of support used to establish claims of value include analo- gies, both literal and figurative, that establish links with other good or bad objects or qualities. Also, quotations from authorities who are admired help establish both expert criteria and judgments of good or bad, right or wrong. Induction is also used by presenting examples to demonstrate that something is good or bad. Signs that something is good or bad are some- times cited. Definitions are used to clarify criteria for evaluation.

Possible organizational strategies. Applied criteria can develop a claim of value. Criteria for evaluation are established and then applied to the subject that is at issue. For example, in arguing that a particular televi.sion series is the best on television, criteria for. what makes a superior series are identified and then applied to the series to defend it as best; The audience would have to agree with the criteria to make the argument effective. Or, suppose the claim is made that toxic waste is the worst threat to the environment. A list of criteria for evaluating threats to the environment is established and applied to toxic waste to show that it is the worst of all. Another possi- bility would be to use topical organization by first developing a list of reasons why something is good or bad. Then each of the reasons is examined as a separate topic.

You may also expect that narrative structure will sometimes be used to develop a claim of value. Narratives are real or made-up stories that can illustrate values in action, with morals or generalizations noted explicitly or implicitly along the way. An example of a narrative used to support a claim of value is the New Testament parable of the Good Samaritan who helped a fellow traveler. The claim is that helping one another in such circumstances is valued and desirable behavior.

A.n example of an argument that contains a claim of value. The following editorial engages a different, more light-hearted, debate over values, arguing that the condescension and disdain many cultural elites feel for reality television is misplaced. Pushing back against this attitude, the author makes the case for the value-as well as the pleasure-of watching this kind of pop cultural fare. Notice how the author appeals to values that the audience is also expected to accept.

164 Chapter 5 Types of Claims

Id, nn • - 1·ty TV7 Do you agree with the • · about rea 1 • · BEFORE YOU READ: What is your op_inion . I value? author that these shows have redeeming socia · -~ h '"--~~~~-- ·-

ESSAY #4

Examples

Claim of Value

Narrative

REALITY TV: MORE THAN JUST A GUILTY PLEASURE*

A.K. Simon S h I This editorial was posted to the New School Web site Free The author is a student at The New c oo ·

Press in 2012.

f t d ttempt to forge a sophisticated New School As part o my concer e a . . ,, I d Derri.da pepper my speech with terms hke post-persona, name rop , h" ·

modernism," and pretend I read Thomas Pynchon. Part of t is ince_ssant charade is concealing my undying love for r~aJity TV be~a~se nothmg destroys your tenuous claim to coolness faster than admitting you watc~ed a "Toddlers and Tiaras" marathon over the weekend. I know enough to Just nod enthusiastica~ly whenever someone makes a reference to "Mad Men." The shameful truth is that I've never seen an episode of "Mad Men" or "30 Rock." I have, however, seen every episode of "The Real Housewives of New York City"-twice.

Hardly a shocking admission, I know. Pl~I?-tY of people relegate their love of reality TV to their cache of guilty pleasures. along with their un-ironic love for The Spice Girls and trove of Harry Potter fan fiction. But why does it incur so much guilt? W}J.at's wrong with reality TV anyway? Why is it nobler to spend your time watching the umpteenth show about single girls and their problems (They live in New York! Theyrre quirky! So many awkward con- versations!) or an hour of Sorkin-bots delivering overwrought sermons about the state of the wodd?

We like to think that what we wat\'.h on TV matters more than it actually does. It can't just be entertainment; it has to be a reflection of our ~alues and personaliti~s. It's an ~dentity. If we watch smart and witty shows, then we are smart and witty. If we watch "Mob Wives" and "Hoarders," on the other ha~d, we'~e not only insipid but also partially responsible for some staggenng societal decline that concerned critics everywhere are attuned to. Who knew a remote could wield so much ? Who kfleW

d . I · · ld • . power. me were te evis10n cou mcite such widespread m 1 • ? A tly . a aise. pparen , the latest harbmger of the cultural apocalypse is "Here Comes Honey Boo

*"R a1·ty TV· More Than Just a Guilty Pleasure" by A.K. Simon from The New s h I 13 2012- e l • c oo Free Press, September •

Reprinted with permission.

r

al to Values, APPe .. n

.. , oefin1t10 Ne"

Five Types of Claims 165

Boo," a new show on TLC (th k h b 11 • e networ t at rought you such classics as Extreme Couponmg" and "M St Add" · " . Y range 1ct1on ) about an outspoken pageant kid and her wacky Southern family. A review in the Hollywood Report~r lamb_asted ~~e- show, calling it "heinous," "horrifying," and TLC's latest ma stn~g of c~imes against humanity." According to the article, we ?ave a mo~al \mperati:e to not watch this show because it represents the dehumamzat10n and mcremental tearing down of the social fabric." Did

yo~ get that? Step away from the television, you rube, before you break society.

In t~e spirit of this kind of hyperbole, let me declare this: Honey Boo Boo will save the world. She, along with Snooki and The Kardashians, is going to repair our frayed social fabric, fine tune our moral barometer, and restore harmony to a.world gone awry. Is it true? Of course not. But it's not any more ridiculous than the claim that this gossamer social fabric is torn every time a Honey Boo Boo comes along. If we're a broken society, it's not because of what we watch on TV. If anything, reality TV gives us insight into the lives of people we'd never know otherwise-adult babies and balloon fetishists, Amish outlaws and Jersey meatheads. It's a guided tour to all the weird and wonderful stories burrowed deep in the fringes of humanity. Even the most vulgar shows serve a purpose; we can cringe at the embarrassing exploits of our fellow human beings and vow never to tread the same path. If all else fails, at least we'll have a couple hours of mindless entertainment. So let's curb the sanctimonious hand-wringing and take the guilt out of this guilty pleasure-even if it means admitting that The Situation is your spirit animal, not Don Draper. The quiet scorn of your classmates will eventually fade, but the relief will last forever.

For Discussion: According to this author, Americans tend to place too much importance on the effect of what they watch on television. Do you agree? Would we be better off if we regarded such pop culture to be as valuable as any other television entertainment? Why or why not?

CLAIMS OF POLICY ihen You claim that all new students should attend orientation or that all stu- c]e~ts Who graduate should participate in graduation ceremonies, you are making auns of policy.

Questions answered by claims of policy. What should we do? How should we act? What should future policy be? What concrete course of action should We pursue to solve the problem? (Notice that policy claims focus _on the future more than the other types of claims, which tend to deal with the Past or present.)

-

166 Chapter 5 Types of Claims . 1

should be sent to prison r h rim.1na h ath . s of policy. T e c should be taug t to recognize er

Examples of clat~ I institution. Everyon~ lace Every person in the Dn~lld than to a me~ :arassment in the wl hor !re s·m.all business loans IllUst Itbect report sexua 10 hea t c · • f e h Id have access br sh their busmesses a ter a nat Sta~es sva~~ble to help people rees~; groups should make objection:t ~a e a Both film.makers and recor to prospective consumers. Batte e disaster. . tter known . . .

1 G . rect

language and subJect ma ould not be placed in Jal . enet1c engineer. men who take revenge sh lled Parents should have the right t wo ·tored and contro . o

ing should be mom . hildren attend. . . choose the schools their c . 1 . oEpolicy. Data and statzstzcs are Used . ted with c aims 'J -'1\•pes of support assocta . r'e moral and commonsense appeals to

A-.J', r la1m but so a . 11 to support a po icy c ' M tivational appeals are espec1a y hnpor. what people value and want.d. o needs to become sufficiently moti- tant for po~icy claims. The .:u a

1 ~~;:rent way. To accomplish this degree

vated to thmk or even act 1 vince the audience that they want f . . the arguer must .con h o mot1vat10n, 1 ed for motivation. T e audience h A peals to values are a so us

to c ange. P . h Id follow a policy to achieve important becomes convmced they s ou ·

value~. 1 . 1. es support policy claims. The arguer estab-Lzteral ana ogzes some 1m d • h h · ·1 eople or groups have · done an suggests the hshes w at ot er s1m1 ar p . .

hi k · thi·s case also Or a successful effort 1s descnbed, same t ng can wor m • , and the claim is made that it could workeven better on a broader scale. This is another type of literal analogy because it compares a small-scale effort to a large-scale, expanded effort. . . .

Argument from authority is also often used to establish clarms of pohcy. The authorities quoted, however, must be trusted and 'must have good credibility. Effort is usually made to establish their credentials. Cause can be used to establish the origin of the problem, and definition can be used to clarify it. Finally, deduction can be used to reach a conclusion based on a general principle.

Possible organizational strategies. The problem-solution structure is typical of policy claims. The problem is first described in sufficient detail so that the audience will want a solution. Then the solution is spelled out. In addi· tion, the solution suggested is usually shown to be superior to other solu· tions by anticipating and showing what is wrong with each of the others. In some arguments the problem and solution sections are followed by _a visualization of how matters will be improved if the proposed solution 15 accepted and followed. Problem-solution arguments often end with a1l action step that directs the audience to take a particular course of actioll (vote, buy, etc.).

An example of an argument that contains a claim of policy. The article oll pages 167-168 addresses the problem posed by th · . I growtb in bottled water. The author describes this probl efexpo~;;ua t poiJltS

. . em rom eren of view, and outhnes the_ different policy solutions that might best address it. Pay partic~lar attent10n to how she describes the problem and tbC potential s0Iut10ns.

I

Five Types of Claims 167

...:,,0 - ....

sffORE YOU REA~: Are you a fan of bottled water? What are the advantages and I otential costs of this particular product? p . .,..__-· - --,.,,,-,,,-- ·-- - .

vaiue comparison

(laim of Policy

comparison

Statements of Values

1tatist· ICS

IS BOTTLED WATER A MORAL ISSUE?* Rebecca Cho Rebecca Cho is a frequent contributor to The Christian Century.

5

Thou shalt not murder. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife. Thou shalt not ... drink bottled water?

Rooted in the notion that clean drinking water. like air. is a God-given resource that shouldn't be packaged and sold, a fledgling campaign against the bottling of water has sprung up among religious groups.

And though the campaign is at a relative trickle and confined mostly to left-leaning religious groups, activists hope to build a broad-based coalition to carry the message that access to water should not be restricted to those who can afford it.

Cassandra Carmichael, director of eco-justice programs for the National Council of Churches, said she has noted an increasing number of religious groups that consider the bottling of water a wrongful, "perhaps immoral" act. "We're just beginning to recognize the issue as people of faith," Carmichael said.

In October, the National Coalition of American Nuns, a progressive group representing 1,200 U.S. nuns, adopted a resolution asking members to refrain from purchasing bottled water unless necessary.

Likewise, Presbyterians for Restoring Creation, a grassroots group within the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), launched a campaign in May urging indi- viduals to sign a piedge against drinking bottled water and to take the mes- sage to their churches.

The United Church of Christ, partnering with the National Council of Churches, produced a documentary, Troubled Waters, that looks at the dan- gers of water privatization around the world, including the bottling of water for sale in poor areas. The documentary aired on ABC television in October.

In the developing world, Carmichael said, water is being sold as a com- modity where the resource is scarce. On the rationale that bottling water takes water resources away from the poor, the environmental issue has become an important one for people of faith, Carmichael said. "The moral call for us is not to privatize water. Water should be free for all."

Americans consume more bottled water than any other type of beverage except carbonated soft drinks, according to the Beverage Marketing Corpo- ration, a New York-based research organization. In 2005, Americans drank about 7.5 billion gallons of bottled water, a 10.4 percent increase from 2004· The U.S. leads the world in bottled-water consumption.

IQ Ps liope I h · · c tury January 9 o,_ © 0 Make Bottled Water a Moral Issue " by Rebecca U. Cho from The C n5t1an en ' ' 2010 '

· Reproduced by permission.

168 Chapter 5 Types of Claims . f h world's population lives in vvater-

Problem

Claim

Claim

Solution

Solution

. one third o t e . d' 10

At the same tune, - . will double by 2025, accor mg to a 2 stressed conditions. That proportion ·ty Water is scarcest in arid develop·006

. ort on water scarci . h f . lllg United Nations rep ht and ollution, such as Sout A nca, where countries plagued by droug p agri~ulture fuels demand. the National Coalition of American ~uns board

Sister Mary_Ann dc~~~~he measure against bott~ed water, said the fear is member who intro u modity access to it will no longer remain a righ that as water becomes a com ' t for all people. · Sh 'd th t · th

d d • ki bottled water as a sin. e sai a m e U.S.

Coyle regar s rm ng , . , 1

. for bottled water when the country s tap water 1s among peop e are paymg the safest in the world. , . . "The use of bottled water in the U.S. is more a lifeStYle issue :han a necessity," Coyle said. "In this country, we should do more to push [avmdance of] bottled water unless we need it."

But Stephen Kay, spokesperson for the International Bottled Water Asso- ciation, said targeting bottled water among the hundreds of other products that use water will not lead to long-term solutions in poor areas. Arguing that bottled-water providers are actually a minimal user of ground water, Kay said better solutions would come from determining how to get clean water into areas struggling with access. "It narrows the focus with what I imagine is good intent," he said.

1s The Coca-Cola Company, a leading provider of bottled water with its Dasani brand, recognizes the serious nature of water issues and is working on several community initiatives in developing countries, said spokesperson Lisa Manley. "From our perspective, water solutions require the efforts of multiple organizations, nonprofits, governments, community organizations and the like," Manley said. "I hope we'd work toward the same purpose of making safe water accessible to all people of the world."

No~etheless, _Rebec~a Barnes-Davies, coordinator of Presbyterians for Restonng Creation, said she hopes that boycotting bottled water would apply pressure on companies marketing it to act responsibly in the U.S. and the rest of the world.

For Discussion: How eff~ctively does this ,essay identify bottled water as an environmental or human nghts problem? Are you convinced by the evid h h resents? D

. h . h f h . ence t e aut or p 7 o you agree wit e1t er o t e solutions her essa tl· ? H h w not, you 1nes. ow or o

Rebecca Cho's essay ("Is Bottled Water a M°.ra,~ls_sue?") raises questions about the ethical and environmental effects of the bottled water l~ldus~~- In ord_er to better' understand the different

typ es of claims this discussion involves, ~s we. a~ e ;ays; connects to the question of

. k I ly at the sample d1scuss1on on t e ne Pj:IQe. citizenship, loo c ose

Five Types of Cia ims 169

, , , Thinking Like a Citizen: Claims of Value • Why do I care about this issue?

As someon~ w~? regularly drinks bottled water, I am very interested in understanding the effects my md1v1dual co_nsumer choices have on the world around me. If it becomes clear tha: the bottled water mdu~trY_ constitu_tes a threat to the environment, I would likely decide that the cost of contmumg to drmk bottled water outweighs the convenience.

• Who else cares about this issue? Clearly, an issue like this would be of great interest to anyone concerned about the state of the enviro_nment: activists, advocates for different environmental causes. Another key stakeholder in this discussion includes representatives of the bottled water industry itself, whose interest would be in ways to maintain the financial viability of their business.

, , , Arguing Like a Citizen: Claims of Fact, Definition, and Cause • What sorts of facts, information, or data most help support my point of view?

The data I would find most useful are those that provide clear, objective evidence of the bottled water industry's harmful effects. Examples include statistics about the amount of unrecyclable waste this industry produces annually and scientific data documenting a causal connection between such wastes and specific environmental threats like global warming. Such data would enable.me tq_ create a definition of the "environmental effects" of the bottled water industry that others would find credible.

• What facts, information, or data most help support others' points of view? For industry advocates, the most useful types of information could include statistical studies establishing the purity or healthful properties of bottled water and data about industry plans to dispose of bo'ttled water waste more efficiently and safely. These kinds of information would enable such advocates to advance a definition of the bottled water industry's "environmental effects" that takes these factors into account.

• t • Acting Like a Citizen: Claims of Policy • What concrete action could I take to advance my own point of view?

To advance my own view, I could create a forum (i.e., a campus gathering, a Facebook page) in which my peers could gather to discuss and debate the issue of bottled water consumption. If I wanted to advocate more directly for my view, I might orchestrate a letter-writing campaign to the major bottled water companies, urging them to reconsider their own policies.

Activity F' tst•. choose one of the issues raised in one of the essays in this chapter {i.e., Is the college ~rnissions process fair? Should our established definition of "poverty" be chang.ed? 1~ the

Widespr d . . . . . Id I brate?) Then using the ea popularity of reality telev1s1on something we shou ce e · · ' . sarnp1 d' h. · sue raising questions of Ila e iscussion above as your guide, discuss the ways you see t ,s ts

lue, fact, definition, cause, and policy.

170 Chapters Types of Claims

[ / . L ~ --•-'c..--..-'.·S

. f contexts and come in a variety of . f und in a variety o r th In our multimedia environment, claims are o f ·r n cause, value, or po ICY, . ere are certain forms. But whether they involve issues of fact, de inic;:i~s work in an on line environment: steps you can follow to better understand how such

• t t step 1: Find the Claim r P d f . ·r n cause value, or po icy . • What type of claim is being made (fact, e mi 1o , '

. . · Wh · ch It Is Found t t t Step 2: Descnbe the Medium 1n 1 . . . • • 1 media post on line video, email, etc)"> • Through what form is this claim presented (Web site, soc1a ' • .

t t t Step 3: Identify the Multimedia Features Used to Present It • What multimedia elements are used to convey this claim (textual, visual, graphic, video)?

Example To learn how these steps can be put into practice, let's look at a specific example. The screenshot below is excerpted from a White House Web site that addresses the issue of energy conservation. The Web page makes two claims: one of fact, and one of policy. Look over this selection carefully, as well as the discussion that follows. How does this sample provide a model for analyzing claims in a digital context?

The President bas taken unprecedented action to build the foundation for a clean energy economy, tackle the issue of climate l'hange, and protect our environment.

' '.. t

t t t Step 1: Find the Claim

• \\ 11 I \l IL, 'l ,~

1 MILLION BARRELS

.. ..

Cl lMb.Tt

CH,\NGE OtH'~ ENVIRONMENT

• -- ,., ,, i 1-.,,u , r

• The key claims here can be stated this way: The President • is taki to help create a clean global economy (fact), and this action ng unprecedented action

. . needs to. I energy technology ,n order to preserve the environment (Policy). inc Ude every modern

r vaiue of the Claim Types and the Claim Q . uest1ons for Readi . . ng, Viewing, and Writing Argument 171

• ~~~7r'T'.~~~-- ' .. ;J '·~'A'

n . rgume11 . ', .'t'.,fo1?i es of Claims (continued.) . ·11.1

, , , Step 2: Describe the Medium in wh· h ~-• , 1c It Is Found • These claims are showcased in a Web site d pro uced by the White House.

, , , Step 3: Identify the Features • The Web site uses both textual and visual elem t t · •

I .

1 • en s o convey this claim. The textual

e ements me ude the written statements· "The p ·d h k · · d h . · resi ent as ta en unprecedented action to bud t e foundation for a clean energy economy" d "W d for the future-an all-of-the-above strategy for the 2tstncentueryntehe tadn enlergy strategy f · a eve ops every source 0 ~~encan-made energy." T~ese claims are supplemented by the image of the President ~tndi~g purpose!ully acr~ss a f1~ld that depicts solar panels in the background. This image 1s ~e_s1gned to reinforce viewers sense of the administration's leadership in taking on this issue.

Activity Go online and find an example of each of the five types of claims covered in this chapter (fact, definition, cause, value, policy). Then use the three steps outlined above to identify and analyze how each of these claims works.

Value of the Claim Types and the Claim Questions for Reading, Viewing, and Writing Argument Readers and viewers of argument find the list of the five types of claims and the questions that accompany them useful for identifying the claim and the main purpose in an argument.: to establish fact, to define, to establish cause, to assign :alue, or to propose a solution. Claims and claim questions can also help readers identify minor purposes in an argument, those that are developed as subclaims. When a reader is able to discover the overall purpose of an argument, 'it is much easier to make predictions and to follow the argument.

Viewers of visual argument will discover that images express the same types of Purposes as those found in written argument: some images primarily estab~sh fa~ts, 0thers define a term or a problem, and still others establish cause-effect rela~onships, ass· . 1 v· ers of online argu-ign value to a subiect or propose a solution to a prob em. iew . rn J ' • • f · al images wntten

ent Will make a similar discovery: that the combmanons O VISU. ~ses text, and Web-based links can also be analyzed in terms of these five purp ·

L02 Identify and analyze how these types of claims operate in written, visual, and online arguments.

172 Chapter 5 Types of Claims

. f the five types of claims and the que . t find the list o . . 1 . st10tl Writers of argumen 1 ·ng an issue, wntmg a c aim about it s that accompany them usefu~ for ~a r:~ for a paper and additional ideas tha~ at1d identifying both the controllmg P rp 1 of how this can work Th call

. h Here is an examp e · e auth be developed mt e paper. t' as in the example "Should highs h 0r writes the issue in the form of a ques tn;he claim questions about this iss c Oo!s be safer places?" T~en the author as of them: Is it ·a fact that high schouel and writes a paragraph m response to eac

1 k O s are

h ld e define unsafe? What causes a ac of safety in h· h unsafe places? How s ou w f d b d? Wh lg schools, and what are the effects? Is a lack of sa ety goo or a. · . at criteria could be established to judge the goodness or badnes~ of safety m high schools? What can be done to make high schools safer places? Fmally, the author reacts th paragraphs and selects the one that is most promising to form the major clai:rn an~ purpose in the paper. For example, suppose the author decides to ':r~te a policy paper, and the claim becomes "Parents, students, teachers, and adm1mstrators all need to cooperate to make high schools safer places." To show how that can be done becomes the main purpose of the paper. The information generated by asking the other claim questions, however, can also be used in the paper to provide rea- sons and evidence. The claim questions, used in this way as part of the prewriting process, can generate considerable information and ideas for a paper.

Review Questions

1. What are the five types of claims? (L01) 2. What are the questions associated with each type? (L01)

3. ~ow d~ claims tY.Pically appear in written argument? That is do writers limit t emse ves to a smgle purpose and claim or not? Discuss. (L02)

4. What events have occurred in the past few m . the national or international level that have onths e1!her on campus or on of these issues? (L02) generated issues? What are some

Exercises and Activities A. Cl.ass Discussion: Predicting Typ

. . es of Claims B:mg m the front page of a current new Discuss headlines that suggest contr sp_aper or check its "top stories" online. th · overs1al top· p . . e type of claim that will be made. ics. redict from each headline

B. Group Work: Reading and Anal . YZIIlg Types of Cl . The class is divided into five groups d auns , an each g . essay on pages 173-175. Prepare for gr roup 1s assigned to read the

with your group, answer the followingoqup w?rk by reading the essay. Then, uest1ons A . your answers to the class. · ss1gn a person to report

I. Which sentence is the claim? Remember th . ning, in the middle, or at the end of the essaat 1Dt can appear at the begin·

y. nderline it.