English Writing

Writing critically 173

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8c

Note Critical writing is not summarizing. You may write a summary to clarify for yourself what an author says or what an image shows, and you may briefly summarize a work in your own larger piece of writing. But your job in critical writing is not just to report; it is to transmit your analysis, interpretation, synthesis, and perhaps evaluation of the text.

Writing critically about a text

The following essay by the student Charlene Robinson re- sponds to Thomas Sowell’s “Student Loans.” Robinson arrived at her response through the process of critical reading outlined in this chapter and then by gathering and organizing her ideas, developing her own central idea (or thesis) about Sowell’s text, and drafting and revising until she believed she had supported her central idea.

Robinson does not assume that her readers see the same things in Sowell’s essay or share her views, so she offers evidence of Sow- ell’s ideas in the form of direct quotations, summaries, and para- phrases (restatements in her own words). (See pp. 617–22 for more on these techniques.) Robinson then documents these borrowings from Sowell using the style of the Modern Language Association (MLA): the numbers in parentheses are page numbers in the book containing Sowell’s essay, listed at the end as a “work cited.” (See Chapter 47 for more on MLA style.)

1

Weighing the Costs

In his essay “Student Loans,” the economist Thomas Sowell chal-

lenges the US government’s student-loan program for several reasons: a

scarce resource (taxpayers’ money) goes to many undeserving students,

a high number of recipients fail to repay their loans, and the easy avail-

ability of money has led to both lower academic standards and higher

college tuitions. Sowell wants his readers to “weigh the costs of things”

(133) in order to see, as he does, that the loan program should not receive

so much government funding. But does he provide the evidence of cost

and other problems to lead the reader to agree with him? The answer is

no, because hard evidence is less common than debatable and unsup-

ported assumptions about students, scarcity, and the value of education.

Sowell’s portrait of student-loan recipients is questionable. It is

based on averages, some statistical and some not, but averages are often

deceptive. For example, Sowell cites college graduates’ low average debt of

$7,000 to $9,000 (131) without acknowledging the fact that many stu-

dents’ debt is much higher or giving the full range of statistics. Similarly,

Sowell dismisses “heart-rending stories” of “the low-income student with a

Introduction

Summary of Sowell’s essay

Robinson’s crit- ical question

Thesis state- ment

First main point

Evidence for first point: para- phrases and quotations from Sowell’s text

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174 Forming a critical perspective

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8c huge debt” as “not at all typical” (132), yet he invents his own exagger-

ated version of the typical loan recipient: an affluent slacker (“Rocke-

fellers” and “Vanderbilts”) for whom college is a “place to hang out for a

few years” sponging off the government, while his or her parents clear a

profit from making use of the loan program (132). Although such students

(and parents) may well exist, are they really typical? Sowell does not offer

any data one way or the other—for instance, how many loan recipients

come from each income group, what percentage of loan funds go to each

group, how many loan recipients receive significant help from their par-

ents, and how many receive none.

Another set of assumptions in the essay has to do with “scarcity”:

“There is never enough of anything to fully satisfy all those who want it,”

Sowell says (131). This statement appeals to readers’ common sense, but

does the “lesson” of scarcity necessarily apply to the student-loan pro-

gram? Sowell omits many important figures needed to prove that the na-

tion’s resources are too scarce to support the program, such as the total

cost of the program, its percentage of the total education budget and the

total federal budget, and its cost compared to the cost of defense, Medi-

care, and other expensive programs. Moreover, Sowell does not mention the

interest paid by loan recipients, even though the interest must offset some

of the costs of running the program and covering unpaid loans.

The most fundamental and most debatable assumption underlying

Sowell’s essay is that higher education is a kind of commodity that not

everyone is entitled to. In order to diminish the importance of graduates’

average debt from education loans, Sowell claims that a car loan will prob-

ably be higher (131). This comparison between education and an automo-

bile implies that the two are somehow equal as products and that an af-

fordable higher education is no more a right than a new car is. Sowell also

condemns the “irresponsible” students who drop out of school and “the in-

creasingly easy availability of college to people who are not very serious

about getting an education” (132). But he overlooks the value of encour-

aging education, including education of those who don’t finish college or

who aren’t scholars. For many in the United States, education has a greater

value than that of a mere commodity like a car. And even from an eco-

nomic perspective such as Sowell’s, the cost to society of an uneducated

public needs to be taken into account.

Sowell writes with conviction, and his concerns are valid: high taxes,

waste, unfairness, declining educational standards, obtrusive government.

However, the essay’s flaws make it unlikely that Sowell could convince

Evidence for first point: Sowell’s omissions

Transition to second main point

Second main point

Evidence for second point: Sowell’s omissions

Third main point

Evidence for third point: paraphrases and quotations of Sowell’s text

Conclusion

Acknowledg- ment of Sow- ell’s concerns

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readers who do not already agree with him. He does not support his

portrait of the typical loan recipient, he fails to demonstrate a lack of

resources for the loan program, and he neglects the special nature of

education compared to other services and products. Sowell may have

the evidence to back up his assumptions, but by omitting it he himself

does not truly weigh the costs of the loan program.

Work Cited

Sowell, Thomas. “Student Loans.” Is Reality Optional? and Other Essays.

Stanford: Hoover, 1993. 131-33.

—Charlene Robinson (student)

Writing critically 175

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8c Summary of three main points

Return to theme of introduction: weighing costs

Reference to complete source (in MLA style)

Writing critically about an image

The essay below, by the student John Latner, responds to the Time magazine advertisement. As you’ve seen earlier in this chapter, Latner examined the image over several stages, each time discover- ing more in it and gradually developing his own ideas. In his paper Latner takes pains to be sure that readers will see the image as he does: he reproduces the ad, captions it, and clearly describes its fea- tures. He cites his sources using the style of the Modern Language Association (Chapter 47). (All but one of Latner’s text citations lack page numbers because the sources themselves are not numbered.)

Note An image is a source just as a written work is, and like a written source it must be acknowledged. Latner cites the Time ad both in the image caption and in the list of works cited. If he pub- lished his paper online, he would also need to seek the copyright owner’s permission to use the image. See pages 633–34 for more about acknowledging sources and pages 635–37 for more about permissions for online publication.

2

Playing It Safe

At first glance, the “Boy at Security” advertisement for Time maga-

zine (fig. 1) is both a humorous and a provocative depiction of a troubling

subject: airport security since September 11, 2001. A boy with an angelic

face and a nervous expression stands obediently as a security agent passes

a large scanner over his chest. The familiar red border and banner of a

Time cover surround the scanner, making it the bull’s-eye of a target. The

caption reads, “At what point do national security and common sense col-

lide?” and then “Join the conversation.” This eye-catching ad implies that

by reading Time magazine consumers will gain alternative perspectives on

important issues. However, a close examination of the ad reveals that it

actually reinforces public opinion instead of challenging it.

Introduction

Description of the image

Thesis state- ment

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