Essay Proposal

Introduction to Chapters 15–21 Reading and Writing About Issue Areas

The Reader contains seven chapters that introduce you to broad issue areas that engage modern society: families and personal relationships; technology; school and education; race, culture, and identity; the environment; security and privacy; and war and peace. Essays are then organized under a specific question related to this issue. These essays explore some of the individual perspectives and positions people have taken in regard to these issues. You may expand your information and understanding of these issues by doing additional research and reading in other reliable sources on the Internet, in the library, or elsewhere. Web sites that provide a starting point for further online research appear in the introduction to each chapter.

Purpose of The Reader

The Reader chapters serve three main purposes:

1. Each chapter introduces you to an important issue, helping you build background and provides you with information to quote in your papers.

2. Each chapter provides you with models of different types of arguments and thus gives you a better idea of how argument works in general. Each provides you with examples and strategies for improving your own written arguments. (See  Table 1 .)

Table 1 Examples of Argument Strategies in Reader Articles

STRATEGY	EXAMPLES
Argument papers	Exploratory: Knoepfler, 436. Rogerian: Jain, 418; James, 472. Position: Steinberg, 430.
Claims	Fact: Jaschik, 442; Hassani, 476. Definition: Weiss, 414; Kurzweil, 433. Cause: Moosa, 412; Carr, 426. Value: McWilliams, 472.
Language and style	Language that appeals to logic: Language that appeals to emotion: Smith, 459. Language that develops  ethos: Jain, 418.
Organizational patterns	Claim plus reasons: Steinberg, 430. Chronological or narrative: Kurzweil, 433. Compare and contrast: Problem–solution: Parker, 448.
Proofs: Ethos	Self as authority: Jain, 418.
Proofs: Logos	Sign: Guerra, 411. Deduction: Smith, 459; James, 472. Definition: Knoepfler, 436.
Proofs: Pathos	Motives: Kurzweil, 433. Values: Ojha, 503.
Adaptation to rhetorical situation	Hassler, 417.
Support	Examples: Guerra, 411; Jain, 418; Kurzweil, 433. Facts: Hassani, 476. Narration: Jain, 418; Kondo, 460. Personal examples and narratives: Asma, 480; Pierce, 504. Images:
Warrants	Smith, 459; Kondo, 460.
Backing for warrants	Schneier, 485.

3. Each chapter helps you invent arguments of your own by providing you with essays that function as springboards for your own thoughts and reactions.

How to Use the chapters in the Reader

1. Select an issue area that is compelling for you. Understand why it is compelling. Assess your background on it. Anticipate ways to build common ground with those who oppose you.

2. Survey it: Read the titles, read the introductory material, and “The Rhetorical Situation” at the beginning of each chapter, and read the introductions to the articles.

3. Select the specific issue within the each chapter that interests you the most.

4. Read the articles about this issue, and jot down the claim and some of the major support and warrants for each article.

5. Make a map or write a list of all of the smaller issues that you think are related to the issue you have read about. Discover the aspect of the issue that interests you the most. This will be your issue.

6. Understand the perspectives on this issue presented by these articles. You may also want to do outside research. Write an exploratory paper in which you explain at least three perspectives on your issue.

7. Take a position on your issue, and phrase it as a question.

8. State your claim, clarify your purpose, and plan and write an argument paper that presents your position on the issue.

Questions to Help You Read Critically and Analytically

1. What is at issue?

2. What is the claim? What type of claim is it?

3. What is the support?

4. What are the warrants?

5. What are the weaknesses in the argument, and how can I refute them?

6. What are some other perspectives on the issue?

7. Where do I stand now in regard to this issue?

Questions to Help You Read Creatively and Move From Reading to Writing

1. What is my exigence for writing about this topic?

2. What is my general position compared to the author’s?

3. With which specific ideas do I agree or disagree?

4. Do the essays confirm what I think, or do they cause me to change my mind?

5. What original or related ideas occur to me as I read?

6. What original perspective can I take?

7. What type of claim do I want to make?

8. What can I quote, paraphrase, or summarize in my paper?

(Page 34) Before you write about an issue, apply the twelve tests of an arguable issue that appear in  Box 1.3  to make certain that it is arguable. If all of your answers are yes, you will be able to work with your issue productively. If any of your answers are no, you may want to modify your issue or switch to another one.

Box 1.3 Twelve Tests of an Arguable Issue

Do You Have an Arguable Issue?

If you cannot answer yes to all of these questions, change or modify your issue.

Your issue (phrased as a question):                                                               

Yes	No	1. Is this an issue that has not been resolved or settled?
Yes	No	2. Does this issue potentially inspire two or more views?
Yes	No	3. Are you willing to consider a position different from your own and, perhaps, even modify your views on this issue?
Yes	No	4. Are you sufficiently interested and engaged with this issue to inspire your audience also to become interested?
Yes	No	5. Do other people perceive this as an issue?
Yes	No	6. Is this issue significant enough to be worth your time?
Yes	No	7. Is this a safe issue for you? Not too risky? Scary? Will you be willing to express your ideas?
Yes	No	8. Can you establish common ground with your audience on this issue—common terms, common background, and related values?
Yes	No	9. Will you be able to get information and come up with convincing insights on this issue?
Yes	No	10. Can you eventually get a clear and limited focus on this issue, even if it is a complicated one?
Yes	No	11. Is it an enduring issue, or can you build perspective by linking it to an enduring issue?
Yes	No	12. Can you predict one or more audience outcomes? Think of your classmates as the audience. Will they be convinced? Hostile? Neutral? Attentive? Remember that any outcomes at all can be regarded as significant in argument.)

There is a sample issue proposal written by a student on page 40 here:

Student Paper #1

Prisna Virasin Professor Wood English 1302 2 Feb. 2017

The Barbie Controversy

Introduce the issue.

It is interesting that a small, blond, blue-eyed, plastic doll could cause an uproar. Barbie has succeeded (intentionally or not) in inciting heated opinion on whether she is fit to be the image of the perfect woman for millions of impressionable young girls. Some people have stated that Barbie’s proportions are humanly impossible, with her exaggerated bustline and minuscule waist. They claim that these impossible proportions could lead girls to develop a poor body image. Barbie doll defenders state that Barbie is a part of most girls’ lives while they are growing up. Is Barbie bad? Does she have the power to affect girls psychologically all over the country or perhaps the world?

Present it in question form.

Explain why it is compelling to you.

I am interested in the Barbie controversy because, like many girls growing up in America, I was obsessed with Barbie when I was a child. Now, as a college student, I am very interested in female icons and their role in self-image development. I also have to fight the voices in my head telling me that I am too short and too fat, and I am not sure exactly where these voices have come from.

Describe what you already know about it.

I know that the Barbie doll product is pervasive in American society. I have never met a woman or girl who has not played with at least one Barbie. Barbie’s image has appeared in McDonald’s Happy Meals, in computer programs, on her own clothing line, on school supplies, and in every major American store with a toy section.

Explain what more you need to learn.

I need to do more research on the validity of the claim that Barbie affects girls’ self-images either detrimentally or positively. I would like to explore the pervasiveness of Barbie internationally and compare the domestic sales figures to the international sales figures. If Barbie proves to be a detriment to girls’ self-images, I would like to seek out some proposed solutions and discuss their feasibility.

· F. Before You Write: Finding Compelling Issues for Future Argument Papers (Page 33)

The objective is to make a list of the issues that interest you so that you can draw possible topics from this list for future argument papers.

1. Become acquainted with the issues that are topical in your world. Make a list of current, debatable issues you find interesting.

2. Report on these issues. Individuals or pairs of students should select from this list of issues until they have all been assigned. Then follow these instructions to prepare a report for the class.

a. Identify the content of the issue. What is it about? What key questions does it raise?

b. Describe the rhetorical situation for each.

c. Give a two-minute oral report in which you identify and describe the key aspects of this issue.

3. Find “your” issues. Most students have issues that they really care about. What are yours? Think about what has affected you in the past. Think about your pet peeves. Think about recent news items on television, in the newspaper, or online that have raised issues for you. Make a class list of the issues that concern you and the other students in your class.

4. Identify campus issues. What issues on campus concern you? What could be changed at your college to improve student life and learning? Make a class list.

· G. Before You Write: Applying the Twelve Tests

Before you write about an issue, apply the twelve tests of an arguable issue that appear in  Box 1.3  to make certain that it is arguable. If all of your answers are yes, you will be able to work with your issue productively. If any of your answers are no, you may want to modify your issue or switch to another one.