I don’t really know how to start this project so I think I’ll take in an unexpected direction. A little background before we begin. I’ve been reading the book A Rhetoric of Argument by a Fahnestock and Secor throughout the semester concurrently with our assigned text. I have a pretty good idea of the subjects covered in both books. You said that I could play with this assignment, so here’s how it’s going to go: I am going to write this as if we are having a conversation at my house. Let me set the stage by saying that AC/DC is playing on the stereo (the Back in Black CD), and there are a couple candles burning on the coffee table, and we are enjoining a nice cup of herb tea. You ready? I hope so. Here we go!
Tracy comments: Ken, have you enjoyed that book I gave you at the beginning of the semester?
Ken comments: You know, I have enjoyed reading the book, but I haven’t completely read the whole thing.
Tracy: You didn’t really have to read every word. I appreciate that you took this assignment on as a reviewer for an alternate text.
Ken: Oh, you’re welcome. It was a lot of extra reading, but it did give me double exposure to the content that you felt was important for this class. I learned a lot about writing argumentative papers.
Tracy: Like what?
Ken: The content of the book I reviewed was pretty good. They went into a very similar style of explaining what an argument is and how to use it effectively; they also explain that audience is very important in an argument. They said all arguments should be addressed to someone specifically. They also talked about how writers don’t deal in the present. Writers can’t make moment-to-moment adjustments by reading their audience. The authors made an impressive point by saying that “writers have to work harder to imagine and anticipate audience reactions since they will not see or hear it as speakers do.” (How do you think its working?) I never really considered this before, but it makes a lot of sense. They talked about another requirement for arguments: they said it was so obvious that it was almost invisible. Arguments need a reason to exist. I hadn’t given this much thought until I read it, but it made a big impact on my writing in the fact that without purpose, writing is forced and kind of hollow.
Tracy: That’s good to hear. What did you think about the organization?
Ken: The organization in the book is good. The chapters were laid out in a logical fashion, and they seemed to build on each other in a reasonable way. I don’t know that this book is exceptional at organizational layout, but it was effective. When I was reading it, I never thought, “Wow this book is fantastically laid out!” Our book is also laid out logically and reasonably, so I couldn’t say that this book is that much better than our text in an organizational sense.
Tracy: What about the readings?
Ken: I liked some of the readings from the book. They didn’t have a lot of pictures, but the use of pictures to accompany the text seems to get the point across. They used a lot of exercises for the students, probably as assignment possibilities for extra work to reinforce the lesson. I, of course, didn’t read all the readings—not even close—but the several that I did read were well written and were organized logically. The topics of the readings were interesting since it seems most of them were written recently. By recently I mean since 2000ish. The topics were diverse and discussed globalization, sports, public taste, and other interesting topics. At the end of the readings, there is an analysis section that asks a few questions about the reading. I assume in an attempt to promote a reinforcement of the topic and possible to aid the teacher in extra assignment possibilities. These all seem to relate to the focus of the chapter which made sense. Sometimes they included writing sections which followed this analysis and asked specific questions about parts of the story. One in thing I really liked was that they gave several websites that tied current issues to the story as well as to the chapter. This book is in its third edition, and while it was last copyrighted in 2004, the text feels more modern than our text (maybe because there is no Gettysburg Address any where to be found). I know our current text book is in the fifth edition and was last copyrighted in 2006, but the other book still feels more modern and up to date. How long have you been using the other book?
Tracy: I’ve used it for a while now. Why do you ask?
Ken: I was just curious. You wanted to know about the other text, so I was just wondering if you were planning on changing to a new book or if you were just torturing us with all this extra work. Oh! This is a great song. (Ken walks over and turns up the stereo a little bit; over the speakers plays “Thunderstruck.”)
Ken: Do you like AC/DC?
Tracy: I do. I’ll have to tell you some time about the concert I went to in Europe. What a wild time!
Tracy: You said there weren’t a lot of pictures, but were there graphics?
Ken: There were. Let me turn the stereo down. Just a second.
Ken: Okay, that’s better. Graphics—that’s right. Really there are not many graphics to speak of. They used a couple flowcharts and data sections on Web searching where they showed some webpage layouts, and there was a pretty extensive chapter on findings sources online to support your claims. They also talked about web pages that may be interesting to researchers from several different fields. These websites of course had to do with supporting your claim in an argument. Some of the flowcharts in the beginning of the book were useful when they were discussing building your case towards an argument; I think sometimes a visual confirmation helps it sink into your head better than just reading it. In a chapter about finding issues to argue, the book showed a graphic about forming issues prior to writing papers. Their really weren’t many graphics that stood out or were impressive enough to form a lasting memory. The index was fairly good. I remember that. I looked up several terms in the book that actually weren’t in our text. I think our text although it has a glossary is not especially helpful as far as the index section goes. I haven’t found the index in our text very useful: it’s only about three pages long. The index in the other book is almost 10 full pages in length, so there are at least three to four times the entries. I think this is an important issue when you’re reading. I find it useful to be able to find something in the index, if you need something clarified, without having to grab a dictionary or leave the desk. This may be one of my pet peeves, but since you wanted to know what’s important to students, I figured it was worth mentioning.
Tracy: Ken I am impressed with your attention to detail concerning this assignment. I appreciate the amount of time and effort that went into reviewing an alternate text along with all the reading and writing assignments that I have put you and your classmates through during this semester. I hope you know that all your suffering will payoff in the end. I’m very impressed with how much progress you’ve made during this semester, and I hope you would consider changing your major to English.
Ken: I appreciate your kind comments and honesty, and that you acknowledge all our pain and sleepless nights. You know, however. that I can’t change my major, but I do appreciate that you are enjoying the tea and rock ‘n roll. (Another AC/DC song continues to play)
Ken: Oh I almost forgot. I was going to tell you about warrants.
Tracy: You know I always have time to listen to warrants. I think you know it is one of my favorite topics, next to playing the wheel of punctuation game.
Ken: I know!!!
Tracy: Did you hear Hasbro wants to market the game?
Ken: I hadn’t heard, but I’ll be first in line.
Ken: The way the book laid out the warrant section was memorable. They said “when you need or want to find a position on the subject, then you first need to identify the questions that have to be answered”; they go on to ask for basic questions like what is it, how did it get that way, is it good or bad, and what should we do about it. The text for our class was effective in the section on warrants, but this section in the review book made a lot of sense and seemed to stick in my head. The authors stated these questions work for pretty much every subject. They remind us that each of the questions could be used for a different type of claim or response, and they said that this analysis helps us to take arguments apart or put them together. They, of course, had several pages that went into much greater detail on every one of the four questions, but this was a part of the book that really impressed me. They brought this up pretty early on in the book, I think earlier than chapter 4. Our English book didn’t delve deeply into warrants until Chapter 6. I liked the exercise we did in class about who should survive. I enjoyed the deeply heated debates that went on in class over whether we should vaporize Mrs. Dane without vaporizing Bobby Dane, and what was with some of my classmates wanting to keep the former prostitute over the glasses-wearing artist (says a lot about how twisted some of them really are). Warrants are tricky business, it seems, and both these exercises were beneficial when trying to learn this difficult subjects. It was good to do the assignments in class because it can be difficult to decipher what warrants really are. Another part of the book I looked in detail at was the section on fallacies. I thought I understood them from our book, but when we did the assignments in class, I didn’t do as well as I thought I should have. After these assignments (unfortunately), I reread this section in the other book, and it seemed well organized with clear and concise examples. I don’t know for a fact that this section is better than our text, but it felt a little more user friendly. I don’t know if this is true, but the vernacular felt more simple and easy to decipher. Don’t get me wrong. I don’t want to be tested again on warrants, so we will have to assume that I understand it better now than I did before. At least that’s my opinion now.
Tracy: Ken I’m impressed with how well you’ve done on this project. I’ve enjoyed this talk, although it seems at times you put words in my mouth. Do you have anything else you want to say about this project?
Ken: I do Tracy; I’m not quite to the three single spaced pages that we discussed as a suitable length, so let me try to sum it up. I think the organization provides a pretty thorough introduction to all the factors of creating and establishing an effective argument. The four questions emphasized that this is an important skill to learn and develop to become a more effective and persuasive writer. The explanations in the readings and throughout the chapters, I felt, were well-written, clear, and concise. Although there weren’t a lot of pictures or graphics, the ones that were included were visually effective in reinforcing the desired lesson. I don’t know how seriously you’ll take this glowing recommendation of this alternate text, but I think I got something useful out of this assignment (which may be more important ultimately than the actual endorsement of an alternative text). Writing assignments always demand interpretation of works of literature, so this skill is highly useful when learning to become a more effective and persuasive writer. I found the portions of the book that I discussed in detail especially informative. I feel this book was well written and useful. I can assume that it’s an extreme amount of work to select a book and set up a whole class around the assignments and exercises, so although this is a good book, I don’t know if it would be worth your time and effort to change to another text that would require totally restructuring the class. That decision would ultimately be up to you; if, in fact, you were looking to change the class text, I feel that you could consider this text as an option. The portions that I read I found useful as well as educational. Wow; I sort of feel like I have dominated this entire conversation. Oh, I almost forgot. Here is a works sited for the book. I know how you English teachers can be sticklers for the rules, so in case I may have inadvertently verbally quoted the author in our talk about A Rhetoric of Argument, here is the citation.
Fahnestock, Jeanne, and Marie Secor. A Rhetoric of Argument: Brief Edition. 3rd ed. New York, NY: Mc Graw Hill, 2004.
Tracy: I am certain that you will do great on this assignment. Thanks again, Ken, for all your input. You have a lovely home, and I appreciate the tea.
Ken: You’re very welcome, Tracy. See you in class!
