Writing Analytically 3E

by Rosenwasser

• ISBN13: 9780155058743
• ISBN10: 0155058746
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2002-07-11
• Publisher: Wadsworth Publishing

Summary

A rhetoric that treats writing as thinking, WRITING ANALYTICALLY offers a sequence of specific prompts that teach students across the curriculum how to use writing to arrive at ideas.

Table of Contents

Preface	xv
PART I Making Meaning: Essential Skills	1	(72)
Habits of Mind: Getting Ready to Have Ideas	3	(18)
Banking	5	(1)
Generalizing	6	(2)
Judging	8	(2)
Debate-Style Argument	10	(2)
Either/Or Thinking (Binaries)	12	(1)
Personalizing (Locating the ``I'')	13	(2)
Opinions (Versus Ideas)	15	(2)
What It Means to Have an Idea	17	(1)
Analysis and Creativity	18	(3)
Assignment	18	(3)
Noticing: Learning to Observe	21	(16)
Notice and Focus (Ranking)	23	(1)
The Method	24	(6)
The Steps of The Method: Making Observation Systematic and Habitual	25	(1)
Rationale for The Method: Looking for Pattern	26	(2)
Anomaly	28	(1)
Using The Method: An Example	29	(1)
Thinking Recursively: Refocusing Binaries	30	(3)
Prerequisites to Getting Smarter	33	(4)
Assignment	34	(3)
Interpreting: Asking ``So What?''	37	(16)
Prompts: ``Interesting'' and ``Strange''	37	(1)
Pushing Observations to Conclusions: Asking ``So What?''	38	(4)
Moving From Description to Interpretation: An Example	39	(3)
Where Do Meaning, Come From?	42	(11)
The Limits on Interpretation	42	(1)
Multiple Meanings and Interpretive Contexts	43	(1)
Intentionality As an Interpretive Context	44	(2)
``Hidden'' Meanings: What ``Reading Between the Lines'' Really Means	46	(2)
The Fortune Cookie School of Interpretation Versus the Anything Goes School	48	(1)
Implication and Inference: Hidden or Not?	49	(1)
Seems to Be About X but...	50	(2)
Assignment	52	(1)
Reading: How to Do It and What to Do with It	53	(20)
How to Read: Words Matter	53	(7)
Becoming Conversant Versus Reading for the Gist	54	(1)
Paraphrase X 3	55	(1)
Summary	56	(1)
Strategies for Making Summaries More Analytical	56	(3)
Passage-based Focused Freewriting	59	(1)
What to Do with the Reading: Avoiding the Matching Exercise	60	(13)
Applying a Reading as a Lens	60	(2)
Comparing and Contrasting One Reading with Another	62	(2)
Uncovering the Assumptions in a Reading	64	(1)
Procedure for Uncovering Assumptions	65	(2)
A Sample Essay: Having Ideas by Uncovering Assumptions	67	(4)
Assignments	71	(2)
PART II Writing the Thesis-driven Paper	73	(116)
Linking Evidence and Claims: 10 on 1 Versus 1 on 10	75	(22)
Developing a Thesis Is More Than Repeating an Idea (``1 on 10'')	76	(6)
What's Wrong with Five-Paragraph Form?	78	(2)
An Alternative to Five-Paragraph Form: The All-Purpose Organizational Scheme	80	(2)
Linking Evidence and Claims	82	(5)
Unsubstantiated Claims	83	(2)
Pointless Evidence	85	(2)
Analyzing Evidence in Depth: ``10 on 1''	87	(10)
Pan, Track, and Zoom: The Film Analogy	89	(3)
Demonstrating the Representativeness of Your Example	92	(2)
10 on 1 and Disciplinary Conventions	94	(1)
A Template for Using 10 on 1	94	(1)
Assignment	95	(2)
The Evolving Thesis	97	(24)
Making the Thesis Evolve	98	(7)
The Reciprocal Relationship Between Thesis and Evidence: The Thesis As a Camera Lens	99	(1)
Procedure for Making the Thesis Evolve Through Successive Complications	100	(5)
Locating the Evolving Thesis in the Final Draft	105	(6)
The Evolving Thesis and Common Thought Patterns: Deduction and Induction	106	(2)
The Evolving Thesis As Hypothesis and Conclusion in the Natural and Social Sciences	108	(2)
The Evolving Thesis and Introductory and Concluding Paragraphs	110	(1)
Putting It All Together	111	(10)
Description to Analysis: The Exploratory Draft	114	(1)
Interpretive Leaps and Complicating Evidence	115	(1)
Revising the Exploratory Draft	115	(1)
Testing the Adequacy of the Thesis	116	(2)
Guidelines for Finding and Developing a Thesis	118	(1)
Assignment	119	(2)
Recognizing and Fixing Weak Thesis Statements	121	(16)
Five Kinds of Weak Theses and How to Fix Them	122	(7)
Weak Thesis Type 1: The Thesis Makes No Claim	122	(1)
Weak Thesis Type 2: The Thesis Is Obviously True or Is a Statement of Fact	123	(1)
Weak Thesis Type 3: The Thesis Restates Conventional Wisdom	124	(2)
Weak Thesis Type 4: The Thesis Offers Personal Conviction As the Basis for the Claim	126	(2)
Weak Thesis Type 5: The Thesis Makes an Overly Broad Claim	128	(1)
How to Rephrase Thesis Statements: Specify and Subordinate	129	(3)
Another Note on the Phrasing of Thesis Statements: Questions	131	(1)
Common Logical Errors in Constructing a Thesis	132	(5)
Assignment	135	(2)
Writing the Researched Paper	137	(26)
What to Do with Secondary Sources	137	(4)
``Source Anxiety'' and What to Do About It	137	(1)
The Conversation Analogy	138	(3)
Six Strategies for Analyzing Sources	141	(8)
Strategy 1: Make Your Sources Speak	141	(2)
Strategy 2: Use Your Sources to Ask Questions, Not Just to Provide Answers	143	(1)
Strategy 3: Put Your Sources into Conversation with One Another	144	(2)
Strategy 4: Find Your Own Role in the Conversation	146	(1)
Strategy 5: Supply Ongoing Analysis of Sources (Don't Wait Until the End)	147	(1)
Strategy 6: Attend Carefully to the Language of Your Sources by Quoting or Paraphrasing Them	148	(1)
Making the Research Paper More Analytical: A Sample Essay	149	(3)
Strategies for Writing and Revising Research Papers	152	(11)
An Analytical Research Paper: a Good Example	155	(5)
Guidelines for Writing the Researched Paper	160	(1)
Assignments	161	(2)
Finding and Citing Sources	163	(26)
Getting Started	163	(3)
Electronic Research: Locating Scholarly Information	166	(10)
Understanding Domain Names	166	(1)
Print Corollaries	167	(1)
For Subscribers Only	168	(1)
Directories Before Search Engines	168	(1)
Asking the Right Questions	169	(1)
Bibliographic Research	170	(1)
Popular Press	171	(1)
Tuning in to Your Environment	171	(1)
Quick Tips	172	(3)
Citation Guides on the Web	175	(1)
Seven Steps to Successful Research	176	(1)
Plagiarism and the Logic of Citation	176	(8)
Why Does Plagiarism Matter?	177	(1)
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) About Plagiarism	177	(2)
How to Cite Sources	179	(3)
How to Integrate Quotations into Your Paper	182	(2)
How to Prepare an Abstract	184	(5)
Assignment: A Research Sequence	186	(3)
PART III Matters of Form	189	(104)
Introductions and Conclusions	191	(20)
The Function of Introductions	192	(3)
Putting an Issue or Question in Context	193	(1)
Using Procedural Openings	194	(1)
How Much to Introduce Up Front	195	(3)
Typical Problems That Are Symptoms of Doing Too Much	196	(2)
Opening Gambits: Five Good Ways to Begin	198	(2)
Gambit 1: Challenge a Commonly Held View	198	(1)
Gambit 2: Begin with a Definition	198	(1)
Gambit 3: Offer a Working Hypothesis	198	(1)
Gambit 4: Lead with Your Second-Best Example	199	(1)
Gambit 5: Exemplify the Topic with a Narrative	199	(1)
The Function of Conclusions	200	(4)
Ways of Concluding	202	(1)
Three Strategies for Writing Effective Conclusions	203	(1)
Solving Typical Problems in Conclusions	204	(2)
Redundancy	205	(1)
Raising a Totally New Point	205	(1)
Overstatement	205	(1)
Anticlimax	205	(1)
Scientific Format: Introductions and Conclusions	206	(5)
Introductions of Reports in the Sciences	206	(2)
Discussion Sections of Reports in the Sciences	208	(1)
Assignment	209	(2)
Forms and Formats	211	(14)
The Two Functions of Formats: Product and Process	211	(5)
Using Formats Heuristically: An Example	213	(1)
Formats in the Natural and Social Sciences	214	(2)
The Psychology of Form	216	(9)
How to Locate Concessions and Refutations	217	(2)
Organizing Comparisons and Contrasts	219	(1)
Climactic Order	220	(1)
How Thesis Shapes Predict the Shape of the Paper	221	(1)
The Shaping Force of Transitions	222	(1)
Assignment: Inferring the Format of a Published Article	223	(2)
Style: Choosing Words	225	(16)
Not Just Icing on the Cake	225	(2)
Tone	227	(2)
Levels of Style: Who's Writing to Whom, and Why Does It Matter?	228	(1)
The Person Question	229	(2)
The First-Person Pronoun ``I'': Pro and Con	230	(1)
The Second-Person Pronoun ``You'' and the Imperative Mood	231	(1)
Shades of Meaning: Choosing the Best Word	231	(10)
What's Bad About ``Good'' and ``Bad'' (and Other Broad, Judgmental Terms)	233	(1)
Concrete and Abstract Diction	234	(1)
Latinate Diction	235	(1)
Using and Avoiding Jargon	236	(2)
The Politics of Language	238	(1)
Assignment: Style Analysis	238	(3)
Style: Shaping Sentences (and Cutting the Fat)	241	(18)
How to Recognize the Four Basic Sentence Shapes	242	(2)
The Simple Sentence	242	(1)
The Compound Sentence	243	(1)
The Complex Sentence	243	(1)
The Compound-Complex Sentence	244	(1)
Coordination, Subordination, and Emphasis	244	(5)
Coordination	245	(1)
Reversing the Order of Coordinate Clauses	245	(1)
Subordination	246	(1)
Reversing Main and Subordinate Clauses	246	(1)
Parallel Structure	247	(2)
Adding Shapes to the Main Clause: Periodic and Cumulative Sentences	249	(2)
The Periodic Sentence: Snapping Shut	249	(1)
The Cumulative Sentence: Starting Fast	250	(1)
Cutting the Fat	251	(8)
Expletive Constructions	252	(1)
Static (Intransitive) Versus Active (Transitive) Verbs: ``To Be'' or ``Not to Be''	253	(1)
Active and Passive Voices: Doing and Being Done To	254	(2)
Experiment!	256	(2)
Assignments: Stylistic Analysis	258	(1)
Nine Basic Writing Errors and How to Fix Them	259	(34)
Why Correctness Matters	259	(1)
The Concept of Basic Writing Errors (BWEs)	260	(17)
What Punctuation Marks Say: A ``Quick-Hit'' Guide	260	(2)
Nine Basic Writing Errors and How to Fix Them	262	(1)
BWE 1: Sentence Fragments	262	(2)
A Note on Dashes and Cola	264	(1)
BWE 2: Comma Splices and Fused (or Run-on) Sentences	265	(2)
BWE 3: Errors in Subject-Verb Agreement	267	(1)
A Note on Nonstandard English	268	(1)
BWE 4: Shifts in Sentence Structure (Faulty Predication)	269	(1)
BWE 5: Errors in Pronoun Reference	269
Ambiguous Reference	268	(1)
Broad Reference	269	(2)
A Note on Sexism and Pronoun Usage	271	(1)
BWE 6: Misplaced Modifiers and Dangling Participles	272	(1)
BWE 7: Errors in Using Possessive Apostrophes	273	(1)
BWE 8: Comma Errors	274	(2)
BWE 9: Spelling/Diction Errors That Interfere with Meaning	276	(1)
Glossary of Grammatical Terms	277	(16)
Guidelines for Revising for Correctness	281	(1)
Assignment: Grammar and Style Quiz	282	(1)
Chapter 14 Appendix: Answer Key (with Discussion)	283	(10)
Works Cited	293	(1)
Credits	293	(1)
Index	294