1) WRITING PROJECT #2: RHETORICAL ANALYSISFIRST : Prompt + Brainstorming

Rhetorical analysis is an important skill to master, certainly within the framework of academic writing, but most particularly in order to allow us to adequately critique and navigate our way through the arguments and pivotal questions that we face in the world today. We have been and will continue to learn about the basics of rhetorical analysis, but this is your opportunity to demonstrate what you have learned.

STEP ONE: Read the Writing Prompt

Choose any of the essays we have read in class throughout the past few weeks and analyze the rhetorical choices the author made in order to persuade their intended readers. You will primarily be examining how this argument is specifically targeting the author's chosen audience and how effective it is at doing so.

The essay: Gloria Anzalda This Bridge Called My Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color, "Speaking in Tongues: A Letter to Third World Women Writers"

You should examine:

1. 1. The intended audienceWho is the author attempting to persuade? How do their choices of intended reader influence how they present and structure their argument?
      1. Please note that you can choose to focus on how a subsection of the audience experiences the text.
      2. Example: Let's say that you think your argument is aimed at well-educated, liberal Americans, but you're interested in thinking about how, say, a liberal American who is Black or Brown (i.e., a specific subgroup of the readership) might experience the text, you are free to do so. Just clarify that you know the readership is broader than that, but you would like to focus on one specific group within that readership.
   2. The author's purpose.What do they seek to accomplish through this essay?
   3. Types of Statements:Does the author qualify as an expert? Do they present expert opinions to back themselves up? Do they rely upon personal opinions? Judgments?
   4. The main claimof the essay. What is its thesis statement?
   5. Key subclaims. What are the supporting claims made in order to prove that the main claim is correct? How do they connect to the main claim? How do they build off of each other?
   6. Counterclaims. How is the author anticipating and addressing potential rebuttals?
   7. Rhetorical appeals. (ethos, pathos, logos).
      1. Ethos: Is the argument credible? What is it about their tone, presentation of evidence, and chosen sources that makes them appear credible?
      2. Pathos: How is the argument targeting the emotions of its readers? What emotions is it attempting to elicit, and how is it doing so?
      3. Logos: What kinds of evidence is it using? Does it rely on fact, expert opinion, personal opinion, or judgments? Is the underlying logic of the argument sound?
   8. Rhetorical strategies.What strategies does the writer use to persuade readers?
   9. Logical fallacies.Does the writer's logic fail them at any point in time?

Please note that this prompt isn't asking you to summarize the content of this text or give your opinion on the issue it is talking about. You're being asked to analyze how the author you chose built their argumentyou're looking at structure, not content (except where it connects to structure). Your argument should focus on HOW your author is making their argument, in other words, not WHAT they are arguing.

So, please do NOT agree or disagree with what is being argued or simply summarize itthis is an analytical paper.

GRADING CONTRACT

• Must submit every assignment throughout the writing process--from brainstorming, outlining, first draft, peer reviews, final draft.
• Your essay should be no less than 4 and no more than 5 pages long.
• You should have an arguable thesis statement (main claim) at the end of the introduction, one subclaim per paragraph, and evidence in each paragraph to support your argument.
• Your essay should be organized and include an introduction, conclusion, and body paragraphs that must include a subclaim and sufficient evidence to verify your subclaim.
• Use MLA format, cite all sources correctly and include a Works Cited page at the end of the essay. Refer to the Online Writing Lab at Purdue University for more information on proper MLA formatting.
• Each paragraph should cite direct evidence (i.e., quotes) from the readings assigned in class.
• Do not use outside sources for this assignment! It's a rhetorical analysis of two essays-there's no reason to bring in outside sources.

STEP TWO

For this activity, read the section titled "Getting Started."This sectionpresents you with three key options--freewriting, brainstorming, and idea mapping--for generating potential paper topics. I'd like you to choose whichever method you think would work best for you and submit a copy of your pre-writing here.

You can submit PNG or JPEG files of handwritten brainstorming, idea mapping, or free writing, or you can type out your prewriting.

Questions to Consider

1. What essay did I find most interesting? List the essays you found memorable or interesting.
2. Choose the essay you are most drawn to, and begin listing what you remember about it. What was the most memorable part of the essay for you? Why did you find it memorable?
3. Take a look at the essay itself. What passages stand out to you? How do they make you feel? What draws your attention?
4. Look at section 4a in Download section 4a inKeys for Writers Download Keys for Writers(titled "Using Critical Thinking to Read and Write Arguments") and answer the questions listed there with regards to your essay.
5. What is their purpose? Why are they writing this essay? What do they hope to accomplish?
6. Who do you think the intended audience is? Are they liberal? Conservative? Moderates? Why do you think so (i.e., what hints are there in terms of the values the essay is mobilizing)? Are they a global audience? American? Academic, or the general public?
7. Can you identify the main claim, subclaims, counterclaims, and/or the overarching structure of the paper? How is it organized? Are there any subclaims/counterclaims you would especially like to discuss? How do these subclaims/main claims/counterclaims specifically target the author's chosen audience?
8. What rhetorical appeals do you see the author using? Are they using any in ways that are interesting? How do they appeal emotionally to their intended readers and the things those readers they value? How do they establish their credibility in ways that their readers would find effective? What is the underlying logic and/or evidence they provide to support their argument, and how/why were these examples chosen in order to appeal specifically to their intended readers?
9. What rhetorical strategies do you see the author using? Are there any that you find especially interesting? How do they appeal to or seek to persuade the author's intended readers? What values are they appealing to that those readers share?

Remember that you don't need to discuss EVERY subclaim, counterclaim, rhetorical strategy and appeal--just the ones that you think are doing something interesting in terms of how they are targeting a specific group of readers.

This activity is primarily to help you settle a general topic, though you shouldn't feel obligated to stick to it if you think of an idea you find more interesting.

2) Project #2: Formal Outline

Instructions

We are going to be working on our formal outlines this week--and they will be, as you can see below, fairly detailed! This will help you plan out and examine the larger structure of your essay in advance, which will help quite a bit when you arrive at the stage of your writing process that involves actually writing the essay itself.

INTENDED READER: Please bear in mind that YOUR intended reader in this essay is someone who is generally well-informed, but has NOT read your specific essay.This means that you must make sure that you explain anything your reader needs to know about the essay you're analyzing in order to get what you're arguing.

Step One: How do I structure my essay?

Your essay can be structured in one of two ways: either 1) chronologically, where you discuss the text you are analyzing in order, and summarize and examine the progress and structure of the text as you go along, or 2) by rhetorical element or device, where you would have a paragraph focusing on rhetorical strategies used, another on rhetorical appeals, another perhaps on addressing counterclaims, etc.

So the first step is to choose which structure you'd like to try out in your essay itself!

Step Two: Choosing Textual Evidence!

Once you have chosen the method you'd like to use for your overarching structure, I'd recommend taking a look at the essay you're analyzing and choosing which specific passages you'd like to discuss in your essay. Since you're likely to need 3-4 body paragraphs for this essay, I'd recommend identifying 4 passages you feel are important or interesting for some reason, and then figuring out what you'd like to say about them.

Rooting your analysis in the text itself is very important, because it will allow your argument to emerge out of and reflect the full complexity of what's happening in the text.

Then, figure out the order you'd like to discuss these pieces of evidence in--if you're approaching this chronologically, it should be relatively simple to decide this, given that they should be organized in the order in which they occur in the text itself. If you're organizing this topically, decide what your passages are an example of--are they rhetorical appeals, strategies, claims, etc.?

Step Three: Figuring Out Your Main Claim

Once you've examined all of the textual evidence you plan to use, start figuring out what happens when you put it all together. If you remember, according to the prompt, the question you should be answering here is how your author's choices in terms of what they're arguing, how they're arguing it, the types of assumptions they're making about their readers and what is important to those readers are specifically geared towards persuading their intended readers that they are right about their argument.

Intended Readers

So, of course, this means you'll have to think about who this argument is aimed at--who are they talking to? Some questions to consider, where relevant:

1. Political stance: Is my author talking to liberals or conservatives, and why do I think so?
2. Gender: Are they targeting men, women, genderqueer people, or all of the above?
3. Race: Are they speaking to members of a specific racial identity, or just everyone in general?
4. Sexual orientation: Are they assuming their readers are straight and/or allo?
5. Class: Are they talking to upper, middle, or working class people?
6. Nationality: Are they talking to Americans? English speakers? Spanish speakers? People all over the world?

Now that you know who it's targeted at, start asking yourself what some of this group's common beliefs and values are. What do they think is important? Traditional family values? Patriotism? Duty? Law and order? Sexual liberation? Gender equality? Racial equality? Social justice in general? Education? Economic success? Maintaining White male privilege? How is your author catering to or using these assumptions about what matters to their readers in order to convince them?

Step Four: Writing the Outline

So, now we'll start writing the outline itself. I've provided you with a template for your outline below, which should help you determine how to structure your own essays:

A Chronological Outline

1. Introduction
   1. The hook (attention getter):Your essay should begin in a way that is engaging to readers and makes them want to keep reading. You can use any of the following:
      1. Questions
      2. An anecdote
      3. Interesting facts or statistics
      4. A relevant quote
   2. Introduce topic: You should transition from your opening attention getter to your introduction of your specific essay topic. Explain what your hook has to do with the rest of your essay by introducing what your essay is actually about.
   3. Introduce key author(s) and text(s)
      1. Establish the author's credibility on this specific topic. In what way are they qualified to discuss this issue?
      2. Introduce your text by explaining what your text is about (1-sentence summary)
   4. Main claim: What are you arguing about this topic? What position are you taking on this issue?
      1. For this specific essay, please respond to this question: how are the rhetorical choices your author makes determined by their intended audience? How are they gearing their argument toward a specific group of people?
2. Body Paragraph #1: Analyzing your essay's introduction.
   1. Subclaim #1:If you're organizing this chronologically, you should begin at the beginning--with the hook. How do they start their essay? Why did they choose this specific story, fact, quote, etc., to open their essay? How or why does it engage/interest your author's intended readers?
   2. Explanation/reasons: Explain how and why you arrived at your subclaim. What things did you notice in the essay itself that made you think the above subclaim is true? Make sure you summarize any key points in the essay that your reader needs to know in order to understand your argument.
   3. Evidence: Cite specific textual evidence (i.e., quotes) that proves your subclaim is right.
      1. Summary: Begin by summarizing and/or explaining anything your reader needs to know in order to understand your quote. For instance, if the quote refers to "him," explain who that "him" is. Remember that 1) this quote is being taken out of its original context, and 2) your reader doesn't know what that original context is.
      2. Quote:
         • Include the actual quote in a way that smoothly transitions from your words to your author's. Use phrases such as "X asserts that...," "X establishes that...," "According to X,..." in order to frame your quotes.
         • Remember to ONLY quote the phrases you absolutely need as phrased by the author themselves in order to prove that the author is really doing what you're arguing they're doing. If it's something that can be summarized or explained by you, it doesn't need to be quoted.
      3. Analysis:This is the most important part of your essay.
         • Explain what's happening in the quote to your reader. How are you understanding and/or interpreting this quote?
         • How and why does it prove that your subclaim is correct? Don't assume your reader will automatically know how this quote relates to your subclaim. Explain it to them.
         • Why does this quote matter? Why choose this specific quote out of all of the choices you could have gone with? What's especially important about this specific quote?
3. Body Paragraphs #2-4: Repeat the structure of #2 and plan out the rest of your body paragraphs.
4. Conclusion: Now that you've presented your evidence, remind your reader of your main claim and why your analysis matters. What can/should they take away from your analysis of this essay, especially when it comes to effective strategies for persuading readers?