For environmental balance pick up a rifle

Writing an Analysis of an Argument

This is what we can all do to nourish and strengthen one another: listen to one another very hard, ask questions, too, send one another away to work again, and laugh in all the right places.

— NANCY MAIRS

I don’t wait for moods. You accomplish nothing if you do that. Your mind must know it has got to get down to work.

— PEARL S. BUCK

Fear not those who argue but those who dodge. — MARIE VON EBNER-ESCHENBACH

ANALYZING AN ARGUMENT

Examining the Author’s Thesis Most of your writing in other courses will require you to write an analysis of someone else’s writing. In a course in political sci- ence you may have to analyze, say, an essay first published in Foreign Affairs, perhaps reprinted in your textbook, that argues against raising tariff barriers to foreign trade. Or a course in soci- ology may require you to analyze a report on the correlation between fatal accidents and drunk drivers under the age of twenty-one. Much of your writing, in short, will set forth rea- soned responses to your reading as preparation for making an argument of your own.

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Obviously you must understand an essay before you can ana- lyze it thoughtfully. You must read it several times—not just skim it—and (the hard part) you must think about it. Again, you’ll find that your thinking is stimulated if you take notes and if you ask yourself questions about the material. Notes will help you to keep track of the writer’s thoughts and also of your own responses to the writer’s thesis. The writer probably does have a thesis, a claim, a point, and if so, you must try to locate it. Perhaps the thesis is explicitly stated in the title or in a sentence or two near the begin- ning of the essay or in a concluding paragraph, but perhaps you will have to infer it from the essay as a whole.

Notice that we said the writer probably has a thesis. Much of what you read will indeed be primarily an argument; the writer explicitly or implicitly is trying to support some thesis and to convince you to agree with it. But some of what you read will be relatively neutral, with the argument just faintly discernible—or even with no argu- ment at all. A work may, for instance, chiefly be a report: Here are the data, or here is what X, Y, and Z said; make of it what you will. A report might simply state how various ethnic groups voted in an elec- tion. In a report of this sort, of course, the writer hopes to persuade readers that the facts are correct, but no thesis is advanced, at least not explicitly or perhaps even consciously; the writer is not evidently arguing a point and trying to change our minds. Such a document dif- fers greatly from an essay by a political analyst who presents similar findings to persuade a candidate to sacrifice the votes of this ethnic bloc and thereby get more votes from other blocs.

Examining the Author’s Purpose While reading an argument, try to form a clear idea of the author’s purpose. Judging from the essay or the book, was the purpose to persuade, or was it to report? An analysis of a pure report (a work apparently without a thesis or argumentative angle) on ethnic vot- ing will deal chiefly with the accuracy of the report. It will, for example, consider whether the sample poll was representative.

Much material that poses as a report really has a thesis built into it, consciously or unconsciously. The best evidence that the prose you are reading is argumentative is the presence of two kinds of key terms: transitions that imply the drawing of a conclusion and verbs that imply proof (see Idea Prompt 5.1). Keep your eye out for such terms, and scrutinize their precise role whenever, or whatever they appear. If the essay does not advance a thesis, think

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of a thesis (a hypothesis) that it might support or some conven- tional belief that it might undermine.

Examining the Author’s Methods If the essay advances a thesis, you will want to analyze the strate- gies or methods of argument that allegedly support the thesis.

• Does the writer quote authorities? Are these authorities really competent in this field? Are equally competent authorities who take a different view ignored?

• Does the writer use statistics? If so, are they appropriate to the point being argued? Can they be interpreted differently?

• Does the writer build the argument by using examples or analogies? Are they satisfactory?

• Are the writer’s assumptions acceptable?

• Does the writer consider all relevant factors? Has he or she omitted some points that you think should be discussed? For instance, should the author recognize certain opposing posi- tions and perhaps concede something to them?

• Does the writer seek to persuade by means of ridicule? If so, is the ridicule fair: Is it supported also by rational argument?

In writing your analysis, you will want to tell your reader some- thing about the author’s purpose and something about the author’s methods. It is usually a good idea at the start of your analysis—if not in the first paragraph then in the second or third—to let the reader know the purpose (and thesis, if there is one) of the work you are analyzing and then to summarize the work briefly.

Next you will probably find it useful (your reader will certainly find it helpful) to write out your thesis (your evaluation or judgment).

ANALYZING AN ARGUMENT 129

IDEA PROMPT 5.1 DRAWING CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLYING PROOF

Transitions that imply the therefore, because, for the reason that, drawing of a conclusion consequently

Verbs that imply proof confirms, verifies, accounts for, implies, proves, disproves, is (in)consistent with, refutes, it follows that

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You might say, for instance, that the essay is impressive but not con- clusive, or is undermined by convincing contrary evidence, or relies too much on unsupported generalizations, or is wholly admirable, or whatever. Remember, because your paper is itself an argument, it needs its own thesis.

And then, of course, comes the job of setting forth your analysis and the support for your thesis. There is no one way of going about this work. If, say, your author gives four arguments (for example, an appeal to common sense, the testimony of authorities, the evidence of comparisons, and an appeal to self-interest), you might want to do one of the following:

• Take up these four arguments in sequence.

• Discuss the simplest of the four and then go on to the more difficult ones.

• Discuss the author’s two arguments that you think are sound and then turn to the two that you think are not sound (or perhaps the reverse).

• Take one of these approaches and then clinch your case by constructing a fifth argument that is absent from the work under scrutiny but in your view highly important.

In short, the organization of your analysis may or may not follow the organization of the work you are analyzing.

Examining the Author’s Persona You will probably also want to analyze something a bit more elusive than the author’s explicit arguments: the author’s self-presentation. Does the author seek to persuade readers partly by presenting him- self or herself as conscientious, friendly, self-effacing, authoritative, tentative, or in some other light? Most writers do two things:

• They present evidence, and

• They present themselves (or, more precisely, they present the image of themselves that they wish us to behold).

In some persuasive writing this persona or voice or presentation of the self may be no less important than the presentation of evidence.

In establishing a persona, writers adopt various rhetorical strategies, ranging from the use of characteristic words to the use of a particular form of organization. For instance,

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• The writer who speaks of an opponent’s “gimmicks” instead of “strategy” is trying to downgrade the opponent and also to convey the self-image of a streetwise person.

• On a larger scale, consider the way in which evidence is presented and the kind of evidence offered. One writer may first bombard the reader with facts and then spend rela- tively little time drawing conclusions. Another may rely chiefly on generalizations, waiting until the end of the essay to bring the thesis home with a few details. Another may begin with a few facts and spend most of the space reflecting on these. One writer may seem professorial or pedantic, offering examples of an academic sort; another, whose examples are drawn from ordinary life, may seem like a reg- ular guy.

All such devices deserve comment in your analysis. The writer’s persona, then, may color the thesis and help it

develop in a distinctive way. If we accept the thesis, it is partly because the writer has won our goodwill by persuading us of his or her good character (ethos, in Aristotle’s terms). Later we talk more about the appeal to the character of the speaker—the so-called eth- ical appeal, but here we may say that wise writers present them- selves not as wise-guys but as decent people whom the reader would like to invite to dinner.

The author of an essay may, for example, seem fair minded and open minded, treating the opposition with great courtesy and expressing interest in hearing other views. Such a tactic is itself a per- suasive device. Or take an author who appears to rely on hard evi- dence such as statistics. This reliance on seemingly objective truths is itself a way of seeking to persuade—a rational way, to be sure, but a mode of persuasion nonetheless.

Especially in analyzing a work in which the author’s persona and ideas are blended, you will want to spend some time comment- ing on the persona. Whether you discuss it near the beginning of your analysis or near the end will depend on your own sense of how you want to construct your essay, and this decision will partly depend on the work you are analyzing. For example, if the author’s persona is kept in the background and is thus relatively invisible, you may want to make that point fairly early to get it out of the way and then concentrate on more interesting matters. If, however, the persona is interesting—and perhaps seductive, whether because it seems so scrupulously objective or so engagingly subjective—you

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may want to hint at this quality early in your essay and then develop the point while you consider the arguments.

Summary In the last few pages we have tried to persuade you that, in writing an analysis of your reading, you must do the following:

• Read and reread thoughtfully. Writing notes will help you to think about what you are reading.

• Be aware of the purpose of the material to which you are responding.

We have also tried to point out these facts:

• Most of the nonliterary material that you will read is designed to argue, to report, or to do both.

• Most of this material also presents the writer’s personality, or voice, and this voice usually merits attention in an analysis. An essay on, say, nuclear war, in a journal devoted to political science, may include a voice that moves from an objective tone to a mildly ironic tone to a hortatory tone, and this voice is worth commenting on.

Possibly all this explanation is obvious. There is yet another point, equally obvious but often neglected by students who begin by writ- ing an analysis and end up by writing only a summary, a shortened version of the work they have read: Although your essay is an analysis of someone else’s writing, and you may have to include a summary of the work you are writing about, your essay is your essay. The thesis, the organization, and the tone are yours.

• Your thesis, for example, may be that although the author is convinced she has presented a strong case, her case is far from proved.

• Your organization may be deeply indebted to the work you are analyzing, but it need not be. The author may have begun with specific examples and then gone on to make generalizations and to draw conclusions, but you may begin with the conclusions.

• Your tone, similarly, may resemble your subject’s (let’s say the voice is courteous academic), but it will nevertheless have its own ring, its own tone of, say, urgency, caution, or coolness.

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Most of the essays that we have printed thus far are more or less in an academic style, and indeed several are by students and by pro- fessors. But argumentative writing is not limited to academicians— if it were, your college would not be requiring you to take a course in the subject. The following essay, in a breezy style, comes from a columnist who writes for the New York Times.

ANALYZING AN ARGUMENT 133

✓ A CHECKLIST FOR ANALYZING A TEXT Have I considered all of the following matters? � Who is the author? � Is the piece aimed at a particular audience? A neutral

audience? Persons who are already sympathetic to the author’s point of view? A hostile audience?

� What is the author’s thesis (argument, main point, claim)? � What assumptions does the author make? Do I share them? If

not, why not? � Does the author ever confuse facts with beliefs or opinions? � What appeals does the author make? To reason (logos), for

instance, with statistics, the testimony of authorities, and personal experience? To the emotions (pathos), for instance, by an appeal to “our better nature,” or to widely shared values? To our sense that the speaker is trustworthy (ethos)?

� How convincing is the evidence? � Are significant objections and counterevidence adequately

discussed? � How is the text organized, and is the organization effective?

Are the title, the opening paragraphs, and the concluding paragraphs effective? In what ways?

� If visual materials such as graphs, pie charts, or pictures are used, how persuasive are they? Do they make a logical appeal? (Charts and graphs presumably make a logical appeal.) Do they make an emotional appeal?

� What is the author’s tone? Is it appropriate? � To what extent has the author convinced me? Why?

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AN ARGUMENT, ITS ELEMENTS, AND A STUDENT’S ANALYSIS OF THE ARGUMENT

Nicholas D. Kristof

Nicholas D. Kristof (b. 1959) grew up on a farm in Oregon. After graduat- ing from Harvard, he was awarded a Rhodes scholarship to Oxford, where he studied law. In 1984 he joined the New York Times as a correspon- dent, and since 2001 he has written as a columnist. He has won two Pulitzer Prizes.

For Environmental Balance, Pick Up a Rifle

Here’s a quick quiz: Which large American mammal kills the most humans each year?

It’s not the bear, which kills about two people a year in North America. Nor is it the wolf, which in modern times hasn’t killed any- one in this country. It’s not the cougar, which kills one person every year or two.

Rather, it’s the deer. Unchecked by predators, deer populations are exploding in a way that is profoundly unnatural and that is destroying the ecosystem in many parts of the country. In a wilder- ness, there might be ten deer per square mile; in parts of New Jersey, there are up to 200 per square mile.

One result is ticks and Lyme disease, but deer also kill people more directly. A study for the insurance industry estimated that deer kill about 150 people a year in car crashes nationwide and cause $1 billion in damage. Granted, deer aren’t stalking us, and they come out worse in these collisions—but it’s still true that in a typical year, an American is less likely to be killed by Osama bin Laden than by Bambi.

If the symbol of the environment’s being out of whack in the 1960s was the Cuyahoga River in Cleveland catching fire, one such symbol today is deer congregating around what they think of as salad bars and what we think of as suburbs.

So what do we do? Let’s bring back hunting. Now, you’ve probably just spilled your coffee. These days, among

the university-educated crowd in the cities, hunting is viewed as barbaric.

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The upshot is that towns in New York and New Jersey are talk- ing about using birth control to keep deer populations down. (Liberals presumably support free condoms, while conservatives back abstinence education.) Deer contraception hasn’t been very successful, though.

Meanwhile, the same population bomb has spread to bears. A bear hunt has been scheduled for this week in New Jersey— prompting outrage from some animal rights groups (there’s also talk of bear contraception: make love, not cubs).

As for deer, partly because hunting is perceived as brutal and vaguely psychopathic, towns are taking out contracts on deer through discreet private companies. Greenwich, Connecticut, bud- geted $47,000 this year to pay a company to shoot eighty deer from raised platforms over four nights—as well as $8,000 for deer birth control.

Look, this is ridiculous. We have an environmental imbalance caused in part by the

decline of hunting. Humans first wiped out certain predators—like wolves and cougars—but then expanded their own role as predators to sustain a rough ecological balance. These days, though, hunters are on the decline.

According to “Families Afield: An Initiative for the Future of Hunting,” a report by an alliance of shooting organizations, for every hundred hunters who die or stop hunting, only sixty-nine hunters take their place.

I was raised on Bambi —but also, as an Oregon farm boy, on venison and elk meat. But deer are not pets, and dead deer are as natural as live deer. To wring one’s hands over them, perhaps after polishing off a hamburger, is soggy sentimentality.

What’s the alternative to hunting? Is it preferable that deer die of disease and hunger? Or, as the editor of Adirondack Explorer mag- azine suggested, do we introduce wolves into the burbs?

To their credit, many environmentalists agree that hunting can be green. The New Jersey Audubon Society this year advocated deer hunting as an ecological necessity.

There’s another reason to encourage hunting: it connects people with the outdoors and creates a broader constituency for wilderness preservation. At a time when America’s wilderness is being gobbled away for logging, mining, or oil drilling, that’s a huge boon.

Granted, hunting isn’t advisable in suburban backyards, and I don’t expect many soccer moms to install gun racks in their minivans. But it’s an abdication of environmental responsibility to eliminate

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other predators and then refuse to assume the job ourselves. In that case, the collisions with humans will simply get worse.

In October, for example, Wayne Goldsberry was sitting in a home in northwestern Arkansas when he heard glass breaking in the next room. It was a home invasion—by a buck.

Mr. Goldsberry, who is six feet one inch and weighs two hun- dred pounds, wrestled with the intruder for forty minutes. Blood spattered the walls before he managed to break the buck’s neck.

So it’s time to reestablish a balance in the natural world—by accepting the idea that hunting is as natural as bird-watching.

In a moment we will talk at some length about Kristof’s essay, but first you may want to think about the following questions.

1. What is Kristof’s chief thesis? (State it in one sentence.) 2. Does Kristof make any assumptions—tacit or explicit—

with which you disagree? With which you agree? 3. Is the slightly humorous tone of Kristof’s essay inappropri-

ate for a discussion of deliberately killing wild animals? Why, or why not?

4. If you are familiar with Bambi, does the story make any argument against killing deer, or does the story appeal only to our emotions?

5. Do you agree that “hunting is as natural as bird-watching” (para. 21)? In any case, do you think that an appeal to what is “natural” is a good argument for expanding the use of hunting?

OK, time’s up. Let’s examine Kristof’s essay with an eye to identify- ing those elements we mentioned earlier in this chapter (pp. 127–32) that deserve notice when examining any argument: the author’s thesis, purpose, methods, and persona. And while we’re at it, let’s also notice some other features of Kristof’s essay that will help us appreciate its effects and evaluate it. We will thus be in a good position to write an evaluation or an argument that confirms, extends, or even rebuts Kristof’s argument.

But first, a caution: Kristof’s essay appeared in a newspaper where paragraphs are customarily very short, partly to allow for easy reading and partly because the columns are narrow and even short paragraphs may extend for an inch or two. If his essay were to appear in a book, doubtless the author would join many of the para- graphs, making longer units.

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Title By combining “Environmental Balance” with “Rifle”— terms that don’t seem to go together—Kristof starts off with a bang. He gives a hint of his topic (something about the environ- ment) and of his thesis (some sort of way of introducing ecological balance). He also conveys something of his persona by introducing a rifle into the environment. He is, the title suggests, a no-non- sense, hard-hitting guy.

Opening Paragraphs Kristof immediately grabs hold of us (“Here’s a quick quiz”) and asks a simple question, but one that we probably have not thought much about: “Which large American mammal kills the most humans each year?” In his second paragraph he tells us it is not the bear—the answer most readers probably come up with—nor is it the cougar. Not until the third paragraph does Kristof give us the answer, the deer. But remember, Kristof is writing in a newspaper, where paragraphs customarily are very short. It takes us only a few seconds to get to the third paragraph and the answer.

Thesis What is the basic thesis Kristof is arguing? Somewhat unusually, Kristof does not announce it in its full form until his sixth paragraph (“Let’s bring back hunting”), but, again, his para- graphs are very short, and if the essay were published in a book, Kristof’s first two paragraphs probably would be combined, as would the third and fourth.

Purpose Kristof’s purpose is clear: He wants to persuade readers to adopt his view. This amounts to trying to persuade us that his thesis (stated above) is true. Kristof, however, does not show that his essay is argumentative or persuasive by using many of the key terms that normally mark argumentative prose. He doesn’t call anything his conclusion, none of his statements is labeled my premises, and he doesn’t connect clauses or sentences with therefore or because. Almost the only traces of the language of argument are “Granted” (para. 18) and “So” (that is, therefore) in his final paragraph.

Despite the lack of argumentative language, the argumentative nature of his essay is clear. He has a thesis—one that will strike many readers as highly unusual—and he wants readers to accept it, so he must go on to support it; accordingly, after his introductory paragraphs, in which he calls attention to a problem and offers a solution (his thesis), he must offer evidence, and that is what much of the rest of the essay seeks to do.

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Methods Although Kristof will have to offer evidence, he begins by recognizing the folks on the other side, “the university-educated crowd in the cities, [for whom] hunting is viewed as barbaric” (para. 7). He goes on to spoof this “crowd” when, speaking of methods of keeping the deer population down, he says in para- graph 8, “Liberals presumably support free condoms, while conser- vatives back abstinence education.” Ordinarily it is a bad idea to make fun of persons who hold views other than your own—after all, they just may be on to something, they just might know some- thing you don’t know, and, in any case, impartial readers rarely want to align themselves with someone who mocks others. In the essay we are looking at, however, Kristof gets away with this smart- guy tone because he (a) has loyal readers and (b) has written the entire essay in a highly informal or playful manner. Think again about the first paragraph, which begins “Here’s a quick quiz.” The informality is not only in the contraction (Here’s versus Here is), but in the very idea of beginning by grabbing the readers and thrusting a quiz at them. The playfulness is evident throughout: For instance, immediately after Kristof announces his thesis, “Let’s bring back hunt- ing,” he begins a new paragraph (7) with, “Now, you’ve probably just spilled your coffee.”

Kristof’s methods of presenting evidence include providing sta- tistics (paras. 3, 4, 10, and 13), giving examples (paras. 10, 19–20), and citing authorities (paras. 13 and 16).

Persona Kristof presents himself as a confident, no-nonsense fel- low, a persona that not many writers can get away with, but that probably is acceptable in a journalist who regularly writes a news- paper column. His readers know what to expect, and they read him with pleasure. But it probably would be inadvisable for an unknown writer to adopt this persona, unless perhaps he or she were writing for an audience that could be counted on to be friendly (in this instance, an audience of hunters). If this essay appeared in a hunting magazine, doubtless it would please and entertain its audience. It would not convert anybody, but conver- sion would not be its point if it were published in a magazine read by hunters. In the New York Times, where the essay originally appeared, Kristof could count on a moderately sympathetic audi- ence because he has a large number of faithful readers, but one can guess that many of these readers —chiefly city dwellers—read him for entertainment rather than for information about how they should actually behave.

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Closing Paragraphs The first two of the last three paragraphs report an episode (the two hundred pound buck inside the house) that Kristof presumably thinks is pretty conclusive evidence. The final paragraph begins with “So,” strongly implying a logical con- clusion to the essay.

Let’s now turn to a student’s analysis of Kristof’s essay and then to our analysis of the student’s analysis. (We should say that the analysis of Kristof’s essay that you have just read is partly indebted to the student’s essay that you are about to read.)

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Betsy Swinton

Professor Knowles

English 101B

March 12, 2007

Tracking Kristof

Nicholas D. Kristof ’s “For Environmental Balance, Pick

Up a Rifle” is an engaging piece of writing, but whether it is

convincing is something I am not sure about. And I am not

sure about it for two reasons: (1) I don’t know much about the

deer problem, and that’s my fault; (2) I don’t know much about

the deer problem, and that’s Kristof ’s fault. The first point

needs no explanation, but let me explain the second.

Kristof is making an argument, offering a thesis: Deer

are causing destruction, and the best way to reduce the

destruction is to hunt deer. For all that I know, he may be

correct both in his comment about what deer are doing and

also in his comment about what must be done about deer. My

ignorance of the situation is regrettable, but I don’t think that

I am the only reader from Chicago who doesn’t know much

about the deer problems in New Jersey, Connecticut, and

Arkansas, the states that Kristof specifically mentions in

connection with the deer problem. He announces his thesis

early enough, in his sixth paragraph, and he is entertaining

throughout his essay, but does he make a convincing case? To

ask “Does he make a convincing case?” is to ask “Does he offer

adequate evidence?” and “Does he show that his solution is

better than other possible solutions?”

Swinton 1

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To take the first question: In a short essay Kristof can

hardly give overwhelming evidence, but he does convince me

that there is a problem. The most convincing evidence he gives

appears in paragraph 16, where he says that the New Jersey

Audubon Society “advocated deer hunting as an ecological

necessity.” I don’t really know anything about the New Jersey

Audubon Society, but I suppose that they are people with a

deep interest in nature and in conservation, and if even such a

group advocates deer hunting, there must be something to this

solution.

I am even willing to accept his argument that, in this

nation of meat-eaters, “to wring one’s hands over them [dead

deer], perhaps after polishing off a hamburger, is soggy

sentimentality” (para. 14). According to Kristof, the present

alternative to hunting deer is that we leave the deer to “die of

disease and hunger” (para. 15). But what I am not convinced

of is that there is no way to reduce the deer population other

than by hunting. I don’t think Kristof adequately explains why

some sort of birth control is inadequate. In his eighth

paragraph he makes a joke about controlling the birth of deer

(“Liberals presumably support free condoms, while conserva-

tives back abstinence education”), and the joke is funny, but it

isn’t an argument, it’s just a joke. Why can’t food containing

some sort of sterilizing medicine be put out for the starving

deer, food that will nourish them and yet make them

unreproductive? In short, I don’t think he has fairly informed

his readers of alternatives to his own positions, and because

Swinton 2

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he fails to look at counterproposals, he weakens his own

proposal.

Although Kristof occasionally uses a word or phrase that

suggests argument, such as “Granted” (para. 18), “So” (final

paragraph), and “There’s another reason” (para. 17), he relies

chiefly on forceful writing rather than on reasoning. And the

second of his two reasons for hunting seems utterly

unconvincing to me. His first, as we have seen, is that the deer

population (and apparently the bear population) is out of

control. His second (para. 17) is that hunting “connects people

with the outdoors and creates a broader constituency for

wilderness preservation.” I am not a hunter and I have never

been one. Perhaps that’s my misfortune, but I don’t think I am

missing anything. And when I hear Kristof say, in his final

sentence—the climactic place in his essay—that “hunting is as

natural as bird-watching,” I rub my eyes in disbelief. If he had

me at least half-convinced by his statistics and his citation of

the Audubon Society, he now loses me when he argues that

hunting is “natural.” One might as well say that war is natural,

rape is natural, bribery is natural—all these terrible things

occur, but we ought to deplore them and we ought to make

every effort to see that they disappear.

In short, I think that Kristof has written an engaging

essay, and he may well have an important idea, but I think that

in his glib final paragraph, where he tells us that “hunting is as

natural as bird-watching,” he utterly loses the reader’s

confidence.

Swinton 3

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AN ANALYSIS OF THE STUDENT’S ANALYSIS

Swinton’s essay seems to us to be excellent, doubtless the product of a good deal of thoughtful revision. She does not cover every pos- sible aspect of Kristof’s essay—she concentrates on his reasoning and she says very little about his style—but we think that, given

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✓ A CHECKLIST FOR WRITING AN ANALYSIS OF AN ARGUMENT

Have I asked myself the following questions? � Early in my essay have I fairly stated the writer’s thesis (claim)

and summarized his or her supporting reasons? Have I explained to my reader any disagreement about definitions of important terms?

� Have I, again fairly early in my essay, indicated where I will be taking my reader, i.e., have I indicated my general response to the essay I am analyzing?

� Have I called attention to the strengths, if any, and the weaknesses, if any, of the essay?

� Have I commented not only on the logos (logic, reasoning) but also on the ethos (character of the writer, as presented in the essay)? For instance, has the author convinced me that he or she is well-informed and is a person of goodwill? Or, on the other hand, does the writer seem to be chiefly concerned with ridiculing those who hold a different view?

� If there is an appeal to pathos (emotion, originally meaning “pity for suffering,” but now interpreted more broadly to include appeals to patriotism, humor, or loyalty to family, for example), is it acceptable? If not, why not?

� Have I used occasional brief quotations to let my reader hear the author’s tone and to ensure fairness and accuracy?

� Is my analysis effectively organized? � Does my essay, perhaps in the concluding paragraphs,

indicate my agreement or disagreement with the writer but also my view of the essay as a piece of argumentative writing?

� Is my tone appropriate?

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the limits of space (about 500 words), she does a good job. What makes this student’s essay effective?

• The essay has a title (“Tracking Kristof”) that is of at least a little interest; it picks up Kristof’s point about hunting, and it gives a hint of what is to come.

• The author promptly identifies her subject (she names the writer and the title of his essay) early.

• Early in the essay she gives us a hint of where she will be going (in her first paragraph she tells us that Kristof’s essay is “engaging . . . but . . .”).

• She uses a few brief quotations, to give us a feel for Kristof’s essay and to let us hear the evidence for itself, but she does not pad her essay with long quotations.

• She takes up all of Kristof’s main points.

• She gives her essay a reasonable organization, letting us hear Kristof’s thesis, letting us know the degree to which she accepts it, and finally letting us know her specific reserva- tions about the essay.

• She concludes without the formality of “in conclusion”; “in short” nicely does the trick.

• Notice, finally, that she sticks closely to Kristof’s essay. She does not go off on a tangent about the virtues of vegetarian- ism or the dreadful politics of the New York Times, the news- paper that published Kristof’s essay. She was asked to analyze the essay, and she has done so.

EXERCISE

Take one of the essays not yet discussed in class or an essay assigned now by your instructor, and in an essay of 500 words ana- lyze and evaluate it.

144 5 / WRITING AN ANALYSIS OF AN ARGUMENT

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