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Major Paper #2--Letter To The Editor

Purpose:

How many times have we heard someone complaining about something happening in our communities--but offering no solutions for the problem? This assignment is designed to develop your problem-solving skills and engage you in a substantive conversation concerning a current local issue. This assignment will also encourage you to begin seriously considering your audience as a writer. When you are writing a letter such as this, you'll want to consider who will be reading it, particularly in terms of what words, examples, facts, or appeals might best convince this particular group.

The Assignment:

* Write a two to three page (double-spaced) letter to the editor, proposing a solution to a current local problem. List the newspaper to which you would be sending this to at the top of your paper. Begin the letter with: "Dear Editor," Throughout the paper, be as specific as you possibly can in terms of:

1.) Defining/describing the problem and who it affects

2.) Describing your solution

3.) Defending your solution as the best means of dealing with this problem

As you're writing this letter, also do keep in mind your audience.

***

IMPORTANT NOTE: Papers on the following topics will not be accepted:

* abortion
* capital punishment
* euthanasia

I've already read more papers on these topics than anyone should in an entire lifetime, so I won't read anymore. I encourage you to be more creative in selecting your topic. For the Letter to the Editor, you should also be choosing a topic that is far more specific and local than any of these broad controversial issues.

Please check the book . (The Book Attached)

9th Edition Reading Assignment:

The St. Martin's Guide to Writing, Chapter 7, pages 320-355. Skim the Guide to Writing section for your reference as well (pages 356-381).

Sample Letter to the Editor

To: Junction City Daily Union

Dear Editor,

There is a robbery in progress! The students of USD 475 are being robbed! The

suspects include the State Budget Cuts, but all evidence points to the Board of Education

and the administrators in this district. The money that should be used to benefit the

students is in the greedy hands of the administration instead.

Clearly, Unified School District #475 is going to be affected by the Kansas State

Budget cuts, along with the rest of the districts in the state. I'm not sure about the other

districts, but USD 475 may have a simple solution: Reallocation of the budget and a new

set of administrators and school board members who value children's education rather

than nepotism and administrative salaries.

Junction City's school district isn't known for its bright decisions regarding

funds. A few recent endeavors include the purchase of a brand-new Ford Expedition a

year or two ago, the move to a different Administrative Building that happens to be in a

much more lavish location, and the decision to build an enclosed walkway for students

between the high school and the former Administrative Building, which is to be used for

more classrooms. These decisions, however foolish, are still not the main cause for a

budget problem. The administrative costs are to blame. When compared to districts of

similar size, USD 475 uses dramatically more money simply for administration. Even

disregarding the percentages, although USD 475 has a smaller budget than 305 (Salina)

and 383 (Manhattan), it allocates more money for administration (Salina spends

$3,843,180 of their $68,267,944 budget; Manhattan $3,043,885 of their $47,298,811

budget, and Junction City $4,142,284 of their $45,743,233 budget). During the 2000-

2001 school year, USD 475 used 9 of the total budget for administrative costs, while

Manhattan and Salina seemed to be able to get by with only 6 of their budget being

used for that reason. They were able to use 50-51 of the total budget for actual

instruction, while USD 475 was only able to allot 46. This is an outrageous allocation of

the budget, but the issue doesn't end there. Both Salina and Manhattan school districts

are comparable in size to Junction City's, but it is very difficult to understand why

Manhattan can get along with 3 central administrators, Salina has 1.2, and Junction City

claims to require 7.5. It's no wonder the administrative monetary "needs" are so high, I

won't even touch on the issue of a single family dominating the entire district.

It may appear that the 3 difference in money allotted for administration isn't all

that significant. However, when it is put into monetary terms, if the administrative costs

were cut by 1/3, which puts the percentage of the budget for administration at 6 like

Salina and Manhattan, there is an additional $1.4 million dollars that could be better

allocated. That is a large sum of money that would be better spent on children's

education, not on the inflated salaries of a large number of administrators.

As stated earlier, the school district's budget problems, on the surface, seem to be

the result of budget cuts and lack of money. The true problem, however, is the

misallocation of money and the absurd number of administrators in this particular

district. By simply eliminating the unessential administrators (and in my opinion

replacing the chief administrators with people that have true devotion to the students

and the community) and reallocation of the budget, the deficiency of money won't be

such a tough issue. Who knows, with the right people writing the budget, we might even

be able to allot at least 50 of the money for instruction, like everyone else does. Some

people may argue that it isn't the misallocation of the money that proves to be the

problem, that it is the lack of money altogether. I still believe that with the appropriate

cutbacks in specific areas, particularly administrative costs, the students will be better

off. The School District is supposed to be teaching the children; let's put some money

towards that for a change. All of the information that has been presented can be found

on the internet on the Kansas State Department of Education webpage. Don't take my

word for it; look at the statistics and budget information for yourself. I'm sure it will

shock and disturb you as much as it did me.

Sincerely,

Sally Smith

Lecture Notes:

As your textbook explains, "Proposals are vital to a democracy." Every country, every state, and every community has its share of problems. In order to solve these problems, citizens must help do their share. Part of what we all can do is use our brains. We can think about the problem, consider possible solutions, and finally propose a solution that we think best solves the problem and ask others to consider it.

In your letter to the editor, you will be proposing a solution to a current local problem. But what problem? And how can it best be solved?

Here are some things to consider before you begin drafting:

One of the best ways to get started in drafting this paper is to make a list of current local problems. What problems does your community face? If you don't know, how can you find out? (One way to find out is to check out a local newspaper, particularly the editorial sections. Here you'll find that a great number of people are already engaged in a conversation about current local problems.)

Once you've made a list of problems, you'll want to chose one to actually focus on in your letter. I recommend you choose the problem that most affects you or those you care about, something that you actually have a stake in. Any writing is always better when the author cares about his or her subject.

Next, you'll want to define the exact nature of the problem. Is this really a problem? How so? Who does the problem affect? (If it doesn't affect anyone--or if the cost of the solution would outweight the benefits, you'll want to choose a different topic.) How long has this problem existed? What are the causes of this problem? Who is responsible for this problem? What are some specific examples of the effects of this problem?

Once you've determined the exact nature of the problem, you'll want to start thinking about possible solutions. What solutions have been tried so far? What solutions have others proposed? What solutions have been successfully (or unsuccessfully) used to deal with similar problems? How can the causes of the problem be dealt with? How can the harms (or negative effects) of the problem be alleviated? What kinds of solutions are actually feasible (practical)?

Next, you'll want to choose the best solution. You'll want to choose a solution that could actually be employed, and one in which the benefits outweigh the costs. You'll also want to think about how you can deal with the typical opposing responses (such as "Things are fine," "It's not that big of a problem," "People won't do it," "We can't afford it," etc.).

Finally, spend a little time thinking about your audience, the readers of your local newspaper. You'll want ask yourself questions such as: What do they already know about the problem? Do they already consider this a significant problem? Are they aware of some of the solutions that have been discussed? What kinds of biases might they have about this issue? How can I best reach these people and minimize opposition to my solution?

Once you've thoroughly worked through the above issues and questions, writing the letter should be a piece of cake. As you're drafting, keep in mind the following:

Ninth Edition

The St. Martin’s Guide to Writing

Rise B. Axelrod University of California, Riverside

Charles R. Cooper University of California, San Diego

Bedford / St. Martin’s

Boston New York

For Bedford/St. Martin’s

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Copyright © 2010, 2008, 2004, 2001 by Bedford/St. Martin’s All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, except as may be expressly permitted by the applicable copyright statutes or in writing by the Publisher.

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ISBN-10: 0-312-53612-7 ISBN-13: 978-0-312-53612-1 (with Handbook) ISBN-10: 0-312-53613-5 ISBN-13: 978-0-312-53613-8 (without Handbook)

Acknowledgments

Acknowledgments and copyrights appear at the back of the book on pages A1-A3, which consti- tute an extension of the copyright page.

Advisory Board

We owe an enormous debt to all the rhetoricians and composition specialists whose theory, research, and pedagogy have informed The St. Martin’s Guide to Writing. We would be adding many pages if we were to name everyone to whom we are indebted.

The members of the Advisory Board for the ninth edition, a group of dedicated composition instructors from across the country, have provided us with extensive insights and suggestions for the chapters in Part One and have given us the benefit of their advice on new features. The St. Martin’s Guide to Writing has been greatly enhanced by their contributions.

Samantha Andrus-Henry Grand Rapids Community College

Melissa Batai Triton College

Mary Bishop Holmes Junior College–Ridgeland

Jo Ann Buck Guilford Technical Community College

Kevin Cantwell Macon State College

Anne Dvorak Longview Community College

Leona Fisher Chaffey College

Diana Grahn Longview Community College

Dawn Hubbell-Staeble Bowling Green State University

Amy Morris-Jones Baker College of Muskegon

Gray Scott University of California, Riverside

Susan Sebok South Suburban College

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Preface for Instructors

When we first wrote The St. Martin’s Guide to Writing, we aimed to demystify writing and authorize students as writers. We wanted to help students learn to commit them- selves to writing projects, communicate effectively with chosen readers, and question their own certainties. We also wanted them to understand that knowledge of writing comes both from analyzing writing and from working hard on their own writing. To achieve this aim, we took what we had learned from classical rhetoric and from con- temporary composition theory and did our best to make it accessible to students.

The response from instructors and students was overwhelmingly positive: The first edition of The Guide, published in 1985, immediately became the most widely adopted text of its kind in the nation.

As with every new edition, we began work on this ninth edition with the goal of adapting the best of current composition research and practice to the needs of instructors and students. We listened closely to our Advisory Board and dozens of talented reviewers (students as well as instructors), and we were confirmed in our belief that the essential purpose and approach of The Guide is more relevant than ever: Students need clear guidance and practical strategies to harness their potential as writers — an achievement that will be key to their success in their other college courses, in their jobs, and in the wider world.

At the same time, we realized that we needed to reach out to these students, and help them connect with writing, in new ways.

Every aspect of the academic landscape has changed since we wrote the first edition. The texts we read and write, the tools we use to find them, the options we have for communicating, the habits of mind we rely on, even the students them- selves — all are more varied and complex than in the past, sometimes overwhelm- ingly so. At the same time, students and instructors alike are increasingly burdened with demands on their time, attention, and energy that emanate from outside the classroom.

For all of these reasons, this edition represents a bold reimagining of our origi- nal vision. The chapters containing the Guides to Writing have been reengineered to reflect and build on the actual writing processes of students, and the Guides them- selves are streamlined and more visual. Throughout the book, we attempt to help students focus on what is important, yet offer multiple options for critical reading and writing. The result of this reimagining is what you hold in your hands: a text that we believe to be more flexible, more engaging, and more pedagogically effective than any previous edition.

v

vi PREFACE FOR INSTRUCTORS

An Overview of the Book The Guide offers everything you need for the writing course.

Part One: Writing Activities

Part One presents nine different genres of writing, all reflecting actual writing assign- ments that students may encounter both in and out of college. While the chapters can be taught in any order, we have organized Part One to move from writing based on personal experience and reflection, through writing based on research and obser- vation, to writing about controversial issues and problems.

Each chapter follows the same organizational plan:

Three brief illustrated scenarios providing examples of how the genre is used in college courses, in the community, and in the workplace

A brief introduction to the genre A collaborative activity helping students start working in the genre An orientation to the genre’s basic features and to questions of purpose and audience specific to the genre A set of readings illustrating the genre accompanied by questions and prompts designed to help students explore connections to their culture and experience and to analyze the basic features and writing strategies

A “Beyond the Traditional Essay” section discussing examples of the genre drawn from unexpected contexts — advertising, blogs, museums, even public parks

A Guide to Writing, tailored to the genre, that helps students refine their own writing processes, with activities for invention and research, easy-reference guides for drafting and revision, a Critical Reading Guide for peer review, strat- egies for integrating sources, and more

Editing and proofreading guidelines, based on our nationwide study of errors in first-year college students’ writing, to help students check for one or two sentence-level problems likely to occur in a given genre

A section exploring how writers think about document design, expanding on one of the scenarios presented at the beginning of the chapter

A look at one student writer at work, focusing on one or more aspects of the writing process of a student whose essay is featured in the chapter

Critical thinking activities designed to help students reflect on what they learned and consider the social dimensions of the genre taught in the chapter

Part Two: Critical Thinking Strategies

Part Two consists of two chapters that present practical heuristics for invention and reading. Chapter 11, “A Catalog of Invention Strategies,” covers clustering, looping, dramatizing, and questioning, among other strategies, while Chapter 12, “A Catalog of Reading Strategies,” includes annotating, summarizing, exploring the significance of figurative language, and evaluating the logic of an argument.

PREFACE FOR INSTRUCTORS vii

Part Three: Writing Strategies

Part Three looks at a wide range of writers’ strategies: paragraphing and coherence; logic and reasoning; and the familiar methods of presenting information, such as narrating, defining, and classifying.

In the ninth edition of The Guide, a new Chapter 20 provides students with criteria for analyzing visuals and illustrates them with several lengthy sample analyses and one full-length, documented student paper. Part Three concludes with a heavily illustrated chapter on document design, which provides principles to guide students in construct- ing a wide range of documents, along with examples of some of the most common kinds of documents they’ll create in school, at work, and in their everyday lives.

Examples and exercises in Part Three have been drawn from a wide range of contemporary publications as well as reading selections appearing in Part One. The extensive cross-referencing between Parts One and Three allows instructors to teach writing strategies as students work on full essays.

Part Four: Research Strategies

Part Four discusses field as well as library and Internet research and includes thorough, up-to-date guidelines for using and documenting sources, with detailed examples of the 2009 Modern Language Association (MLA) and 2010 American Psychological Association (APA) documentation styles. An annotated sample student research paper models ways students can integrate citations into their own work in accordance with the rules for MLA documentation. The final chapter in Part Four, new to the ninth edition of The Guide, offers detailed guidelines for creating anno- tated bibliographies and literature reviews.

Part Five: Writing for Assessment

Part Five covers essay examinations, showing students how to analyze different kinds of exam questions and offering strategies for writing answers. It also addresses portfolios, helping students select, assemble, and present a representative sample of their writing.

Part Six: Writing and Speaking to Wider Audiences

Part Six includes chapters on oral presentations, collaborative learning, and service learning, offering advice to help students work together on writing projects and to write in and for their communities.

The Handbook

The Handbook offers a complete reference guide to grammar, word choice, punctua- tion, mechanics, common ESL problems, sentence structure, and usage. We have designed the Handbook so that students will find the answers they need quickly, and we have provided student examples from our nationwide study so that students will see errors similar to the ones in their own essays. In addition to the section on ESL problems, boxes throughout the rest of the Handbook offer specific support for ESL students.

viii PREFACE FOR INSTRUCTORS

Proven Features

While this edition of The Guide represents a bold reimagining of the way students work, it has retained the three central features that have made it a best-seller since its first edition: the detailed, practical guides to writing in different genres; the sys- tematic integration of reading and writing; and continuing attention to changes in composition pedagogy.

Practical Guides to Writing

Each chapter in Part One offers practical, flexible guides that help students with different aspects of writing, such as invention or revision, as they write. Common- sensical and easy to follow, these writing guides teach students to assess a rhetorical situation, identify the kinds of information they will need, ask probing questions and find answers, and organize writing to achieve a particular purpose for chosen readers.

In the ninth edition, we’ve done even more to make these guides effective and easy to use, by streamlining them, by adding easy reference charts and tables, and by offering students multiple entry points into the composing process.

Systematic Integration of Reading and Writing

Each chapter in Part One introduces a single genre of writing, which students are led to consider both as readers and as writers. Chapters begin with an essay written in the genre by a student writer using The Guide; these essays are annotated with questions designed to encourage students to discover the ways in which the essay exemplifies that genre’s basic features.

Each of three professional readings in the chapter is accompanied by carefully focused apparatus to guide purposeful, productive rereading. First is a response activity, Making Connections, which relates a central theme of the reading to stu- dents’ own lives and cultural knowledge. The section following, Analyzing Writing Strategies, asks students to examine how the writer makes use of the basic features and strategies typical of the genre. Essays that include visuals are followed by an Analyzing Visuals section, which asks students to write about the way(s) in which photos, graphs, and other visual elements enhance the text. Finally, in Considering Topics for Your Own Essay, students approach the most important decision they have to make with a genre-centered assignment: choosing a workable topic that inspires their commitment to weeks of thinking and writing.

Continuing Attention to Changes in Composition

With each new edition, we have responded to new thinking and new issues in the field of composition and turned current theory and research into practical class- room activities — with a minimum of jargon. As a result, in every new edition The Guide incorporated new material that contributed to its continued effectiveness, including more on appropriate methods of argument, research, and working with

PREFACE FOR INSTRUCTORS ix

sources; attention to new technologies for writing and researching; activities that promote group discussion and inquiry and encourage students to reflect on what they have learned; and material on document design, oral presentations, and writ- ing in the community.

Changes in the Ninth Edition

In this edition, we have taken instructors’ advice and revised the text to make it an even more effective teaching tool.

Streamlined and redesigned Part One chapters provide more visual cues for students who learn visually, more “easy-reference” features for students who need help navigating a lengthy text, and more “ways in” to each assignment for students whose writing processes don’t conform to an imaginary norm.

The Basic Features of each chapter’s genre of writing are now introduced at the start of the chapter, to lay the groundwork for students’ understand- ing of the genre and to prepare them for their work with that chapter’s readings.

A new color-coding system calls out the Basic Features in the annotated stu- dent essay, the post-reading apparatus, and throughout the Guide to Writing, helping students see the connections among the chapter’s various parts and more easily grasp what makes a successful example of a given genre.

New “Beyond the Traditional Essay” sections illustrate and discuss ex- amples of that chapter’s genre of writing drawn from advertising, blogs, museums — even public parks.

New easy-reference charts in each Guide to Writing — “Starting Points” and “Troubleshooting Your Draft” — help students self-assess and efficiently find the advice and models they need for overcoming individual writing challenges.

Newly designed Invention activities highlight different paths through the processes of generating and shaping material.

Chapter 5, newly revised as “Finding Common Ground,” now teaches students how to analyze opposing positions and find “common ground” between them — a key step in analyzing and synthesizing sources and in con- structing academic as well as civic arguments.

New material brings the book up-to-date and teaches students what they’ll need to succeed at academic writing.

To help students understand and evaluate the visual data that increas- ingly dominate our culture, we have added a new Chapter 20, “Analyzing Visuals,” which provides clear guidance on how to critically read and write about photos, ads, works of art, and other image-based texts. The chapter also offers a multi-stage model of a student’s analysis of a photo by Gordon Parks, as well as exercises in visual analysis that students can do in class or on their own.

x PREFACE FOR INSTRUCTORS

To help them cope with information overload while doing research, we have added a new Chapter 25, “Annotated Bibliographies and Literature Reviews,” which offers detailed guidance on these important elements of the research process.

To help them make useful connections between their previous writing ex- periences and the writing they will do in college, Chapter 1 now focuses on the literacy narrative, encouraging students to reflect on their own literacy experiences in preparation for the reading and writing challenges they’ll en- counter in the course.

Fifteen new readings, with at least one new reading in every Writing Assignment chapter, introduce compelling topics, multicultural perspectives, and fresh voices, including Trey Ellis on a family member’s battle with AIDS, Saira Shah on finding her roots in Afghanistan, and Amy Goldwasser on what kids learn online — and why it matters.

Additional Resources You Get More Help with The St. Martin’s Guide

The benefits of using The St. Martin’s Guide don’t stop with the print text. Online, in print, and in digital format, you’ll find both free and affordable premium resources to help students get even more out of the book and your course. You’ll also find course management solutions and convenient instructor resources, such as sample syllabi, suggested classroom activities, and even a na- tionwide community of teachers. To learn more about or order any of the prod- ucts below, contact your Bedford/St. Martin’s sales representative, e-mail sales support (sales_support@bfwpub.com), or visit the Web site at bedfordstmartins .com/theguide/catalog.

Student Resources

The St. Martin’s Guide Student Center (bedfordstmartins.com/theguide). Send students to free and open resources, allow them to choose an affordable e-book op- tion, or upgrade to an expanding collection of innovative digital content — all in one place.

Free and open resources for The St. Martin’s Guide provide students with easy-to-access book-specific materials, exercises, and downloadable con- tent, including electronic versions of the Critical Reading Guides, Starting Points and Troubleshooting Your Draft charts; tutorials for the sentence strategies in the Part One chapters; and additional essays on topics of con- temporary debate for use with Chapter 5, “Finding Common Ground.” Additional free resources include Research and Documentation Online by Diana Hacker, with clear advice on how to integrate outside material into a

PREFACE FOR INSTRUCTORS xi

paper, how to cite sources correctly, and how to format the paper in MLA, APA, Chicago, or CSE style; and Exercise Central, a database of over 9,000 editing exercises designed to help identify students’ strengths and weak- nesses, recommend personalized study plans, and provide tutorials for com- mon writing problems.

The St. Martin’s Guide e-Book and enhanced Web site let students do more and pay less. This flexible e-book allows users to highlight important sections, insert their own sticky notes, and customize content; the enhanced Web site includes Marriage 101 and Other Student Essays, a collection of 32 essays inspired by The Guide, and a peer-review lesson module and online role- playing game. The St. Martin’s Guide e-Book and access to the enhanced Web site can be packaged free with the print book or purchased separately at the Student Center for less than the price of the print book. An activation code is required.

Re:Writing Plus, now with VideoCentral, gathers all of Bedford/St. Martin’s premium digital content for composition into one online collection. It includes hundreds of model documents and VideoCentral, with over 50 brief videos for the writing classroom. Re:Writing Plus can be purchased separately at the Student Center or packaged with the print book at a significant discount. An activation code is required.

Sticks and Stones and Other Student Essays, Seventh Edition. Available for packaging free with new copies of The Guide, Sticks and Stones is a collection of es- says written by students across the nation using earlier editions of The Guide. Each essay is accompanied by a headnote that spotlights some of the ways the writer uses the genre successfully, invites students to notice other achievements, and supplies context where necessary.

Who Are We? Readings in Identity and Community and Work and Career. Available for packaging free with new copies of The Guide, Who Are We? contains selections that expand on themes foregrounded in The Guide. Full of ideas for class- room discussion and writing, the readings offer students additional perspectives and thought-provoking analysis.

i·series on CD-ROM. Free when packaged with new copies of The St. Martin’s Guide, the i·series includes multimedia tutorials in a flexible CD-ROM format — because there are things you can’t do in a book:

ix visual exercises help students visualize and put into practice key rhetorical and visual concepts.

i·claim visualizing argument offers a new way to see argument — with 6 tutorials, an illustrated glossary, and over 70 multimedia arguments.

i·cite visualizing sources brings research to life through an animated introduc- tion, four tutorials, and hands-on source practice.

xii PREFACE FOR INSTRUCTORS

Course Management

CompClass for The St. Martin’s Guide (yourcompclass.com). An easy-to-use online course space designed for composition students and instructors, CompClass for The St. Martin’s Guide comes preloaded with the St. Martin’s Guide e-Book as well as other Bedford/St. Martin’s premium digital content, including VideoCentral. Powerful assignment and assessment tools make it easier to keep track of your stu- dents’ progress. CompClass for The St. Martin’s Guide can be purchased separately at yourcompclass.com or packaged with the print book at a significant discount. An activation code is required.

Content cartridges for WebCT, Angel, and other course management systems. Our content cartridges for course management systems — Blackboard, WebCT, Angel, and Desire2Learn — make it simple for instructors using this online learn- ing architecture to build a course around The Guide. The content is drawn from the Web site and includes activities, models, reference materials, and the Exercise Central gradebook.

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9th Edition (hardcover) Short 9th Edition

The St. Martin’s Guide e-Book and

enhanced Web site

ISBN-10: 0-312-58408-3

ISBN-13: 978-0-312-58408-5

ISBN-10: 0-312-58409-1

ISBN-13: 978-0-312-58409-2

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ISBN-10: 0-312-62901-X

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Sticks and Stones and Other

Student Essays, Seventh Edition

ISBN-10: 0-312-62539-1

ISBN-13: 978-0-312-62539-9

ISBN-10: 0-312-63793-4

ISBN-13: 978-0-312-63793-4

Who Are We? Readings in Identity

and Community and Work

and Career

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ISBN-13: 978-0-312-63791-0

CompClass for

The St. Martin’s Guide

ISBN-10: 0-312-62533-2

ISBN-13: 978-0-312-62533-7

ISBN-10: 0-312-63792-6

ISBN-13: 978-0-312-63792-7

PREFACE FOR INSTRUCTORS xiii

Instructor Resources

You have a lot to do in your course. Bedford/St. Martin’s wants to make it easy for you to find the support you need — and to get it quickly.

Instructor’s Resource Manual (ISBN-10: 0-312-58260-9/ISBN-13: 978-0-312- 58260-9 (print); also available for download at bedfordstmartins.com/theguide). The Instructor’s Resource Manual includes helpful advice for new instructors, guide- lines on common teaching practices such as assigning journals and setting up group activities, guidelines on responding to and evaluating student writing, course plans, detailed chapter plans, an annotated bibliography in composition and rhetoric, and a selection of background readings.

Additional Resources for Teaching with The St. Martin’s Guide to Writing, available for download at bedfordstmartins.com/theguide, supports classroom in- struction with PowerPoint presentations offering lists of important features for each genre, critical reading guides, collaborative activities, and checklists, all adapted from the text. It also provides more than fifty exercises designed to accompany the Handbook section of the hardcover edition of The Guide.

The Elements of Teaching Writing (A Resource for Instructors in All Disciplines) (ISBN-10: 0-312-40683-5/ISBN-13: 978-0-312-40683-7). Written by Katherine Gottschalk and Keith Hjortshoj, The Elements of Teaching Writing provides time- saving strategies and practical guidance in a brief reference form. Drawing on their extensive experience training instructors in all disciplines to incorporate writing into their courses, Gottschalk and Hjortshoj offer reliable advice, accom- modating a wide range of teaching styles and class sizes, about how to design effective writing assignments and how to respond to and evaluate student writing in any course.

Teaching Central (bedfordstmartins.com/teachingcentral). Designed for the con- venience of instructors, this rich Web site lists and describes Bedford/St. Martin’s acclaimed print series of free professional sourcebooks, background readings, and bibliographies for teachers. In addition, Teaching Central offers a host of free online resources, including

Bits, a blog that collects creative ideas for teaching composition from a com- munity of teachers, scholars, authors, and editors. Instructors are free to take, use, adapt, and pass the ideas around, in addition to sharing new suggestions.

Just-in-Time Teaching and Adjunct Central — downloadable syllabi, hand- outs, exercises, activities, assignments, teaching tips, and more, organized by resource type and by topic

Take 20 — a 60-minute film for teachers, by teachers, in which 22 writing teachers answer 20 questions on current practices and emerging ideas in composition

xiv PREFACE FOR INSTRUCTORS

Acknowledgments We owe an enormous debt to all the rhetoricians and composition specialists whose theory, research, and pedagogy have informed The St. Martin’s Guide to Writing. We would be adding many pages to an already long book if we were to name everyone to whom we are indebted; suffice it to say that we have been eclectic in our bor- rowing.

We must also acknowledge immeasurable lessons learned from all the writers, professional and student alike, whose work we analyzed and whose writing we used in this and earlier editions.

So many instructors and students have contributed ideas and criticism over the years. The members of the advisory board for the ninth edition, a group of dedicated composition instructors from across the country, have provided us with extensive insights and suggestions on the eighth edition and have given us the benefit of their advice on new readings and other new features for the ninth. For their many contributions, we would like to thank Samantha Andrus-Henry, Grand Rapids Community College; Melissa Batai, Triton College; Mary Bishop, Holmes Junior College–Ridgeland; Jo Ann Buck, Guilford Technical Community College; Kevin Cantwell, Macon State College; Anne Dvorak, Longview Community College; Leona Fisher, Chaffey College; Diana Grahn, Longview Community College; Dawn Hubbell-Staeble, Bowling Green State University; Amy Morris-Jones, Baker College of Muskegon; Gray Scott, University of California, Riverside; and Susan Sebok, South Suburban College.

Many other instructors have also helped us improve the book. For responding to detailed questionnaires about the eighth edition, we thank Diana Agy, Jackson Community College; James Allen, College of DuPage; Eileen Baland, Texas Baptist University; Sydney Bartman, Mt. San Antonio College; Elisabeth Beccue, Erie Community College; Maria J. Cahill, Edison College; Lenny Cavallaro, Northern Essex Community College; Chandra Speight Cerutti, East Carolina University; Connie Chismar, Georgian Court University; Marilyn Clark, Xavier University; Lori Rios Doddy, Texas Woman’s University; Deborah Kay Ferrell, Finger Lakes Community College; April Gentry, Savannah State University; Diane Halm, Niagara University; Tammy Harosky, Virginia Highlands Community College; Anne Helms, Alamance Community College; Teresa Henning, Southwest Minnesota State University; Rick Jones, South Suburban College; Cristina Karmas, Graceland University; Glenda Lowery, Rappanannock Community College, Warsaw Campus; Rachel Jo Mack, Ball State University; Linda McHenry, Fort Hays State University; Jim McKeown, McLennan Community College; Michelle Metzner, Wright State University; Lisa Wiley Moslow, Erie Community College North Campus; Caroline Nobile, Edinboro University of Pennsylvania; Gordon Petry, Bradley University; Richard W. Porter, Cedarville University; Pamela J. Rader, Georgian Court University; Kim Salrin, Bradley University; Wanda Synstelien, Southwest Minnesota State University; Ruthe Thompson, Southwest Minnesota State University; Janice M. Vierk, Metropolitan Community College; Betsey Whited, Emporia State University; John M. Ziebell, College of Southern Nevada; and Susan Zolliker, Palomar College.

PREFACE FOR INSTRUCTORS xv

For this new edition of The Guide, we also gratefully acknowledge the spe- cial contributions of the following: Paul Tayyar, who drafted the new “Analyzing Visuals” chapter; Gray Scott, who drafted the new “Annotated Bibliographies and Literature Reviews” chapter; and Jill Markgraf, Judith Van Noate, Debbi Renfrow, Jaena Hollingsworth, and Beth Downs, who provided expert advice on the revised coverage of library and Internet research. We want especially to thank the many instructors at the University of California, Riverside, who offered advice and class tested new material, including Stephanie Kay, Leona Fisher, Gray Scott, Elizabeth Spies, Elissa Weeks, Rob d’Annibale, Kimberly Turner, Amanda Uvalle, Joshua Fenton, Benedict Jones, and Sandra Baringer. Finally, we are especially grateful to the student authors for allowing us to use their work in Sticks and Stones, Marriage 101, and The Guide.

We want to thank many people at Bedford/St. Martin’s, especially Senior Editor Alexis Walker, whose wisdom, skill, and tireless enthusiasm made this edition pos- sible, and our production team of Harold Chester, Shuli Traub, and Jenny Peterson. Denise Quirk made many valuable contributions to this revision with her careful copyediting, as did Diana Puglisi George with her meticulous proofreading. Cecilia Seiter managed and edited all of the most important ancillaries to the book: the Instructor’s Resource Manual, Sticks and Stones, Marriage 101, and the rest of the Guide Web site. Without the help of Dan Schwartz, the new media supplements to The Guide would not have been possible.

Thanks also to the immensely talented design team — book designer Jerilyn Bockorick as well as Bedford/St. Martin’s art directors Anna Palchik and Lucy Krikorian — for making the ninth edition so attractive and usable. Our gratitude also goes to Sandy Schechter and Warren Drabek for their hard work clearing permissions, and Martha Friedman and Naomi Kornhauser for imaginative photo research.

We wish finally to express our heartfelt appreciation to Nancy Perry for help- ing us to launch The Guide successfully so many years ago and continuing to stand by us. Over the years, Nancy has generously and wisely advised us on everything from planning new editions to copyediting manuscript, and now she is helping us develop the new customized publication of The Guide. We also want to thank Erica Appel, director of development, and Karen Henry, editor-in-chief, who offered valued advice at many critical stages in the process. Thanks as well to Joan Feinberg and Denise Wydra for their adroit leadership of Bedford/St. Martin’s, and to mar- keting director Karen Soeltz and marketing manager Molly Parke — along with the extraordinarily talented and hardworking sales staff — for their tireless efforts on behalf of The Guide.

xvi PREFACE FOR INSTRUCTORS

Features of The St. Martin’s Guide to Writing, Ninth Edition, Correlated to the WPA Outcomes Statement

Desired Student Outcomes Relevant Features of The St. Martin’s Guide

Rhetorical Knowledge

Focus on a purpose Each writing assignment chapter in Part One offers extensive discussion of the purpose(s) for the genre of writing covered in that chapter.

Respond to the needs of different audiences

Each chapter in Part One discusses the need to consider one’s audience for the particular genre covered in that chapter. In Chapters 6–10, which cover argument, there is also extensive discussion of the need to anticipate opposing positions and readers’ objections to the writer’s thesis.

Respond appropriately to different kinds of rhetorical situations

Each chapter in Part One gives detailed advice on responding to a particular rhetorical situation, from remembering an event (Chapter 2) to analyzing stories (Chapter 10).

Use conventions of format and structure appropriate to the rhetorical situation

Each chapter in Part One points out features of effectively structured writing, and the Guides to Writing help students systematically develop their own effective structures. Document design is covered in two sections in each of these chapters, as well as in a dedicated Chapter 21, “Designing Documents.”

Adopt appropriate voice, tone, and level of formality

Many of the Sentence Strategies sections in each chapter in Part One deal with these issues. Also, see purpose and audience coverage mentioned previously.

Understand how genres shape reading and writing

Each chapter in Part One offers student and professional readings accompanied by annotations, questions, and commentary that draw students’ attention to the key features of the genre and stimulate ideas for writing. Each chapter’s Guide to Writing offers detailed, step-by-step advice for writing in the genre and for offering constructive peer criticism. In addition, “In College Courses,” “In the Community,” and “In the Workplace” sections that open each Part One chapter, as well as “Beyond the Traditional Essay” sections later in the chapter, show how the various genres are used outside the composition course.

Write in several genres The Guides to Writing in each of the nine chapters in Part One offer specific advice on writing to remember an event; to profile a person, activity, or place; to explain a concept; to analyze opposing positions and find common ground; to argue a position; to propose a solution; to justify an evaluation; to speculate about causes; and to analyze literature. In addition, Chapters 22–25 cover research strategies that many students will use while writing in the genres covered in Part One.

PREFACE FOR INSTRUCTORS xvii

Desired Student Outcomes Relevant Features of The St. Martin’s Guide

Critical Thinking, Reading, and Writing

Use writing and reading for inquiry, learning, thinking, and communicating

Each Writing Assignment chapter in Part One emphasizes the connection between reading and writing in a particular genre: Each chapter begins with a group of readings whose apparatus introduces students to thinking about the features of the genre; then a Guide to Writing leads them through the process of applying these features to an essay of their own. Chapter 11, “A Catalog of Invention Strategies,” and Chapter 12, “A Catalog of Reading Strategies” prompt students to engage actively in invention and reading. Other Part Two chapters include coverage of specific invention, reading, and writing strategies useful in a variety of genres.

Understand a writing assignment as a series of tasks, including finding, evaluating, analyzing, and synthesizing appropriate primary and secondary sources

The Guides to Writing in each chapter in Part One break writing assignments down into doable focused thinking and writing activities that engage students in the recursive process of invention and research to find, analyze, and synthesize information and ideas. “Working with Sources” sections teach specific strategies of evaluating and integrating source material. Chapter 12, “A Catalog of Reading Strategies,” covers various strategies useful in working with sources, including annotating, summarizing, and synthesizing. Chapter 24, “Using Sources,” offers detailed coverage of finding, evaluating, using, and acknowledging primary and secondary sources, while Chapter 25, “Annotated Bibliographies and Literature Reviews,” helps students master these essential research-based tasks.

Integrate their own ideas with those of others

Chapter 24, “Using Sources,” offers detailed advice on how to integrate and introduce quotations, how to cite paraphrases and summaries so as to distinguish them from the writer’s own ideas, and how to avoid plagiarism. “Sentence Strategy” and “Working with Sources” in several Part One chapters offer additional support.

Understand the relationships among language, knowledge, and power

“Making Connections,” a recurring section in the apparatus following the professional readings in Part One chapters, encourages students to put what they’ve read in the context of the world they live in. These preliminary reflections come into play in the Guides to Writing, where students are asked to draw on their experiences in college, community, and career in order to begin writing. “Thinking Critically about What You Have Learned” sections that conclude Part One chapters ask students to reconsider what they have learned, often in a social/political context.

Processes

Be aware that it usually takes multiple drafts to create and complete a successful text

The need for a critical reading of a draft and for revision is emphasized in Chapter 1 as well as in the Guides to Writing in each chapter of Part One. Case studies of particular students’ writing processes are offered in “Writer at Work” sections in each Part One chapter.

(continued)

xviii PREFACE FOR INSTRUCTORS

Desired Student Outcomes Relevant Features of The St. Martin’s Guide

Processes (continued)

Develop flexible strategies for generating ideas, revising, editing, and proofreading

The Guides to Writing in each Part One chapter offer genre-specific coverage of invention and research, getting a critical reading of a draft, revising, editing, and proofreading. Also in each Part One chapter, “Ways In” invention activities encourage students to start from their strengths, and “Starting Points” and “Troubleshooting Your Draft” charts offer specific, targeted advice for students with different challenges. A dedicated Chapter 11, “A Catalog of Invention Strategies,” offers numerous helpful suggestions for idea generation.

Understand writing as an open process that permits writers to use later invention and rethinking to revise their work

The Guides to Writing in each Part One chapter offer extensive, genre-specific advice on rethinking and revising at multiple stages. “Ways In” activities, “Starting Points” charts, and “Troubleshooting Your Draft” charts in Part One chapters encourage students to discover, review, and revise their own process(es) of writing.

Understand the collaborative and social aspects of writing processes

Each chapter in Part One includes several opportunities for and guides to collaboration: “Practice” activities at the beginning of the chapter, “Making Connections” activities after the readings, and, in the Guides to Writing, “Testing Your Choice” activities and the Critical Reading Guide.

Learn to critique their own and others’ works

The Critical Reading Guide and Revising sections in the Guides to Writing in each Part One chapter offer students specific advice on constructively criticizing — and praising — their own work and the work of their classmates. Peer review is also covered in depth in Chapter 29, “Working with Others.”

Learn to balance the advantages of relying on others with the responsibility of doing their part

This goal is implicit in several collaborative activities: “Practice” activities at the beginning of the chapter, “Making Connections” activities after the readings, and, in the Guides to Writing, “Testing Your Choice” activities and the Critical Reading Guide. Group work is also covered in depth in Chapter 29, “Working with Others.”

Use a variety of technologies to address a range of audiences

Each Guide to Writing in Part One chapters includes advice on using the Web for various stages of the writing process, as well as “sidebars” providing information and advice about grammar- and spell-checkers and software-based commenting tools. See also Chapter 23, “Library and Internet Research,” for extensive coverage of finding, evaluating, and using print and electronic resources and of responsibly using the Internet, e-mail, and online communities for research, and Chapter 21, “Designing Documents,” which offers advice on creating visuals on a computer or downloading them from the Web. Finally, The Guide’s electronic ancillaries include a robust companion Web site and an e-Book.

PREFACE FOR INSTRUCTORS xix

Desired Student Outcomes Relevant Features of The St. Martin’s Guide

Knowledge of Conventions

Learn common formats for different kinds of texts

Document design is covered in a dedicated Chapter 21 as well as in two sections in each of the Writing Assignment chapters in Part One. Examples of specific formats for a range of texts appear on pp. 787–94 (research paper); p. 704 (memo); p. 705 (business letter); p. 706 (e-mail); p. 708 (résumé); p. 710 (job application letter); pp. 712–13 (lab report); and pp. 696–702 (table, diagrams, graphs, charts, map, and other figures).

Develop knowledge of genre conventions ranging from structure and paragraphing to tone and mechanics

Each chapter in Part One presents several basic features of a specific genre, which are introduced up front and then consistently reinforced throughout the chapter. Genre-specific issues of structure, paragraphing, tone, and mechanics are also addressed in the “Sentence Strategies” and “Editing and Proofreading” sections of each Guide to Writing.

Practice appropriate means of documenting their work

Chapter 24, “Using Sources,” offers detailed advice on how to integrate and introduce quotations, how to cite paraphrases and summaries so as to distinguish them from the writer’s own ideas, and how to avoid plagiarism. This chapter also offers coverage of MLA and APA documentation in addition to an annotated sample student research paper. Chapter 20, “Analyzing Visuals,” also offers a complete student paper with MLA documentation. In addition, “Working with Sources” sections in each Guide to Writing in the Part One chapters help students with the details of using and appropriately documenting sources by providing genre-specific examples of what (and what not) to do.

Control such surface features as syntax, grammar, punctuation, and spelling

Genre-specific editing and proofreading advice is given in two sections in each Guide to Writing in the Part One chapters: “Sentence Strategies” and “Editing and Proofreading.” The hardcover version of The Guide also includes a concise yet remarkably comprehensive handbook with coverage of syntax, grammar, punctuation, and spelling.

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We have written this book with you, the student reading and using it, always in the forefront of our minds. Although it is a long book that covers many different topics, at its heart is a simple message: The best way to become a good writer is to study ex- amples of good writing, then to apply what you have learned from those examples to your own work. Accordingly, we have provided numerous carefully selected examples of the kinds of writing you are likely to do both in and out of college, and we have ac- companied them with detailed advice on writing your own essays. In this Preface, we explain how the various parts of the book work together to achieve this goal.

The Organization of the Book Following Chapter 1 — an introduction to writing that gives general advice about how to approach different parts of a writing assignment — The St. Martin’s Guide to Writing is divided into six major parts:

Part One: Writing Activities (Chapters 2–10)

Part Two: Critical Thinking Strategies (Chapters 11 and 12)

Part Three: Writing Strategies (Chapters 13–21)

Part Four: Research Strategies (Chapters 22–25)

Part Five: Writing for Assessment (Chapters 26 and 27)

Part Six: Writing and Speaking to Wider Audiences (Chapters 28–30)

This hardcover version of the book also includes a Handbook that you can refer to for help with grammar, punctuation, word choice, common ESL problems, and similar issues.

The Part One Chapters

For now, to understand how to use the book effectively to improve your writing, you first need to know that the most important part — the part that all of the rest depends on — is Part One, Chapters 2 through 10. Each of these chapters is orga- nized to teach you about one important specific genre, or type of writing:

autobiography

profile of a person, activity, or place

Preface for Students: How to Use The St. Martin’s Guide

xxi

xxii PREFACE FOR STUDENTS

explanation of a concept

analysis of opposing positions seeking common ground

argument supporting your position

proposal to solve a problem

evaluation

analysis of possible causes

analysis of a short story

Each Part One chapter follows essentially the same structure, beginning with three scenarios that provide examples of how that kind of writing could be used in a college course, in a workplace, and in a community setting such as a volunteer program or civic organization.

Next come a brief introduction to the genre, a collaborative activity to get you thinking about the genre, and an introduction to the genre’s basic features, each of which is assigned a specific color.

2 IN COLLEGE COURSES In a linguistics course, students are assigned a paper in which they are to discuss published research in the context of their own experience. The class had recently read Deborah Tannen’s Gender and Discourse, in which Tannen discusses differences in how men and women talk about problems: according to Tannen, women tend to spend a lot of time talking about the problem and their feelings about it, while men typi- cally cut short the analysis of the problem and focus on solutions.

One student decides to write about Tannen’s findings in light of a conversation she recently had

Remembering an Event

Short chapter-opening scenarios provide examples of how the kind of writing covered in the chapter is used in other college courses, in your job, and in your community.

PREFACE FOR STUDENTS xxiii

Next, you’ll find a series of readings, essays that will help you see how writers deploy the basic features of the genre for different purposes and audiences. The first reading in each chapter is always one written by a first-year college student who was using The St. Martin’s Guide. These readings include color coding that highlights the writer’s use of the basic features of the genre, as well as marginal questions that ask you to analyze the essay and also call your attention to particular writing strategies — such as quoting sources, using humor, providing definitions, and giving examples — that the writer used.

Reading Remembered Event Essays

Basic Features As you read remembered event essays in this chapter, you will see how different authors incorporate the basic features of the genre.

A Well-Told Story

Read first to enjoy the story. Remembered event essays are autobiographical stories that recount an important event in the writer’s life; the best ones are first and fore- most a pleasure to read. A well-told story

arouses curiosity and suspense by structuring the narrative around conflict, building to a climax, and leading to a change or discovery of some kind;

is set in a specific time and place, often using dialogue to heighten immediacy d d

Basic Features

The genre’s basic features are introduced toward the beginning of the chapter, so you know what to look for in the readings. Each basic feature is assigned a color, which is used whenever that basic feature is discussed later in the chapter.

1

2

Calling Home

Jean Brandt

As we all piled into the car, I knew it was going to be a fabulous day. My grand-

mother was visiting for the holidays; and she and I, along with my older brother and

sister, Louis and Susan, were setting off for a day of last-minute Christmas shopping.

On the way to the mall, we sang Christmas carols, chattered, and laughed. With

Christmas only two days away, we were caught up with holiday spirit. I felt light-headed

and full of joy. I loved shopping — especially at Christmas.

The shopping center was swarming with frantic last-minute shoppers like our-

selves. We went first to the General Store, my favorite. It carried mostly knickknacks

and other useless items which nobody needs but buys anyway. I was thirteen years

old at the time, and things like buttons and calendars and posters would catch my

fancy. This day was no different. The object of my desire was a 75-cent Snoopy button.

As you read, look for places where Brandt lets us know how she felt at the time the event occurred. Also consider the questions in the margin. Your instructor may ask you to post your answers or bring them to class.

Basic Features

Color-coded highlighting in the chapter’s first essay calls attention to the student writer’s use of the basic features of the genre; questions in the margin ask you to analyze and reflect on the writer’s use of various strategies.

xxiv PREFACE FOR STUDENTS

Usually, the remaining readings in the chapter are by professional writers. Each of these additional essays is accompanied by the following groups of questions and activities to help you learn how essays in that genre work:

Making Connections invites you to explore an issue raised by the reading that is related to your own experience and often to broader social or cultural issues.

Analyzing Writing Strategies helps you examine closely some specific strate- gies the writer used. The questions in this section are organized according to the basic features of the genre, to help you keep track of different aspects of the essay’s construction. Following essays that include visuals, an Analyzing Visuals section asks you to examine what graphics, photographs, and the like contrib- ute to the written text.

Considering Topics for Your Own Essay suggests subjects that you might write about in your own essay.

Following the readings, each assignment chapter also includes the following sections:

a “Beyond the Traditional Essay” section that provides examples of that chap- ter’s genre of writing drawn from unexpected contexts — advertising, blogs, museums, even public parks

a Guide to Writing that will help you write an effective essay in the genre for your particular audience and purpose. The Guides to Writing, the most impor- tant parts of the entire book, will be explained fully in the next section.

a Writer at Work narrative showing key elements of the writing process of one student whose essay appears in the chapter

a concluding section titled Thinking Critically about What You Have Learned, which invites you to reflect on the work you did for that chapter and to consider some of its wider social and cultural implications.

Beyond the Traditional Essay: Remembering an Event

Our culture commemorates events in many ways that are likely familiar to you. Physical memorials such as statues, plaques, monu- ments, and buildings are traditional means of ensuring that important events remain in our collective memory: Relatively recent examples include the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C., and the planned commem- orative complex at the site of the 9/11 World Trade Center attack in New York City. Though such memorials function primarily visually, rather than textually, they can also be seen to exhibit the basic features we’ve discussed in essays remembering an event. The Vietnam memorial is a dramatic, V-shaped black gran- ite wall partly embedded in the earth, which

reflects the images of visitors reading the names of the dead and missing inscribed there; the names are presented in chronological order, telling the story of the con-

“Beyond the Traditional Essay” sections provide examples of that chapter’s genre of writing drawn from unexpected contexts — advertising, blogs, museums, even public parks.

PREFACE FOR STUDENTS xxv

The Guides to Writing

Just as the Part One assignment chapters are the heart of the book, the heart of each assignment chapter is the Guide to Writing.

Writing an essay does not usually proceed in a smooth, predictable se- quence — often, for example, a writer working on a draft will go back to what is usually an earlier step, such as invention and research, or jump ahead to what is usually a later one, such as editing and proofreading. But to make our help with the process more understandable and manageable, we have divided each Guide to Writing into the same elements that appear in the same order:

the Writing Assignment;

Invention and Research;

Planning and Drafting;

a Critical Reading Guide;

Revising;

and Editing and Proofreading.

The Writing Assignment. Each Guide to Writing begins with an assignment that defines the general purpose and basic features of the genre you have been studying in the chapter.

Starting Points chart. Each Guide to Writing opens with an easy-reference Starting Points chart, which is designed to help you efficiently find the advice you need for getting past writer’s block and other early-stage difficulties.

Starting Points: Explaining a Concept Basic Features

A Focused Explanation

Choosing a Concept

Question Where to Look

Each Guide to Writing opens with an easy-reference Starting Points chart, with advice for getting started.

xxvi PREFACE FOR STUDENTS

Invention and Research. Every Guide to Writing includes invention activities designed to help you

find a topic

discover what you already know about the topic

consider your purpose and audience

research the topic further — in the library, on the Internet, through observa- tion and interviews, or some combination of these methods

explore and develop your ideas, and

compose a tentative thesis statement to guide your planning and drafting.

Because we know that different students start writing at different places, we’ve offered different “ways in” to many of the Invention activities: specifically, their new layout (as shown in the example below) is meant to suggest the different possible paths through the processes of generating and shaping material.

The colors used correspond to the basic features of the genre that were introduced in the chapter’s first few pages, which is meant to help you see how in composing in a particular genre, writers use the same basic features but may use them differently to achieve specific purposes for their readers.

“Ways In” activities suggest different ways of coming up with material for your essay.

Ways In: Constructing a Well-Told Story

Once you’ve made a preliminary choice of an event, the following activities will help you begin to construct a well-told story, with vivid descriptions of people and places. You can begin with whichever basic activity you want, but wherever you begin, be sure to return to the other activities to fill in the details.

Sketch the Story. Write a quick sketch telling roughly what happened. Don’t worry about what you’re leaving out; you can fill in the details later.

Explore a Revealing or Pivotal Moment. Write for a few minutes developing a moment of surprise, confrontation, crisis, change, or discovery that may become the climax of your story. To dramatize it, try using specific narrative actions and dialogue.

Reimagine the Place. Identify the place where the event occurred and describe it. What do you see, hear, or smell? Use details — shape, color, texture — to evoke the scene.

Research Visuals. Try to locate visuals you could include in your essay: Look through memorabilia such as family photographs, yearbooks, newspaper articles, concert programs, ticket stubs, or T-shirts — anything that might stimulate your memory and help you reflect on the place. If you submit your essay electronically or post it online, also consider adding

i h i i h h

Describe People. Write about people who played a role in the event. For each person, name and detail a few distinctive physical features, mannerisms, dress, and so on.

Create a Dialogue. Reconstruct one important conversation you had during the event. You will probably not remember exactly what was said, but try to re-create the spirit of the interaction. Consider adding speaker tags (see p. 36) to show people’s tone of voice, attitude, and gestures.

Research People Do someReflect on the Conflict and Its

Shaping the Story Describing the Place Recalling Key People

Basic Features

PREFACE FOR STUDENTS xxvii

Planning and Drafting. To get you started writing a draft of your essay, each Guide to Writing includes suggestions for planning your essay. The section is divided into three parts:

Refining Your Purpose and Setting Goals involves reviewing what you have discovered about your subject, purpose, and audience and helps you think about your goals for the various parts of your essay.

Outlining Your Draft suggests some of the ways you might organize your essay.

Drafting launches you on the writing of your draft, providing both general advice and suggestions about one or two specific sentence strategies that you might find useful for the particular genre.

The Planning and Drafting section also includes a section called Working with Sources, which offers advice (using examples from one or more of the readings) on a particular issue related to incorporating materials from research sources into your essay.

Critical Reading Guide. Once you have finished a draft, you may want to make an effort to have someone else read the draft and comment on how to improve it. Each Guide to Writing includes a Critical Reading Guide, color-coded to correspond to that genre’s basic features, which will help you get good advice on improving your draft as well as help you make helpful suggestions to improve others’ drafts. (These Guides break out suggestions for both praise and critique — because we all sometimes need reminding that pointing out what works well can be as helpful as pointing out what needs improvement in a piece of writing.)

Critical Reading

Guide

For a printable version of this Critical Reading Guide, go to bedfordstmartins .com/theguide.

Your instructor may arrange a peer review session in class or online where you can exchange drafts with your classmates and give each other a thoughtful criti- cal reading, pointing out what works well and suggesting ways to improve the draft. This Critical Reading Guide can also be used productively by a tutor in the writing center or by a roommate or family member. A good critical reading does three things: it lets the writer know how well the reader understands the point of the story, praises what works best, and indicates where the draft could be improved.

1. Assess how well the story is told.

Praise: Give an example in the story where the storytelling is especially effective — for example, where the speaker tags help make a dialogue dra- matic or where specific narrative actions show people in action.

Critique: Tell the writer where the storytelling could be improved — for example, where the suspense slackens, the story lacks drama, or the chronol- ogy is confusing.

2. Consider how vividly people and places are described.

Basic Features

Critical Reading Guides suggest ways of giving constructive criticism, as well as praise, for your classmates’ drafts.

xxviii PREFACE FOR STUDENTS

Revising. Each Guide to Writing includes a Revising section to help you get an overview of your draft, consider readers’ comments, chart a plan for revision, and carry out the revisions.

A new easy-reference chart in the Revising section called “Troubleshooting Your Draft” offers specific advice for problems many students encounter at this critical stage of the writing process.

Following this chart, a section called “Thinking about Document Design” illustrates the ways in which one writer (author of one of the chapter’s opening scenarios) used visuals and other elements of document design to make the essay more effective.

Troubleshooting Your Draft charts offer specific advice for revising your essay.

Troubleshooting Your Draft Basic Features

Problem Suggestions for Revising the Draft

Vivid Description

of People and Places

Name objects in the scene. Add sensory detail. Try out a comparison to evoke a particular mood. Consider adding a visual — a photograph or other memorabilia.

Places are hard to visualize.

Describe a physical feature or mannerism that gives each person individuality. Add speaker tags to characterize people and show their feelings. Liven up the dialogue with faster repartee.

People do not come alive.

Omit extraneous details. Add a simile or metaphor to strengthen the dominant impression. Rethink the impression you want your writing to convey and the significance it suggests.

Some descriptions weaken the dominant impression.

Tell about your background or the particular context.

A Well-Told Story

Shorten the exposition. Move a bit of dialogue or specific narrative action up front. Start with something surprising. Consider beginning with a flashback or flashforward.

The story starts too slowly.

Add dramatized dialogue or specific narrative actions. Clarify your remembered feelings or thoughts. Reflect on the conflict from your present perspective.

The conflict is vague or seems unconnected to the significance.

Add remembered feelings and thoughts to heighten anticipation. Add dialogue and specific narrative action. Build rising action in stages with multiple high points. Move or cut background information and description.

The suspense slackens or the story lacks drama.

The chronology is confusing.

Add or change time transitions. Clarify verb tenses.

PREFACE FOR STUDENTS xxix

Editing and Proofreading. Each Guide to Writing ends with a section to help you recognize and fix specific kinds of problems in grammar, punctuation, and sentence structure that are common in essays in that genre of writing.

The Other Parts of the Book

Parts Two through Five provide more help and practice with specific strategies for reading critically, analyzing visuals, designing documents, and many other key aspects of writing and research.

Also included are up-to-date guidelines for choosing, using, and documenting dif- ferent kinds of sources (library sources, the Internet, and your own field research); writing annotated bibliographies and literature reviews; taking essay exams; and assembling a portfolio of your writing.

Chapter 20, “Analyzing Visuals,” helps you approach visual texts critically and analytically.

674 CHAPTER 20: ANALYZING VISUALS

created it? Where was it published? What audience is it addressing? What is it trying to get this audience to think and feel about the subject? How does it attempt to achieve this aim?

Let's look, for example, at the following visual text: a public service announcement (PSA) from the World Wildlife Fund (WWF).