Linking Evidence and Claims

1
Linking Evidence and Claims

• Writing Analytically

2
The Function of Evidence

• A common assumption about evidence is that it is
  the stuff that proves Im right.
• Although this way of thinking about evidence is
  not wrong, it is much too limited.
• Corroboration (proving the validity of a claim)
  is one of the functions of evidence, but not the
  only one.

3
Prove

• The word prove actually comes from a Latin verb
  meaning to test.
• The noun form of proof has two meanings (1)
  evidence sufficient to establish a thing as true
  or believable, (2) the act of testing for truth
  or believability.
• Operating on the first definition alone leads to
  closed down thinking.

4
Fallacy facts can speak for themselves.

• Evidence rarely, if ever, can be left to speak
  for itself.
• The word evident comes from a Latin verb meaning
  to see.
• When a writer leaves evidence to speak for
  itself, he or she is assuming that it can be
  interpreted in only one way, and that readers
  will think as the writer does.

5
Make the implicit explicit

• The thought connections that have occurred to you
  will not automatically occur to others
• In science, writers present evidence and then
  interpret it.
• In the humanities, writers interpret the evidence
  as it is presented.
• AVOID unsubstantiated claims and pointless
  evidence

6
Linking Evidence and Claims
7
evidence vs. claimsfacts vs. judgments

• The owners are ruining baseball in America.
  Although they claim they are losing money, they
  are really just being greedy. A few years ago,
  they fired the commissioner, Fay Vincent, because
  he took the players side. Baseball is a sport,
  not a business, and it is a sad fact that it is
  being threatened by greedy businessmen.

8
Give Evidence a Point

• Problem Presenting a mass of evidence without
  explaining how it relates to the claim
• Solution Make details speak. Explain how
  evidence confirms and qualifies the claim.

9
Nothing but evidence

• Baseball is a sport, not a business, and it is
  sad that it is threatened by greedy businessmen.
  For example, Eli Jacobs, the previous owner of
  the Baltimore Orioles, recently sold the team to
  Peter Angelos for one hundred million dollars
  more than he spent ten years earlier. Also, new
  generation baseball stadiums have been built that
  are enormously expensive and luxurious. The
  average baseball player meanwhile, earns more
  that a million dollars a year, and they all have
  agents.

10
The function of Conclusions

• Readers want 3 things a judgment, a culmination,
  and a send-off.
• Judgment final judgment on the claim that is the
  focus of the paper. Often repeats some key terms
  from first paragraph. Explicitly revisits the
  claim for why it matters.
• Culmination to culminate is the reach the
  highest point, and it implies a mountain of
  information that you have scaled. Bring things
  together and ascend to one final statement.
• Send-off both social and conceptual, an opening
  outward of the topic that leads the reader out of
  the paper with something further to think about,
  often a universal theme.

11
(No Transcript)