Argumentative Writing: Prewriting and Drafting

1
Argumentative WritingPrewriting and Drafting

• Argumentative Writing

2
Basics of Argumentative Writing

• Goalconvince your audience to think, believe, or
  act a specific way concerning a topic.

3
Basics of Argumentative Writing

• Four things that effective persuasion does are
  the following
• 1. States a clear opinion on the topic. (main
  idea/thesis)
• 2. Gives convincing support for this opinion
  (reasons or evidence)
• 3. May appeal to the readers emotion.
• 4. Takes opposing viewpoints into account

4
Prewriting

• Choose a topic that
• 1. you will be interested in
• 2. the audience will find interesting
• 3. about which you are knowledgeable enough to
  write
• 4. about which you can identify opposing
  viewpoints
• 5. about which you will be able to write a
  statement of opinion

5
Prewriting

• A statement of opinion is written in this
  fashion
• I believe __________________ because
  ____________, ___________ and ____________.
• You will need at least three reasons that you
  believe your opinion on the issue.

6
Prewriting

• Opinionwhat a person believes or thinks about an
  issue but cannot be proved by direct observation
  (use of the five senses)
• Factsomething that can be proven by direct
  observation
• One can check the truth of a fact

7
Prewriting

• Evidence
• 1. What kinds of support can I use to argue my
  position on the issue?
• 2. What pieces of support should I use? (Facts,
  examples, expert opinions)
• 3. What kinds of appeals can I make to the
  audience? (Emotional, logical)

8
Prewriting

• Audience
• 1. Who is my audience for this piece of writing?
  
• 2. What is my audience likely to feel about my
  issue?
• 3. What arguments will those who disagree with
  me use?
• 4. How can I convince them that these arguments
  are faulty?

9
Drafting

• The structure that follows is the structure you
  are to use to write your argumentative essay.
• Remember that your first draft should not be
  perfectworry more about getting it written than
  about how it looks or if it has mistakes.

10
Drafting

• I. Introduction
• A. Hook the reader (see handout on basic essay
  structure)
• B. State the significance of the argument. (Why
  should the reader care about the issue?)
• C. Give background on the issue. (What is the
  history of the issue? What does a reader need to
  know to understand the issue?)
• D. State the thesisyour position on the
  issueyour statement of opinion.

11
Drafting

• II. Body
• A. Support for the thesiseach main point should
  be a topic sentence for a paragraph with
  supporting sentences that back up this topic
  sentence.

12
Drafting

• 1. Appeal to reason
• a. appeals to the audiences intelligence and
  common sense
• i. Facts are statements whose truth can be
  verified by observation or research, can be
  validated via the five senses
• ii. Facts employing numbers are statistics.
• b. uses cause/effect or definition structure

13
Drafting

1. Cause/effect structure gives causes for events of
   conditionswhy things happen (causes) and what
   happens as a result (effects).
2. Definition structure is when one gives a term and
   shows to what group it belongs and the specific
   things that are covered by the term.

14
Drafting

• 2. Appeal to authority
• a. appeals from people that the audience will
  respect/listen to
• i. Expert opinions are the judgments formed
  by authorities on the basis of their own
  examination of their facts. Choose expert
  opinions based on audience
• ii. Opinions of well know and liked people
  (be careful herethey may not have opinions
  that work well)

15
Drafting

• 3. Appeal to the readers beliefs, needs or
  emotions
• a. Use a readers emotional responses to get him
  or her to believe the thesis.
• i. One of the best ways to do this is to give
  very specific examples.
• ii. Examples are specific instances of the
  point being made, including historical
  precedents (stories often used to elicit
  emotional responses from the audiencepity,
  amusement, anger, fear, righteousness)

16
Drafting

• b. Three types of emotional appeals that may
  backfire
• i.) Bandwagonbased on the desire to join the
  crowd
• ii.) Flatterybased on the desire to think
  highly of oneself
• iii.) Testimonialbased on the desire to
  identify self with the famous, important or
  knowledgeable--same as b above)

17
Drafting

• c. Appeals to beliefs or needs are statements
  that ask readers to accept an assertion, in part,
  because it states something they accept as true
  without evidence (on faith) or because it
  coincides with their needs.

18
Drafting

• B. Opposing viewpoints
• 1. Explain why people would believe or think the
  opposite (counterthesis)
• a. Refute the evidence that you can prove it
  wrong
• b. Deal with evidence you cannot ("Despite
  piece of evidence X, I believe Y because of all
  the other evidence in its favor.)

19
Drafting

• C. Arrange these pieces of support by order of
  importance (or strength of argument).

20
Drafting

• III. Conclusion
• 1. A restatement of my thesis (weakest
  conclusionwill not score well in your grade) in
  stronger words
• 2. A statement about the importance of the
  argument and my stance on it. (better)
• 3. A call to actionnow that Ive convinced you,
  go do something about it (best)
• 4. Restate the reasons that you hold your
  opinion (your main points)