Class Session: October 6, 2020

Agenda

  • Workshop summaries
  • Rhetorical Analysis (handout) ( Word | PDF )
  • “Rhetorical Analysis Worksheet” – Homework for Thursday, October 8th.
  • I will be following up with an email to get us on track with our online portfolios.

Today is going to be a busy day, so we need to stay focused! Let’s do our best.

Work-shopping summaries

Before going into the breakout workshops, let’s practice what we should be doing before entering. NOTE: Everyone should have their summary (which is due today for class) ready to share when they enter the breakout room.

First, let’s take a quick look at some BASICS of what our “Writing Academic Summaries” handout tells us:

  • Rhetorical situation (information about the author, audience, text, purpose, and context).
  • Main argument – does the writer capture early in the summary what they see as the main argument? Remember, if you wrote about the same text as you, you may see something different from them. You may offer where you differ, but try to engage with what the writer of the summary sees? Do they support that finding in their summary? (This is the next point)
  • Main support – Does the writer of the summary give an appropriate support that informs what they see as the main argument? Does it hold together for you as a reader?
  • Notable features (optional) – PLEASE NOTE HERE THE WORD “OPTIONAL”. These things are optional in a summary, though sometimes writers choose to include them so that they may write more on them later in a larger essay (like our pending Rhetorical Analysis Essay, the RAE).
    • Organization scheme – is the summary well organized and does that organization reflect the organization of the text under review? Does it flow from one point to the next making connections OR does it seem like a list of things put together in a paragraph which merely describes what happened in the text?
    • Strategies/Appeals
    • Strengths
    • Weaknesses/Limitations

Use the above as a guide when critiquing your peer. Be generous in your reading of your peer, but it’s ok to be rigorous too. If you see something done well, clearly say that to the writer. But if you seem room to improve, please be generous with that feedback as well. A key thing to remember here is that when we give feedback to another writer, we are also giving feedback to ourselves because we can put that feedback back into our own writing. Giving this level of feedback might seem uncomfortable at first, but this is the “social aspect” of writing that is part of our learning.

OPTIONAL: Looking at a sample (time allowing). We can negotiate this together in class.

This sample is from a longer Rhetorical Analysis Essay I found online here. It discusses a text we have not read, but it does have some essential features we can examine. There may be some benefit to examining a text we have not read because MAYBE we can see the “moves” more clearly. For example, do you think you can get a good idea what this text is about from the summary??? ALSO, do not take this as a “perfect” model just because I am choosing to highlight it. It’s just a sample!!!

[HOOK] A woman’s work is never done: many American women grow up with this saying and feel it to be true. One such woman, author [CONTEXT / RHETORICAL SITUATION] Jessica Grose, wrote “Cleaning: The Final Feminist Frontier,” published in 2013 in the New Republic, and she argues [Article author’s claim or purpose] that while the men in our lives recently started taking on more of the childcare and cooking, cleaning still falls unfairly on women. [THESIS] Grose begins building her credibility with personal facts and reputable sources, citing convincing facts and statistics, and successfully employing emotional appeals; however, toward the end of the article, her attempts to appeal to readers’ emotions weaken her credibility and ultimately, her argument.

[The next paragraph is a very effective summary of the text under examination. It is also noted that this next summary paragraph could easily have part of the first paragraph, but this in not particularly important, just a note.]

In her article, Grose first sets the stage by describing a specific scenario of house-cleaning with her husband after being shut in during Hurricane Sandy, and then she outlines the uneven distribution of cleaning work in her marriage and draws a comparison to the larger feminist issue of who does the cleaning in a relationship. Grose continues by discussing some of the reasons that men do not contribute to cleaning: the praise for a clean house goes to the woman; advertising and media praise men’s cooking and childcare, but not cleaning; and lastly, it is just not fun. Possible solutions to the problem, Grose suggests, include making a chart of who does which chores, dividing up tasks based on skill and ability, accepting a dirtier home, and making cleaning more fun with gadgets.

Here is my offering of a LIGHTLY reworked version of the text above to create a sample summary. I have removed the “hook” and the “thesis”, but this editing of mine could easily be disputed. My intention here is to highlight the SUMMARY contained in the sample text above. What do we see in the summary below that matches – or differs from – the criteria above?

“Cleaning: The Final Feminist Frontier,” by Jessica Grose, was published in 2013 in the New Republic. Grose argues that while the men in our lives recently started taking on more of the childcare and cooking, cleaning still falls unfairly on women. In her article, Grose first sets the stage by describing a specific scenario of house-cleaning with her husband after being shut in during Hurricane Sandy, and then she outlines the uneven distribution of cleaning work in her marriage and draws a comparison to the larger feminist issue of who does the cleaning in a relationship. Grose continues by discussing some of the reasons that men do not contribute to cleaning: the praise for a clean house goes to the woman; advertising and media praise men’s cooking and childcare, but not cleaning; and lastly, it is just not fun. Possible solutions to the problem, Grose suggests, include making a chart of who does which chores, dividing up tasks based on skill and ability, accepting a dirtier home, and making cleaning more fun with gadgets.

Rhetorical Analysis (handout)

Let’s review the Rhetorical Analysis (handout) ( Word | PDF ).

This handout is meant as guide as you consider what it means to approach a text from the perspective of what it is doing “rhetorically”. Why is this important? First, the guidance included in the handout will help inform how you will fill out the Rhetorical Analysis Worksheet homework, but it is also informative on how we will compose our Rhetorical Analysis Essay for this phase.

As you read this handout, consider that many things we have done will be inform your Rhetorical Analysis Essay: Rhetorical Situation Worksheets, your summary, and now the Rhetorical Analysis Worksheet. All of these will form a foundation for your Rhetorical Analysis Essay. Read the handout with these things in mind.

Questions?

Rhetorical Analysis Worksheet

“Rhetorical Analysis Worksheet” – Homework for Thursday, October 8th.

Complete & submit via email to me a “Rhetorical Analysis Worksheet” for the course text you intend to analyze for your essay. 

Online Portfolios

Be on the lookout for an email that addresses our online portfolios.