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THINKING CRITICALLY
To think critically means to use all of the knowledge you have acquired from the information in this chapter, your own writing, the writing of other students, and class discussions to reflect deeply on your work for this assignment and the genre (or type) of writing you have produced. The benefit of thinking critically is proven and important: Thinking critically about what you have learned will help you remember it longer, ensuring that you will be able to put it to good use well beyond this writing course.
Reflecting on What You Have Learned
In this chapter, you have learned a great deal about the genre from reading several causal arguments and from writing one of your own. To consolidate your learning, reflect not only on what you learned but also on how you learned it.
Write a blog post, a letter to your instructor, or an e-
Explain how your purpose and audience influenced one of your decisions as a writer, such as how you explained the subject, how you supported your preferred causes or effects, or how you responded to readers’ likely objections.
Discuss what you learned about yourself as a writer in the process of writing this argument or from remixing it in another genre or medium. For example, what part of the process did you find most challenging? Did you try anything new, like getting a critical reading of your draft or re-
If you were to give advice to a friend who was about to write a causal argument, what would you say?
Which of the readings in this chapter influenced your essay? Explain the influence, citing specific examples from your essay and the reading.
If you got good advice from a critical reader, explain exactly how the person helped you — perhaps by questioning your use of support, your choice of medium, your use of visuals, the way you began or ended your essay, or the kinds of sources you used.
Reflecting on the Genre
Causal arguments are always shaped by the writer’s expertise and special interests. For example, Stephen King — a horror writer — has a personal investment in establishing the horror movie as a legitimate literary and cinematic form; not surprisingly, then, he emphasizes the psychological benefits of horror movies. Shankar Vedantam, a science journalist, is clearly sympathetic to the work of the evolutionary psychologists and philosophers he quotes to support his claim that human beings are unable to respond viscerally (from the gut) to information about mass suffering.
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Write a page or two explaining how causal arguments disguise the writer’s assumptions. In your discussion, you might do one or more of the following:
Consider how the readings and your own argument are exercises in exerting authority. We have said that because causal arguments deal with possibilities instead of certainties, writers must be somewhat tentative about their speculations. However, if a causal argument is to be convincing, it cannot be too timid. Writers who have studied a subject carefully may feel that they are justified in exerting their authority. Compare two or more of the essays by Pangelinan, King, Wallis, and Vedantam. Which seems most assertive? What accounts for your response? What seems to you assertive or unassertive about your own essay? Was it your knowledge or your ideology (your way of looking at the world), or both, that gave you (or withheld from you) the confidence to be authoritative?
Consider how easy it is to accept a causal argument. If not alert, readers may begin to think that the argument a selection offers is the only possible one. Are any of the selections in this chapter so seductive that you find yourself accepting their causal arguments without question? Explain briefly.
Write a page or two explaining your ideas about authority and ideology in essays analyzing causes or effects. Connect your ideas to your own essay and to the readings in this chapter.