The Assignment: Taking a Stand

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Find a controversy that rouses your interest. It might be a current issue, a long-standing one, or a matter of personal concern: the pros and cons of legalizing medical marijuana, the contribution of sports to a school’s educational mission, or the need for menu changes at the cafeteria to accommodate ethnic, religious, and personal preferences. Your purpose isn’t to solve a social or moral problem but to make clear exactly where you stand on an issue and to persuade your readers to respect your position, perhaps even to accept it. As you reflect on your topic, you may change your position, but don’t shift positions in the middle of your essay.

Assume that your readers are people who may or may not be familiar with the controversy, so provide relevant background or an overview to help them understand the situation. They also may not have taken sides yet or may hold a position different from yours. You’ll need to consider their views and choose strategies to enlist their support.

Each of these students took a clear stand:

A writer who pays her own college costs disputed the opinion that working during the school year provides a student with valuable knowledge. Citing her painful experience, she maintained that devoting full time to studies is far better than juggling school and work.

Another writer challenged his history textbook’s portrayal of Joan of Arc as “an ignorant farm girl subject to religious hysteria.”

A member of the wrestling team argued that the number of weight categories in the sport should be increased because athletes who overtrain to qualify for the existing categories often damage their health.

Generating Ideas

For this assignment, you will need to select an issue, take a stand, develop a clear position, and assemble evidence that supports your view.

Find an Issue. The topic for this paper should be an issue or a controversy that interests both you and your audience. Try brainstorming a list of possible topics. Start with the headlines of a newspaper or newsmagazine, review the letters to the editor, check the political cartoons on the opinion page, or watch for stories on demonstrations or protests. You might also consult the library index to CQ Researcher, browse news or opinion Web sites, talk with friends, or consider topics raised in class. If you keep a journal, look over your entries to see what has perplexed or angered you. If you need to understand the issue better or aren’t sure you want to take a stand on it, investigate by freewriting, reading, or turning to other sources.

Once you have a list of possible topics, drop those that seem too broad or complex or that you don’t know much about. Weed out anything that might not hold your—or your readers’—interest. From your new list, pick the issue or controversy for which you can make the strongest argument.

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Start with a Question and a Thesis. At this stage, many writers try to pose the issue as a question—one that will be answered through the position they take. Skip vague questions that most readers wouldn’t debate, or convert them to questions that allow different stands.

You can help focus your position by stating it in a sentence—a thesis, or statement of your stand. Your statement can answer your question:

Your thesis should invite continued debate by taking a strong position that can be argued rather than stating a fact.

Notice that both Suzan Shown Harjo and Marjorie Lee Garretson pose questions in their introductory paragraphs that are then addressed in their thesis statements. If you came up with a debatable question to devise your thesis, you might revisit and revise this question later, to develop a strong introduction.

Use Formal Reasoning to Refine Your Position. As you take a stand on a debatable matter, you are likely to use reasoning as well as specific evidence to support your position. A syllogism is a series of statements, or premises, used in traditional formal logic to lead deductively to a logical conclusion.

For a syllogism to be logical, ensuring that its conclusion always applies, its major and minor statements must be true, its definitions of terms must remain stable, and its classification of specific persons or items must be accurate. In real-life arguments, such tidiness may be hard to achieve.

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For example, maybe we all agree with the major statement above that all students must pay tuition. However, some students’ tuition is paid for them through a loan or scholarship. Others are admitted under special programs, such as a free-tuition benefit for families of college employees or a back-to-college program for retirees. Further, the word student is general; it might apply to students at public high schools who pay no tuition. Next, everyone might agree that you are a student, but maybe you haven’t completed registration or the computer has mysteriously dropped you from the class list. Such complications can threaten the success of your conclusion, especially if your audience doesn’t accept it. In fact, many civic and social arguments revolve around questions such as these: What—exactly—is the category or group affected? Is its definition or consequence stable—or does it vary? Who falls in or out of the category?

Use Informal Toulmin Reasoning to Refine Your Position. A contemporary approach to logic is presented by the philosopher Stephen Toulmin (1922–2009) in The Uses of Argument (2nd ed., 2003). He describes an informal way of arguing that acknowledges the power of assumptions in our day-to-day reasoning. This approach starts with a concise statement—the essence of an argument—that makes a claim and supplies a reason to support it.

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You develop a claim by supporting your reasons with evidence—your data or grounds. For example, your evidence might include facts about the cost of lunches on campus, especially in contrast to local fast-food options, and statistics about the limited resources of most students at your campus.

However, most practical arguments rely on a warrant, your thinking about the connection or relationship between your claim and your supporting data. Because you accept this connection and assume that it applies, you generally assume that others also take it for granted. For instance, nearly all students might accept your assumption that a campus café should serve the needs of its customers. Many might also agree that students should take action rather than allow a campus facility to take advantage of them by charging high prices. Even so, you could state your warrant directly if you thought that your readers would not see the connection that you do. You also could back up your warrant, if necessary, in various ways:

As you develop your reasoning, you might adjust your claim or your data to suit your audience, your issue, or your refined thinking. For instance, you might qualify your argument (perhaps limiting your objections to most, but not all, of the lunch prices). You might also add a rebuttal by identifying an exception to it (perhaps excluding the fortunate, but few, students without financial worries due to good jobs or family support). Or you might simply reconsider your claim, concluding that the campus café is, after all, convenient for students and that the manager might be willing to offer more inexpensive options without a student boycott.

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Toulmin reasoning is especially effective for making claims like these:

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Select Evidence to Support Your Position. When you state your claim, you state your overall position. You also may state supporting claims as topic sentences that establish your supporting points, introduce supporting evidence, and help your reader follow your reasoning. To decide how to support a claim, try to reduce it to its core question. Then figure out what reliable and persuasive evidence might answer the question.

As you begin to look for supporting evidence, consider the issue in terms of the three general types of claims—claims that require substantiation, provide evaluation, and endorse policy.

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Consider Your Audience as You Develop Your Claim. The nature of your audience might influence the type of claim you choose to make. For example, suppose that the nurse or social worker at the high school you attended or that your children now attend proposed distributing free condoms to students. The following table illustrates how the responses of different audiences to this proposal might vary with the claim. As you develop your claims, try to put yourself in the place of your audience. For example, if you are a former student, what claim would most effectively persuade you? If you are the parent of a teenager, what claim would best address both your general views and your specific concerns about your own child?

Assemble Supporting Evidence. Your claim stated, you’ll need evidence to support it. That evidence can be anything that demonstrates the soundness of your position and the points you make—facts, statistics, observations, expert testimony, illustrations, examples, and case studies.

The four most important sources of evidence are facts, statistics, expert testimony, and firsthand observation.

Facts. Facts are statements that can be verified objectively, by observation or by reading a reliable account. They are usually stated dispassionately: “If you pump the air out of a five-gallon varnish can, it will collapse.” Of course, we accept many of our facts based on the testimony of others. For example, we believe that the Great Wall of China exists, although we may never have seen it with our own eyes.

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Sometimes people say facts are true statements, but truth and sound evidence may be confused. Consider the truth of these statements:

Some would claim that each statement is true, but when you think critically, you should avoid treating opinions, beliefs, judgments, or personal experience as true in the same sense that verifiable facts and events are true.

Statistics. Statistics are facts expressed in numbers. What portion of American children are poor? According to statistics from the U.S. Census Bureau, 16.1 million children (or 21.8 percent of all children) lived in poverty in 2012 compared with 14.7 million (or 19.9 percent) in 2013. Clear as such figures seem, they may raise complex questions. For example, how significant is this decrease in the poverty rate? Is it an aberration or part of a longer trend? What percentage of children were poor over longer terms such as fifteen years or twenty?

Most writers, without trying to be dishonest, interpret statistics to help their causes. The statement “Fifty percent of the populace have incomes above the poverty level” might substantiate the fine job done by the government of a developing nation. Putting the statement another way—“Fifty percent of the populace have incomes below the poverty level”—might use the same statistic to show the inadequacy of the government’s efforts.

Even though a writer is free to interpret a statistic, statistics should not be used to mislead. On the wrapper of a peanut candy bar, we read that a one-ounce serving contains only 150 calories. The claim is true, but the bar weighs 1.6 ounces. Gobble it all—more likely than eating 62 percent of it—and you’ll ingest 240 calories, a heftier snack than the innocent statistic on the wrapper suggests. Because abuses make some readers automatically distrustful, use figures fairly when you write, and make sure they are accurate. If you doubt a statistic, compare it with figures reported by several other sources. Distrust a statistical report that differs from every other report unless it is backed by further evidence.

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Expert Testimony. By “experts,” we mean people with knowledge gained from study and experience in a particular field. The test of an expert is whether his or her expertise stands up to the scrutiny of others who are knowledgeable in that field. The views of Peyton Manning on how to play offense in football carry authority. So do the views of economist and Federal Reserve chairwoman Janet Yellen on what causes inflation. However, Manning’s take on the economy or Yellen’s thoughts on football might not be authoritative. Also consider whether the expert has any bias or special interest that would affect reliability. Statistics on cases of lung cancer attributed to smoking might be better taken from government sources than from the tobacco industry.

Firsthand Observation. Firsthand observation is persuasive. It can add concrete reality to abstract or complex points. You might support the claim “The Meadowfield waste recycling plant fails to meet state guidelines” by recalling your own observations: “When I visited the plant last January, I was struck by the number of open waste canisters and by the lack of protective gear for the workers who handle these toxic materials daily.”

As readers, most of us tend to trust the writer who declares, “I was there. This is what I saw.” Sometimes that trust is misplaced, however, so always be wary of a writer’s claim to have seen something that no other evidence supports. Ask yourself, Is this writer biased? Might the writer have (intentionally or unintentionally) misinterpreted what he or she saw? Of course, your readers will scrutinize your firsthand observations, too; take care to reassure them that your observations are unbiased and accurate. Evidence must be used carefully to avoid defending logical fallacies—common mistakes in thinking—and making statements that lead to wrong conclusions. Examples are easy to misuse (claiming proof by example or too few examples). Because two professors you know are dissatisfied with state-mandated testing programs, you can’t claim that all—or even most—professors are. Even if you surveyed more professors at your school, you could speak only generally of “many professors.” To claim more, you might need to conduct scientific surveys, access reliable statistics from the library or Internet, or solicit the views of a respected expert in the area.

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Record Evidence. For this assignment, you will need to record your evidence in written form in a notebook or a digital file. Note exactly where each piece of information comes from. Keep the form of your notes flexible so that you can easily rearrange them as you plan your draft.

Test and Select Evidence to Persuade Your Audience. Now that you’ve collected some evidence, sift through it to decide which information to use. Always critically test and question evidence to see whether it is strong enough to carry the weight of your claims.

You may find that your evidence supports a different stand than you intended to take. Might you find facts, testimony, and observations to support your original position after all? Or should you rethink your position? If so, revise your working thesis. Does your evidence cluster around several points or reasons? If so, use your evidence to plan the sequence of your essay.

In addition, consider whether information presented visually would strengthen your case or make your evidence easier for readers to grasp.

Test each visual as you would test other evidence for accuracy, reliability, and relevance. Mention each visual in your text, and place the visual close to that reference. Cite the source of any visual you use and of any data you consolidate in your own graph or table.

Most effective arguments take opposing viewpoints into consideration whenever possible. Doing so demonstrates that the writer respects those viewpoints, thereby encouraging readers to respect the viewpoint the writer presents. Providing evidence that refutes opposing viewpoints can also bolster an argument’s strength. Use these questions to help you assess your evidence from this standpoint.

ANALYZE YOUR READERS’ POINTS OF VIEW

FOCUS ON THOSE WITH DIFFERENT OR OPPOSING OPINIONS

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ACKNOWLEDGE AND REBUT THE COUNTERARGUMENTS

Planning, Drafting, and Developing

Reassess Your Position and Your Thesis. Now that you have looked into the issue, what is your current position? If necessary, revise thesis that you formulated earlier. Then summarize your reasons for holding this view, and list your supporting evidence.

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Organize Your Material to Persuade Your Audience. Arrange your notes into the order you think you’ll follow, perhaps making an outline. One useful pattern is the classical form of argument:

Note that most college papers are organized deductively—that is, they begin with a general statement (often a thesis) and then present particular cases to support or apply it. However, when you expect readers to be hostile to your position, stating your position too early might alienate resistant readers or make them defensive. Instead, you may want to refute the opposition first, then replace those views by building a logical chain of evidence that leads to your main point, and finally state your position. Papers that begin with particular details and evidence and then lead up to a larger generalization are organized inductively. Of course, you can always try both approaches to see which one works better. Note also that some papers will be mostly based on refutation (countering opposing views) and some mostly on confirmation (directly supporting your position). Others might even alternate refutation and confirmation rather than separate them.

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Define Your Terms. To prevent misunderstanding, make clear any unfamiliar or questionable terms used in your thesis. If your position is “Humanists are dangerous,” you will want to give a short definition of what you mean by humanists and by dangerous early in the paper.

Attend to Logical, Emotional, and Ethical Appeals. The logical appeal engages readers’ intellect; the emotional appeal touches their hearts; the ethical appeal draws on their sense of fairness and reasonableness. A persuasive argument usually operates on all three levels. For example, you might use all three appeals to support a thesis about the need to curb accidental gunshot deaths, as the table on page 167 illustrates.

Credit Your Sources. As you write, make your sources of evidence clear. One simple way to do so is to incorporate your source into the text: “As analyzed in an article in the May 25, 2015, issue of Time” or “According to my history professor, Dr. Harry Cleghorn . . .”

Revising and Editing

When you’re writing a paper that takes a stand, you may fall in love with the evidence you’ve gone to such trouble to collect. Taking out information is hard to do, but if it is irrelevant, redundant, or weak, the evidence won’t help your case. Play the crusty critic as you reread your paper. Consider outlining what it actually includes so that you can check for missing or unnecessary points or evidence. Pay special attention to the suggestions of friends or classmates who read your draft for you. Apply their advice by ruthlessly cutting unneeded material, as in the following passage:

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Use the Take Action chart to help you figure out how to improve your draft. Skim the left-hand column to identify questions you might ask about strengthening support for your stand. When you answer a question with “Yes” or “Maybe,” move straight across to Locate Specifics for that question. Use the activities there to pinpoint gaps, problems, or weaknesses. Then move straight across to Take Action. Use the advice that suits your problem as you revise.

After you have revised your argument, edit and proofread it. Carefully check the grammar, word choice, punctuation, and mechanics—and then correct any problems you find. Wherever you have given facts and figures as evidence, check for errors in names and numbers.

Recognizing Logical Fallacies

Logical fallacies are common mistakes in thinking that may lead to wrong conclusions or distort evidence. Here are a few familiar logical fallacies.