English 124 Structure Analysis Essay 1 Prompt
For your first paper you will be required to write an essay at least four pages long
evaluating an argument article. Find and read a published article that makes a clear argument in
a specific topic. You may use an article from our textbook, or one you select from the library.
After reading through the article, you will write your own essay, explaining how the argument is
constructed, both in terms of organization and content. Does the author start with their thesis
clearly in the introduction, or do they wait until the conclusion to make their argument clear?
Does the author use a range of ethical, emotional, and logical evidence to support their argument,
or do they rely on one type of evidence the most? Does the author arrange their argument from
weakest to strongest evidence, and if so why do they do this? You are writing an argument on
how and why the article you read is organized and written the way it is, to persuade readers to
agree with the author’s point. You will argue how well the author succeeded at convincing you
of their goals.
Your essay needs to be clear and unified under your thesis. Make sure to include specific
evidence from the article you read, to show how and why you analyzed the article the way you
did in your essay. Make sure to review the section in your textbook on proper MLA citation for
any quotes or paraphrases you use from your outside source.
Grading Criteria
Successful papers will have:
1. A developed introductory paragraph, with a clear thesis. Must state why the article was
persuasive or not. (10 points)
2. Well-supported, unified body paragraphs with specific examples that reinforce your
thesis. Include your original thoughts on the evidence, and how it supports your thesis.
(15 points)
3. Analysis of how the articles organization enhances or distracts from the author’s
argument. (10 points)
4. Smoothly integrated quotes from an outside source. (5 points)
5. A conclusion that summarizes your main point, and offers a final thought about the value
of your argument. (5 points)
6. Your paper will also be thoroughly edited for sentence-level errors. If you have any
questions on sentence structure or grammar, visit the Writing Center, or see me in my
office. (5 points)
Total points: 50
54
CHAPTER 2 Critical Reading of Written Arguments
Gun Debate: Where is the Middle Ground?
MALLORY SIMON
Opening example
5
Emotional appeal
Amardeep Kaleka will never forget the moment when his father laid on the
ground and prayed.
Satwant Singh Kaleka had been shot five times while wrestling a gunman
in a Sikh temple in Oak Creek, Wisconsin. His turban was knocked off, and
two kids and a priest crawled up beside him. Together, they prayed.
Amardeep Kaleka went to the temple and stared at that spot.
His father did not survive. He died along with five others.
“It felt like he was praying and putting something into the zeitgeist and
imprinting it,” he told CNN. His son hoped it would lead to a changing tide
on gun violence.
.
As he began his meditation that day, Amardeep made a vow: He would do
whatever he could to ensure nobody ever went through what his family had.
“It just came over me that you can't stay silent,” he said. “You can't continue
to allow violence like this to happen haphazardly at a church, at a school,
any place.”
That was August 2012.
Four months later, 20 children and six adults were gunned down in
Newtown, Connecticut.
That school massacre has led many people, including Kaleka, 33, to
question where we go from here as a country. Or if we will ever get there at all.
It led him to stand up at a gathering here on Thursday, CNN's Guns
Under Fire: An AC360° Town Hall Special, and ask a panel of advocates with
polar opposite views if they could agree on anything. If there was actually any
middle ground.
“After meeting with so many senators, so many gun proponents and gun
control advocates, it seems like they're recycling the same jargon all the time,”
he said, explaining his reason for the question. “So I was just hoping, let's get
to the common ground.”
The panel included National Rifle Association board members, the
president of the Brady Campaign to End Gun Violence, law enforcement
representatives, and other participants voicing viewpoints across the spectrum.
Related example
10
Looking for common ground
Mallory Simon works for CNN as a writer and editor for all of CNN's digital, television, and social
platforms. This piece appeared on cnn.com on January 31, 2013.
Reading for Content and Structure
55
15
Expert representing one
position: There is common
ground.
Common ground
Expert representing another
position: There is common
ground.
20
Example
Was there a consensus?
Sort of
“There's a lot of common ground,” Sandra Froman, a member of the NRA
board of directors and a former president of the group, said at the town hall.
“We don't want people who are insane to have guns, we don't want terrorists
to have guns. Part of this national dialogue is coming together. "
So everyone agreed: Something has to happen. The devil is in the details.
“I think the common ground clearly exists from a policy standpoint when
talking about background checks,” said Dan Gross, president of the Brady
Campaign to End Gun Violence.
But it isn't that simple. It never is when it comes to gun control.
“The NRA is not against background checks,” Froman said. “We support
making sure they are enforced. We're not supporting more background checks
of law-abiding citizens.
Her remarks signaled a slight change in the NRA's stance.
In a heated back and forth, the two debated whether it was truly harmful
to force everyone who wants to purchase a gun-whether at a gun store, a
gun show, or in a private sale —to go through a background check.
Froman talked about how the current background check system was
broken, noting that an “instant check” in Colorado can actually take about
10 days.
“We have to get it working before we add any more checks,” she said,
noting that requiring everyone to undergo a check would take a lot of
resources and money.
Philadelphia Police Commissioner Charles Ramsey spoke from his
experience, saying whatever it took, whatever the price tag, it would be worth
it to stem the violence.
“Please, don't worry about the cost. I'll spend the money," he said, a line
that drew massive applause from the crowd at George Washington University.
“It's a much greater cost than human lives. We have to do something. The
status quo is not acceptable.”
When Kaleka, the son of one of the Sikh shooting victims, rose to ask his
question about finding a middle ground, he wasn't just talking about policy.
He also meant in our collective way of thinking. A filmmaker, Kaleka has
made a documentary about violence in America. There are too many facets to
the problem, he says.
“It's a culture of violence. And that has to do with guns, that has to do
with mental illness, it has to do with stigmatizing people, it has to do with the
media, everything about our culture.'
Logical appeal
25
Expert opinion
Appeal to the need for
security
Deductive reasoning
56
CHAPTER 2 Critical Reading of Written Arguments
30
Emotional appeal/appeal to
needs and values
35
Example
Appeal to need for security
Many appeared to think he was right.
“Everybody's got to step up on this,” Ramsey said. “That's prosecutors, the
courts, everyone. If we're serious about this, it can't just be a series of laws that
are passed."
Much of the discussion inside the town hall went beyond politics and
legislation. One heated debate focused on whether armed guards should be
posted at schools.
That's a proposal that's been discussed by former congressman
Asa
Hutchinson.
“What is more important than the education and the safety of those
children?” he asked, noting that if malls have armed security, so should schools.
“I believe an armed security presence is very important."
It's an idea that Veronique Pozner thinks about. Her son Noah was killed
in the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown.
“I think there might be a certain power in deterrence,” she said. “In the
case of Newtown, it's clear that the perpetrator did choose the path of least
resistance, the most vulnerable defenseless victims. He didn't head for the high
school where he could have been tackled."
While she said she wasn't sure an armed guard would have saved her son, she
did say it made her feel more comfortable dropping off her other children at the
new school for Sandy Hook children, a building that does have armed guards.
Colin Goddard, who survived the Virginia Tech shooting, said he
understood the desire to protect children, but he didn't understand why
arming guards is the go-to solution.
“I just don't understand why the first idea put forth is something that
might help at the last second,” he said, to massive applause from the audience.
“We can do things in advance to keep a dangerous person and a gun
from
coming together in the first place.”
That's the conversation that usually leads to a debate about mental health.
It is an area President Barack Obama has pledged resources to; he and many
others hope to keep guns out of the hands of the mentally ill.
The difficulty comes in figuring out who poses a threat.
“We look at behavior and what's going on in the person's life, the social
dynamics and what are the personality issues that make that person think
acting out dangerously is a way to handle their problems,” said Mary Ellen
O'Toole, a former FBI special agent and criminal profiler.
Froman, the NRA board member, said she'd like to see more sharing of
resources to ensure a database of the mentally ill would prevent them from
having access to guns.
Logical appeal
Deductive reasoning
40
Expert opinion
A possible compromise
57
Reading for Content and Structure
0
every
But Liza Long, whose blog post I Am Adam Lanza's Mom went viral
after the Newtown shooting, said perhaps we were thinking about this all
wrong. What if it wasn't just about identifying threats, but actually making
a change.
“We spend a lot of time talking about keeping guns out of the wrong
hands,” she said. “What if we could put those resources to making people less
dangerous.
For Kaleka, at the end of the day, progress on enforcing background checks A positive move on which
would be a step in the right direction.
different sides might agree
He recognizes that no solution will make everyone happy. But he wishes
advocate, no matter their point of view, would think about the issue as if
they were in his shoes.
“When you are a survivor or a victim or someone close to you dies, it's
everyday you think about it,” he said. “Gun advocates or scholars or people Emotional appeal, pathos
making money about it, they probably think about it 10 percent of how much
(appeal based on Kaleka's
credibility)
we think about it. We go to the bathroom and think about it. We take a cold
shower one day, and we start to cry. We wake up in the middle of the night
with night sweats, and we have to live with it. Every breath is taken with some
thought of violence and safety."
He thinks it is time the country does the same: that its citizens think
about the issue with every breath.
“I can never go another moment in my life without thinking about it.
My wife, my brother, my mother, the people of Newtown, they will not
go a moment for the rest of their life without thinking about it,” he said.
“Personally I think the tide is changing, the zeitgeist is moving towards justice. Need to work toward
Hopefully, once we stop the fear mongering on both sides we can finally get to
common ground
the point of what makes sense.
His greatest hope: That the will to do something about the violence does Emotional appeal
not die along with those who never had to.
35
50
40
Reading and Discussion Questions
1. Which of the three approaches to argument-Aristotelian rhetoric, Rogerian
argument, or the Toulmin Model – seems the one best suited to use in
discussing this particular essay? Why?
2. Is there information about the essay that you got from the other two
approaches that complements what you learned through that primary
approach? that contradicts it?
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