Take Home Department Exam

For this paper, you will create a 2-3 page rhetorical analysis of an article. Choose ONE of the following articles:

“The Best Reason to Go to College” by Pico Iyer

“Hygiene Theater is a Huge Waste of Time” by Derek Thompson

“COVID-19 is Transmitted Through Aerosols” by Jose-Luis Jimenez

For the article chosen, analyze the purpose, context, audience, main arguments, methods of development, logical appeal, character appeal, and emotional appeal used by the author. Include short quotations to support your analysis and cite these appropriately. Include a Works Cited entry at the bottom of the page. This paper is worth 100 points.

The essay should contain the following:

• a concise introduction that includes a brief (4-5 sentences) summary of the article
• a thesis statement that argues whether or not the text makes an effective argument
• an analysis of the author’s purpose, context, and audience
• identification of the main arguments, supporting arguments, and methods of development
• analysis of the logical appeal, character appeal, and emotional appeal
• a clear defense of your stance that explains what makes the article effective or ineffective for its audience
• paragraphs that develop logically from the thesis statement
• short quotations or paraphrases to support your discussion; these are a part of your paragraphs
• MLA citations for all primary source material used
• a Works Cited entry
• clear and concise writing

Your essay should contain approximately 500-600 words (about 2-3 pages), use 12-point standard font, double space, and have 1-inch margins. The Works Cited entry should be on a separate page. Add a heading at the top with your name; you do not need a separate title page.

This exam will be graded Pass/Fail only. If you do not pass the first time around, you can retest once on a different article. Take the test by Dec 1, 11:59 pm. The retest deadline is Dec 10, 11:59 pm. I will not grade late tests. Submit the test via the appropriate submission link on Blackboard.

Additional Notes

In Your Introduction:

Summarize what the author is arguing.  This should be about four-five sentences.

After the summary, be sure that you IDENTIFY THE AUTHOR’S MAIN CLAIM using a “because” clause.

Example: The author argues that we must address the drop-out problem because if we don’t, the resulting low-paying jobs, unemployment and welfare recipients will burden every taxpaying member of society.

Identify the intended audience.  Work on demographics and other defining traits rather than something as broad as “Americans.”  Determine if the author is arguing to a friendly, unfriendly, or neutral audience.  Think about the purpose of the argument.  Who is the author trying to persuade or convince?

Be sure that you PROVIDE AN EVALUATION of how persuasive the author is to his intended audience, using a “because” clause here as well:

Example: The author is persuasive to his intended audience, because he provides shocking statistics about how many students drop out and how much this is costing taxpayers.

Provide a specific reason why the argument is or is not persuasive—don’t just say that the author had good logos.

Underline both the author’s main claim and your evaluation of the author’s persuasiveness to the intended audience.

In the Body of Your Paper:

Write a SEPARATE paragraph for each appeal and for the style analysis.  This will ensure that each appeal and the style is addressed and evaluated.  (The body of your paper requires multiple paragraphs.)

QUOTE supporting examples from the text as evidence to support your analysis and evaluation.  If the statistics are solid, quote a particularly impressive one.  If there’s a point at which you connect on a value or feel an emotion, quote that part of the text.

Weave EVALUATIONS into your paragraphs.  Go beyond identifying the value that the author appeals to (our hard-earned money) to evaluate how persuasive the appeal is: did the author succeed in making you so protective of your cash that you feel moved to act to defend it?

Consider beginning each paragraph with an evaluative claim: Although the logos appeal was persuasive, I found the pathos appeal to be lacking, because…    You could also rank the appeals and choose to present your analysis accordingly: the strongest appeal was ethos…the weakest appeal was logos…it was the author’s style that truly made this argument persuasive…

The order in which you present your analysis is up to you.  I recommend tackling the appeal that first comes to mind as you read.

In Your Conclusion:

Be sure that you WRITE A CONCLUSION!

Re-state the main argument.  This is a good time to go back and make sure that you DO have the main claim identified and underlined in your introduction.

Identify strengths and weaknesses in the argument.  Be more specific than just saying the logos was strong and the ethos was weak.  Which elements of logos blew you away?  What would make the author a more credible authority on the subject?  If you wanted to see the author address opposing views, clearly state what those views might be.  If you wanted more statistics, state what kind and where in the essay the author needs them.

Conclude with an evaluation: the author’s argument is/is not persuasive to the intended audience BECAUSE… (provide a reason for your evaluation).

Now that you’ve written your conclusion, go back and make sure that you also have a solid evaluation with a specific supporting reason underlined in your introduction—you may need to tweak it now that you’ve nearly finished your essay.

Be sure that evaluations of the appeals, the style, and the argument overall are clearly stated and developed in your essay.

To recap then,

Your paper must have an introductory paragraph.

Your body paragraphs must analyze the effectiveness of each of the three appeals and you must also write one paragraph in which you analyze the argument and method of development (Causal, Definition, Narrative, Position, Description, or Proposal).

Your paper must have a concluding paragraph.

SAMPLE SOLUTION

The Best Reason to Go to College
In his article titled “The best reason to go to college,” published in the New York Times on 6th September 2020, Pico Lyer reasons that the best reason to go to school, regardless of one’s position, either a teacher or a first-time learner is to find out how much one does not know (Lyer). Lyer begins his article by offering a background of how the COVID-19 pandemic has interrupted learning across the United States and providing a glimpse of what awaits students upon reopening of colleges. He provides a personal account of how in 2019, after 37 years he went back to teach at university. His choice of…