Description

Every conversation, no matter how formal or informal, has governing rules. Participants engage positions according to particular (usually unstated) conventions and patterns. Your overarching mission for this essay is to analyze a scholarly or public conversation. In other words, you’ll analyze the rhetoric of several written and related sources–those that grapple with the same question or specific concern. You’ll attempt to discover the quiet inner-workings of the conversation.

Step 1: The first step is focusing on a specific conversation. You’ll benefit from taking on an issue or topic related to your academic study or interests. Consider the following possibilities:

a contested issue at the heart of your academic discipline
a political or civic issue that has drawn a range of different voices
an issue related to a specific avocation (e.g. an artistic, hobbyist, or adventure society)
Step 2: Collect several published sources (three to five) that directly engage the issue. The sources need not take opposing positions, but try to seek out sources that diverge in opinion–as divergent opinions often reveal something about the nature of a conversation. Your sources may include written articles, speeches, presentations (e.g. TED Talks), or formal interviews. Please make certain you have transcripts of non-written sources.

Step 3: Analyze those sources thoroughly and try to discover the unstated rules of engagement, the rhetorical boundaries and currents, the discursive “dance,” in Gee’s terms. Using concepts from our shared reading, write an essay (of at least 1500 words) that explains how this conversation works. Consider the tensions, underlying values, and unstated assumptions among those sources. In class sessions, we will discuss a range of strategies for developing the essay. For now, consider these key invention questions, which can propel and frame your essay:

What are the discursive patterns among sources? What rhetorical trends and argumentative tactics do you detect? (Consider Gee’s discussion “On Being a ‘Real Indian.'”)
What are the discourse types most relied upon?
How does the conversation relate to broader cultural context? How has it emerged from historical tensions or similar conversations?
What unstated assumptions operate in the arguments? And how, specifically, do they work? What ideas or specific claims do they support or generate?
How well defined is the conservation? What are its borders? How do sources work to stretch the boundaries of the issue itself?
What is the exigence (the issue or condition addressed)? Is the conversation kairotic? Or why is it timely?
How does the conversation reinforce, rely on, or even push against ideology?
What is the main tension? What do the writers disagree about?
What are the subtle tensions? How do writers’ positions subtly diverge or chafe against one another?
How does genre matter to the conversation? How do the genre’s formal features figure into the claims, the tensions, and so on?
Do you sense a discourse community? In other words, does the conversation emerge from a identifiable and persistent membership of practitioners or adherents?
~Citing Sources~

The Key Sources: Please include at least three sources directly. In other words, cite at least three sources that constitute the conversation at hand. Please quote any passages, phrases, or sentences taken directly from those sources, and make sure to cite (with page numbers when appropriate).
Core Readings/Texts: Please integrate relevant terms and passages from our core readings (e.g. Crowley and Hawhee, Gee). Consider those passages or statements that we highlighted and discussed in class sessions–those that help you to understand and work with key concepts.
Secondary Outside Sources: You may integrate outside secondary sources that help to articulate the issue or to frame related concepts. As with all formal writing for this course, please cite and document passages and ideas taken from readings and your texts. Unless we discuss otherwise, please apply MLA format and citation style.
~Rhetorical Strategies~

Your overarching mission for this essay is to analyze the discourses of a published conversation. But you will do various other things along the way. In class, we will discuss specific strategies—including those we’ve observed in the core reading. The trickiest aspect, perhaps, is avoiding the temptation to argue about the issues themselves. Remember: we’re out to explain how the conversation works, not to participate in the arguments.