From Inquiry to Academic Writing: Chapters 1 and 2: Critical Writing and Critical Thinking

Critical Writing

Applying your critical thinking to academic writing 

You will find that your task as a writer at the higher levels of critical thinking is to argue. 

You will express your argument in 6 ways: 

One. You will define a situation that calls for some response in writing by asking critical questions. For example, is the Confederate flag a symbol of honor and respect for the heritage of white people in the South? Or is the flag a symbol of racial hatred, slavery, and Jim Crow? 

Two. You will demonstrate the timeliness of your argument. In other words, why is your argument relevant? 

Why is it relevant for example to address the decision of many parents to NOT vaccinate their children?

Three. Establish your personal investment in the topic. Why do you care about the topic you’re writing about? 

You may be alarmed to see exponential increases in college costs and this is personal because you have children who will presumably go to college someday. 

Four. Appeal to your readers by anticipating their thoughts, beliefs, and values, especially as they pertain to the topic you are writing about. You may be arguing a vegetarian diet to people who are predisposed to believing that vegetarian eating is a hideous exercise in self-denial and amounts to torture. 

You may have to allay their doubts by making them delicious vegetarian foods or by convincing them that they can make such meals. 

You may be arguing against the NFL to those who defend it on the basis of the relatively high salaries NFL players make. Do you have an answer to that? 

Five. Support your argument with solid reasons and compelling evidence. If you're going to make the claim that the NFL is morally repugnant, can you support that? How?

Six. Anticipate your readers’ reasons for disagreeing with your position and try to change their mind so they “see things your way.” We call this “making the readers drink your Kool-Aid.”  

Being a Critical Reader Means Being an Active Reader

To be an active reader we must ask the following when we read a text: 

One. What is the author’s thesis or purpose? 

Two. What arguments is the author responding to? 

Three. Is the issue relevant or significant? If not, why? 

Four. How do I know that what the author says is true or credible? If not, why? 

Five. Is the author’s evidence legitimate? Sufficient? Why or why not? 

Six. Do I have legitimate opposition to the author’s argument? 

Seven. What are some counterarguments to the author’s position? 

Eight. Has the author addressed the most compelling counterarguments? 

Nine. Is the author searching for truth or is the author beholden to an agenda, political, business, lobby, or something else? 

Ten. Is the author’s position compromised by the use of logical fallacies such as either/or, Straw Man, ad hominem, non sequitur, confusing causality with correlation, etc.? 

Eleven. Has the author used effective rhetorical strategies to be persuasive? Rhetorical strategies in the most general sense include ethos (credibility), logos (clear logic), and pathos (appealing to emotion). Another rhetorical strategy is the use of biting satire when one wants to mercilessly attack a target.

Twelve. You should write in the margins of your text (annotate) to address the above questions. Using annotations increases your memory and reading comprehension far beyond passive reading. And research shows annotating while reading is far superior to using a highlighter, which is mostly a useless exercise. 

An annotation can be very brief. Here are some I use: 

? 

Wrong 

Confusing 

Thesis 

Proof 1 

Counterargument 

Good point

Genius 

Lame

BS

Cliché

Condescending 

Full of himself

Contradiction!

 

Two. How do we generate ideas for an essay?

We begin by not worrying about being critical. We brainstorm a huge list of ideas and then when the list is complete, we undergo the process of evaluation. 

Sample Topic for an Essay: Parents Who Don’t Immunize Their Children

1. Most parents who don’t immunize their children are educated and upper class.
2. They read on the Internet that immunizations lead to autism or other health problems.
3. They follow some “natural guru” who warns that vaccines aren’t organic and pose health risks.
4. They panic over anecdotal evidence that shows vaccines are dangerous.
5. They confuse correlation with causality.
6. Why are these parents always rich?
7. Are they narcissists?
8. Are they looking for simple answers for complex problems?
9. Would they not stand in line for the Ebola vaccine, if it existed?
10. These parents are endangering others by not getting the vaccine.

Thesis that is a claim of cause and effect: 

Parents who refuse to vaccinate their children tend to be narcissistic people of privilege who believe their sources of information are superior to “the mainstream media”; who are looking for simple explanations that might protect their children from autism; who are confusing correlation with causality; and who are benefiting from the very vaccinations they refuse to give their children.

Thesis that is a claim of argumentation:

Parents who refuse to vaccinate their children should be prosecuted by the law because they are endangering the public and they are relying on pseudo-intellectual science to base their decisions.

To test a thesis, we must always ask: “What might be objections to my claim?”

Prosecuting parents will only give those parents more reason to be paranoid that the government is conspiring against them.

There are less severe ways to get parents to comply with the need to vaccinate their children.

Generating Ideas for Our Essays

How do we prepare our minds so we have “Eureka” (I found it) moments and apply these moments to our writing?

The word eureka comes from the Greek heuristic, a method or process for discovering ideas. The principle posits that one thought triggers another.

Diverse and conflicting opinions in a classroom are a heuristic tool for generating thoughts.

Here’s an example:

One student says, “Fat people should pay a fat tax because they incur more medical costs than non-fat people.”

Another student says, “Wrong. Fat people die at a far younger age. It’s people who live past seventy, non-fat people, who put a bigger drain on medical costs. In fact, smokers and fat people, by dying young, save us money.”

Another heuristic method is breaking down the subject into classical topics:

Definition: What is it? Jealousy is a form of insanity in which a morally bankrupt person assumes his partner is as morally bankrupt as he is.

Comparison: What is it like or unlike? Compared to the risk of us dying from global warming, death from a terrorist attack is relatively miniscule.

Relationship: What caused it, and what will it cause? The chief cause of our shrinking brain and its concomitant reduced attention span is gadget screen time.

Testimony: What is said about it by experts? Social scientists explain that the United States’ mass incarceration of poor people actually increases the crime rate.

Another heuristic method is finding a controversial topic and writing a list of pros and cons.

Consider the topic, “Should I become a vegan?”

Here are some pros:

1. I’ll focus on eating healthier foods.
2. I won’t be eating as many foods potentially contaminated by E.coli  and Salmonella.
3. I won’t be contributing as much to the suffering of sentient creatures.
4. I won’t be contributing as much to greenhouse gasses.
5. I’ll be eating less cholesterol and saturated fats.

Cons

1. It’s debatable that a vegan diet is healthier than a Paleo (heavy meat eating) diet.
2. Relying on soy is bad for the body.
3. My body craves animal protein.
4. Being a vegan will ostracize me from my family and friends.

One. Checklist for Critical Thinking 

My attitude toward critical thinking: 

Does my thinking show imaginative open-mindedness and intellectual curiosity? Or do I exist in a circular, self-feeding, insular brain loop resulting in solipsism? The latter is also called living in the echo chamber. 

Am I willing to honestly examine my assumptions? 

Am I willing to entertain new ideas—both those that I encounter while reading and those that come to mind while writing? 

Am I willing to approach a debatable topic by using dialectical argument, going back and forth between opposing views? 

Am I willing to exert myself—for instance, to do research—to acquire information and to evaluate evidence? 

My skills to develop critical thinking 

Can I summarize an argument accurately? 

Can I evaluate assumptions, evidence, and inferences? 

Can I present my ideas effectively—for instance, by organizing and by writing in a manner appropriate to my imagined audience?

Study the Templates of Argumentation  

While the author’s arguments for meaning are convincing, she fails to consider . . .

 

While the authors' supports make convincing arguments, they must also consider . . .

 

These arguments, rather than being convincing, instead prove . . .

 

While these authors agree with Writer A on point X, in my opinion . . .

 

Although it is often true that . . .

 

While I concede that my opponents make a compelling case for point X, their main argument collapses underneath a barrage of . . .

 

While I see many good points in my opponent’s essay, I am underwhelmed by his . . .

 

While my opponent makes some cogent points regarding A, B, and C, his overall argument fails to convince when we consider X, Y, and Z.

 

My opponent makes many provocative and intriguing points. However, his arguments must be dismissed as fallacious when we take into account W, X, Y, and Z.

 

While the author’s points first appear glib and fatuous, a closer look at his polemic reveals a convincing argument that . . .

Ways to Improve Your Critical Reading  

1. Do a background check of the author to see if he or she has a hidden agenda or any other kind of background information that speaks to the author’s credibility.
2. Check the place of publication to see what kind of agenda, if any, the publishing house has. Know how esteemed the publishing house is among peers of the subject you’re reading about.
3. Learn how to find the thesis. In other words, know what the author’s purpose, explicit or implicit, is.
4. Annotate more than underline. Your memory will be better served, according to research, by annotating than underlining. You can scribble your own code in the margins as long as you can understand your writing when you come back to it later. Annotating is a way of starting a dialogue about the reading and writing process. It is a form of pre-writing. Forms of annotation that I use are “yes,” (great point) “no,” (wrong, illogical, BS) and “?” (confusing). When I find the thesis, I’ll also write that in the margins. Or I’ll write down an essay or book title that the passage reminds me of. Or maybe even an idea for a story or a novel.
5. When faced with a difficult text, you will have to slow down and use the principles of summarizing and paraphrasing. With summary, you concisely identify the main points in one or two sentences. With paraphrase, you re-word the text in your own words.
6. When reading an argument, see if the writer addresses possible objections to his or her argument. Ask yourself, of all the objections, did the writer choose the most compelling ones? The more compelling the objections addressed, the more rigorous and credible the author’s writing.

 To read critically, we have to do the following:

One. Comprehend the author's purpose and meaning, which is expressed in the claim or thesis

Two. Examine the evidence, if any, that is used

Three. Find emotional appeals, if any, that are used

Four. Identify analogies and comparisons and analyze their legitimacy

Five. Look at the topic sentences to see how the author is building his or her claim

Six. Look for the appeals the author uses be they logic (logos), emotions (pathos), or authority (ethos).

Seven. Is the author's argument diminished by logical fallacies?

Eight. Do you recognize any bias in the essay that diminishes the author's argument?

Nine. Do we bring any prejudice that may compromise our ability to evaluate the argument fairly?

Topic for an Argumentative Essay: The Costs and Benefits of College

Writing Assignment:

In a 4-page essay that addresses the major poings in "College Calculus" and "America: Abandon Your Reverence for the Bachelor's Degree," develop an argumentative thesis that addresses the question if college is worth the cost for your particular area of study. You may consult the following:

"3 Reasons College Still Matters" by Andrew Delbanco. 

"Is College Worth It?"

"College Is Still Worth It, Despite the Cost"