Thoughtful, articulate, and readable rhetoric.

books:


	• Writing Arguments: A Rhetoric with Readings, Concise Edition (4th Edition) John D. Ramage, John C. Bean, ... Longman, 2006 - 336 pages average customer review:based on 3 reviews view larger image
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Thoughtful, articulate, and readable rhetoric.

"Writing Arguments" shines like a beacon in the dark and murky waters of composition textbooks. Although some have critiqued it for its "passive" approach, I support both the approach and the layout as the best way I've found to approach basic argumentation. A solid understanding of audience (in particular) is vital for successful writing, and it's also something inexperienced, self-focused writers often lack.

Rather than pushing a "win at all costs" or "go with your gut" victory-based approach to rhetoric, the authors promote rhetorical writing grounded in Perelman's audience concepts, Toulmin's warrants, and Aristotelian enthymeme. By encouraging students to locate common ground (warrants) between themselves and their real or imagined audience, this book sets them up to engage in rhetoric as participants in a broader civic culture. And this is the rhetoric that will ultimately equip them to survive in the real world--where knowing what a client or an opponent wants and believes is critical to "winning" the argument in a lasting and productive way.

No theory or approach is perfect (not that I've found so far at least), and a rigid application of the Toulmin model or the schema as outlined in this book will inevitably bog down writers as they move into more advanced composition. But that, afterall, is why we teachers are there. By focusing students' attention on the basic principles in the book--audience awareness, orderliness, situational groundedness, etc.--rather than forcing them to memorize rules or endlessly construct Toulmin models, I may just be able to help my students develop a new respect for argumentation as discovery (and themselves as rhetors) in the public sphere. And if we can do that, maybe there's a little civil light in the civic culture tunnel after all.

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A lackluster experience.

I didn't buy this book because writing arguments fascinates me. I picked it up because I needed it for my freshman composition class. For that, it serves a purpose, but I do not particularly like this book.

I love to write. Absolutely love it, and I am always interested in books that can help me become a better writer.

This book, however, is a confusing read. It has a monotonous design: chapters are not easily distinguishable from one another. Sample essays are, of course, always nice, but they are peppered throughout the book to an exhausting degree. The writing is technical and uninspiring. I found that I learned more about ethos, pathos and logos by listening to my instructor than by browsing through the overly-complicated text in this book.

Some books are designed to look interesting and to excite you into reading them. This one is unfortunately not one of them.

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Essential for Argument Presentation

Presented in textbook fashion, WRITING ARGUMENTS: A RHETORIC WITH READINGS, doesn't exactly make for compelling reading, but is certainly a critical source for argumentation documents. Author's Ramage, Bean and Johnson guide the reader through the process both deliberately and succinctly, covering every aspect of argument presentation, beginning with definition through source documentation.

Mine is an older edition and the technology aspect is dated, but nonetheless, I turn often to this book to guide me through argument preparation. Though certainly intended for classroom study, this book is also useful outside the classroom. I have prepared a fair number of arguments for political presentation and have found this to be a useful volume.

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Teaches readers to write better arguments. How to write arguments; how to do research for arguments; an anthology of argumentative readings. Anyone interested in writing better arguments.