An Insider's Guide to Academic Writing: A Rhetoric and Reader, with 2020 APA Update

Preface for Instructors

PART ONE A Guide to College and College Writing

1 Inside Colleges and Universities

What Is Higher Education?

How Do Colleges and Universities Differ from One Another?

■ Inside Work: Choosing a College

What Is the Purpose of College?

■ Inside Work: Writing about Your School’s Mission

■ Inside Work: Writing about College

■ Inside Work: Writing about Resources at Your Institution

What Are Academic Disciplines?

How Many Different Academic Disciplines Are There?

■ Inside Work: Understanding Disciplinarity

Why Do Academics Write?

■ Inside Work: Thinking about What Academics Write

Insider’s View: Sam Stout, Gena Lambrecht, Alexandria Woods, Students

How Does Writing in College Compare with Writing in Other Contexts?

Insider’s View: Karen Keaton Jackson, Writing Studies

■ Inside Work: Understanding the Goals of Your Writing Course

How Do Writers Learn to Write in New Contexts?

■ Inside Work: Learning about Writing in Other Contexts

　

■ WRITING PROJECT: Profile a Writer

Insider Example: Student Profile of a Business Professional

Rubbal Kumar, First Draft of Interview QuestionsRubbal Kumar, Literacy Profile – Benu BadhanTip Sheet: Inside Colleges and Universities

2 Writing Process and Reflection

What Is a Writing Process?

1) Develop a Writing Project through Multiple Drafts

■ Inside Work: Reflecting on Your Drafting Process

2) Develop flexible writing process strategies.

■ Inside Work: Reflecting on Flexibility

3) Learn to give and to act on productive feedback to works in progress.

Insider Example: Rough Draft of Student Jack Stegner’s Literacy Narrative with Peer Review Feedback from student Nichelle Oquendo

4) Use composing processes and tools as a means to discover and reconsider ideas.

Insider’s View: Jonathan Morris and Jody Baumgartner, Political Science

Insider’s View: Patrick Bahls, Mathematics

■ Inside Work: Talk about Technology with a Partner

5) Reflect on the development of composing practices and how those practices influence your work.

■ Inside Work: Reflecting on Your Thought Processes

What Is Reflective Writing?

What Is Literacy?

What Is a Literacy Narrative?

Characteristics of a Literacy Narrative

Main Idea

Scenes

Sensory Details

"I" Point of View

Aimee C. Mapes, Two Vowels Together: On the Wonderfully Insufferable Experiences of Literacy

■ Inside Work: Drafting a Scene for a Literacy Narrative

■ WRITING PROJECT: Composing a Literacy Narrative

Insider Example: Student Literacy Narrative

Michaela Bieda, My Journey to Writing Tip Sheet: Reading and Writing Rhetorically

3 Reading and Writing Rhetorically

Understanding Rhetorical Context

Insider’s View: Karen Keaton Jackson, Writing Studies

■ Inside Work: Identifying Rhetorical Context

Understanding Genres

Insider’s View: Moriah McCracken, Writing Studies

Reading Rhetorically

Reading Visuals Rhetorically

■ Inside Work: Reading Rhetorically

Writing Rhetorically

■ Inside Work: Analyzing Rhetorical Context

Writing a Rhetorical Analysis

George H. W. Bush, Letter to Saddam Hussein Insider Example: Student Rhetorical Analysis

Sofia Lopez, The Multiple Audiences of George H. W. Bush’s Letter to Saddam Hussein

■ WRITING PROJECT: Writing a Rhetorical Analysis

Tip Sheet: Reading and Writing Rhetorically

4 Developing Arguments

Understanding Proofs and Appeals

■ Inside Work: Writing about Arguments

Making Claims

Thesis versus Hypothesis

Developing Reasons

■ Inside Work: Constructing Thesis Statements

Supporting Reasons with Evidence

Insider’s View: Moriah McCracken, Writing Studies

Insider’s View: Michelle Richter, Criminal Justice

■ Inside Work: Analyzing Audience Expectations

Understanding Assumptions

■ Inside Work: Considering Assumptions and Audience

Anticipating Counterarguments

Insider’s View: Mike Brotherton, Astronomy

■ Inside Work: Dealing with Counterarguments

Analyzing Arguments

Insider Example: Professional Analysis of an Advertisement

Jack Solomon, from Masters of Desire: The Culture of American Advertising Insider Example: Student Analysis of an Advertisement 00

Timothy Holtzhauser, Rhetoric of a 1943 War Bonds Ad

■ WRITING PROJECT: Composing a Rhetorical Analysis of an Advertisement

Tip Sheet: Developing Arguments

 

5 Academic Research

Conducting Research

Developing a Research Question

■ Inside Work: Writing a Research Question

Insider’s View: Jody Baumgartner and Jonathan Morris, Political Science

Choosing Primary and Secondary Sources

Insider’s View: Moriah McCracken, Writing Studies

■ Inside Work: Collecting Primary Evidence

■ Inside Work: Using Primary and Secondary Sources

Searching for Sources

■ Inside Work: Generating Search Terms

■ Inside Work: Generating Sources from an Academic Database

Evaluating Sources

Insider’s View: Jonathan Morris, Political Science

■ Inside Work: Evaluating Sources

Summarizing, Paraphrasing, and Quoting from Sources

■ Inside Work: Summarizing, Paraphrasing, and Quoting from Sources

Avoiding Plagiarism

Insider’s View: Karen Keaton Jackson, Writing Studies

■ Inside Work: Understanding Plagiarism

Understanding Documentation Systems

■ WRITING PROJECT: Writing an Annotated Bibliography

■ WRITING PROJECT: Developing a Supported Argument on a Controversial Issue

Insider Example: Student Argument on a Controversial Issue

Jack Gomperts, English 101 Essay on Hydration in Athletes Tip Sheet: Academic Research

PART TWO Inside Academic Writing

6 Reading and Writing in Academic Disciplines

Insider’s View: Karen Keaton Jackson, Writing Studies

Analyzing Genres and Identifying Conventions of Academic Writing

Insider’s View: Moriah McCracken, Writing Studies

Adapting to Different Rhetorical Contexts: An Academic Writer at Work

Insider’s View: Mike Brotherton, Astronomy

■ Inside Work: Reflecting on a Discipline

Using Rhetorical Context to Analyze Academic Writing

Mike Brotherton, from Hubble Space Telescope Spies Galaxy/Black Hole Evolution in Action Insider’s View: Mike Brotherton, Astronomy

■ Inside Work: Reflecting on Rhetorical Context

Using Structure, Language, and Reference to Analyze Genre Conventions

Insider’s View: Mike Brotherton, Astronomy

M. S. Brotherton, Wil van Breugel, S. A. Stanford, R. J. Smith, B. J. Boyle, Lance Miller, T. Shanks, S. M. Croom, and Alexei V. Filippenko, from A Spectacular Poststarburst Quasar

■ Inside Work: Reflecting on an Academic Article

Insider’s View: Mike Brotherton, Astronomy

■ WRITING PROJECT: Writing a Genre Analysis of an Academic Article

■ WRITING PROJECT: Writing a Comparative Genre Analysis

■ WRITING PROJECT: Comparing Scholarly and Popular Articles

Translating Scholarly Writing for Different Rhetorical Contexts

Insider Example: Student Translation of a Scholarly Article

Jonathan Nastasi, Life May Be Possible on Other Planets

■ WRITING PROJECT: Translating a Scholarly Article for a Public Audience

Tip Sheet: Reading and Writing in Academic Disciplines

7 Reading and Writing in the Humanities

Introduction to the Humanities

Insider’s View: John McCurdy, History

Texts and Meaning

■ Inside Work: Thinking about Texts

Observation and Interpretation

■ Inside Work: Observing and Asking Questions

Research in the Humanities

Insider’s View: Karen Keaton Jackson, Writing Studies

■ Inside Work: Observing and Interpreting Images

The Role of Theory in the Humanities

Close Reading in the Humanities

Insider Example: Professional Close Reading

Dale Jacobs, More Than Words: Comics as a Means of Teaching Multiple Literacies

Strategies for Close Reading and Observation

Kate Chopin, from The Story of an Hour

■ Inside Work: Annotating a Text

Kate Chopin, The Story of an Hour

■ Inside Work: Preparing a Content / Form-Response Grid

Responding to the Interpretations of Others

Insider’s View: Moriah McCracken, Writing Studies

Conventions of Writing in the Humanities

Insider’s View: Shelley Garrigan, Spanish Language and Literature

Structural Conventions

Developing Research Questions and Thesis Statements

Insider’s View: Karen Keaton Jackson, Writing Studies

■ Inside Work: Developing Why, What, and How Questions

Developing Effective Thesis Statements

■ Inside Work: Drafting Thesis Statements

Five-Paragraph Essays and Other Thesis-Driven Templates

Insider’s View: Karen Keaton Jackson, Writing Studies

Other Structural Conventions in the Humanities

Language Conventions in the Humanities

Reference Conventions in the Humanities

Documentation

■ Inside Work: Analyzing Scholarly Writing in the Humanities

Genres of Writing in the Humanities

Insider’s View: Shelley Garrigan, Spanish Language and Literature

Textual Interpretation

■ WRITING PROJECT: Interpreting a Text

Insider Example: Student Interpretation of a Text

Sarah Ray, Till Death Do Us Part: An Analysis of Kate Chopin’s "The Story of an Hour"

Artistic Texts

■ WRITING PROJECT: Creating an Artistic Text

Tip Sheet: Reading and Writing in the Humanities

8 Reading and Writing in the Social Sciences

Introduction to the Social Sciences

Insider’s View: Kevin Rathunde, Social Sciences

■ Inside Work: Observing Behavior

Research in the Social Sciences

The Role of Theory

Insider Example: Exploring Social Science Theory

Kalervo Oberg, from Cultural Shock: Adjustments to New Cultural Environments

■ Inside Work: Tracing a Theory’s Development

Research Questions and Hypotheses

■ Inside Work: Developing Hypotheses

Methods

Insider’s View: Kevin Rathunde, Social Sciences

Insider’s View: Jonathan Morris, Political Science

■ Inside Work: Considering Research Methods

The IRB Process and Use of Human Subjects

Conventions of Writing in the Social Sciences

Insider’s View: Aya Matsuda, Linguistics

Structural Conventions and IMRAD Format

Other Structural Conventions

■ Inside Work: Observing Structural Conventions

Language Conventions

■ Inside Work: Observing Language Features

Reference Conventions

■ Inside Work: Observing Reference Features

Genres of Writing in the Social Sciences

Insider’s View: Aya Matsuda, Linguistics

The Literature Review

Insider Example: An Embedded Literature Review

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi and Jeremy Hunter, from Happiness in Everyday Life: The Uses of Experience Sampling

Writing a Literature Review

■ WRITING PROJECT: Writing a Literature Review

Insider Example: Student Literature Review

William O’Brien, Effects of Sleep Deprivation: A Literature Review

Theory Response Essay

■ WRITING PROJECT: Writing a Theory Response

Insider Example: Student Theory Response Paper

Matt Kapadia, Evaluation of the Attribution TheoryTip Sheet: Reading and Writing in the Social Sciences

 

9 Reading and Writing in the Natural Sciences

Introduction to the Natural Sciences

Insider’s View: Sian Proctor, Geology

Research in the Natural Sciences

Insider’s View: Paige Geiger, Molecular and Integrative Physiology

■ Inside Work: Considering a Natural Science Topic

Observation and Description in the Natural Sciences

■ Inside Work: Thinking about Systematic Observation in the Sciences

Moving from Description to Speculation

■ Inside Work: Practicing Description and Speculation

■ Inside Work: Developing Research Questions and a Hypothesis

Designing a Research Study in the Natural Sciences

Insider’s View: Michelle LaRue, Conservation Biology

Insider’s View: Patrick Bahls, Mathematics

■ Inside Work: Freewriting about an Experiment

Conventions of Writing in the Natural Sciences

Insider’s View: Michelle LaRue, Conservation Biology

Objectivity

■ Inside Work: Looking for Conventions of Objectivity

Replicability

Recency

Insider’s View: Patrick Bahls, Mathematics

■ Inside Work: Looking for Conventions of Replicability and Recency

Cooperation and Collaboration

Genres of Writing in the Natural Sciences

An Observation Logbook

Insider’s View: Paige Geiger, Molecular and Integrative Physiology

■ WRITING PROJECT: Keeping an Observation Logbook

Insider Example: Student Observation Logbook

Kedric Lemon, Comparing the Efficiency of Various Batteries Being Used over Time

Research Proposal

■ WRITING PROJECT: Developing a Research Proposal

Insider Example: Research Proposal

Gary Ritchison, Hunting Behavior, Territory Quality, and Individual Quality of American Kestrels (Falco sparverius)

Lab Report

■ WRITING PROJECT: Composing a Lab Report

Insider Example: Student Lab Report

Kedric Lemon, Which Type of Battery Is the Most Effective When Energy Is Drawn Rapidly? Tip Sheet: Reading and Writing in the Natural Sciences

10 Reading and Writing in the Applied Fields

Introduction to the Applied Fields

What Are Applied Fields?

■ Inside Work: Defining and Solving Problems

■ Inside Work: Considering Additional Applied Fields

Rhetoric and the Applied Fields

Insider’s View: Michelle Richter, Criminal Justice

Genres in Selected Applied Fields

Health Fields

Insider’s View: Janna Dieckmann, Nursing

Insider Example: Professional Research Report

Margaret Shandor Miles, Diane Holditch-Davis, Suzanne Thoyre, and Linda Beeber, Rural African-American Mothers Parenting Prematurely Born Infants: An Ecological Systems Perspective Insider Example: Discharge Instructions

First Hospital, Discharge Instructions for Heart Attack

■ Inside Work: Nurse for a Day

Education

Insider Example: Student Lesson Plan

Myra Moses, Lesson Plan Insider Example: Student IEP

Myra Moses, IEP

■ Inside Work: Teacher for a Day

Business

Insider Example: Student Memorandum

James Blackwell, Investigative Report on Hazen and Sawyer Insider Example: Student Business Plan

Daniel Chase Mills, The Electricity Monitor Company

■ Inside Work: CFO for a Day

Criminal Justice and Law

Insider’s View: Michelle Richter, Criminal Justice

Insider Example: Professional Legal Brief

University of Texas at Austin, et al., Brief for Respondents Insider Example: E-Mail Correspondence from Attorney

Joseph E. Miller Jr., Sample E-Mail

■ Inside Work: Lawyer for a Day

■ WRITING PROJECT: Discovering Genres of Writing in an Applied Field

Tip Sheet: Reading and Writing in the Applied Fields

PART THREE Entering Academic Conversations: Readings and Case Studies

11 Love, Marriage, and Family

Andrew Cherlin, How American Family Life Is Different

"Both pictures, contradictory as they may be, are part of the way that Americans live their family lives. Together they spin the American merry-go-round of intimate partnerships."

Susan Krauss Whitbourne, The Myth of the Helicopter Parent

"[T]he findings lead to a new understanding of parent-child support in the years of emerging adulthood."

Brian Powell, Catherine Bolzendahl, Claudia Geist, and Lala Carr Steelman, Changing Counts, Counting Change: Toward a More Inclusive Definition of Family

"The United States includes a rich diversity of families whether or not they are officially recognized as such. In fact, ‘the family,’ although still invoked far too often in public and scholarly venues, is an increasingly untenable and obsolete concept."

Susan Saulny, In Strangers’ Glances at Family, Tensions Linger

"Many mixed-race youths say they feel wider acceptance than past generations, particularly on college campuses and in pop culture. . . . [W]hen they are alone, the family strives to be colorblind. But what they face outside their home is another story."

Academic Case Study: Perspectives on Love

Humanities

Warren E. Milteer Jr., The Strategies of Forbidden Love: Family across Racial Boundaries in Nineteenth-Century North Carolina

Despite legal and social disapproval of the time, "free women of mixed ancestry and white men developed relationships that mimicked legally sanctioned marriages."

Social Sciences

Marissa A. Harrison and Jennifer C. Shortall, Women and Men in Love: Who Really Feels It and Says It First?

"[W]omen may not be the greater ‘fools for love’ that society assumes."

Natural Sciences

Donatella Marazziti and Domenico Canale, Hormonal Changes When Falling in Love

"[T]o fall in love provokes transient hormonal changes, some of which seem to be specific to each sex."

Applied Fields

Cara O. Peters, Jane B. Thomas, and Richard Morris, Looking for Love on Craigslist: An Examination of Gender Differences in Self-Marketing Online

"The results illustrate that language is an imprecise form in how people read and understand the written and spoken word."

■ Writing Project: Contributing to a Scholarly Conversation

■ Writing Project: Writing a Comparative Analysis of Research Methodologies

12 Crime, Punishment, and Justice

Barbara Bradley Hagerty, Inside a Psychopath’s Brain: The Sentencing Debate

" ‘Neuroscience and neuroimaging is going to change the whole philosophy about how we punish and how we decide who to incapacitate and how we decide how to deal with people.’ "

Sophia Kerby, The Top 10 Most Startling Facts about People of Color and Criminal Justice in the United States: A Look at the Racial Disparities Inherent in Our Nation’s Criminal-Justice System

"[I]t is imperative that criminal-justice reform evolves as the civil rights issue of the 21st century."

Inimai M. Chettier, The Many Causes of America’s Decline in Crime

"It turns out that increased incarceration had a much more limited effect on crime than popularly thought."

Abigail Pesta (reporting), I Survived Prison: What Really Happens behind Bars

"I’m about to become a prisoner in a massive penitentiary, and I feel an overwhelming sense of dread. I’m surrounded by people who have been here before, who know the system, who know how to work the guards. But I know nothing."

Academic Case Study: Capital Punishment

Humanities

Dwight Conquergood, Lethal Theatre: Performance, Punishment, and the Death Penalty

"The death penalty cannot be understood simply as a matter of public debate or an aspect of criminology, part from what it is pre-eminently: performance."

Social Sciences

Benedikt Till and Peter Vitouch, Capital Punishment in Films: The Impact of Death Penalty Portrayals on Viewers’ Mood and Attitude toward Capital Punishment

"[T]hese films certainly deteriorate the viewer’s mood, and have the potential to influence their social values and beliefs."

Natural Sciences

Teresa A. Zimmers, Jonathan Sheldon, David A. Lubarsky, Francisco López-Muñoz, Linda Waterman, Richard Weisman, and Leonidas G. Koniaris, Lethal Injection for Execution: Chemical Asphyxiation?

"We sought to determine whether the current drug regimen results in death in the manner intended."

Applied Fields

Joshua Marquis, The Myth of Innocence

"Popular culture…has created an entire alternate universe that posits a legal system that regularly hurls doe-eyed innocents onto death row through the malevolent machinations of corrupt cops and district attorneys..."

■ Writing Project: Writing a Brief Annotated Bibliography

■ Writing Project: Composing an Evaluative Rhetorical Analysis

13 Food, Sustainability, and Class

Gustavo Arellano, Taco USA: How Mexican Food Became More American Than Apple Pie

"Food is a natural conduit of change, evolution, and innovation. Wishing for a foodstuff to remain static, uncorrupted by outside influence — especially in these United States — is as ludicrous an idea as barring new immigrants from entering the country."

Patrick J. Kiger, How Cooking Has Changed Us

"Cooking, some scientists believe, played a crucial role in the evolution, survival, and ascent of early humans, helping to transform them from a ragged, miniscule fringe of struggling hunter-gatherers into the animal that dominates the planet."

Ruhlman, No Food Is Healthy. Not Even Kale.

"Our food is not healthy; we will be healthy if we eat nutritious food. Words matter. And those that we apply to food matter more than ever."

Michael Pollan, Why Cook?

"Cooking has the power to transform more than plants and animals: It transforms us, too, from mere consumers into producers."

Academic Case Study: Genetically Modified Food

Humanities

Daniel Gregorowius, Petra Lindemann-Matthies, and Markus Huppenbauer, Ethical Discourse on the Use of Genetically Modified Crops: A Review of Academic Publications in the Fields of Ecology and Environmental Ethics

The study surveys more than three decades of "the moral reasoning on the use of GM crops expressed in academic publications."

Social Sciences

Charles Noussair, Stéphane Robin, and Bernard Ruffieux, Do Consumers Really Refuse to Buy Genetically Modified Food?

Are consumers truly hesitant to buy foods that have been modified genetically? Or, do they often express opinions on GMO foods that are not reflected in their purchasing decisions?

Natural Sciences

Aziz Aris and Samuel Leblanc, Maternal and Fetal Exposure to Pesticides Associated to Genetically Modified Foods in Eastern Townships of Quebec, Canada

The goal of this study is to help "develop procedures to avoid environmentally induced disease in susceptible populations such as pregnant women and their fetuses."

Applied Fields

Sherry Seethaler and Marcia Linn, Genetically Modified Food in Perspective: An Inquiry-Based Curriculum to Help Middle School Students Make Sense of Tradeoffs

How do middle school students learn about the controversial scientific issue of genetically modified foods?

■ Writing Project: Writing a Persuasive Narrative

■ Writing Project: Translating a Scholarly Work for a Popular Audience

14 Writing

Stephen King, Reading to Write

"Every book you pick up has its own lesson or lessons, and quite often the bad books have more to teach than the good ones."

Isabel Allende, Writing as an Act of Hope

"In the process of writing the anecdotes of the past, and recalling the emotions and pains of my fate, and telling part of the history of my country, I found that life became more comprehensible and the world more tolerable."

Jimmy Baca, Coming Into Language

"The language of poetry was the magic that could liberate me from myself, transform me into another person, transport me to places far away."

Nicholas Carr, Is Google Making Us Stupid?

"My mind now expects to take in information the way the Net distributes id: in a swiftly moving stream of particles. Once I was a scuba diver in the sea of words. Now I zip along the surface like a guy on a Jet Ski."

Academic Case Study: The Scholarship of Writing

Humanities

David Bartholomae, Writing with Teachers: A Conversation with Peter Elbow; Peter Elbow, Being a Writer vs. Being an Academic: A Conflict in Goals

This scholarly conversation explores "two ways of being in the world of texts" and how instructors and students might navigate the potential conflicts between them.

Social Sciences

Martin E.P. Seligman, Tracey A. Steen, Nansook Park, and Christopher Peterson, Positive Psychology Progress: Empirical Validation of Interventions

Drawing on existing research in the field of positive psychology, the authors the impact that regular, prescribed writing can have on a person’s overall outlook.

Natural Sciences

Elizabeth Gray, Lisa Emerson, and Bruce MacKay, Meeting the Demands of the Workplace: Science Students and Written Skills

With employers consistently ranking "oral and written communication skills as or more highly than any technical or quantitative skill," are science graduates adequately prepared for these demands?

Applied Fields

Gavin Fairbairn and Alex Carson, Writing about Nursing Research: A Storytelling Approach

The authors propose that a storytelling approach to reporting research results in resources that can be read and understood by "the maximum possible number of people, whether they are nurses, policy makers, or col-leagues in other healthcare professions."

Appendix: Introduction to Documentation Styles

Index