Passage Analysis Practice

Passage Analysis Practice• Identify 1 SCHEME & in complete sentences

describe its effect in relation to the content:• "With Miss Tilney she felt no restraint; and, with

the interest of a road entirely new to her, of an abbey before, and a curricle behind, she caught the last view of Bath without any regret, and met with every mile-stone before she expected it. The tediousness of a two hours' bait at Petty-France, in which there was nothing to be done but to eat without being hungry, and loiter about without any thing to see, next followed" (106).

Rhetorical Structure

Organization & Form

Rhetoric is ...

• The ART of persuasion.• The devices used to make claims

attractive and convincing.

For essays, . . .

• The most important device is argumentation.

• i.e. the reasons that support your THESIS.

• Logos -- Appeal to Logic, Reasoning

REVIEW: Argumentative Structure

• Inductive reasoning: specific examples used to draw general conclusions.

• These conclusions become premises on which one may base deductive reasoning.

REVIEW: Argumentative Structure

• Dedductive reasoning: general propositions are used to draw specific conclusions.

• These conclusions become claims about the significance of inductive reasoning.

Practice: SYLLOGISM

• All students who are late to class 3 or more times will lose 1 conduct mark.

• Ethan is a student.• Ethan loses 1 conduct mark.• Therefore, Ethan is late to class 3 or

more times.

Practice: ENTHYMEMES

• Downton Abbey should be considered pornography because it encourages emotional investment in fictional characters.

• What are the unstated premise(s) on which this deductive reasoning is based?

Other rhetorical devices include . . .

• How you organize your essay, paragraphs, even sentences.

• Where do you place your thesis (introduction, body, conclusion)? Do you state the thesis explicitly or leave it implicit?

• What parts of your syllogisms (premises of your deductive reasoning) do you leave unstated?

• Which do you emphasize & support (inductive reasoning)?

Emphasis and Support

• It is evident that Desdimona is not a submissive wife because she repeated attempts to change the subject of conversation. When ordered to fetch the handkerchief, she dismisses the order as a trick and begs, "Let Cassio be received." And as Othello exclaims again and again, "The handkerchief! . . . The Handkerchief!" Desdimona expounds Cassio's praises as if her husband's anger brooks no threat and is but a childish fit from which time and destruction will dissuade him.

These create the rhetorical structure

• They depend on the line of reasoning you develop.

• This will vary from topic to topic.• Yet there is a relatively standard

structure.

Standard Units

• Title• Introduction• Body• Conclusion• Thesis

Title

• Tell enough about the topic of the essay to capture the interest of readers and let them know the focus of the essay.

• Include the author’s name and the title of the work you will discuss:

“The Jungle as Symbol in Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness.”

Introduction

• State the topic of your essay. NOTE: topic + your opinion = thesis• Purpose: Capture readers’ attention

(hook)• Hook problem, or question.• Keep introductions short—one to

three paragraphs.

For centuries, people have considered the biblical Garden of Eden a model for “paradise.” Surprisingly, a work of literature nearly as ancient as the Bible, Homer’s Odyssey, contains a place so similar to Eden that it, too, qualifies as a paradise. This place is Calypso’s island, Ogygia. Yet as alike as Eden and Ogygia are, the mortals who dwell there react to them very differently. Adam and Eve want to remain in Eden, but because of their disobedience they are expelled. In contrast, Odysseus chooses to leave Ogygia. This choice is puzzling. Why would he want to leave paradise?

Body

• Develop your line of reasoning.• A series of paragraphs that contain

claims (usually one claim per paragraph) along with supporting evidence.

• Include as many paragraphs as necessary to make your argument convincing.

Body Paragraphs

• Goal: Develop thesis into an argument.

• Omit anything that does not help your arugment: e.g. isolated biographical, historical, literary-historical contextualization; unwarrant-ed generalizations.

• Do not list isolated points: provide argumentative transitions between your paragraphs.

Argumentative Transitions

• Ogygia is similar to Eden in at least four ways.

• In sum, Adam, Eve, and Odysseus possess the benefits of paradise.

• Yet Odysseus rejects this paradise. Why? The answer Odysseus gives is that he loves Penelope and wants to be with her.

• A less obvious explanation for Odysseus’s rejection of paradise, however, springs from his nature.

• Odysseus, in short, is a craftsman, a maker, a builder.

Conclusion

• Remind the reader of the problem posed at the beginning of the essay (the topic).

• Briefly summarize the solutions.• The conclusion should be brief, a

paragraph or so.

The answer—unstated—is no. Odysseus loves his craftiness too much to stop. How satisfied would he be in a place like Ogygia? He would hate it. Ogygia, like the Garden of Eden, provides everything one could possibly want. That’s the trouble with it. There are no challenges, no obstacles to overcome. People whose love for overcoming obstacles is “instinctive” would be so bored and so restless they would go crazy. That is the real reason Odysseus chooses to leave Ogygia. He loves Penelope. But he loves, also, the very things we usually think of as bad—the difficulty and pain of life. Athene tells Zeus at the beginning that Odysseus “is tired of life” (2). Odysseus would rather die than live forever in the static eternity of “paradise.”

Thesis

• Do not start with “In this paper, I argue that … ”

• But your thesis should logically follow these six words. “Readings of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter that interpret its protagonist Hester Prynne as a proto-feminist have three fundamental limitations: x, y, and z.”

NOTE: This thesis is not something you can prove. But a good argument may persuade of its validity.

Where to put the thesis.

You have three choices:• introduction• conclusion• leave it unstated, but implicit

Which is rhetorically most effective for your topic?

Introduction

• Readers have the comfort of knowing what to look for as they read the rest of the essay. “Readings of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter that interpret its protagonist Hester Prynne as a proto-feminist have three fundamental limitations: x, y, and z.”

Conclusion

• Creates a sense of suspense that climaxes with the revelation of thesis.

“This choice is puzzling. Why would he want to leave paradise?”

“Odysseus loves his craftiness too much to stop. How satisfied would he be in a place like Ogygia? He would hate it. That is the real reason Odysseus chooses to leave Ogygia.”

Implicit

• Allows readers to infer it and thus to participate in its discovery.

Works Cited

Manuel for Writers of Papers in Literature and Cultural Studies University of Basel (available for download on weebly)

Griffith, Kelly. Writing Essays About Literature Eighth Edition