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SECTION E. RESPONDING TO READINGS
How to Start Your
Paper by Reading
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If your instructor assigns a text to read--for
example, a short essay or perhaps the chapter of a book--see below. If you
find your own text (e.g., an online or library essay) to read, then you should
look for one that has two qualities in particular:
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Unless otherwise assigned by your instructor, the text of the reading preferably should be about an issue with which you have
personal experience or one about which you have a store of knowledge from
others close to you and/or from studying it. Do not pick something
merely because it causes you a strong emotional reaction. However, if
you have several possible choices about which you have experience or
knowledge, then choosing one that also creates strong feelings in you may
help you better write your paper.
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The text also should represent just one main side of a debatable issue. That
is--unless otherwise assigned by your instructor--the text should be an argument on a debatable question, and the
text should not try to show more than one side of the issue. It should not, for
example, try to fairly represent two or three sides of the issue, nor merely
report on someone else's opinion, unless this is what your instructor
assigns.
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SOURCES OF SHORT, ARGUMENTATIVE TEXTS
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The "Opposing Viewpoints" series or "The
Reference Shelf" series, both of which can be found in larger
libraries, as assigned by your instructor
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One- or two-page editorials in newsmagazines that are specifically
marked as opinion pieces (usually found at the very end), as
assigned by your instructor (but not regular news articles in
the magazines)
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Long editorials in the editorial or opinion sections of large,
daily, city newspapers, as assigned by your instructor (but--at the
college level--not
short editorials or letters to the editor, for they are too short; and not standard
news articles, for these are factual, not argumentative)
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Web sites with arguments, as assigned by your instructor.
For a list of links to such sites, see OnlineGrammar.org's "Online
Arguments."
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You should buy or copy the text so that you can mark the pages as you read.
Then read it thoroughly using the methods described in the chapter called "How
to Read Texts."
An alternative focus at the beginning is to have a strong, intelligent, and
complex opinion on a subject--even to freewrite about it, if you wish--and then
to find a text on the same subject, but one with which you disagree. If the
text is a good match for what you know--in terms of an opposing topic and
opposing subtopics--then you will have an appropriate text with which to
disagree.
However,
quite often, the text will be assigned to you. In such a case, you must
do everything you can to understand the text thoroughly. You certainly
can write rough drafts of your thoughts during the time you read the essay, or
even after a first reading. However, generally speaking, you need to read
your text at least twice, if at all possible, using critical reading for at
least one of those texts. To find out how to read critically, go
to the chapter in this section called "How
to Read Texts."
To
continue the chapter of this Web book that you are reading, please click on your
back arrow or use the right-hand column.
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