This concise, accessible text teaches students how to write logical, cohesive arguments and how to evaluate the arguments of others.   Integrating writing skills with critical thinking skills, this practical book teaches students to draw logical inferences, identify premises and conclusions and use language precisely. Students also learn how to identify fallacies and to distinguish between inductive and deductive reasoning. Ideal for any composition class that emphasizes argument, this text includes coverage of writing style and rhetoric, logic, literature, research and documentation.

Table of Contents:
Guide to Readings         Preface        CHAPTER 1 Thinking and Writing—A Critical Connection      Thinking Made Visible   Critical Thinking       AN OPEN MIND—EXAMINING YOUR WORLD VIEW  Writing as a Process       INVENTION STRATEGIES—GENERATING IDEAS       THE FIRST DRAFT       THE TIME TO BE CRITICAL   Audience and Purpose       E-MAIL AND TEXT MESSAGING        WRITING ASSIGNMENT 1  Considering Your Audience and Purpose   Reason, Intuition, Imagination, and Metaphor         REASONING BY ANALOGY             SUMMARY   KEY TERMS     CHAPTER 2 Inference—Critical Thought           What Is an Inference?       HOW RELIABLE IS AN INFERENCE?   What Is a Fact?       RELIABILITY OF FACTS IN A CHANGING WORLD What Is a Judgment?   Achieving a Balance Between Inference and Facts      FACTS ONLY       INFERENCES ONLY          WRITING ASSIGNMENT 2  Reconstructing the Lost Tribe   Reading Critically Making Inferences—Writing About Fiction              WRITING ASSIGNMENT 3  Interpreting Fiction            WRITING ASSIGNMENT 4  Analyzing Fiction  Making Inferences—Analyzing Images       PERSUADING WITH VISUAL IMAGES     EXAMINING ADS           the smoking campaign         vidual images and the law SUMMARY   KEY TERMS     CHAPTER 3 The Structure of Argument        Premises and Conclusions   Distinguishing Between Premises and Conclusions   Standard Form        WRITING ASSIGNMENT 5  Creating a Political Handout   Ambiguous Argument Structure   Hidden Assumptions in Argument       DANGERS OF HIDDEN ASSUMPTIONS       HIDDEN ASSUMPTIONS AND STANDARD FORM       HIDDEN ASSUMPTIONS AND AUDIENCE AWARENESS   Summaries       STRATEGIES FOR WRITING A SUMMARY       AN EXAMPLE OF A SUMMARY       WRITING ASSIGNMENT 6  Summarizing an Article   Argument and Explanation—Distinctions   SUMMARY   KEY TERMS     CHAPTER 4 Written Argument          Focusing Your Topic       THE ISSUE       THE QUESTION AT ISSUE       THE THESIS  Shaping a Written Argument—Rhetorical Strategies       THE INTRODUCTION      THE DEVELOPMENT OF YOUR ARGUMENT      HOW MANY PREMISES SHOULD AN ARGUMENT HAVE?       THE CONCLUSION   A Dialectical Approach to Argument       ADDRESSING COUNTERARGUMENTS       HOW MUCH COUNTERARGUMENT?       REFUTATION AND CONCESSION      ROGERIAN STRATEGY       WHEN THERE IS NO OTHER SIDE   Logical Connections—Coherence       JOINING WORDS       MORE ON COHERENCE   Sample Essays   A Two-Step Process for Writing a Complete Argument        WRITING ASSIGNMENT 7  Arguing Both Sides of an Issue        WRITING ASSIGNMENT 8  Taking a Stand   SUMMARY   KEY TERMS     CHAPTER 5 The Language of Argument—Definition Definition and Perception           who controls the definitions?      DEFINING OURSELVES       SHIFTING DEFINITIONS       DEFINITION: THE SOCIAL SCIENCES AND GOVERNMENT  Language: An Abstract System of Symbols       THE IMPORTANCE OF CONCRETE EXAMPLES       ABSTRACTIONS AND EVASION       EUPHEMISM AND CONNOTATION   Definition in Written Argument       APPOSITIVES—A STRATEGY FOR DEFINING TERMS WITHIN THE SENTENCE       APPOSITIVES AND ARGUMENT       PUNCTUATION OF APPOSITIVES       EXTENDED DEFINITION         WRITING ASSIGNMENT 9  Composing an Argument Based on a Definition   Inventing a New Word to Fill a Need        WRITING ASSIGNMENT 10  Creating a New Word   SUMMARY   KEY TERMS     CHAPTER 6 Fallacious Arguments   What Is a Fallacious Argument?       APPEAL TO AUTHORITY       APPEAL TO FEAR       APPEAL TO PITY       BEGGING THE QUESTION       DOUBLE STANDARD       EQUIVOCATION       FALSE ANALOGY       FALSE CAUSE       FALSE DILEMMA       HASTY GENERALIZATION       PERSONAL ATTACK      POISONING THE WELL      RED HERRING       SLIPPERY SLOPE       STRAW MAN        WRITING ASSIGNMENT 11  Analyzing an Extended Argument   KEY TERMS     CHAPTER 7 Deductive and Inductive Argument        Key Distinctions       (1) NECESSITY VERSUS PROBABILITY       (2) FROM GENERAL TO SPECIFIC, SPECIFIC TO GENERAL   The Relationship Between Induction and Deduction   Deductive Reasoning       CLASS LOGIC       RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN CLASSES       INCLUSION       EXCLUSION       OVERLAP      CLASS LOGIC AND THE SYLLOGISM       THE SUBJECT AND THE PREDICATE       TRUTH, VALIDITY, AND SOUNDNESS      GUILT BY ASSOCIATION      MORE ON SYLLOGISMS  Hypothetical Arguments       THE VALID HYPOTHETICAL ARGUMENT      THE INVALID HYPOTHETICAL ARGUMENT       NECESSARY AND SUFFICIENT CONDITIONS       HYPOTHETICAL CHAINS       HYPOTHETICAL CLAIMS AND EVERYDAY REASONING   Inductive Reasoning       GENERALIZATION       THE DIRECTION OF INDUCTIVE REASONING      TESTING INDUCTIVE GENERALIZATIONS       CRITERIA FOR EVALUATING STATISTICAL GENERALIZATIONS       HASTY GENERALIZATIONS       THINKING CRITICALLY ABOUT SURVEYS AND STATISTICS        MISTAKING CORRELATION FOR CAUSATION       EPIDEMIOLOGY       CONSIDERING THE SOURCE        WRITING ASSIGNMENT 12  Questioning Generalizations        WRITING ASSIGNMENT 13  Conducting a Survey: A Collaborative Project   SUMMARY   KEY TERMS    CHAPTER 8 The Language of Argument—Style        Parallelism       THE STRUCTURE OF PARALLELISM       LOGIC OF THE PARALLEL SERIES       EMPHASIZING IDEAS WITH PARALLELISM  Sharpening Sentences, Eliminating Wordiness       CONCRETE SUBJECTS       ACTIVE AND PASSIVE VERBS       PASSIVE VERBS AND EVASION       WHEN THE PASSIVE IS APPROPRIATE      CONSISTENT SENTENCE SUBJECTS   SUMMARY   KEY TERMS   Revision:  A Checklist   A Quick Guide to Evaluating Sources and Integrating Research into Your Own Writing     Where to Begin   Evaluating Online Sources Checking for Bias Three Options for Including Research   Blend Quotations and Paraphrases into Your Own Writing       MAKE THE PURPOSE CLEAR       PUNCTUATION AND FORMAT OF QUOTATIONS      OMITTING WORDS FROM A DIRECT QUOTATION—ELLIPSIS   Plagiarism  A Final Note                                                                                                                                                                                                              Additional Readings      “The Conservative Case for Gay Marriage,” Ted Olsen “You Are What You Speak,” Guy Deutscher “The Order of Things,” Malcolm Gladwell