For courses in Argument and Research.
This version of Writing Arguments: A Rhetoric with Readings, Brief has been updated the reflect the 8th edition of the MLA Handbook (April 2016) *
Teach students to read arguments critically and to produce effective arguments
Writing Arguments: A Rhetoric with Readings, Brief Edition, Tenth Edition integrates four different approaches to argument: the enthymeme as a logical structure, the classical concepts of logos, pathos, and ethos, the Toulmin system, and stasis theory. Focusing on argument as dialogue in search of solutions instead of a pro-con debate with winners and losers, it is consistently praised for teaching the critical thinking skills needed for writing arguments. Major assignment chapters each focus on one or two classical stases (e.g. definition, resemblance, causal, evaluation, and policy). Each concept is immediately reinforced with discussion prompts, and each chapter ends with multiple comprehensive writing assignments. This brief version contains exemplary readings within the chapters but excludes the anthology included in the comprehensive version. Also available in a Comprehensive version (032190673X) and a Concise version (0321964284) which is a redaction of the Brief edition.
* The 8th Edition introduces sweeping changes to the philosophy and details of MLA works cited entries. Responding to the “increasing mobility of texts,” MLA now encourages writers to focus on the process of crafting the citation, beginning with the same questions for any source. These changes, then, align with current best practices in the teaching of writing which privilege inquiry and critical thinking over rote recall and rule-following.
John Ramage received his BA in philosophy from Whitman College and his Ph.D. in English from Washington State University. He served for over thirty years on the faculties of Montana State University and Arizona State University. In addition to his teaching duties, which included both graduate and undergraduate courses in writing and rhetoric, literary theory and modern literature, Dr. Ramage served as a writing program administrator overseeing writing across the curriculum and composition programs and writing centers. At Arizona State university, he was the founding executive director of the university's Division of Undergraduate Academic Services, responsible for academic support services campus-wide.
In addition to the Writing Arguments Dr. Ramage was the co-author of the textbooks Form and Surprise in Composition, and Allyn & Bacon Guide to Writing. He was also the lead author for Argument in Composition, and the sole author of Rhetoric: A User's Guide, and Twentieth Century American Success Rhetoric: How to Construct a Suitable Self. He is currently writing a book about political rhetoric.
John C. Bean is an emeritus professor of English at Seattle University, where he held the title of “Consulting Professor of Writing and Assessment.” He has an undergraduate degree from Stanford (1965) and a Ph.D. from the University of Washington (1972). He is the author of an internationally used book on writing across the curriculum--Engaging Ideas: The Professor’s Guide to Writing, Critical Thinking, and Active Learning in the Classroom, 2nd edition (Jossey-Bass, 2011). He is also the co-author of the Allyn and Bacon Guide to Writing as well as two other influential composition textbooks–Writing Arguments and Reading Rhetorically. He has published numerous articles on writing and writing-across-the-curriculum as well as on literary subjects including Shakespeare and Spenser. His current research interests focus on pedagogical strategies for teaching undergraduate research including quantitative literacy, disciplinary methods of inquiry and argument, and the problem of “transfer of learning” as students move through and across a curriculum. A concomitant research interest is the development of institutional assessment strategies that promote productive faculty conversations about teaching and learning. In 2001, he presented a keynote address at the first annual conference of the European Association of Teachers of Academic Writing at the University of Groningen. He has delivered lectures and conducted workshops on writing-across-the-curriculum throughout the United States and Canada as well as for universities in Germany, Bangladesh, Ghana, and Zambia. In 2010 his article “Messy Problems and Lay Audiences: Teaching Critical Thinking within the Finance Curriculum” (co-authored with colleagues from finance and economics) won the 2009 McGraw-Hill — Magna Publications Award for the year’s best “scholarly work on teaching and learning.”
June Johnson is an associate professor of English, Director of Writing Studies, and Writing Consultant to the University Core at Seattle University. She has a B.A. in English and an M.A. in Education from Stanford and an M.A. in English from Mills College. After chairing the English department of a preparatory school in Los Angeles and working as a development editor in educational publishing, she earned her Ph.D. from the University of Washington. At Seattle University, she supervises the teaching of first-year academic writing seminars as well as teaches these courses and advanced argument and composition theory in the Writing Studies minor . Her research areas include global studies, reflective writing, first-year composition, writing transfer, argumentation, and Rogerian communication–subjects on which she conducts workshops at Seattle University and at institutions around the country. She has published articles in American Studies on women’s writing about the West in the nineteenth century. She is the co-author (with John Bean) of the The Allyn and Bacon Guide to Writing, a text known for its foundation in writing-across-the-curriculum pedagogy and its useful introduction to academic writing and co-author (also with John Bean) of Writing Arguments, and she authored Global Issues, Local Arguments, 3rd edition (Pearson, 2014), an argument reader and rhetoric with a civic literacy focus that provides a cross-curricular introduction to global problems.
