Begin by browsing through each of the following pieces of writing:
“‘Cure’ Me? No, Thanks” by Ben Mattlin [PDF]
“The NBA’s Secret Addiction” by Baxter Holmes [PDF]
“The Age of Rudeness” by Rachel Cusk [PDF]
“Why Does Hollywood Keep Equating Beauty with Virtue?” by Zachary Pincus-Roth [PDF]
Next, choose one of these pieces of writing for your textual analysis. Give this piece of writing some additional attention.
Read it from top to bottom, making notes on its main idea, the various claims and subtopics that elaborate this idea, the details the author incorporates (including research, experts, quotations, anecdotes, personal stories, and other elements), and anything else that might offer clues as to the author’s purpose and how readers could interpret the piece. Then, start planning your textual analysis.
Your task is to write a letter to someone who might be interested in the piece of writing you’ve chosen, explaining its main idea and describing in detail the strategies the author uses to convey this idea.
The person you’re writing to may be someone you personally know, but that’s not absolutely necessary—you can probably think of famous actors and directors who would be interested in Pincus-Roth’s argument about beauty and virtue, for example. What is necessary is that you think about your audience’s perspective as you’re drafting your letter.
Consider your audience’s experiences and perspectives and reference these in your letter when possible so that your textual analysis becomes interesting and relevant to this person. Notice that the word “summary” hasn’t appeared anywhere in these instructions. The goal of the letter you’re writing isn’t primarily to summarize a piece of writing. Instead, it’s to explain how the author accomplishes a purpose—to identify the writerly “moves” he or she is making.
Of course, you’ll have to summarize a little bit so that your audience understands the context for these “moves,” but your primary goal is to describe these techniques and provide illustrations of how the author uses them.
That means you’ll be incorporating quite a few quotations, and perhaps a few paraphrases, into your letter. You’ll get some practice with quotations and paraphrases in the learning activities for this unit.
