A. Fallacies (*=more likely to appear on test)
1. ad hominem*
2. straw man: oversimplifying or creating a weaker argument that is easy to knock down
3. bandwagon
4. post hoc ergo propter hoc (false causality)*
5. slippery slope
6. red herring: intentional distraction*
7. begging the question (because I'm an A student, you can't give me a C=circular logic)*
8. scare tactic
9. appeal to false authority
10. non sequitur*
11. either / or (oversimplification)
12. appeal to emotion
13. hasty generalization (generalize from insufficient evidence) [computers never work for me! / ipod broke = ipods suck, don't buy them]
B. Rhetorical / Argumentative Terms
Refutation: rebuttal; rejecting the counterargument
Syllogism: 3 part argument; major / minor premises; conclusion [audience has to agree with both premises to agree with conclusion]; a form of deductive reasoning (as opposed to inductive, which goes from particular evidence to a general conclusion...)
Recommended practice multiple choice sets and all the old sample essays at :
http://www.collegeboard.com/student/testing/ap/english_lang/samp.html?englang
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
Monday, May 3, 2010
Session 4: Syntax
What is Syntax?It is not only being able to say what something is (this is periodic, or this is complex-compound). That won't get you anything unless it comes with a why or an explanation of the effect it creates or evokes.
I. A Syntax Cheat Sheet
A. LOOSE (CUMULATIVE) sentences: are long, stop at any point, are rambling; could end earlier but go on adding more detail, sound more and more rambling (the more you add the more it sounds rambling).
B. PERIODIC sentences: build up to sense, withholding the main point until it's built up to at the end (Considering the x, y, and z...I wept).
C. PARALLEL sentences: deploy repeated grammatical structures. Sometimes called parallelism, sometimes parallel construction.
D. INVERTED sentences: reverse standard word order (subject / verb / object:: You, I love.)
E. BALANCED sentences: deploy repeated, parallel rhythms (which may or may not be syntactical: parallelism is therefore a specific, special form of balance).
F. ANTITHESIS in sentences: creates another kind of balance; juxtapose opposing ideas which are yet expressed in the same grammatical structure.
G. REPETITION in sentences: uses repeated words, sounds, or structures (like anaphora).
II. Sentence Types
clause=subject and verb
A. Simple: one main clause (or one independent clause).
"In june, in the summertime, i like to eat Locopops."
B. Complex: one main clause and one or more dependent clauses (while, although, when).
"I ate a burger while he had fries."
"Although I like Locopops, I never go there."
C. Compound: two or more independent clauses joined by a conjunction (fanboys).
"I like to eat Locopops, but I never go there."
D. Compound-Complex: two or more independent clauses and one or more dependent clauses.
III. Sentence Function
Declarative: statement
Interrogative : question
Exclamatory: exclaiming
Imperative: command
IV. Sentence Length
Telegraphic: very short : "Quit!"
I. A Syntax Cheat Sheet
A. LOOSE (CUMULATIVE) sentences: are long, stop at any point, are rambling; could end earlier but go on adding more detail, sound more and more rambling (the more you add the more it sounds rambling).
Effect: adds more information; creates less drama (main point up front); easier to understand (main point right away); more informal (more rambling).
B. PERIODIC sentences: build up to sense, withholding the main point until it's built up to at the end (Considering the x, y, and z...I wept).
Effect: adds more suspense; we wait to hear the main clause, whose completion is withheld for a time; sounds more formal; harder to understand.
C. PARALLEL sentences: deploy repeated grammatical structures. Sometimes called parallelism, sometimes parallel construction.
Effect: clearer; more formal; equal importance given to various ideas.
D. INVERTED sentences: reverse standard word order (subject / verb / object:: You, I love.)
Effect: more formal, more sophisticated; attention grabbing.
E. BALANCED sentences: deploy repeated, parallel rhythms (which may or may not be syntactical: parallelism is therefore a specific, special form of balance).
Effect: lyrical; poetic.
F. ANTITHESIS in sentences: creates another kind of balance; juxtapose opposing ideas which are yet expressed in the same grammatical structure.
Effect: highlights contrast (she likes ice cream; i hate it); draws more attention to the contrast by putting opposing ideas in the same structure.
G. REPETITION in sentences: uses repeated words, sounds, or structures (like anaphora).
Effect: emphasis; emphasis on formality or drama of something.
II. Sentence Types
clause=subject and verb
A. Simple: one main clause (or one independent clause).
"In june, in the summertime, i like to eat Locopops."
B. Complex: one main clause and one or more dependent clauses (while, although, when).
"I ate a burger while he had fries."
"Although I like Locopops, I never go there."
C. Compound: two or more independent clauses joined by a conjunction (fanboys).
"I like to eat Locopops, but I never go there."
D. Compound-Complex: two or more independent clauses and one or more dependent clauses.
III. Sentence Function
Declarative: statement
Interrogative : question
Exclamatory: exclaiming
Imperative: command
IV. Sentence Length
Telegraphic: very short : "Quit!"
Monday, April 19, 2010
Session 3: Rhetorical Analysis Prompts
Rhetorical Analysis
1) Analyzing the "language" (syntax, tone, diction, figurative language, the 3 appeals, style, fallacies)
"Language" here means rhetoric, style, the conventions of language. The prompt may give you different terms to try to throw you off. [How mean! -MS]
It's fair game, however, to talk about all these things.
2) Rhetorical Analysis Prompt
= you are going to have to read and annotate a passage
= don't use your planning time for this but for the Synthesis prompt instead
Break down the prompt before you begin. It will always have two parts: the what and the how. The how part is always the same, and is always, at bottom, all about the "language" (see above).
3) Some practice prompts. We identified the what and the how embedded in each of four practice prompts.
1) Edward Abbey
- what: characterize Abbey's attitude toward nature
- how: how Abbey conveys these views
2) Woolf
- what: lasting significance of these moments from her past
- how: how W. uses langauge to convey....
3) Green
- what: Af Ams should join the union forces
- how: analyze the methods of persuasion (note: the prompt doesn't explicitly say "language" or "rhetoric," but they do mention persuade [so, think about the appeals, and possibly the fallacies])
4) John Downe
- what: wife should emigrate to the US
- how: analyze the rhetorical methods
1) Analyzing the "language" (syntax, tone, diction, figurative language, the 3 appeals, style, fallacies)
"Language" here means rhetoric, style, the conventions of language. The prompt may give you different terms to try to throw you off. [How mean! -MS]
It's fair game, however, to talk about all these things.
2) Rhetorical Analysis Prompt
= you are going to have to read and annotate a passage
= don't use your planning time for this but for the Synthesis prompt instead
Break down the prompt before you begin. It will always have two parts: the what and the how. The how part is always the same, and is always, at bottom, all about the "language" (see above).
3) Some practice prompts. We identified the what and the how embedded in each of four practice prompts.
1) Edward Abbey
- what: characterize Abbey's attitude toward nature
- how: how Abbey conveys these views
2) Woolf
- what: lasting significance of these moments from her past
- how: how W. uses langauge to convey....
3) Green
- what: Af Ams should join the union forces
- how: analyze the methods of persuasion (note: the prompt doesn't explicitly say "language" or "rhetoric," but they do mention persuade [so, think about the appeals, and possibly the fallacies])
4) John Downe
- what: wife should emigrate to the US
- how: analyze the rhetorical methods
Tuesday, April 13, 2010
Session 2: Diction / Synthesis Prompt
1. Diction: Word choice
Some common characterizations:
Diction affects the reader's perception of what the author is saying.
2. How to talk about diction?
Don't say "she uses diction." Everybody uses diction. Get specific. Tell us what kind... (use some of those characterizations listed above).
FOR THE MOST ADVANCED: you may even want to avoid using the word diction altogether, and just get down to characterizing the language.
3. Ms. Beatty's Diction Handout
4. Synthesis Essays
Use at least three of the provided sources. Add your own if you like, but use at least three of theirs.
Use 15-minute planning period to read and annotate synthesis sources.
Try to get different sources "in dialogue" with each other.
There is no single, objective way to "use" a source. Each may be useful in multiple ways, depending on how you wield or deploy or manipulate it.
Worried about time? The place to cut is the intro. One-sentence introductory paragraph, cutting right to the thesis, can still be effective.
5. Ms. Beatty's 6 Steps to Writing Synthesis Essays
6. Mr. Klirs's Sample Prompt and Essay
Some common characterizations:
- cacophonous / euphonious (sound)
- colloquial / formal
- connotation / denotation
- formal / informal
- high / low (register)
- general / specific, precise
- monosyllabic / pollysallabic
- Latinate / Saxon
- idiomatic
- cliche
Diction affects the reader's perception of what the author is saying.
2. How to talk about diction?
Don't say "she uses diction." Everybody uses diction. Get specific. Tell us what kind... (use some of those characterizations listed above).
FOR THE MOST ADVANCED: you may even want to avoid using the word diction altogether, and just get down to characterizing the language.
3. Ms. Beatty's Diction Handout
4. Synthesis Essays
Use at least three of the provided sources. Add your own if you like, but use at least three of theirs.
Use 15-minute planning period to read and annotate synthesis sources.
Try to get different sources "in dialogue" with each other.
There is no single, objective way to "use" a source. Each may be useful in multiple ways, depending on how you wield or deploy or manipulate it.
Worried about time? The place to cut is the intro. One-sentence introductory paragraph, cutting right to the thesis, can still be effective.
5. Ms. Beatty's 6 Steps to Writing Synthesis Essays
6. Mr. Klirs's Sample Prompt and Essay
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Session 1: Tone / Open Prompt
1. Tone: Attitude of author / speaker / persona / character towards
What determines tone?
[Tone Word Bank: Insipid / Flippant / Benevolent / Turgid / Burlesque / Lugubrious / Colloquial / Incisive / Whimsical / Patronizing / Effusive / Didactic / Sardonic / Diffident]
"If at any one time of my life more than another, I was made to drink the bitterest dregs of slavery, that time was during the first six months of my stay with Mr. Covey. We were worked in all weathers. It was never too hot or too cold; it could never rain, blow, hail, or snow, too hard for us to work in the field. Work, work, work, was scarcely more the order of the day than of the night. The longest days were too short for him, and the shortest nights too long for him. I was somewhat unmanageable when I first went there, but a few months of this discipline tamed me. Mr. Covey succeeded in breaking me. I was broken in body, soul, and spirit. My natural elasticity was crushed, my intellect languished, the disposition to read departed, the cheerful spark that lingered about my eye died; the dark night of slavery closed in upon me; and behold a man transformed into a brute!"
4. Practice Open Prompt
Defend (agree with), challenge (disagree with), or modify the following quote, said by English author Margaret Drabble: "Our desire to conform is greater than our respect for objective facts." Use your experience, observations, or readings.
- subject / topic
- audience
- self
What determines tone?
- Diction
- Syntax
- Figurative Language / Imagery
- Rhetorical strategy (logos / ethos / pathos)
- just about everything else you've studied in class can go to the making of tone
[Tone Word Bank: Insipid / Flippant / Benevolent / Turgid / Burlesque / Lugubrious / Colloquial / Incisive / Whimsical / Patronizing / Effusive / Didactic / Sardonic / Diffident]
- Lacking qualities that excite, stimulate, or interest; dull
- Impulsive or arbitrary, erratic or unpredictable
- Shy, reserved, lacking confidence
- Informal; writing akin to speech
- Ridiculing a subject; a ludicrous or mocking imitation
- Penetrating, clear, sharp
- Treating in a condescending manner
- Suggestive of doing good
- Disrespectful with an air or levity or casualness
- The Puritans perished in the slowly turning ashes of history; alas, I alone lament the doom of their sweet, sweet innocence.
- Surely the Puritans were justified; anyone who thinks otherwise is foolish. It is not for you to cry witch while other, more sinister witches lurk under your bed. Now, take note and learn as I offer you a nobler path.
- Indubitably, one presupposes the Puritan belief in predestination and eschews one's obligation to qualify and undermine such intellectually vapid notions -- indeed, aforementioned qualities of ecclesiastical predetermination quail before the decontextualized post-industrial philosophies of deconstructive anti-theistic arguments of existential mobility -- ergo, to wit, our cognitive recidivism precludes objective analysis of Puritan dogma.
- Yes, the Puritans -- those tight-fisted black-hatted buggers, so clean and pure in their starched blouses -- internally reeking of bloody sin. So righteous, so good, so grand-friggin-tastic! Oh, we should worship at their buckled feet!
- Those splendidly zealous, amazingly driven, magically wonderful Puritans have never been matched for pure awesomeness.
"If at any one time of my life more than another, I was made to drink the bitterest dregs of slavery, that time was during the first six months of my stay with Mr. Covey. We were worked in all weathers. It was never too hot or too cold; it could never rain, blow, hail, or snow, too hard for us to work in the field. Work, work, work, was scarcely more the order of the day than of the night. The longest days were too short for him, and the shortest nights too long for him. I was somewhat unmanageable when I first went there, but a few months of this discipline tamed me. Mr. Covey succeeded in breaking me. I was broken in body, soul, and spirit. My natural elasticity was crushed, my intellect languished, the disposition to read departed, the cheerful spark that lingered about my eye died; the dark night of slavery closed in upon me; and behold a man transformed into a brute!"
4. Practice Open Prompt
Defend (agree with), challenge (disagree with), or modify the following quote, said by English author Margaret Drabble: "Our desire to conform is greater than our respect for objective facts." Use your experience, observations, or readings.
Review Sessions Schedule
3/29: Tone / Open Prompt
4/12: Diction / Synthesis
4/19: Figurative Language / Rhetorical Analysis
4/26: Syntax / Open Prompt
5/3: Argument / Sythnesis
5/10: Test Strategies / Rhetorical Analysis
5/12: Exam
4/12: Diction / Synthesis
4/19: Figurative Language / Rhetorical Analysis
4/26: Syntax / Open Prompt
5/3: Argument / Sythnesis
5/10: Test Strategies / Rhetorical Analysis
5/12: Exam
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