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 ANALYTICAL WRITING

Chapter 1

  The writer of an analysis is less concerned with convincing readers to

approve or disapprove of professional wrestling, or legal intervention into

the sexual politics of the workplace…than with discovering how each of these

complex subjects might be defined and explained.

  To write an accurate summary you have to ask analytical questions, such as:

o  Which of the ideas in the reading are most significant? Why?

o  How do these ideas fit together? What do the key passages in the

reading mean?

  A good summary provides perspective on the subject as a whole by

explaining, as an analysis does, the meaning and function of each of that 

subject’s part s. Moreover, like an analysis, a good summary does not aim toapprove or disapprove of its subject: the goal, in both kinds of writing, is to

understand rather than to evaluate.

  A summary is a focused description

  Laying out the data is key to any kind of analysis because it keeps the

analysis accurate

  It requires the writer to reason from evidence

  Some rules:

o  The range of associations for explaining a given detail or word must 

be governed by context.

o  It’s fine to use your personal reactions as a way into exploring what a

subject means, but take care not to make an interpretive leap stretch

farther than the actual details will support.

o  What other explanations might plausibly account for this same

pattern of detail?

  A good analytical thinker needs to be the attentive Dr. Watson to his or her

own Sherlock Holmes.

Writing Assignments

1. 

Locate any portrait, preferably a good reproduction from an art book ormagazine, one that show detail clearly. First, summarize the portrait,

describing accurately its significant details. Do not go beyond a recounting of 

what the portrait includes; avoid interpreting what these details suggest.

What repetitions (patterns of same or similar detail) do you see? What 

organizing contrasts suggest themselves? In light of these patterns of 

similarity and difference, what anomalies do you then begin to detect? Move

from the data to interpretive conclusions.

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Chapter 8

  The basic five-paragraph form:

o  An introduction with a thesis listing three points (the so-called

tripartite thesis)

o  Three body paragraphs, each supporting one of the three pintso  A conclusion beginning “Thus, we see” or “In conclusion” that 

essentially repeats the thesis statement as it was in paragraph one.

  What’s wrong with the five-paragraph form?

o  The introduction reduces the remainder of the essay to redundancy .

The first paragraph tells readers, in an overly general and list-like

way, what they’re going to hear; the succeeding three paragraphs tell

the readers the same thing again in more detail, carrying the overly

general main idea along the inertly; and the conclusion repeats what 

the readers have just been told (twice). The first cause of all this

redundancy lies with the thesis. As in the preceding example, the

thesis is too broad---an unqualified and obvious generalization---andsubstitutes a simple list of predictable points for a complex statement 

of idea.

o  The form arbitrarily divides content: why are there three points (or

examples or reasons) instead of five or one? A quick look at the three

categories in our example reveals how arbitrarily the form has divide

the subject. Isn’t overcooked food unhealthy? Isn’t a lack of variety

also conceivably unhealthy? The format invites writers to list rather

than analyze, to plug supporting examples into categories without 

examining them or how they are related. Five-paragraph form, as is

evident in our sample’s transitions (“first,” “second,” and “in

addition”) counts things off but doesn’t make logical connections. At its worst, the form prompts the writer to simply append evidence to

generalizations without saying anything about it.

  Here are two quick checks for whether a paper of yours has closed down on

your thinking through a scheme such as a five-paragraph form:

o  Look at the paragraph openings. If these read like a list, each beginning

with an additive transition like “another” followed by a more or less

exact repetition of your central point (another example is… yet 

another example is…), you should suspect that you are not adequately

developing ideas.

o  Compare the wording in the last statement of the paper’s thesis (in the

conclusion) with the first statement of it in the introduction. If the

wording at these two locations is virtually the same, you know that 

your thesis has not responded adequately to your evidence.

  Analyzing Evidence in depth: 10 on 1

o  The phrase 10 on 1 means ten observations and implications about 

one representative piece of evidence (10 as in arbitrary number

meaning many)

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o  The phrase 1 on 10 means one general point attached to 10 pieces of 

evidence

  Revising the Draft Using 10 on 1 and Difference within Similarity

o  Revision Strategy 1. Assume that the essay’s answer ----its conclusion

about the evidence---does not yet go far enough. Rather than having tothrow out his thinking, the writer should consider, as is almost always

the case in revision, that he hasn’t refined his initial idea enough. As

an interpretation of the evidence, it leaves too much unaccounted for.

o  Revision Strategy 2. Find a “1” to use with 10 on 1---a piece of 

evidence sufficiently revealing to be analyzed in more detail; then zoom

in on it. In the case of the writer of “Flood Stories,” that 1 might be a

single story, which he could examine in more detail. He could then test 

his claims about this story through a comparison and contrast with

other stories. In the existing draft, the writer has not used comparison

and contrast to refine his conclusion; he has just imposed the same

conclusion on other stories. Alternatively, the 1 might be the singlemost interesting feature that the three stories share.

o  Revision Strategy 3. To find the most revealing piece or feature of the

evidence, keep asking, What can be said with some certainty about the

evidence? This question induces a writer to rehearse the facts to keep

them fresh so that his or her first impressions don’t “contaminate” or

distort consideration of subsequent evidence.

  What can I say with some certainty about my evidence?

  What else is certain about this evidence?

o  Revision Strategy 4. Examine the evidence closely enough to see what 

questions the details imply and what other patterns they reveal. 

o  Revision Strategy 5. Uncover implications in your zoom that candevelop your interpretation further.

o  Revision Strategy 6. Look for difference within similarity to better 

 focus the thesis.

o  Revision Strategy 7. Constellate the evidence to experiment with

alternative thesis options.

  Think of the working thesis as an ultimate So what? Notice how the writer

allows her evidence to complicate and stimulate her thinking rather than just 

confirm (corroborate) her general idea.

[last read p. 137]