AP III - English Language and Composition

Assignment #1: Informational Text

Read Salt Sugar Fat: How the Food Giants Hooked Us by Michael Moss (ISBN: 978-0812982190). Complete a dialectical (2-sided) journal with at least 15 entries: left side = one meaningful quote, right side = your reaction to or insight into the quote. Preferably, you should reflect on the rhetorical elements present (see Assignment #2). Directions for making a dialectical journal can be found here.

Assignment #2: Rhetorical Essay

Read the following article on rhetoric here.

Assignment #3: Essays

Read the following essays:

  • "On Dumpster Diving" by Lars Eighner may be found here.
  • "Black Men and Public Space" by Brent Staples may be found here.
  • "I Want a Wife" by Judy Brady may be found here.

These articles will serve as the foundation of a class discussion during the first few days of school. As you read, annotate the articles for rhetorical terms defined and described in Assignment #2: Rhetorical Essay. Directions for annotation can be found here. An example of annotated text may be found here.

Assignment #4: Rhetorical Strategies/Argumentation/Persuasion

The argument is the thesis statement, the point or purpose of the speech or paper. Persuasion utilizes all the literary and rhetorical strategies in the author’s arsenal to convince an audience that the author is either correct concerning stated views or at least offers interesting or believable points in an essay or speech. Therefore—the essay or speech is one of argumentation//persuasion.

Know/own the following:

According to Aristotle, persuasion is the act of winning a claim achieved through the combined effects of the audience’s confidence in the speaker’s character (Ethos), appeals to reason (Logos), and the audience’s emotional needs and values (Pathos).

Define/explain the following Rhetorical Strategies and provide one example:

Abstract

Allegory

Alliteration

Allusion

Analogy

Anaphora

Anastrophe

Antecedent

Antithesis

Aphorism

Apostrophe

Chiasmus

Comparison / Contrast

Conceit

Diction

Doublespeak

Ellipsis

Enthymeme

Euphemism

Idiom

Jargon

Juxtapose

Lending Credence

Litotes

Metaphor

Metonymy

Motif

Oxymoron

Paradox

Parallelism

Polysyndeton

Process Analysis

Repetition

Satire

Simile

Spin

Syllogism

Synecdoche

Syntax

Tone

Voice

Zeugma

Logical Fallacies: Logical fallacies are methods of pseudo-reasoning that may occur accidentally or may be internationally contrived to lend plausibility to an unsound argument. The following are the most common, but there are more to discover.

Define each fallacy and provide one example:

Ad Hominem

Begging the Question

False Analogy

Non Sequitur

Red Herring

Slippery Slope

Straw Man