Argumentative Essay: The Art of Argumentation
The art of argumentation is not as easy as it seems. Many people might think that arguing effectively is simply speaking out your mind or conversing an opinion. It's far beyond that. In writing argumentative essays, many writers often forget that the primary purpose of an argument is to "win" it - to be able to sway the readers to accept their point of view, not mere argue illogically.
Here are some features that argumentative essays have to contain in order to be effective:
1. Have a well-defined, controversial issue. Readers must understand what the issue is and what is at stake. The issue must be arguable enough – a topic that people have diverse opinions on.
2. Must take a clear side or stand. This is the thesis statement of the essay – the heart of the argument. Thus, it must be clear and concrete. And apparently state the position it takes regarding the issue of argument.
3. Must present compelling and realistic arguments. An argumentative essay does not simply assert an opinion - it presents an argument that is backed up by data that can convince readers that the opinion is valid. This data can consist of data, statistics, testimony of others or articles and books. The writer of an argumentative essay must also seek sources that are non-biased.
4. Must use a reasonable tone. Essay writers must always assume that the reader can disagree or be skeptical. It is important, therefore, that the tone employed is reasonable, professional, and trustworthy.
Carrying out an argument is not that different with writing it all down. Argumentation is an art, it requires skill – and writing argumentative essay is a skill of efficiently presenting logical points to win the readers' “yes” vote.

Types of Papers: Argument/Argumentative

While some teachers consider persuasive papers and argument papers to be basically the same thing, it’s usually safe to assume that an argument paper presents a stronger claim—possibly to a more resistant audience.

For example: while a persuasive paper might claim that cities need to adopt recycling programs, an argument paper on the same topic might be addressed to a particular town. The argument paper would go further, suggesting specific ways that a recycling program should be adopted and utilized in that particular area.

To write an argument essay, you’ll need to gather evidence and present a well-reasoned argument on a debatable issue.

How can I tell if my topic is debatable? Check your thesis! You cannot argue a statement of fact, you must base your paper on a strong position. Ask yourself…

  • How many people could argue against my position? What would they say?
  • Can it be addressed with a yes or no? (aim for a topic that requires more info.)
  • Can I base my argument on scholarly evidence, or am I relying on religion, cultural standards, or morality? (you MUST be able to do quality research!)
  • Have I made my argument specific enough?

Worried about taking a firm stance on an issue?

Though there are plenty of times in your life when it’s best to adopt a balanced perspective and try to understand both sides of a debate, this isn’t one of them.

You MUST choose one side or the other when you write an argument paper!

Don’t be afraid to tell others exactly how you think things should go because that’s what we expect from an argument paper. You’re in charge now, what do YOU think?

Do… / Don’t…
…use passionate language / …use weak qualifiers like “I believe,” “I feel,” or “I think”—just tell us!
…cite experts who agree with you / …claim to be an expert if you’re not one
…provide data, evidence, and statistics to support your position / …use strictly moral or religious claims as support for your argument
…provide reasons to support your claim / …assume the audience will agree with you about any aspect of your argument
…address the opposing side’s argument and refute their claims / …attempt to make others look bad (i.e. Mr. Smith is ignorant—don’t listen to him!)

Why do I need to address the opposing side’s argument?

There is an old kung-fu saying which states, "The hand that strikes also blocks", meaning that when you argue it is to your advantage to anticipate your opposition and strike down their arguments within the body of your own paper. This sentiment is echoed in the popular saying, "The best defense is a good offense".

By addressing the opposition you achieve the following goals:

  • illustrate a well-rounded understanding of the topic
  • demonstrate a lack of bias
  • enhance the level of trust that the reader has for both you and your opinion
  • give yourself the opportunity to refute any arguments the opposition may have
  • strengthen your argument by diminishing your opposition's argument

Think about yourself as a child, asking your parents for permission to do something that they would normally say no to. You were far more likely to get them to say yes if you anticipated and addressed all of their concerns before they expressed them. You did not want to belittle those concerns, or make them feel dumb, because this only put them on the defensive, and lead to a conclusion that went against your wishes.
The same is true in your writing.

How do I accomplish this?

To address the other side of the argument you plan to make, you'll need to "put yourself in their shoes." In other words, you need to try to understand where they're coming from. If you're having trouble accomplishing this task, try following these steps:

  1. Jot down several good reasons why you support that particular side of the argument.
  2. Look at the reasons you provided and try to argue with yourself. Ask: Why would someone disagree with each of these points? What would his/her response be? (Sometimes it's helpful to imagine that you're having a verbal argument with someone who disagrees with you.)
  3. Think carefully about your audience; try to understand their background, their strongest influences, and the way that their minds work. Ask: What parts of this issue will concern my opposing audience the most?
  4. Find the necessary data, evidence, quotes from experts, etc. to refute the points that your opposition might make.
  5. Carefully organize your paper so that it moves smoothly from defending your own points to sections where you argue against the opposition.

How to Organize Your Argument
Author: Bob Finegan
In his 1959 book The Uses of Argument, philosopher Stephen Toulmin analyzed the components of effective argumentation. Toulmin's analysis yielded one of the most useful formulas for organizing arguments. The first three components of the Toulmin argument are methods you use any time to you try to convince someone using an assertion combined with a “because” statement.
The Big Three: Claim, Data and Warrant
Claim: This is the thesis or central point you’re trying to prove. For instance, maybe your laptop was stolen from your dorm room and you want to argue that your university should install security cameras in residence halls. According to the Toulmin method, your assertion that cameras should be installed is the argument’s claim.
Data/Evidence: This is the evidence you put forward to support your claim. The truth of your claim might not be immediately apparent to your audience, so you need evidence to persuade them your claim is true. In this case you’d assert that the cameras should be installed because they would deter theft and make it easier for campus security to catch the thieves or recover stolen property. The theft deterrence and enhanced ability to catch thieves that the cameras would offer is the data, or evidence, that the claim is true.
Warrant/Interpretation Toulmin’s third component, the warrant, is an explanation of how the data supports your claim. Sometimes, as in the example above, the connection between the claim and the warrant is obvious, so you don’t need to state it. But in many cases, the evidence won't speak for itself in terms of clearly supporting your claim. In such cases you'll need to provide detailed analysis of HOW your examples prove your thesis. Also, when your warrant includes additional claims (or sub-arguments), you'll need additional evidence to support those claims. In this case, you’d want to do research and find data showing that cameras in residence halls actually can deter theft or lead to apprehension of robbery suspects.
Supporting Cast: Backing, Counterclaim and Qualifier
These supporting components of the Toulmin Method make your argument stronger with more detailed defense and anticipation of audience disagreement.
Backing: This component is an extension of the warrant—additional use of evidence and logic to back up the explanation of how your data supports your claim. When you argue that your school should install dorm security cameras, your audience may not be aware of conditions that make the cameras necessary. So you’d want to explain the background that has created such a need: “In the fall semester, six laptops were stolen from Pencader Residence Hall alone, and the student lounge in Frost Hall was vandalized. Investigations of these thefts and vandalism have yielded no suspects.”
Counterclaim/Rebuttal: Since some of your readers may have objections to your main claim or supporting points, you’ll want to head off those objections. You do this by stating a counterclaim or counterargument and then offering a rebuttal—that is, a compelling argument against the objection. For instance, you could head off disagreements this way: “Some may object that tuition and housing costs are already very high, and purchase of extra security equipment would only raise such costs. But installing cameras in dorms would raise residential tuition by less than $30 a year, which is a small price to pay for preventing the theft and vandalism of student property.” If you don’t include the counterclaim and soundly refute it, you won’t be able to persuade readers who have that objection to your argument.
Qualifier: The qualifier component has a function similar to the counterclaim and rebuttal; it’s an effective way of preventing or dealing with objections. If one of your claims seems too strong, general or absolute, it may be less persuasive. So you use the qualifier to modify, limit, or qualify your claims—this should make your claims more precise or accurate. Qualifying statements use words such as sometimes, possibly, may, and perhaps for points on which there’s less certainty, and words like often, probably, or many when the writer is more confident about her assertion and its consequences. In the argument about dorm security cameras, you might qualify your claim this way: “Installation of dorm security cameras may not deter campus robbery completely or help to catch every campus thief. But the evidence shows that they often aid in tracking down the perpetrators, and sometimes even lead to recovery of stolen property.”
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Sample #1

The Faceless Teacher

by Dennis Gardner, Writing Tutor

The Internet is here to stay. Whether one lives in a backwoods shack or Silicon Valley, the potential of online communication cannot be ignored. In facing the twenty-first century, a fearless inventory of the role that the World Wide Web will play in global culture must be taken. This “phantom resource,” where web sites can shift and vanish like ghosts, should not lend itself to widespread application without careful examination of the specific functions it will be utilized to perform. The Internet is an entity without a master, and censure and discretion on the Web are left to the responsibility of the individual publisher. This means a student searching the vast fields of information that have flowered on-line may find pay dirt or fertilizer. Overzealous use of computers, even in innocence, to ease the burden of solid research in favor of convenience or for the sinister purpose of cutting costs, will reduce learning from a creative process to a point-and-click procedure, effectively diminishing students from social-learners to a cyber-tribe of hunters-and-gatherers relying on the ability of machines and the rote memorization of monitors’ displays.

The blank countenance of the computer screen, the faceless teacher, is a frightening prospect of education’s on-line future. Information is present as print, yet the medium of transference is missing. The student may be receptive and the information relevant; however, learning takes place not by passive observation but in a dynamic whirlwind of uncertainty and intent. A student enters the classroom to learn, and another human being must provide the nuance, the animation, and the conscious feedback--in short, the simple bioactivity--to stimulate a student’s mind. The professor provides another lifetime of experience to contrast with the student’s own personal reality. This interaction alone breaks the constraints of personal bias and helps to form a skill vital to critical thinking: objectivity. In a formal classroom, the informality of the social scene is left outside the door and a new discipline of rhetoric and discussion is acquired. The human teacher, while not infallible, can explain different solutions to a single problem, demonstrate objectivity and understanding, and illustrate alternate approaches to obstacles. The computer can calculate and display, but a teacher can calculate and devise.

Innovation is the ability to employ creative methods to solve a problem. How does one get it? Confronting problems directly and working through them is the only way. Education supplies not just raw data but also the strategies for dealing with that raw data, the template for forming this information into ideas by shaping it with innovation, and eventually the arena to use these weapons in challenging specific problems. Typing a command into a search engine or deleting an errant pornographic advertisement from a screen does not teach or even require critical thinking or innovation on the part of the student. Lessons hide in the process of learning--the cross-referencing, the questioning that is the lifeblood of the dialogue, and the discipline so important in the search for knowledge--not in the simple instant gratification in the click of a mouse. The ease of information acquisition provides the student with plenty of sources but hinders the development of a critical and flexible frame of reference to interpret this wealth of material. The computer can show but cannot teach. The student is left alone in a sea of information without a means of propulsion.

If the student seems the scapegoat, portrayed as dull-witted or lazy, this is unintentional. Though “virtual education” is only a keystroke away, and these are possibilities, not inevitabilities, the Internet is powerful, and with power comes the potential for abuse, by the teachers themselves as well as the students. As the Web gives pupils the option to decrease human involvement in their education, institutions may choose to use the Web as the primary classroom forum in the quest to save money. The equation E=mc2 can also be employed when examining a College or University’s financial strategy. Substitute “$” for “E,” manpower for “m,” and leave “c” as it is to represent “time” squared. The amount of time faculty members work multiplied by the size of the university’s staff equals money exiting from that institutions’ bank account. Time equals money, but money saved does not equal comparable education. It is vital that quality face-to-face education wins out over cost-cutting measures.

Machines work well with machines and people work best with other people. The human race is composed of a web of social animals. Human contact is essential for the development of quality minds. However, there are prospective students who, due to uncontrollable forces, find that a Web course is their only means of education. In this unfortunate circumstance, the concession must be given that any education at all is preferable to ignorance. But these on-line courses must be offered with caution and should not become the norm.

The web can be an aid to education in the way that a calculator is an aid to mathematics. With all of the speed and number crunching ability of a calculator, it would be highly difficult to learn algebra directly from this device. In the same respect, the World Wide Web is not a means to an end. It is not the magnificent force that is the human intellect. The mind is humanity’s greatest asset and its refinement is humanity’s greatest achievement. The evolution of such a device should not be left to anything less than its equal. The intangibles involved in the shaping and growth of human consciousness--the excitement of sharing knowledge, the drive to communicate in the most effective way, the value of having a person take a personal stake in the education of an individual-- are without parallel. In the complex chemistry of education, the computer is just a tool. The true energy and force is in the experiment itself; the teacher is the catalyst; and the student is the reaction.