Tutorama: Week Five: Deepening Your Argument

No matter how you are doing so far in 301, one of your goals should be to see if you can raise your next paper up a grade from your previous one. As you review the papers in the 301 Gradatorium, you'll notice that students' papers improve the most when they make a more complex argument. A very simple argument, no matter how cleanly written, probably will not earn a grade higher than a C. (To review the basic elements of an expository essay, go back to What Is an Expository Essay?)

C-level writers often write papers that present summaries of a set of texts, with an argument that makes an obvious observation or connection. For example, a C writer in the Internet Cultures course produced a research paper that argued that online communities exist because several framing texts agreed that such communities are valid. Her paper would have been more complex and interesting if she'd asked some thoughtful questions about online communities, or if she'd reached beyond agreeing with some very basic ideas in her framing texts. In order for this writer to have earned a B, or an A, she'd have to deepen, or complicate, her argument. (To read about strategies for the research paper specifically, go to Approaches to Argument.)

Here are several paths you can take to deepen the argument of your paper.

Ask Questions about a Central Term from a Source Text

By asking questions about key terms, you can become better prepared to meet any writers' argument on its own ground. This is so because the central terms of an argument contain the unstated assumptions of the writer, and by asking about them we become more aware of how our own assumptions work.

For instance, in Bill Readings's book The University in Ruins, a text used in a 301 class about Higher Education, the author employs the term "nation-state." As a strategy for deepening your understanding of what Readings means when he employs this term, you could ask questions about it. Is a nation the same as a country? What defines a nation? Should a nation's universities reflect its culture?

Now return to a source text from your own class and choose a central term to investigate.

Examine Each Paragraph to See if Another Voice Can Be Added to Its Dialogue
Rather than assigning one paragraph to each source text and your own position, see if you can use more than one writer in each paragraph. For instance, if you have a paragraph about a writer's key term or central idea, go back to another text to see what it has to say that might be related to concept you've discussed. Then, plow this new information back into the original paragraph. Drawing again from the readings for the Higher Education 301, Bill Readings's The University in Ruins uses the idea of "the university of excellence," a university in which no educational goal is privileged, but any goal should be pursued excellently. But philosopher Martha Nussbaum, in her book Cultivating Humanity, argues that universities should educate "world citizens," people who care about the welfare of others beyond their local community. So you might add Nussbaum into a discussion of Readings by asking if the university of excellence is capable of creating world citizens. This question doesn't only add more information to your paragraph: it changes the work the paragraph can accomplish. Now you will not only introduce a new idea, the new idea will challenge the old idea and force you to address questions you could not have conceived working only with Readings's text.

Now go back to a source text you are writing about, and try to put it in conversation with the concerns and ideas of a second text.

See if You Can Explain Your Own Assumptions Thoroughly
If you are writing about multiculturalism and American Universities, and you believe that American universities should be as inclusive as possible of the many kinds of American culture, explain why and how this should happen. How many cultures have to be represented for a school to be "multicultural?" Should courses with multicultural content be required? What about universities that specialize in a particular kind of American culture-like yeshivas, Catholic schools, Mormon schools, historically Black institutions, military academies? Should they be changed or avoided in the name of multiculturalism?

Now go back to your own argument and try to explain your own assumptions clearly and thoroughly.

Play Devil's Advocate with Your Own Argument
Imagine possible objections to your position as you articulate it, and respond to such objections as part of the process of explanation. For instance, if you're a dyed-in-the-wool multiculturalist, as in the example above, imagine why someone would not want to mix with different kinds of cultures or people. Try to make an argument for a position you strongly disagree with, and then show why your alternative still makes sense.

Change the Rules of the Argument—Think outside the Box
Every dialogue has unspoken limitations that no member has questioned or articulated. So one of the ways to deepen your own argument is to boldly go where no one has gone before. For instance, if I were writing a paper about what "the American school" should be, and all of my source texts assumed that any given student goes only to one kind of school, I might point out that many students go to several different kinds of school before the end of their education. The same student may go to a public elementary school, then to an Evangelical high school, then to a private college as an undergraduate, and then to a public university's professional school. In an argument where previous scholars have ignored this kind of experience, just pointing out its existence is a strong contribution to the dialogue.

Now go back to your own argument and try to think outside the box.

Go after the Most Confusing Idea in a Given Reading
Let's say you're struggling to understand what Bill Readings means when he says that the university has been the "ideological arm of the state." You're not wrong to think this is a difficult idea—it is, even for professional academics. So begin by breaking the idea into parts: What is ideology? What is a state? How can a state have an arm? How can it have an ideological arm? Why would it matter if a university was or wasn't an ideological arm of the state?

In the case of such difficult ideas, your work can make a contribution to the dialogue simply by trying to explain what everyone is having trouble with. Remember that you don't have to say everything to say something useful.

Now go back to one of your sources and tackle its most confusing idea.

Tell Us about Your Wild Theory
There's no easier way to make a paper boring than by playing it safe. Don't be afraid to experiment with theories or plans or claims that you can't entirely justify: let yourself go, but explain yourself to the best of your ability, keeping in mind that you need to sustain a dialogue between the source texts and your own ideas.

Keep in mind that a theory is different from an opinion. An opinion is a belief one holds for reasons one may not be able to explain. Because of this, opinions are not useful in academic arguments, because an unexplained belief cannot be judged or questioned. A theory, however, is a belief that has been systematically explained using logic and evidence. Theories may still be wrong, but they can be tested. Therefore, they can become part of an academic argument.

Now go back to your own essay and argue boldly.