Writing in Response to Reading.

Writing in response to your critical reading can take a variety of forms. Your instructors may ask
you to summarize an author’s main points to be sure you have read and comprehended important
material, or they may ask you to analyze an author’s position on an issue and assess its worth. At
times, you will be asked to express your reactions and share any associations and emotions the
writing prompts. Although you are writing as a student for a teacher, you are part of the exchange
of views and information that is at the heart of the academic community.

Strategies for organizing a response depend on the purpose of the response. Typically, responses
include one or more of the following three purposes:
 Analyzing the effectiveness the effectiveness of a text.
 Agreeing and/or disagreeing with the ideas of the text.
 Interpreting and reflecting on the text.

Writing about Texts

The word texts can refer to a variety of works: essays, periodical articles, government reports, books,
and even visuals such as advertisements and photographs. Most assignments that ask you to
respond to a text call for a summary or an analysis or both.

The keys to writing a good summary are identifying the main points and then putting those points in
your own words. A summary is neutral in tone and demonstrates that you have understood the
author’s key ideas. Your readers may not know the text you are writing about, so you need to tell
them about it before you analyze it.

Texts don’t exist in isolation: they are influenced by and contribute to ongoing conversations,
controversies, or debates, so to understand the text you need to understand the larger context. You
may need to explain what else has been said about the topic and what was going on at the time that
influenced the topic. To analyze the context you should ask yourself
 What is the purpose of the article?
 Who is the author?
 Who is the audience? Who are the intended readers targeted by the article?
 What is the larger conversation? How does the article represent reality?
 What phrases are understood only by a select community or culture?
Assignments calling for an analysis of a text vary widely, but they will usually ask you to look at how
the text’s parts contribute to its central argument or purpose, often with the aim of judging its
evidence or overall effect. When you write about a written text, you will need to read it several times
to digest its full meaning.

Rhetorical Analysis
To many people, the term rhetoric means speech or writing that is highly ornamental or deceptive or
manipulative. But the term rhetoric is also used in a positive or neutral sense to describe human
communication. As a subject of study, rhetoric is usually associated with effective communication.
Rhetoric is not just a means of producing effective communication but also a way of understanding
communication. The two aspects mutually support one another: becoming a better speaker/ writer
makes you a better listener/ reader, and becoming a better listener/ reader makes you a better
speaker/ writer.

You react to what others say or write all the time. Sometimes a text, such as an advertisement or
speech, grabs your attention and you need to take the text apart to see how it works. Put those
discoveries into words and you’ve composed a Rhetorical Analysis. Rhetorical Analysis is an effort to
understand how people in specific social situations attempt to influence others through language.
Rhetorical Analysis examines how an idea is shaped and presented to an audience in a particular form
for a specific audience.

A Checklist for Analyzing a Text

Have I considered all of the following matters?
 Who is the author?
 Is this piece aimed at a particular audience? A neutral audience? Persons already
sympathetic to the author’s point of view? A hostile audience?
 What is the author’s thesis (argument, main point, claim)?
 What assumptions does the author make? Do I share them? Why or why not?
 Does the author ever confuse facts with beliefs or opinions?
 How convincing is the evidence?
 Are significant objections and counterevidence adequately discussed?
 How is the text organized, and is the organization effective? Are the title, opening
paragraphs, and the concluding paragraphs effective? In what ways?
 What is the author’s tone? Is it appropriate?
 To what extent has the author convinced me? Why?