Forming a Critical

Perspective
Chapter 8
?”What do we mean by “ Critical
• Being critical means to be
– “ skeptic”
– “creative”
– “exacting”
• Do not confuse critical to” negative”
• Critical thinking helps you to
– Express yourself
– Weigh and evaluate your ideas
– Persuade others of your point of view
– Articulate your reasoning and motivations
Thinking and Reading Critically
• It operates at three levels
– What the creator actually says or show
– What the creator does not say or show but builds
into work (intentionally or unintentionally)
– What you think
Examples: Thinking and Reading
Critically
• Example 1
– "I'm sorry I can't come tonight because I have a
prior unbreakable engagement, but here's my cell
phone number. Call me!“
• Example 2
– "I'm sorry I can't come tonight, but I'm really busy
this summer. In fact, the rest of the year doesn't
look too good either. But thanks for asking."
 Techniques for Critical Reading
• Writing
• Previewing
• Reading
• Summarizing
• Forming your critical response
 Step 1: Writing while Reading
• Reading is an active process
• Focusing on WHY and WHAT?
• Reading Journals might help.
 Step 2: Previewing the Material
• What is the subject structure
– Headline, subheadings, introduction, title, definition,
summary, abstract, conclusion, main idea
• What are the facts of publication
– Date of publication, publisher credibility, online source
credibility
• What do you know about the author
– Biography, interests, biasness, reputation in the field
• What is your preliminary response
– What do you know already, any bias or opinion you might
hold for author or the topic
 Step 3: Reading
• Reading is more than one step process
– Read the text at face value
– Read the text in depth
– Start looking for answers to the questions.
– Start understanding the meaning
– Look for other sources
– Dictionary encyclopedia that can help you
decipher meaning for what author intended to tell
you.
 Step 4: Summarizing
• Distill the ideas in your own words
• Helps in understanding
• Helps avoiding plagiarism
 Step 5: Developing a Critical
Response
• Now focus on what the author is not saying!
• Focus on what author implies, suggest, or lets
slip
• It has four operations
– Analyzing
– Interpreting
– Synthesizing
– Evaluating
 Analyzing
• Analysis is the separation of something into its parts or
elements
• First identify purpose of reading
• Purpose serves as a lens to elements
Example:
Does the editorial material in magazine encourage readers to
consume goods and entertainment?
Elements
Encouragement of consumption: with reference to goods and
entertainment, consumers equating happiness or success to
consumption
 Interpret
• Understanding significance of the elements
• Infer to the beliefs, values, opinions and
assumptions of the author
• Reasonable inferences
• Unreasonable inferences
 Synthesizing
• You make connections about relationships and
implications
• Synthesizing means working within the text or from
supporting readings
• Focus on
– How your work compare with others
– How the work fit into other context
– What cultural political economic forces influence the work
– What historical forces influence the work
• With synthesizing you create something new!
 Evaluating
• Understand what your reactions are to the
work?
• Are there any biases?
• How unified and coherent is the work?
• What is the significance of the work?
• Do you agree, disagree with work?
 Example: Thinking Critically

• Every year sees the disappearance of more

book publishers because the larger companies
gobble up the smaller ones.
 Thinking Critically
• Analysis:
– Why author write this statement. Words like more and gobble state the
purpose of writing it.
• Interpretation:
– more means others have previously disappeared, because tell you the
cause and gobble means being a predator.
• Synthesize:
– author objects on predatory behavior of large publishers and holds
them responsible for eliminating small companies and reducing total
number of companies
• Evaluation:
– A biased statement against the big publishers but are large companies
solely responsible? Why is shrinking bad?
Critically analyzing an image
 Critically Analyzing Images
• Step 1:Writing while reading an image
– Record your impressions precisely
• Step 2:Preview an image
– Works origin, overall effect, symbols, publisher, artist,
striking thing in image, subject familiar or not
• Step 3:Reading an image
– Purpose, audience, argumentative or persuasive or
informative, image tells a story? Characters represent
what? Image a photograph or a cartoon?
 Critically Analyzing Images
• Step 4: Analyzing an • What is the highlighted feature?
• Telling a story?
Image • Background, images juxtaposed
– Emphasis or set apart?
– Narration • Creators attitude
• Source of an image or
– Arrangement
background effects its meaning
– Color • Identifying problem, seize
– Characterization attention
– Context • Reference to something audience
recognize.
– Tension
– Allusion
 Critically Analyzing Images
• Step 5:Questions for analysis
– Does the ad ask the reader to change the perception/attitude about
something or reinforces the common notion.
• Step 6: Interpret the image
– Build reasonable inferences
• Step 7:Synthesize your image
– Place the image into bigger context, history, social cultural, economic,
past present future trends
• Step 8: Evaluate the image
– Does the image achieve its purpose, is the purpose worthwhile, how it
effects you?
 Writing critically
• Writing critically is also known as critique
• Its 70% summary of the major ideas, thesis
statements and conclusion drawn
• 30% is your input
– Context, timeliness, appropriateness, applicability
– Coherence, relevance, future prospects
 Exercise: Think Critically
• News paper and magazines are better news
sources than television because they demand
reading not just viewing.
• Online communication threatens our ability to
interact face to face.
• Radio call in shows are the true democratic
forum, giving voice to people of all
persuasion.
 Exercise: Write a Critique
• For Sowell’s Essay on Student Loans write a
one page critique.