After successfully completing this week's Learning Module, you should:

• Know what a typical college research paper is and the role it plays assessing learning in your classes

• Develop a deeper understanding of audience and how it can affect writing

• Analyze key rhetorical elements in published research-based writing and understand best practices for rhetorical reading

• Begin thinking about how you'll adapt the editorial you wrote in Weeks 4-6 for Essay #4

• Review the Essay #4 assignment sheet, scoring rubric, and samples

This week you'll begin the fourth and final essay assignment. That essay will focus on taking Essay #2--the editorial where you found a debatable issue in higher education and then took position--and adding length, sources, as well as MLA in-text and Works Cited citations. This will mean adapting the evidence you had previously only introduced with signal phrases to use a more academic approach to source documentation, finding additional sources (including at least one peer-reviewed journal article, also called a scholarly source), and translating your tone to match a more formal audience (which often means replacing personal experience with sources). The positive side is that this means your final essay for ENG 101 is already started and all you have to do is finish it over the next three weeks.

Formal argumentative essays that use sources and citations like this are very common in college courses across the country in nearly every academic subject. While there are some notable similarities with essays like this that you might have written in a high school class (or other college classes), you'll want to continue using the more advanced rhetorical approach we've modeled in our course. That means it'll be important to establish a clear problem that you are responding to since it's possible readers don't see the problem you do. It's also important to include a potential objection paragraph since some readers may have strong opinions that disagree with your own. And finally, it's crucial to establish and leverage many highly credible sources to support your position since it's not enough to rely only on your own credibility as a member of the community when you write for a formal audience of experts. 

By the end of this week you should be familiar with the assignment, have looked at the assignment sheet and some samples, learned more about key features for this kind of writing, and made a decision about where you'll add length and sources to your earlier essay. Next week we'll begin by reviewing an outline and focus on how to sufficiently prove each of our assertions.

-----

You can see a video walkthrough of this week's assignments and where to submit them here.

What Is a College Research Paper? Why do We Do Them?

According to the SUNY Empire State College Writing Center, "A research paper is an expanded essay that presents your own interpretation or evaluation or argument. When you write an essay, you use everything that you personally know and have thought about a subject. When you write a research paper you build upon what you know about the subject and make a deliberate attempt to find out what experts know." In short, this means while an essay lets us share what we already know with others, a research paper also asks us to share what experts know about the subject. Often, and definitely in the case of this assignment, that's as evidence for an argumentative claim you make in your thesis statement.

Some of the other features of college research papers include specific formatting, usually dictated by an outside organization (for example, MLA and APA) or a professor's own specific requirements. Of course, how important the formatting is depends on the priorities of a class. The same is true for length. While some college research papers are long--RCC requires a minimum of 5-8 pages for ENG 101 and 7-10 pages for ENG 102--there are also assignments in courses that require shorter papers. Again, that will also depend on the professor and the course. Finally, you'll also notice that college research papers are formal, and that's generally because the sources they use are formal. As we'll see later in this module, it's also because the audience for a college research paper often expects formal writing and we want to meet their expectation. 

As you're probably sensing, college research papers aren't generally intended to be creative and personal expressions. And that's, honestly, the worst thing about them and a reason lots of people grow to dislike writing in college. So why do we even do them? I see two reasons why research papers continue to play a role in college. First is that the origin of colleges in the middle ages focused on having an experienced scholar (in this case, me) help you learn the trade so that you could become a scholar yourself. That work might mean writing laws, forming government policy, developing diplomacy with valuable allies, and so on. In today's college, your professors do similar work training you on the path to your degree--and written argument is how you create and share your knowledge as a scholar. The second reason why college research papers are used is because they allow a professor to assess your learning. This is similar to how you might take a quiz or exam to show that you understand an assigned reading or a concept covered in class. Only here you not only have to know and understand the content, you also have to present it in a specific way when you write. 

Whether your with me or not on seeing these two reasons as important factors why college research papers haven't been replaced with creating photo essays, podcasts, and YouTube tutorials, you'll have to accept this fact: college research papers will be present until you finish your degree, and being good at them can help you earn better grades while hopefully saving time and reducing stress. 

What Is an Academic Argument and How Is It Different ? 

To get us started on this work, think back to Essay #2--the editorial you wrote about an issue in higher education. Public argument, like the editorial, is a kind of writing that's meant to shape everyday people's ideas or behaviors. It's intended to be accessible to a wide audience and often engages with smaller local problems where extensive scholarly evidence isn't available. 

In contrast, academic argument--like a college research paper--isn't meant for everyone; it's meant for experts. And not only is it trying to shape ideas (mostly) and behaviors (often indirectly), it's also trying to advance specialized knowledge within a group of researchers in a particular area. With that in mind, it often focuses on very small, and sometimes seemingly less important, problems where other experts have already contributed scholarly evidence and popular sources like credible websites fill the gaps.  

Whether those differences make sense, hopefully you're seeing that not all writing is the same--and knowing how to do more than one kind can help you as a student and as a scholar. 

Just to recap, here is a clear presentation for some of the key differences between the kind of public argument you did for Essay #2 and formal research essays like the one we're working on for Essay #4:

As you review these differences, pay attention to how many elements of writing depend upon who the audience is and what the author's purpose is. Some, of course, also depend on external factors like assignment requirements. The key is to notice how your Essay #4 will be similar but significantly different than the other writing we've done this semester and how those adjustments are based on the idea that we want to reach a very different audience. 

Understanding Audience

When you're assigned a paper for a college course it's easy to forget that you're writing for an audience--or even easier to think your professor is your audience or your classmates are your audience. But these are overly simplistic ways of thinking about our readers. 

The truth is that audiences are complex, partly because who reads a piece of writing is determined by a lot of factors: what you're writing about, where that writing would be found, the timing, the appeal of your exigence, and even the decisions you make about how formal to be or how much knowledge it's safe to assume readers might have about the topic. This complexity, however, shouldn't stop you from thinking about who is reading as you make decisions about your writing (more on that in a minute). 

So if audiences are complex, and if knowing your audience is important, how do you get a sense of who's reading? According to the University of Maryland Global Campus Writing Center, you should consider the following questions to help you decide:

1. What is the relationship between the writer and the reader? If you are in a position of authority over your readers, as might be the case if you are writing some sort of employment memo, your tone might be more instructive and authoritative. However, if you are writing to someone with more power than you, such as your boss, your tone should be more formal and polite. You would make suggestions rather than issue directives, for example. Always be polite and respectful to a reader!

2. How much does the reader know? Does the reader have more knowledge or less knowledge than you? Are they familiar with the jargon or terminology of this specific discipline, or will you need to define terms? Do they have the background knowledge (including the history of the topic or issue) necessary to understand your topic, or will you need to provide background information? You might also consider what information you can leave out. You want to make sure you provide all the information the reader needs, but you don't want to bog down the reader with information he or she already knows.

3. Is the audience likely to agree or disagree with you? It's important to think about this before you begin writing, so you can write in a way that appeals to your audience. Sometimes you will be addressing an audience that agrees with you, so you'll be emphasizing why their point of view is a productive or beneficial one, and perhaps arguing in favor of a course of action or particular outcome. You'll want to reinforce their opinion, but try to avoid flattery or excessive compliments, since this can make you sound insincere.

On other assignments, you will be writing to an audience that already has a particular opinion or stance on your topic, and your goal will be to change their minds or alter their points of view. You might be required to write to an audience that is opposed or even hostile to your ideas. Avoid telling an audience that their opinion is wrong or incorrect; instead, try to communicate why a change of opinion would be beneficial to them.

4. What will the reader do with the information? Will the reader be making a decision or taking a course of action based on the information you provide? If so, have you included all the information necessary for that person to make an intelligent decision or take action? Have you anticipated questions the reader might have and provided answers for them?

In addition to these demographic considerations, UMGC suggests deciding what readers might already know about your subject, what they might expect from your writing, how interested they'll be in your approach, and how you can best help readers understand your ideas. 

But whether or not you're actually able to confidently narrow these things down, the more important consideration is that you've thought about someone reading your writing and made deliberate decisions--about things like tone, vocabulary, point-of-view, amount of background information, type and number of sources, and so on--in order to ensure your writing is effective for a real audience. Those things, in turn, help you write a stronger essay that helps you get a better grade no matter the class or assignment.  

How Does Audience Shape Writing?

I've mentioned a few of the writing decisions that we have to base on what we know about our audience. But let's consider an example to help make the process a bit clearer. 

Let's look at a real assignment from a music class on global hip hop. Here's the description:

Choose a song from outside the U.S. (or by an international artist living/producing music in the U.S.) that is categorized as “hip-hop” in the country where it was composed. Your goal in this assignment is to highlight the main social themes in the song. Some examples of such social themes may be a critique of economic inequality, gender dynamics, or personal experience. Use lines of song text to show how the artist addresses the themes you identify in his/her song. 

Okay, so if I'm writing this essay I might be inclined to assume that the audience is my professor. But like we said, that's not always a safe move. What if, for example, I assume my professor is the audience and s/he knows a lot about the subject so I don't include a definition of hip hop, or maybe I don't give an example of what a social theme is, and instead I skip that information. The impact of this decision could be that my professor thinks I don't understand those concepts. Or if my writing is submitted somewhere later for publication so an outside audience reads it, and maybe those readers get confused since they're not part of the class discussions and are missing key details. 

The key is knowing what areas of the essay are likely to be impacted. Here are the ones I think are most important to keep in mind.

Language/Tone/Vocabulary

When we've decided our audience is formal, and that they're experts, like they are for our college research paper, then we we need to match our language choice to their expectations. According to a tutorial from Northern Illinois University, that means the decision between so-called "standard English" (what we see in professional and business contexts) and "non-standard English" (which uses regional or social language variations) . 

Audience also means thinking about tone. A guide from Walden University suggests the following concerns for formal academic writing:

• Avoid slang, text-message spellings, and clichés

• Avoid making broad generalizations ("always," "never").

• Avoid using over-sweeping adjectives ("outstanding," "obvious").

• Avoid using adverbs ("really," "clearly").

• Use qualifiers only when necessary ("a little," "definitely").

• Avoid overly emotional language ("It is heartbreaking that so many are starving").

• Avoid inflammatory language ("Smith's study was terrible, sickening, sad").

Finally, thinking about audience means thinking about whether we use less formal vocabulary like "everything worked out" or more formal vocabulary like "everything was successful." It also impacts whether we use specialized terminology. For example, if I'm writing for a non-expert audience it might not matter whether I specify "pain" or "chronic pain"; however, for an audience of experienced nurses, that distinction is significant.  

To be clear, these concerns about formality also have a long history of being used as a tool of linguistic discrimination. For that reason, it's important to be aware of their uses and misuses when we make decisions about the voice we choose in our writing. 

Point-of View

In my experience, the most common situation where this is an issue is when students ask if an essay can use "I" or when I inform someone not to use "you" in their writing. It can feel arbitrary, especially if you've had teachers in the past tell you something different without an explanation or providing a clear source so you can verify what they tell you. 

To be clear, both "I" and "you" are commonly avoided with formal writing, which is most of what you do in college and definitely what you're doing for your final college research paper in our class. To see a helpful breakdown of first/second/third person as well as an explanation of when they might be appropriate, consider this handout from St. Louis Community College. The key is that for our current assignment you should not use "I" in order to convey credibility and something like objectivity, and you should not use "you" in order to avoid seeming too casual or alienating some readers who don't seem included.  

Depth and Detail

Another common area of writing that's impacted by audience is how much depth we use to cover a subject, and how much detail we include in our explanations. Clearly, an audience of experts will need less information than an everyday person might. 

One suggestion the University of North Carolina Writing Center makes is to imagine your audience as you understand them reading your essay. Where do they seem to get bored? Where do they seem confused? Where are they set and able to focus on hearing you prove your thesis? If this kind of imaginative assumption isn't your thing (if I'm honest, it's not mine) try having a real reader point to areas they found unnecessary, boring, or challenging; this person might not be the expert you had in mind for your audience, but they can still point you to areas of concern so you can make a well-considered decision about just how much to include. 

Sources and Citation

One last spot where an audience will influence the decisions you make as you write will be how many sources you use, what kinds of sources you include, and how you document those sources so readers can find the original. Let's take a look at a few safe assumptions for a formal, expert audience like the one you're addressing in Essay #4. 

Expert audiences prefer lots of sources. There isn't a set number, unfortunately, so you'll have to think whether or not your reader would be inclined to agree with what you say or note; if they won't be likely to agree, it's a good idea to use more than one source. 

Formal audiences tend to prefer scholarly sources, which are a special class of source that requires the information to have been verified by other experts in the same academic area (a process called "peer review"). When we can't find scholarly sources--and it's rare to only use scholarly source because they're harder to find--we look for sources that have high perceived credibility. That means they come from authors and publications that readers are likely to recognize and trust. 

Both expert and formal audiences prefer to see sources documented with an academic citation style. Some classes, like nursing and psychology, are likely to focus on APA style; our class, on the other hand, uses a citation style called MLA since it's one lots of people see in high school (no worries if you missed it or don't remember it). We used MLA in-text citations on the information literacy essay, and we included MLA Works Cited page citations. We also used MLA page format on all three essays so far, and you'll want to keep it up this time. I've mentioned this before, but even though most of us hate doing MLA, it's not going anywhere, and I guarantee you'll see it many more times before you graduate. It's worth it to learn and try to get it right in our class, not just because it helps your assignment grade, but because there's space for me to offer advice on how to improve. 

As we leave this topic, I hope you're seeing the things that understanding audience can help resolve are often the things that professors and teachers have just told you to do or not do for an assignment. The goal in developing your understanding of audience further is to make sure that you're able to make these decisions on your own. 

Best Practices for Reading Scholarly Sources

Unlike the rhetorical analysis you did for your editorial essay in Week 4, this time you'll be reading texts that are written for a formal academic audience of experts. That should be another big clue how Essay #2 and Essay #4 are different. 

If I'm honest, this kind of writing isn't fun to read. Even if you really care about the subject, the use of specialized terminology, the lack of explanation for complex concepts, even the density of information can be overwhelming. The good news is that when it comes to rhetorical analysis you don't have to read the subject text deeply; instead of focusing on what it says, you're looking at how it says it. More importantly, you're doing that with a clear purpose which is to write something later (not to memorize and recall it on a test). In fact, if you use the handout above you'll even see specific questions to answer about the source text which can give you very specific focus for your own analysis. That may mean you don't have to read a source so much as skim it for what you need, which is what most scholars do anyway. 

I'll also offer one relatively new tool that can help with complex reading if you're using Google Scholar. That is a Google Chrome browser extension called Google Scholar PDF Reader. With that extension installed any article you find in Scholar will open with an AI generated summary on the left of your screen that you can click to be taken to the specific spot in the article you could quote or paraphrase.

Activity: Informal Rhetorical Analysis

Start by finding a scholarly source on the same subject as your editorial essay. This will mean you can use it as a source later in the final essay. 

To find scholarly sources start by going to one of the following (additional instructions above):

RCC Library

Google Scholar

If you can't find something (note, you should push to find one since this is an essential college skill) and end up short on time, you can use this scholarly source as a default:

"Rationalization of Higher Education" by Tressie McMillan Cottom and Gaye Tuchman

Once you've picked a source text., or decided to use the default by Professors Cottom and Tuchman, you should start by looking for examples of the terminology we reviewed in Week 4 (exigence, background, thesis, evidence, objections, benefits, etc.) as well as anything that stood out in terms of language/tone, vocabulary, and how sources are used. That means looking to see if you can spot them but also to see things like the kind and quantity, how sources are cited, and the formality of language/tone used. Keep in mind, you can both speak about what you do see in the text you choose and what you don't see. 

Then, consider the 10 additional questions from this handout, especially if you find yourself stuck on what to talk about. 

For your post to the Discussion Forum, I want you to write a short paragraph with the most important things you noticed about the author's rhetorical technique--not a summary of what it says--with as many or as few of the specific points mentioned above. The only absolute requirement is that the first sentence of your post needs to establish what you're analyzing. 

For example, using this scholarly source about community college and student confidence, my first sentence would say:

In the article titled "Experiences of Earned Success: Community College Students’ Shifts in College Confidence," which was published in the International Journal of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education in 2017, Susan Bickerstaff, Melissa Barragan, and Zawadi Rucks-Ahidiana argue that... 

...their exigence was, the thesis was, they provide background that, the tone was, the use of sources was, etc. 

This should only be one paragraph long but needs to address a few of the rhetorical elements that stood out the most in your analysis. Your final sentence should explain what you noticed that you plan to adapt into your own Essay #4: 

In my own research essay I want to include scholarly sources to increase my credibility and match the tone expectations of a formal expert audience.

You do not need to post any replies, but it would be a good idea to read what other people noted to check your own understanding.

Looking Ahead: How to TurN Essay #2 into Essay #4 

Remember, for the final essay this semester you should:

1) Reopen the editorial you wrote about an issue in higher education for Essay #2

2) Look to add additional depth and detail, including a source for your exigence, one or more additional reasons to your thesis (which means additional body paragraphs), more than one source/quotation/citation per paragraph, a second naysayer objection and reply, and additional benefits in your conclusion. We'll go over this in more detail next week, but for now it's good to have a plan. 

3) Add a Works Cited page and verify that you have correct MLA in-text citations and MLA page format. You must use at least one scholarly source for this assignment.

4) Make revisions based on feedback you've received and what you've learned at this point in the semester, the RCC Writing Center if you're looking for extra credit, and online office hours for the optional conference worth +50 points for our class (see the course syllabus for details). Make sure as you revise that you translate the text for a formal, expert audience using the guidance provided above. 

5) Turn Essay #4 as a shared document with "editor" or "Can edit" access and Process Portfolio IV in to Canvas no later than midnight on December 15th. Remember, no work can be accepted after this deadline given the date final grades are due to RCC. 

Contact your professor if you have questions about the assignment or need help catching up. 

Essay #4 Materials

Essay #4 Assignment Sheet

Essay #4 Scoring Rubric

Essay #4 Checklist

Essay #4 Student Sample

Process Portfolios Assignment Sheet

Key Takeaways

• Arguments that use research can come in more than one form, including formal argumentative writing intended for experts. 

• Audience shapes most factors in writing, from the tone we use, the word choice, the kind and amount of evidence, and point-of-view. 

• Essay #4 is a college research paper with cited sources (including at least one scholarly source) using the same issue in higher education you wrote about in Essay #2; it will again use sources with signal phrases but now needs to add formal MLA in-text and Works Cited citations. 

• You can use rhetorical analysis to look at the writing techniques used in a scholarly source and get ideas for your own essay, especially if you've haven't thought much about this kind of writing before.

• The best way to get started is to open Essay #2 and look for ways you could add length, sources, and translate for a more formal audience. 

"College Writing" from the University of North Carolina

"Determine If a Source Is Scholarly" from the University of Illinois Library