Fletcher Taught Me About Writing Arguments and She Did It Quite Well!

I'll be honest. (If y'all know me, you know I'm nothing if I'm not honest.)

The only reason I picked Fletcher's book as my second book is because it had the most recent copyright date and the most recent research. That being said, this book could have information that was at least three years old and I still would have found it to be fantastic. For me to try an encapsulate everything I've read into something concise wouldn't be easy so here are the three greatest bits of information I gathered when reading Fletcher's book.

1. Context - Fletcher uses the famed Washington Post piece about Joshua Bell playing the violin in a subway to talk about how important context is when writing. If you haven't read it (you should, it's phenomenal) Joshua Bell dresses himself down in a t-shirt, jeans and sneakers and plays a nearly four million dollar Stradivarius in a Washington DC Subway. Because of the context in which Bell was placed in, many who walked through that subway were under the impression that this person who was playing violin was just an average person playing violin for people on their way to work. But outside of this context, Bell is actually one of the most accomplished violinists and celebrated violinists of today. Something like this is crucial for students who plan to use quotes in their writing to support an argument. You have to understand the context in which that quote came from. Likewise, the quote has to fit within the context of what you're arguing for.
2. Forensic Rhetoric - Fletcher talks about Forensic rhetoric and likens it to crime shows such as CSI or Law and Order. Forensic rhetoric looks at motives to support an argument as opposed to deliberative rhetoric which relies on examples. She also uses a great graphic organizer to get students to work on forensic analysis. I think it's important for students to understand motives when writing since it's crucial that they know why everything happens. There's an underlying motive for everything and while this might be higher level thinking, forensic rhetoric could help them become better writers and look more in depth into their argument.
3. Distinguishing Among Different Purposes for Writing - Students are always asked what the purpose of a piece of writing is. But they never really look at it from the perspective of writing an argument. In this case, Fletcher mentions the many different purposes that writers seek to accomplish with regards to their rhetoric. This is great across all student levels since each student will be able to look at the many different reasons why an argument is written. Students will be able to think more analytically about the text as well as incorporate these different purposes in their own writing.

I thought Fletcher's book was rather narrow in it's subject but after reading it, I realized that there are so many ways to write arguments and there's so much that goes into it. Arguments on their own are a much broader subject than anyone would realize.