Leonard Hoy's List: DD Choices

• Photographs don't lie, as the saying goes, but they do offer only select testimony.

  • Texts don't necessarily lie, but they offer only the author's perspective.
    
    Texts can lie, offering not only honest declaration of perspective but carring subliminal, peripheral, underlying texts that effect the reader in ways of which the reader is not aware. WEASEL WORDS, WEASEL STRUCTURES AND WEASEL PHRASING.
• • the choice of content
  • the choice of language
  • the choice of structure

  • THESE ARE HIS THREE AREAS OF FOCUS: Content, language and structure
    
    He chooses them because the authors of texts make choices regarding them and THEREFORE readers must IDENTIFY the choices, ANALYZE them for effect (obvious and subliminal) on meaning and DERIVE MEANING from the analyzed elements
• Note that we do not list elements such as tone, style, perspective, purpose, and message. While these are all useful perspectives for discussing texts, they are all based on, and reflect, the choice of content, language, and structure.

  • He considers tone, perspecrtive, purpose and message as secondary, derivative and subheaded under his BIG THREE.
• To the critical reader, any single text provides but one portrayal of the facts, one individual's “take” on the subject.

  • CR: Deriving the notion of ONE PORTRAYAL of facts, one POSSIBLE PORTRAYAL of facts.
• act of choice underlying the content.
• and they
• evaluate the persuasiveness of a text accordingly.
• how language is being used.
• structure of a discussion
• Your first step as a writer is to generate some content

  • See the rubric list way back in critical reading section. Don't remember which one it is, but it was a great list of what writer's task is.
• ensuring a coherent flow of ideas.

  • The true import of editing-organization, relationship among ideas and from one idea to another.
• To ensure a coherent flow of ideas, we must focus on the three areas of choice:
  • providing appropriate and sufficient arguments and examples?
  • choosing terms that are precise, appropriate, and persuasive?
  • making clear the transitions from one thought to another and assured the overall logic of the presentation

  • Beautiful paragraph here:
    Focus on the coherent flow of ideas and how to insure coherence

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• They are selected and ordered by him as he thinks.

  • THE SUBJECTIVITY OF THE AUTHOR of any text.
• What are we to make of the disagreement? Indeed, why do the two respondents differ?

  • Not so much why do they differ but HOW do they transmit that difference?
• the nature of the pattern of examples they each offer

  • The pattern of examples drives each piece of writing to different conclusions.
• In each case, the choice of content both determines and reflects the overall perspective and understanding

  • The choice of content drives the overall perspective offered by each author.
    
    See: PESPECTIVE is a secondary effect here, derived from the content (EXAMPLES)

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• . Examples justify and illustrate generalizations. Examples make abstract ideas concrete.

  • EXAMPLES: Used to JUSTIFY and ILLUSTRATE generalizations; make ABSTRACT ideas CONCRETE.
    
    CR's interest in examples: Not what they ARE but what the examples ARE OF!!!
• Probably the single greatest key to critical reading is the realization that critical reading is not concerned with what the examplesare, as with what the examples are examplesof.
• All of these statements convey the same message: Mervin runs in an awkward manner. The specific example does not matter; meaning lies in what the example is an exampleof.

  • The specifics of the example matter not; what matters is WHAT THE EXAMPLE IS AN EXAMPLE OF!!!!
• We disregard the claim and draw our own conclusion from the evidence: the candidate is not just and honorable, he's wicked! If we do not simply reject the passage for being contradictory, we must interpret the claim that he is just and honorable as sarcasm. But in no case will we disregard the evidence and accept the conclusion as offered.

  • Examples cause the reader to DRAW HIS OWN CONCLUSIONS. This is an active moment, one of participation, one in which the reader takes the reins from the writer.
    
    HOWEVER, if the writer is a weasel and gives a disengenuous example, why the writer turns the tables on the reader!!!!!
• The example wins.

  • EXAMPLES WIN OVER CONCLUSIONS, EVERY TIME!!!
• Careful readers verify for themselves that the evidence offered does indeed justify the generalizations.

  • Readers MUST verify for themselves that the examples are legitimate justifications of the generalizations they seek to serve. WRITERS CAN BE WEASELS!!!!
• When reading a text, we must first recognize that examples are indeed present. We must see that certain statements offer specific support for more general remarks. We can then take the next step and recognize what those examples are examples of. In the first instance, we describe the use of examples by the text, what the text does. In the second instance, we infer additional meaning from those examples, and, in the process, test whether the text really offers support for its conclusions.

  • Excellent CONCLUSION and strong OUTLINE/ANALYSIS of text, generalization, example/illustration and critical reading

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• For communication to work, authors must have some means of controlling how readers interpret their examples. They must find some means to assure that readers will classify concepts as they intended.

  • HERE LIES WEALELOCITY for the corrupt writer, a benchmark to be honored by the honest writer and a note of caution for EVERY READER.
• The more examples an author adds, the more a reader's options for interpreting any single example are constrained.

  • Coherent patterns of examples LIMIT THE OPTIONS A READER HAS FOR INTERPRETATION.
• 
  As you read a text, group examples together to isolate between two and five major patterns. (Any fewer than two would not provide patterns to work with; any more than five would probably fail to clearly distinguish major patterns). You might look at
  • how different groups are portrayed,
  • how different actions are presented,
  • how different sources are characterized,
  • how different historical periods are described,

  • DIRECTIONS: Group examples together, 2-5 items, to see what patterns emerge.
    1. How'as a group portrayed?
    2. How different actions are presented
    3. How sources are characterized
    4. How a period of time gets described.
• Whatever a text does, you want to seehowthat text does it.
• Here again we must rely on patterns. We must look at other examples and generalizations within the text to judge how far the text wants, or will allow, us to go.

  • KEY CONCEPT: How far a text WANTS or WILL ALLOW us to go. This is what we wish to determine at all costs.
• we cared about the well-being of those creatures, not only about our oil platform

  • An example of determining what the example is an example of-and so with all the other boldfaced items here.
• The bodfaced comments are not cases of reading in whatever we like, or even of reading in additional information.
• • actions taken for the benefit of the animals
  • actions taken beyond regulatory requirements
  • actions that go beyond the simple, the easy, or the obvious

  • An example of Step II: The boldfaced 'labels' were GROUPED and then each group CLASSIFIED. NOW, THE EFFECT OF THE WHOLE CAN BE NOTED.

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• A reliance on statistics lends an objective tone to the coverage. Nevertheless, the pattern of terms

  • Date CAN add a semblance of OBJECTIVITY that can disarm the reader's critical faculties. If that's the point, than weasel's have won the war for your mind.
• The choices of content and language focus more on the reaction of investors than on the stock market itself.

  • Here DK analyzes the content and the language to notice that they have a common focus: The reaction of investors.
• How we say something is often as important as what we say.

  • GREAT TRUTH

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• Here we look  at two meanings of structure, following the two parts of analysis. The first  sense of structure we examine is in the sense of parts coming together to form  a larger unit. The second sense is in terms of the relationships between parts.

  • STRUCTURES HAVE TWO FACETS:
    1. IDENTIFY the parts
    2. ANALYZE their relationship
    
    At this point, we can infer meaning
• From one perspective, we have    grouped    similar elements together, X's with adjacent X's and O's with adjacent O's.  From another perspective, we have    separated    the whole into parts, either X's or O's. Either way, we break the whole into  parts.    Writers use this process when they signal

  • GROUP similar elements together
    SEPARATE the whole into the grouped parts
    Spaces, punctuation, indents and headings all help us GROUP a text according to the writer's wishes.
• Part and parcel of this action is recognizing how those  elements go together—and giving them a name. When we group items we classify  them under a common heading.

  • When one GROUPS, one CLASSIFIES.
    When one CLASSIFIES, one NAMES the classified groups
• • how    words    are related to form    phrases and sentences   
  •   how    sentences    are related to form    paragraphs   
  •   how    paragraphs    are related to form    complete texts    , and 
  •   how    patterns of content and language    are related to shape    the thought of a text as a whole    .

  • GOATLY has some useful insertions here.

  • RANGE OF RELATIONSHIPS: Word-Phrase, etc
    1. Words relate to form phrases and sentences
    2. Sentences relate to form paragraphs
    3. Paragraphs relate to form sections, subheadings or, in short works, the whole darn text.
    4. Patterns of content and language are related to shape the thought of a text as a whole.

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