Pro/Pro Argument Papers
Length: TWO papers of 1000 words each for a TOTAL of 2000 words with size 12 Arial or Times New Roman font and one-inch margins on all sides.
Papers Due: April 24 by 11:59 pm
Overview
In your digital forum, you identified the main issues of disagreement that a discourse community currently has. Now in the Pro/Pro papers, you will articulate two opposing positions in the discourse community focused on claims of proposal/policy and issues of jurisdiction. In fact, you will write two short arguments, each supporting a different position, to two separate audiences, each inclined to agree with your position. That is, each Pro/Pro argument will argue in favor of the positions it advances with a proactive argument. The two positions must agree with each another enough that the same person could not agree with both sides.
Avoid articulating contradictory, pro/con arguments like the following:
Pro: D.C. should become a state.
Con: D.C. should not become a state.
Instead, formulate two proactive arguments:
Pro: D.C. should become the 51st state in the U.S.A.
Pro: D.C. should remain under the control of the U.S. House of Representatives.
Notice how the two proactive arguments create a more specific set of arguments than the pro/con approach. Of course both sides still disagree with each other in the proactive arguments, but rather than reduce the discourse community’s rhetoric to “we want this” versus “we don’t want this,” the proactive approach provides what each side wants.
Notice also how the discourse community takes place in the real world, not in theory. You need to find out where your issue is in debate regarding real potential policy claims and outcomes for the issue.
It may help to imagine yourself as two different people to write these arguments. Suppose, for example, your overall topic is the debate over D.C. statehood (not a real option for your research topic). To help you to imagine the arguments that could be in favor of D.C. statehood, you could pretend that you are a D.C. Council member, and, to help imagine the pro-Congressional control side, you could imagine yourself as a conservative member of Congress who believes that the best action is to maintain the status quo.
Audience and Purpose
Why write to an audience that already agrees with you in your paper or that already disagrees with what your position will be? As Marlon Brando tells Al Pacino in The Godfather, “Keep your friends close, but keep your enemies closer.” In essence, you need to familiarize yourself with each side of the issue with the claims made in the discourse community. Once you achieve this goal, you are in a position to join the discourse community in your argument and research paper because you know what the real debate is. Whether you choose a classical or Rogerian model, knowing what you need to defeat or bridge will be essential to your success.
Audience Analyses
On the title page for each paper, specific the audience for that paper and publication or Web site in which you imagine yourself writing. You need to find out where to address each side in a real-world forum, as your debate also takes place in the real world. Just writing “a magazine” or “a Web site” is not enough, though. Which magazine or journal or Web site would reach each specific audience? If you do your research, you will find out what each side reads and where to find each side on the Web, so the task is not as daunting as it seems. In fact, this part of the assignment is helpful because it allows you to learn where and how to engage each side in the discourse community.
Research
For this paper, you need to cite three sources for each paper, six in total. Avoid making this paper a string of outside sources, though. Use sources to provide proofs and appeals that are acceptable to each side of the discourse community. You will need to use proper MLA parenthetical and works cited page citations for all sources.
Arrangement Advice
The most direct and manageable way to handle these papers is to follow the claims from fact to definition while you mimic the rhetoric from each side along with quotes, paraphrases, and/or summaries to support your and their claims. Think of your theses as your policy claims and outline, draft, and revise from that starting point.
