English 1160
English Composition
Instructor: Dori Richards
Spring 2004
Writing Arguments:
Chapter One Study Guide
Original Document: Dori Richards
To use these study guides effectively, first read the assigned pages, then respond to the
study guide questions. Always put your responses in your own words. If you must quote the
text, use quotation marks.
Vocabulary:
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cogent
justification
continuum
propaganda
reconceptualize
1. Define the rhetorical term, “argument.”
2. What is the difference between explicit and implicit argument? Would a pictorial
magazine advertisement be implicit or explicit?
3. What are the three defining features of explicit argument?
4. If you were forced to take the side of either Socrates or the Sophists, whose side would
you be on? Why?
5. Read the two case studies on pp. 14-15. Which case is more interesting to you? Which
side would you choose to represent?
6. If you were a member of the Standards Committee, would you vote for or against Gordon
Adams’s petition request (pp. 17-20)? Why?
7. In the chapter’s conclusion, the authors, Ramage, Bean and Johnson (RB&J), “suggest”
that you adopt a particular attitude toward argumentation. In your own words, explain
that attitude.
8. Why do the authors hope you will be more like Socrates than the Sophists this semester?