LibGuides: ASC 0150: Writing Workshop: Visual Arguments

Questions to Consider

Arguments in different fields look different, but they all consist of answers to just these five questions:

What are you claiming?

What are your reasons?

What evidence supports your reasons?

But what about other points of view?

What principle makes your reasons relevant to your claim?

Source: A Manual for Writers by Kate Turabian, 8th edition, pages 50-62.

Creating Evidence

Evidence: Writing Center at Chapel Hill

Evidence is the information you use to support your argument. It's also the information that you cite. Your evidence can be in a variety of formats and come from several different places.

Format

books (including textbooks)
articles (peer-reviewed or news)
images
videos
graphs/charts
statistics
etc.

Locating Evidence

print and electronic sources (at the library, online, etc.)
observations (listen to a lecture; go to a cultural event)
interviews
surveys
experiments
personal experience (NOTE: Use this sparingly and only when related to your argument and allowed by the instructor. Also, be sure to use other forms of evidence in addition to personal experience.)
etc.

Based on Evidence, created by The Writing Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Visual Rhetoric

Support with Research

• Find background information in reference resources such as Credo.

• Collect data through interviews and field research.

• Find statistics about the topic.

• Look at opinions on both sides of the issue in resources such as CQ Researcher.

• Search Multidisciplinary databases first such as Academic Search Complete and JSTOR, then move to specialized databases depending on your topic.

Nexis Uni This link opens in a new window Nexis Uni™ features more than 15,000 news, business and legal sources from LexisNexis®—including U.S. Supreme Court decisions dating back to 1790—with an intuitive interface that offers quick discovery across all content types, personalization features such as Alerts and saved searches and a collaborative workspace with shared folders and annotated documents.
CQ researcher This link opens in a new window CQ Researcher is often the first source that librarians recommend when researchers are seeking original, comprehensive reporting and analysis on issues in the news. Founded in 1923 as Editorial Research Reports, CQ Researcher is noted for its in-depth, unbiased coverage of health, social trends, criminal justice, international affairs, education, the environment, technology and the economy. Reports are published in print and online 44 times a year by CQ Press, an imprint of SAGE Publications.
Academic Search Complete This link opens in a new window Academic Search Complete , designed specifically for academic institutions, is the world's most comprehensive scholarly, multidisciplinary full-text database, with more than 5,300 full-text periodicals, including 4,400 peer-reviewed journals.
JSTOR This link opens in a new window Includes scholarship published in more than 2,500 of the highest-quality academic journals across the humanities, social sciences, and sciences, as well as monographs and other materials valuable for academic work. JSTOR is an archival database providing complete runs of back issues. Issues published in the last 3-5 years are not usually available.

Need statistics?

American FactFinder

Authorship Exercise

Questions about Authorship