EGL 220: Critical Thinking, Spring 2022

Jan van Grevenbroeck (1731-1807). Alternatively Grevenbroeck, Jan the Younger (fl. 17th cent.) / Public domain

Important Links

Zoom Perma-Link

Course Outline

Course Calendar (revised 2/4)

Rhetorical Terms Glossary (revised 2/21)

Good Guy/Bad Guy Worksheet

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Course Home

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Compare & Contrast Paper is Due!

  • Monday, April 4

    Note: New due date for 1st draft of compare/contrast paper: Friday, April 8 @ 9:00 A.M. (section 4) or 4:30 P.M. (section 3). Turn in to BrightSpace.

    In-Class Essay #3: Alex Jones

  • February 2, 2022

    Today’s Terms:

    Authorizing tropes: history, logic, nature, science, statistics

    accommodation vs. assertion

    slippery slope

    Today’s ads:

    slippery slope

    Ad presentation assigned

    Presentation dates (please note your section!):

    Section 4: (MWF 9:00-9:50 am). Sign up here.

    Section 3: Wednesday, Feb. 9-Friday, Feb. 18. Sign up here.

    Directions: Find a partner and exchange contact information. Choose an internet advertisement together and send a link to jchisholm@csum.edu. Plan a 15-minute presentation in which the two of you discuss the following:

    1. Overt vs. implied vs. covert theses
    2. Overall rhetorical strategy (assertive vs. accommodating/deductive vs. inductive)
    3. Visual vs. written rhetoric
    4. Loaded words
    5. Target audience

    You’re going to want to work from smaller details like loaded words to larger, overarching claims like author/thesis/target audience.

    Be sure to support all of your claims with evidence!

  • Friday, January 28: Visual Rhetoric

    Homework: Quiz #2 on Monday (inductive arguments)

    Can you find a covert thesis?
    A little hard talk from the U.K.

    Today’s terms (see Glossary on left for definitions):

    ad misericordiam

    allusion

    author

    demonize

    existential import

    naming

    slippery slope

    target audience

    thesis: overt, implied, covert

  • Wednesday, January 26: Quiz #1

  • Friday, January 14: Truth, Facts & Reality

    Homework for Monday: none

    from A Few Good Men (1992)

    Discussion packet

    Quotes about the nature of truth
    Truth, facts and reality
    Facts and social pressure
    Survey

  • Wednesday, January 12: Deconstructing the Self

    Homework for Friday: none

    Discuss Habits of Critical Thinking Survey


    Discussion Packet
    : Deconstructing the Self

    Do you know where you stand on the political spectrum? Take a survey at Political Compass and put your plotted dot here.

    Here’s a handy infographic illustrating the major American political beliefs. We’ll need this when we start looking at arguments.

  • Important note: Due to the omicron surge, we will hold class online (live) until February 1. Please make sure to be on Zoom at 9:00 on MWF (permanent link to our Zoom room is on the left).

    Monday, January 10: Deconstructing the Self

    My name is Dr. Julie Chisholm.  I’ll be your instructor for critical thinking, an important course in your college experience.  This semester, we will first define critical thinking, and look at ways we both encourage and discourage it in our lives.  Then we will go into the gym:  a mental gym, that is, in which we work out with our brains.  We will use a tool called rhetorical analysis, the study of argument, to help get our critical thinking muscles into shape.  Along the way, we’ll look at a current event—one we’ll choose together, and the arguments made around it.  Ideally, you will learn a few things:  not just about the pandemic, but about yourself and the way you think.  Welcome to our class!

    Critical thinking is a purposeful mental activity. ‘Critical’ means to take something apart and analyze it on the basis of standards.” –Michael Baker, Basics of Critical Thinking

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    Introductions!

    What is your name? Have you picked up any new interests or skills during the pandemic? or Which is your favorite character in the Marvel Multiverse? (Mine is the Lokigator)

    from Collider.com

    Discussion Packet: Deconstructing the Self

    Habits of Critical Thinking Survey

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