50 pages • 1 hour read
Gerald Graff, Cathy BirkensteinThey Say / I Say: The Moves That Matter in Academic Writing
Nonfiction | Reference/Text Book | Adult | Published in 2006A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
“The Art of Listening” and Its Role in Argumentation
One of the central points (if not the only point) of They Say/I Say is presented in the form of a metaphor: Argumentative writing is a conversation, and Graff and Birkenstein refer to this idea constantly throughout. They use this metaphor to stress that it impossible to make a point without responding to something, either implicitly or explicitly. “A key premise of this book,” they write, “is that to launch an effective argument you need to write the arguments of others into your text” (42). That’s what makes the writing-as-conversation metaphor so apt. As in everyday conversations, a person must listen to what other people are saying before they can respond, and a thoughtful response will incorporate those other ideas.
Graff and Birkenstein encourage writers to practice empathy for their readers in the “conversation” of arguing. This is not necessarily an appeal to emotion or compassion; rather, it is a strategy for filling a reader’s needs more effectively: “Put yourself in the shoes of someone who disagrees with you and ask if such a reader would recognize himself in your summary,” they write, describing what they mean by “empathy” for the reader (86). “Would that reader think you have taken his views seriously, as beliefs that reasonable people might hold? Or would he detect a mocking tone or an oversimplification of his views?” (87). The latter would, of course, be fatal to a fruitful argument.
Doing so also serves the purpose of an argument, which is to convince someone of something. This requires the writer to understand their reader: What does that reader already know? What do they need to know? What are their biases? What tones and styles will they respond to positively? According to Graff and Birkenstein, the ability to listen to other perspectives and account for them in one’s writing contributes significantly to the effectiveness of one’s argument.
Graff and Birkenstein also recommend that writers listen to themselves during the writing process in order to keep their argument focused, coherent, and easy for the reader to follow. This notion is addressed in detail in Chapter 8: “‘As a Result’: Connecting the Parts,” which explores strategies for keeping a piece of argumentative writing focused and easy to follow. “What we suggest […]is that you converse not only with others in your writing but with yourself: that you establish clear relations between one statement and the next by connecting those statements” (107). Graff and Birkenstein encourage their readers to review the things they’ve already written (and plan to write) to ensure that every aspect of the piece fits together logically and works in service of a central argumentative goal while remaining empathetic to the audience.
Graff and Birkenstein’s advice readily carries over to classroom discussion—or conversations among different students who have different points of view. Listening to one another and practicing empathy in response will go a long way toward making a conversation productive and keeping it going. Listening to oneself will help one understand what others are hearing. Editing for clarity in speech is not unlike editing for clarity in writing. In both cases, it serves the purpose of furthering a conversation.
Demystifying Academic Writing for Students and Laypeople
In her review of They Say/I Say, Patricia Bizzell praises the book for “demystifying academic writing.” In later editions of the book, this quote is featured on its cover, which strongly suggests that this is the way the authors and/or publisher would like this book to be seen. This desire to present academic writing techniques in simple, clear terms is also reflected in They Say/I Say’s prose and structure. In order to demystify academic writing for students and laypeople, Graff and Birkenstein make rhetorical, organizational, and stylistic choices to keep their writing simple and easy to digest.
One of the most pivotal choices Graff and Birkenstein make to this end is adopting a casual and conversational style, which, according to them, is perfectly consistent with academic writing: “Academic writing can—and in our view should—be relaxed, easy to follow, and even a little bit fun” (121). They also acknowledge that this is a conscious choice, made with their intended audience in mind.
Part of what makes Graff and Birkenstein’s style so relaxed is their consistent use of simplified terminology. Due to its roots in classical philosophy and stodgy academic tradition, rhetoric can be a prohibitively challenging subject for inexperienced scholars to study. The relatively informal tone Graff and Birkenstein take when describing these concepts make them much more accessible. Rather than refer to multisyllabic phrases like “critical evaluation” or “exegesis,” they use more colloquial language: The point of “critical evaluation” or “exegesis” is to ask, and to answer, the “so what” question. They even draw on slang when they talk about the “duh” move, “in which you disagree not with the position itself but with the assumption that it is a new or stunning revelation” (59). This maneuver of nicknaming rhetorical devices (without paying much or any attention to their traditional counterparts and historical usage) makes these ideas less intimidating to approach and easier to remember. As for grammar—they keep technicalities to a minimum. For example, although “but” is a part of speech called a “conjunction,” knowing that doesn’t help one write. Instead, Graff and Birkenstein talk about “transitions.” These are what make for continuity within sentences and between them, and certain words, such as “but,” “therefore,” and many more, serve that purpose; they are “transitional words."
Graff and Birkenstein also use instructive similes to clarify the practical purposes of certain rhetorical moves and principles. For example, they compare transitional words and phrases to turn signals
Ideally, transitions should operate so unobtrusively in a piece of writing that they recede into the background and readers do not even notice that they are there. It’s a bit like what happens when drivers use their turn signals before turning right or left: just as other drivers recognize such signals almost unconsciously, readers should process transition terms with a minimum of thought. But even though such terms should function unobtrusively in your writing, they can be among the most powerful tools in your vocabulary. Think how your heart sinks when someone, immediately after praising you, begins a sentence with ‘but’ or ‘however.’ No matter what follows, you know it won’t be good (111)
Here, Graff and Birkenstein use “unobtrusive” forms of communication in daily life to explain the way transitions should function. Similes like this, which compare rhetorical strategies to simple aspects of everyday life, make rhetoric and composition more conceptually approachable for new writers. Crucially, they also model the clarity for which good writing should strive.
Teaching Effective Argumentative Writing Through Metatextual Demonstration
Throughout They Say/I Say, Graff and Birkenstein model the principles they teach. This means that because they take the position that “academic writing is argumentative writing” (3), They Say/I Say is argumentative. In other words, they practice what they preach. Throughout this book, Graff and Birkenstein do not just teach their rhetorical methods, they argue for them. To do this, they use the methods they recommend to make and support their own points.
Take, for example, this explanation of how to make transitions from Chapter 8, “‘As a Result’: Connecting the Parts.” They explain a number of strategies writers can use to transition from one sentence or idea to the next without sacrificing clarity:
This chapter offers several strategies you can use to put this principle into action: (1) using transition terms (like ‘therefore’ and ‘as a result’); (2) adding pointing words (like ‘this’ or ‘such’); (3) developing a set of key terms and phrases for each text you write; and (4) repeating yourself, but with a difference—a move that involves repeating what you’ve said, but with enough variation to avoid being redundant. All these moves require that you always look back and, in crafting any one sentence, think hard about those that precede it (108).
Here, we find a multilayered approach that not only describes transitions, but also models them. For example, the numbers themselves serve the purposes of transition: first this, then that, then that. The enumerated points also appear in a specific-to-general pattern, which is logical: Transitions need to make sense. When they get to the fourth item, “repeating yourself, but with a difference,” the rest of the sentence does exactly that. This is metatextual demonstration, or a demonstration of their own argument through the very structuring of their argument. And then when say, “Notice how we ourselves have used such connecting devices thus far in this chapter” (108), they are adding a metatextual directive, telling the reader to look back at how they have constructed their sentences or, more broadly, to be aware that the writing in front of the reader itself demonstrates what it is talking about. They’re pointing out that they’re teaching; they’re showing and telling. But there’s yet another layer: it involves the reader-as-writer paying the same kind of attention to their own writing. Metatextual demonstration thus opens up to metatextual analysis, whether of one’s own writing or someone else’s.
Graff and Birkenstein’s choice to employ the methods they argue for serves several key pedagogical functions. Firstly, it gives the reader an opportunity to identify these methods on their own, strengthening their critical reading skills. It also helps Graff and Birkenstein keep their suggestions fresh in their readers’ minds without having to insert tedious reminders. Finally, when Graff and Birkenstein take their own advice, it demonstrates that they truly believe these are real and reliable methods. These strategies are good enough for Birkenstein and Graff (two professional academic writers) to use—not just when creating demonstrations of these ideas, but also when presenting arguments about other topics.
The repetition of key strategies also introduces rhetorical moves and ideas slowly over time that scaffold off of one another to form Graff and Birkenstein’s arguments. For example: Graff and Birkenstein introduce the “planting a naysayer” strategy in Chapter 6. Throughout They Say/I Say, they consistently use that strategy when building other arguments. Later, in Chapter 7, they explicitly return to the naysayer idea to develop it further. This process helps to ease readers into new ideas and gives them space to explore new ideas at a manageable pace. This methodology also uses the theme of Teaching Effective Argumentative Writing Through Metatextual Demonstration for Demystifying Academic Writing for Students and Laypeople, demonstrating that metatextual devices are useful and broadly appealing teaching tools.
