The Brief Bedford Reader

1032 Pages·2016·8.122 MB·English

by  X. J. Kennedy, Dorothy M. Kennedy, Jane E. Aaron, Ellen Kuhl Repetto

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Methods for Achieving Your Purpose in Writing
The Brief Bedford Reader centers on common ways of thinking and writing about all kinds of subjects, from
everyday experiences to public policies to scientific theories. Whatever your purpose in writing, one or more of
these ways of thinking — or methods of development — can help you discover and shape your ideas in
individual paragraphs or entire papers.
The following list connects various purposes you may have for writing and the methods for achieving
those purposes. The blue boxes along the right edge of the page correspond to tabs on later pages where each
method is explained.
PURPOSE METHOD
To tell a story about your subject, possibly to
Narration
enlighten readers or to explain something to them
To help readers understand your subject through
the evidence of their senses — sight, hearing, touch, Description
smell, taste
To explain your subject with instances that show
Example
readers its nature or character
To explain or evaluate your subject by helping
readers see the similarities and differences between Comparison and Contrast
it and another subject
To inform readers how to do something or how
something works — how a sequence of actions Process Analysis
leads to a particular result
To explain a conclusion about your subject by
Division or Analysis
showing readers the subject’s parts or elements
To help readers see order in your subject by
understanding the kinds or groups it can be sorted Classification
into
To tell readers the reasons for or consequences of
Cause and Effect
your subject, explaining why or what if
To show readers the meaning of your subject — its
boundaries and its distinctions from other subjects Definition
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To have readers consider your opinion about your
Argument and Persuasion
subject or your proposal for it
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THE BRIEF
BEDFORD
READER
Thirteenth Edition
X. J. Kennedy
Dorothy M. Kennedy
Jane E. Aaron
Ellen Kuhl Repetto
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FOR BEDFORD/ST. MARTIN’S
Vice President, Editorial, Macmillan Learning Humanities: Edwin Hill
Editorial Director, English: Karen S. Henry
Senior Publisher for Composition, Business and Technical Writing, Developmental Writing: Leasa Burton
Executive Editor: John E. Sullivan III
Developmental Editor: Sherry Mooney
Production Editor: Louis C. Bruno Jr.
Media Producer: Rand Thomas
Publishing Services Manager: Andrea Cava
Senior Production Supervisor: Jennifer Wetzel
Executive Marketing Manager: Joy Fisher Williams
Assistant Editor: Jennifer Prince
Project Management: Jouve
Senior Photo Editor: Martha Friedman
Photo Researcher: Julie Tesser
Permissions Editor: Kalina Ingham
Senior Art Director: Anna Palchik
Text Design: Anna Palchik, Dorothy Bungert/EriBen Graphics, and Jean Hammond
Cover Design: William Boardman
Cover Image: Dariush M / Shutterstock
Composition: Jouve
Printing and Binding: LSC Communications
Copyright © 2017, 2014, 2012, 2009 by Bedford/St. Martin’s
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic,
mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, except as may be expressly permitted by the applicable copyright statutes or in writing by the
Publisher.
Manufactured in the United States of America.
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For information, write: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 75 Arlington Street, Boston, MA 02116 (617-399-4000)
ISBN 978-1-319-07423-4
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Text acknowledgments and copyrights appear at the back of the book on pages 559–61, which constitute an extension of the copyright page. Art
acknowledgments and copyrights appear on the same pages as the art selections they cover.
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PREFACE FOR INSTRUCTORS
“A writer” says Saul Bellow, “is a reader moved to emulate.” In a nutshell, the aim of The Brief Bedford
Reader is to move students to be writers, through reading and emulating the good writing of others.
Like its popular predecessors, this thirteenth edition pursues that aim both rhetorically and thematically.
We present the rhetorical methods realistically, as we ourselves use them — as instinctive forms that assist
invention and fruition and as flexible forms that mix easily for any purpose a writer may have. Further, we
make numerous thematic connections among selections, both to spark students’ interest in reading and to
show how different writers tackle similar subjects with unique results.
Filling in this outline is a wealth of features, new and enduring.
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NEW FEATURES
ENGAGING NEW READINGS BY REMARKABLE WRITERS
As always, we have been enthralled with freshening the book’s selections. In searching for essays academic
yet lively, we discovered exceptional rhetorical models that will, we trust, also capture students’ interest. The
twenty-eight new selections include classic pieces by writers such as N. Scott Momaday and Joan Didion;
recent works by established favorites such as Diane Ackerman, Bruce Catton, and Annie Lamott, and
contemporary voices such as Issa Rae, Brian Doyle, and Colson Whitehead.
FOCUS ON STUDENT WORK
The Brief Bedford Reader now features more student writing than any other textbook of its kind. Twenty-
four models of exemplary college work (ten of them new to this edition) include samples of a student’s critical
reading and response; ten annotated examples of student writing in academic genres such as lab reports, field
observations, and policy proposals; eleven essays given the same treatment as the professional writing; and two
new annotatated research papers.
A GREATER EMPHASIS ON THE CONNECTION BETWEEN READING AND WRITING
More than ever, The Brief Bedford Reader demonstrates that critical reading and academic writing are
related processes that naturally inform and build off each other. At the request of instructors who use the
book, we have thoroughly revised and reorganized the material on academic reading and writing in Part One,
with increased attention throughout the text to writing in response to sources, whether one or many.
A stronger focus on reading to write. Offering more guidance on active and critical reading than any other
rhetorical reader, we stress the interconnectedness of reading and writing in Chapter 1, with a clearer
overview of annotating texts and a new discussion of writing in response as a component of critical
thinking.
Expanded coverage of key writing topics. Chapter 2 now examines the writing situation in more detail,
clarifying the distinctions between writing to reflect, entertain, explain, or persuade, and explaining how
an awareness of purpose and audience influences a writer’s choices. Placing fresh emphasis on supporting a
thesis with ideas gleaned from reading, the chapter also features a newly integrated discussion of
synthesizing evidence, with multiple examples of acceptable and unacceptable summaries, paraphrases, and
quotations.
Examples of writing that responds to reading. In addition to the essay-in-progress that concludes Chapter
2, The Brief Bedford Reader for the first time features multiple student and professional essays that respond,
directly or indirectly, to other works in the book. Student writer Rachel O’Connor, for instance, shares her
critical reading of Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery,” and composition instructor Barbara B. Parsons offers a
rhetorical analysis of Brent Staples’s “Black Men and Public Space.” Janelle Asselin makes a point-by-
point rebuttal of an argument presented by Chuck Dixon and Paul Rivoche, while Jon Overton counters
Brianne Richson’s call for trigger warnings on syllabi. And Luis Alberto Urrea, in “Barrio Walden,” reveals
how he was influenced by the writings of Henry David Thoreau, “What I Lived For” in particular.
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A new Appendix, “Finding and Documenting Sources,” gathers the details on research and source citation
where students are most likely to look for guidance. Freshened guidelines emphasize asking questions,
finding and evaluating sources, creating annotated bibliographies, and avoiding plagiarism; and updated
help with documenting sources reflects the most recent versions of both MLA style and APA style,
offering dozens of current models and new annotated student essays for each. Ten additional examples of
documented writing are spread throughout the book.
A FRESH TAKE ON THE WRITERS’ COMMENTS ON WRITING
After their essays, more than half of the book’s writers offer comments on everything from reading to
grammar to how they developed the particular piece we reprint. Besides providing rock-solid advice, these
comments — eighteen of them new — prove that for the pros, too, writing is usually a challenge. New notes
following the comments highlight the writers’ key points, telling students where in the book they can find
additional resources and suggesting how they might apply the insights to their own work.
For easy access, the “Writers on Writing” commentaries are listed in a new Directory under the topics
they address. Look up Revision, for instance, and find that Junot Díaz, Shirley Jackson, Anne Lamott, and
Colson Whitehead, among others, have something to say about this crucial stage of the writing process.
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