ENGL-145 -01 Reasoning, Argumentation and Writing
Paper #1: Outlining
Due 6:00 AM, Monday April 6 by email to smarx@calpoly.edu as a MS Word attachment. in Outline View
The subject line of the email must have this format: yourlastname, yourfirstname 145paper1
This is a critical reading assignment. It requires you to grasp and convey the arrangement of an essay and also to learn to use the "Outline View" function in Microsoft Word. Following the procedure begun in class, you'll be reading for both sense and structure.
1. Click here to download Michael Pollan's essay, "Open Letter to the Farmer-in-Chief," to your desktop as a Word.doc
2. Open the Word document in "Outline View" using the "View" pulldown menu in the menu bar at the top of the window. Go to Toolbars in the View menu and check "Outlining." The appropriate Toolbar with arrows and numbers should appear on your screen. The essay will appear with horizontal rectangles before each paragraph.
- Clicking on the rectangle highlights the text that follows it.
- You "demote" the highlighted text by dragging the rectangle to the right. This makes the highlighted text a "daughter" or subheading of the text that precedes it. The rectangle before the preceding text turns into a plus sign, indicating that it is followed by a subheading. You can also demote a selected text by clicking the right arrow or the minus sign in the outlining toolbar. Double clicking the plus sign collapses all the daughters that follow it. Double clicking the plus sign again makes the daughters reappear. This capability allows you to view an outlined text at many levels of organization.
- You "promote" the selected text by dragging the rectangle to the left or clicking the left facing arrow or the plus sign in the toolbar.
- Placing your cursor anywhere within a text and clicking Return or Enter creates a new paragraph at the same level of heading--a "sister."
- If, as I do, you find the appearance of different fonts and formats for different heading levels distracting, click the A/A box in the outlining toolbar, and the outline will use only one font and format.
- Save frequently. Outlining uses lots of memory and likes to crash the program or the computer.
3. Your task is to perform a structural analysis of this 8400 word essay that reduces it to about 1000 words. Whenever possible, use the language of the essay itself. If you paraphrase or summarize in your own words, include them in brackets [].
- First find the largest units, prompted by the typographical hints (italics and section headings and numbers) and the verbal cues ("let me explain," "the good news") provided by the author. You may want to add the headings "Introduction" and "Conclusion." [Hint: the thesis of an essay usually appears at the end of the Introduction.] Make headings for these large units and demote all the text within each one step to the right. Then apply the same method to smaller and smaller units. (I found it helpful to start doing this analysis after the Introduction and analyzing the Introduction later.)
- You'll have to be ruthless in cutting out support material, but try to include all the major points and show their relationship to one another--mother, daughter, sister. Your outline should have at least three levels of headings.
4. After you've arrived at a rough draft of the outline, let MSWord apply numbers and letters to your headings.
- Select All, either in the Edit Menu or on the keyboard.
- Top Menu: Format>Bullets and Numbering. In the window that appears click "Outline Numbered" and then choose the seventh format which applies I. A. 1. Click OK. When you continue reconfiguring your outline, the heading numbers and formats will change accordingly.
After "Outline Numbered" has been applied, the heading structure appears in Normal View as well as Outline View. To eliminate the multiple fonts and formats here, select all and choose a uniform font, size and format.
5. Sample