first: For this assignment, use a Word document and type (or write) your research question at the top of the page. On the rest of the page, use one of the prewriting techniques found in the PowerPoint, and use the rest of the page to prewrite on your research topic. For now, you can just use what you know about the topic or do a simple Google search to come up with some ideas and details.
second: Advertising, politics and student writing assignments all require rhetorical devices (lots on this next week!) to convince people that their arguments are valid. Ideally, persuaders use facts, reasoning and logic to prove their points, but they’re always tempted to take a shortcut and make their case with logical fallacies — assertions that seem plausible but collapse under scrutiny.
Understanding logical fallacies can help you evaluate the credibility of marketing messages, activists’ appeals and research sources. And you can use this knowledge to strengthen your persuasive writing and earn better grades on their assignments.
Logical fallacies work because they make messages feel more persuasive. But fallacious logic also undermines the academic effectiveness of writing. Naturally, you need to learn to keep logical fallacies out of your writing assignments.
For this assignment, choose an ad (think Youtube, or something from the internet) and post the link in a Word document.
Then, tell me who the ad’s intended audience.
How does the ad try to reach the audience (actors, music, color, sound, etc.)?What fallacy did you find in the ad (from the PowerPoint where the fallacies are discussed)?Why do you think the author used the logical fallacy in the ad?
Was it effective, and do you think it would have been more effective if the ad left out the fallacy?
This should be two paragraphs:
1) description and analysis of the ad, and
2) the logical fallacy and its effectiveness3
Requirements: word
