George Miller, University of Delaware
©2015 |Pearson | Out of print
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This rhetorical reader emphasizes process by presenting a student essay in each chapter in both its first and final draft.
Widely adopted for George Miller’s supportive voice and highly reliable writing assignments, The Prentice Hall Reader balances classic and contemporary essays, arranged in increasing level of difficulty in each chapter. Extensive reading, writing, and research instruction and an exceptionally comprehensive instructor manual make this rhetorical reader an effective text for any writing program.
Emphasis on revision--Each modal chapter presents a student essay in its first draft and final draft to emphasize the importance of revision in the writing process.
Selections arranged by difficulty.--The readings are scaled in terms of length and sophistication–moving from a student example in the chapter’s introduction to examples written by professional writers arranged in increasing length, difficulty, and sophistication.
Extensive greatly expanded chapter on writing the research paper, tracing it from idea to finished draft. Detailed advice on how to locate and evaluate print and online sources, with two new student research papers.
Literary examples of each organizational strategy. A poem or short story is included in each of the nine chapters. These creative examples show how the strategies can be used to structure not just essays, but poetry and fiction as well. Each selection has discussion questions and writing suggestions.
Detailed and extensive writing suggestions. Each reading is followed by four writing suggestions: the first is for a journal or blog entry; the second calls for a paragraph-length response; the third, an essay; and the fourth, an essay involving research. Extensive new lists of writing suggestions can be found at the end of each chapter. In all, the Reader has nearly 500 writing suggestions.
Chapter introductions are organized around key questions that writers have.
Links between the chapter introductions and the readings that follow in sections labeled “In the readings, look for.”
Emphasis on critical reading skills. In addition to a section “How To Read an Essay” at the beginning of the text, each chapter has an example of how critical reading skills can be applied to reading each rhetorical strategy. In addition, each essay is preceded by two questions that invite students to connect the reading to their own experience and to focus their attention on a close reading of the essay. Each reading has a “Critical Reading Activity” (in the Annotated Instructor’s Edition) as well as a “Collaborative” reading activity.
Writing about images. Each chapter includes a section with writing suggestions.
Extensive Web activities appear throughout the text and extensive advice on Web searching and evaluating Web resources.
A commitment to exploring the links between grammar and writing and between reading and writing. In addition to the three opening units on reading, writing, and revising an essay, each chapter has a “Focusing on Grammar and Writing Activity.”
A Glossary and Ready Reference explains and illustrates common problems with grammar and writing, tying these explanations back to activities in the text. The links help build bridges between the content of the essays and the writing skills they reveal.
The eleventh edition of The Prentice Hall Reader features fifty-five essays, twenty-three of which are new, eleven papers written by students, and nine poems or short, short stories that show the organizational strategies at work. As in the previous editions, the readings are chosen on the basis of several criteria: how well they demonstrate a particular pattern of organization, appeal to an audience of first-year students, and promote interesting and appropriate discussion and writing activities.
The eleventh edition of The Prentice Hall Reader includes a number of new features:
• New readings. More than 40 percent of the readings are new in this edition.
Readings come from a variety of emerging genres including blogs, self-help books, and web pages and include many new voices such as [[TK]], Michael Pollan, Richard Bolles, and Jhumpa Lahiri.
• Expanded treatment of how to read an essay, with sections on how to write a summary and a critical analysis. A new essay dealing with the “soft skills” that employers are looking for in new hires is annotated, summarized, and analyzed.
• New apparatus for each essay. The “writing suggestions” and the section “for further study” for each essay have been re-cast and re-written.
1. “Finding Reading Connections” links each essay to another in the Reader and provides an essay topic through which that link can be explored.
2. “Linking to an On-line Reading” extends the conversation by suggesting a specific on-line reading that students can pair with each essay and then offering a writing suggestion that links the two.
3. “Writing the Research Paper” suggests topics that can be explored through the Web and print sources for writing an academic essay with formal documentation.
• Revised chapter on argument and persuasion now includes material on the role of rhetoric in creating a writer’s voice. The readings range from opinion writing to clusters of opposing arguments with formal documentation. A new casebook presents a pair of readings debating the question “Is a Vegan Diet Healthier Than a Balanced Diet?”
• Revised chapter on the research paper now moves from providing simple documentation in a traditional essay to preparing and documenting an academic research paper. Special attention is given to using and documenting on-line sources.
• New student examples in Chapters 7 and 9, with first drafts, revision suggestions, and final drafts.
• Learning Objectives have been added to each chapter, clearly establishing chapter goals at the start.
• Timely readings appealing to college students. The new essays add topics such as job skills, discrimination based on physical appearance, campus suicide, campus engagement by gender, MOOCs, how to avoid being “hacked,” children’s exposure to junk food, and vegan versus balanced diets.
Table of Contents
How to Read and Then Analyze an Essay
Exploring the Links Between Reading and Writing
Practicing Active Reading: A Model
[[*]]Nick Schulz, “Hard Unemployment Truths About ‘Soft’ Skills”
Analyzing an Essay
Reading a Visual Image
Practicing Reading a Visual: A Model
[[*]]“Are You Man Enough…to Be a Nurse?”
How to Write an Essay
Getting Ready to Write
Writing a Draft
How to Revise an Essay
Understanding What Revision Is
Developing Your Own Revising Skills
Getting Help from Other Readers
Making Sure to Proofread
Writers at Work
A Student Writer: Tina Burton, “The Watermelon Wooer”
A Professional Writer: Gordon Grice, “Caught in the Widow’s Web”
Chapter 1 Gathering and Using Examples
Writing with Examples
Getting Ready to Write
Writing
Revising
Student Essay: Frank Smite, “Looking for Love”
Reading for Examples
In prose: Steven Pinker, from The Language Instinct
In literature: Bret Lott, “Night” (short story)
In a visual: Photographs of college life
Bob Greene, “Cut”
“In driving around the country, I have found that an inordinately large proportion of successful men share that same memory—the memory of being cut from a sports team as a boy.”
[[*]] Helen Keller "Acquiring Language" (from The Story of My Life)
"Everything had a name, and each name gave birth to a new though. As we returned to the house every object which I touched seemed to quiver with life."
Rick Reilly, “Getting a Second Wind”
“One day five years ago bubbly, gorgeous soccer goalie Korinne Shroyer came home from eighth grade, found her father’s revolver in his closet, and fired a bullet into her skull.”
Oscar Casares, “Ready for Some Fútbol?”
“Speedy Gonzales, the famous cartoon star of the fifties and sixties, has been in the news again lately.”
[[*]]Deborah L. Rhode, “Why Looks Are the Last Bastion of Discrimination”
“Unattractive people are less likely to be hired and promoted, and they earn lower salaries, even in fields in which looks have no obvious relationship to professional duties.”
Chapter 2 Narration
Writing Narration
Getting Ready to Write
Writing
Revising
Reading Narration
[[*]]In literature:on Wallca, "Worry"
[[*]]In a visual: Shearing a sheep (cartoon)
Langston Hughes, “Salvation”
“I was saved from sin when I was going on thirteen.”
[[*]]Lynn Bernardini, “Does This Date Mean Anything to You?”
"'Yes,' I whispered to teh stranger on the phone... On that date, I have birth to a son."
Tom Haines, “Facing Famine”
“What comes from knowing people who, with an empty grain basket or a thinning goat, edge closer to death?”
[[*]]Marguerite Choi, “The Suddenly Empty Chair”
“‘Student found dead on campus. Police investigating.’ And your heart sinks. I cannot explain why, but I knew it was my student.”
Evans D. Hopkins, “Lockdown”
“I have endured lockdowns in buildings with little or no heat; lockdowns during which the authorities cut off the plumbing completely, so contraband couldn’t be flushed away; and lockdowns where we weren’t allowed to shower for more than a month.”
Chapter 3 Description
Writing Description
Getting Ready to Write
Writing
Revising
Student Essay: Nadine Resnick, “Natalie”
Reading Description
In prose: Charles Dickens, from Bleak House
In literature: Duane BigEagle, “Traveling to Town” (poem)
In a visual: Mulberry Street, NYC (photograph)
[[*]]Sonya Lea, “First Bath”
“His shoulders hang low and his back is bowed. His body is forty pounds lighter than it was a few days ago, before the cancer surgery, before the blood loss that caused his mind to empty its memories.”
[[*]]Alisa Wolf, “The Day Nana Almost Flew”
“I soon learned what shuold have been obvious- Nana was suffering from dementia."
William Least Heat Moon, “Nameless, Tennessee”
“‘You think Nameless is a funny name,’ Miss Ginny said, ‘I see it plain in your eyes. Well, you take yourself up north a piece to Difficult, Defeated or Shake Rag. Now them are silly names.’”
[[*]]Adrienne Ross, “The Queen and I”
“The more I learned about the bess, the closer I came to sharing their lives.”
Scott Russell Sanders, “The Inheritance of Tools”
“At just about the hour when my father died, soon after dawn one February morning when ice coated the windows like cataracts, I banged my thumb with a hammer.”
Chapter 4 Division and Classification
Writing Division and Classification
Getting Ready to Write
Writing
Revising
Student Essay: Evan James, “Riding the Rails: The American ‘Hobo’”
Reading Division and Classification
In prose: Mark Lester, from Grammar in the Classroom
In literature: Aurora Levins Morales, “Child of the Americas” (poem)
[[*]]In a visual: Two brains (cartoon)
David Bodanis, “What’s in Your Toothpaste?”
“So it’s chalk, water, paint, seaweed, antifreeze, paraffin oil, detergent, peppermint, formaldehyde, and fluoride—that’s the usual mixture raised to the mouth on the toothbrush for a fresh morning’s clean.”
Thomas Goetz, “Does the Pleasure of Lighting Up Outweigh the Consequences?”
“His dentist told him that smoking has severely aggravated his gums. If he didn’t quit smoking, he was likely to start losing his teeth.”
[[*]]Sue Shellenbarger, “The Peak Time for Everything”
“A growing body of research suggests that paying attention to the body clock, and its effects on energy and alertness, can help pinpoint the different times of day when most of us perform our best at specific tasks, from resolving conflicts to thinking creatively.”
Pico Iyer, “This Is Who I Am When No One Is Looking”
“My secret life, as Leonard Cohen calls it, also happens to be my deepest and my best life.”
Judith Ortiz Cofer, “The Myth of the Latin Woman: I Just Met a Girl Named
Maria”
“Every time I give a reading, I hope the stories I tell, the dreams and fears I examine in my work, can achieve some universal truth that will get my audience past the particulars of my skin color, my accent, or my clothes.”
Bernard R. Berelson, “The Value of Children: A Taxonomical Essay”
“Why do people want children? It is a simple question to ask, perhaps an impossible one to answer.”
Chapter 5 Comparison and Contrast
Writing Comparison and Contrast
Getting Ready to Write
Writing
Revising
Student Essay: Alicia Gray, “Minimizing the Guesswork in a Library Search”
Reading Comparison and Contrast
In prose: John McPhee, from Oranges
In literature: Martin Espada, “Coca-Cola and Coco Frio” (poem)
[[*]]In a visual: William Hogarth, “Gin Lane and Beer Street” (engravings)
William Zinsser, “The Transaction: Two Writing Processes”
“A school in Connecticut once held ‘a day devoted to the arts,’ and I was asked if I would come and talk about writing as a vocation. When I arrived I found that a second speaker had been invited—Dr. Brock…a surgeon who had recently begun to write.”
Suzanne Britt, “Neat People vs. Sloppy People”
“I’ve finally figured out the difference between neat people and sloppy people. The distinction is, as always, moral. Neat people are lazier and meaner than sloppy people.”
[[*]]Libby Sander, “Colleges Confront a Gender Gap in Student Engagement”
“Men and women, it turns out, tend to view college differently—and those differences often shape their willingness to get invested in academic pursuits and other activities.”
[[*]]Justin Pope, “MOOCs Gaining Popularity”
“Credit’s the coin of the realm in higher education, the difference between knowing something and the world recognizing that you do.”
Michael Pollan, “The Consumer: A Republic of Fat”
“Because of diabetes and all the other health problems that accompany obesity, today’s children may turn out to be the first generation of Americans whose life expectancy will actually be shorter than that of their parents.”
Meghan Daum, “Virtual Love”
“It was the courtship ritual that had seduced us. E-mail had become an electronic epistle, a yearned-for rule book. It allowed us to do what was necessary to experience love.”
Chapter 6 Process
Writing Process
Getting Ready to Write
Writing
Revising
Student Essay: Julie Anne Halbfish, “How to Play Dreidel”
Reading Process
[[*]]In prose: Moway, "Souris a la Creme" (recipe)
In literature: Janice Mirikitani, “Recipe” (poem)
In a visual: “The Four-In-Hand” (diagram)
[[*]]Nicole Perlroth, “How to Devise Passwords That Drive Hackers Away”
“It is absurdly easy to get hacked. All it takes is clicking on one malicious link or attachment.”
[*]]Sherry Simpson, “Tiny Masters: An Artful Trick to Writing the Personal
Essay”
“‘What is a personal essay?’ I’ll begin. Students start shifting uneasily in their seats. It’s that word, essay. So scholarly, so stiff, so self-important. And personal–they’re probably thinking that means ‘writing about your mother.’”
Lars Eighner, “My Daily Dives in the Dumpster”
“I began scavenging by pulling pizzas out of the Dumpster behind a pizza delivery shop.”
Nora Ephron, “Revision and Life: Take It from the Top—Again”
“I have been asked to write something for a textbook that is meant to teach college students something about writing and revision.”
Richard N. Bolles, “The Internet: The 10% Solution”
“Internet job-matching works. Sometimes. Beautifully. But know ahead of time that you can’t count on it necessarily working for You. In the end, it’s a big fat gamble that works about 10% of the time.”
Jennifer Kahn, “Stripped for Parts”
“None of this is what I expected from an organ transplant.”
Chapter 7 Cause and Effect
Writing Cause and Effect
Getting Ready to Write
Writing
Revising
[[*]]Student Essay: Katie McCarthy, “Why Are Tattoos So Popular?”
Reading Cause and Effect
[[*]]In prose:ebecca Donatelle, "Immediate Effects of Alcohol"
[[*]]In literature: Ellie Schoenfeld, “Barbie’s Little Sister” (poem)
In a visual: “Polar Bear Adrift” (photograph)
[[*]]James Paul Gee,"Games, Not Schools, Are Teaching Kids to Think"
“The fact is, when kids play videogames they can experience a much more powerful form of learning than when they're in the classroom”
Andres Martin, “On Teenagers and Tattoos”
“Tattoos and piercing have become a part of our everyday landscape.”
[[*]]Maureen O’Hagan, “Kids Battle the Lure of Junk Food”
“‘Most of us…are going to choose fat and salt and sugar over foods that don’t have those things in them.’ It’s biology. It’s culture.”
Brent Staples, “Black Men and Public Space”
“My first victim was a woman—white, well dressed, probably in her early twenties.”
Mark J. Penn, “Caffeine Crazies”
“Life in America today is a rest-less frenzy.”
Michael Jernigan, “Living the Dream”
“I am living with P.T.S.D. [Post Traumatic Stress Disorder].”
Chapter 8 Definition
Writing Definition
Getting Ready to Write
Writing
Revising
Student Essay: Sherry Heck, “Infallible”
Reading Definition
In prose: Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, “ADHD”
In literature: Jamaica Kincaid, “Girl” (short story)
In a visual: “Seeing Yourself” (photograph)
[[*]]Sarah J. Lin, “Devotion”
“When I was twelve years old, a boy named Sherman decided he loved me. Sherman was nine years older than me and had been born with Down syndrome.”
Judy Brady, “I Want a Wife”
“I belong to that classification of people known as wives. I am A Wife.”
[[*]]Mark Bittman, "eating Food That's Better for You, Organic or Not"
“People don't...realize 'organic' doesn't meant 'local.' It doesn't matter if it's from the farm dowm the road or from Chile... As long asit meets the standards it's organic."
Jhumpa Lahiri, “My Two Lives”
“Like many immigrant offspring I felt intense pressure to be two things, loyal to the old world and fluent in the new.”
Amy Tan, “Mother Tongue”
“Language is the tool of my trade. And I use them all—all the Englishes I grew up with.”
[[*]]Backgrounder, MediaSmarts, “Little Princesses and Fairy Tale Stereotypes”
“There may be no escaping the 'princess phase,' but teaching kids to view media critically can help make sure your princess doesn't grow up expecting a handsome prince- or a fairy godmother- to solver all her problems."
Chapter 9 Argument and Persuasion
Writing Argument and Persuasion
Getting Ready to Write
Writing
Revising
[[*]]Student Essay: Morgan Murphy, “A Not So Simple Solution”
Reading Argument and Persuasion
[[*]]In prose: James Paul Gee,"Games, Not Schools, Are Teaching Kids to Think"
In literature: Wilfred Owen, “Dulce et Decorum Est” (poem)
In a visual: James Montgomery Flagg, “I Want You” (poster)
Debate Casebook: Is College for Everyone and Just How Valuable Is a College
Education?
Katherine Porter, “The Value of a College Degree”
“Many wonder whether the high cost of tuition, the opportunity cost of choosing college over full-time employment, and the accumulation of thousands of dollars of debt is, in the long run, worth the investment.”
Linda Lee, “The Case Against College”
“America is obsessed with college.”
The 30 Occupations with the Largest Employment Growth, 2006–2016
Perspectives for Argument: “Are Too Many Students Going to College?”
Debate Casebook: Are Performance Enhancing Drugs Cheating?
Michael Dillingham, “Steroids, Sports, and the Ethics of Winning”
“Society cares because steroid use is a form of cheating.”
Perspectives for Argument: Is Using Performance Enhancing Drugs “Fair”?
Debate Casebook: What Are the Ethical Issues Surrounding Human Organ Harvesting and Donation?
Pete du Pont, “Have a Heart—but Pay Me for It”
“Permitting donors to receive some type of compensation for their organs would help alleviate our organ-shortage problem.”
Advertisement Promoting Organ Donation
Perspectives for Argument: What Moral Issues Does Transplantation Raise?
[[*]]Debate Casebook: Is a Vegan Diet Healthier Than a Balanced Diet?
[[*]]T. Colin Campbell, “Cut Animal-Based Protein”
“I know beyond any doubt that I am better off for having changed my diet to whole and plant-based foods.”
[[*]]Nancy Rodriguez, “It’s a Question of Balance”
“Appreciating the science behind nutrition helps us make smart choices about the best way to feed ourselves and the world.”
Debate Casebook: Are You Willing to Save a Child’s Life?
Peter Singer, “The Singer Solution to World Poverty”
“The formula is simple: whatever money you’re spending on luxuries, not necessities, should be given away.”
A Perspective on Singer’s Argument
Statistics About Worldwide Need and How to Help
Chapter 10 The Research Paper
Writing a Research Paper
Getting Ready to Write
Starting Your Research
Caution: Using Wikipedia as a Source
Writing
Caution: Plagiarism, Academic Dishonesty, and the Misuse of Sources
Revising
Student Research Paper: Kristen LaPorte, “Music as a Healing Power: A Look into the Effect of Music Therapy on Alzheimer’s Patients”
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