Contextualizing Toulmin's Model in the Writing Classroom: A Case Study
Abstract
Although Toulmin models of argumentation are pervasive in composition textbooks, research on the model's use in writing classrooms has been scarce'typically limited to evaluating how students' essays align with the model's elements (claim, data, warrant, qualifier, rebuttal, backing) construed as objective standards. That approach discounts Toulmin's emphasis on context. In contrast, this study of a major university's summer composition program for high school students employs Wenger's notion of communities of practice and Bakhtin's notion of response to trace how classroom contexts mediate students' and teachers' understandings of a Toulmin model. The article presents a case study of a controversy that emerged when participants attempted to identify the main claim in one student's essay. The controversy arose, the analysis suggests, as participants positioned competing tacit and explicit representations of claims with/against other rhetorical terms (for example, thesis), variously interpreted the assigned tasks, and negotiated over tasks and texts.
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1. Fulkerson cites Barnet and Bedau (1996); Hairston (1981); Spurgin (1985); and Vesterman (1994). See also Chapman and Waller (1995); Crusius and Channell (2000); Hatch (1999); Hirschberg (1996); Lunsford and Ruszkiewicz (2001); Nicholas and Nicholl (1991); and Wood (2001).
2. For example, Cawelti and Duncan (1993); Clark (1998); Coe (1990); Corbett and Eberly (2000); Harris and Cunningham (1994); Kennedy, Kennedy, and Aaron (2000); Laib (1993); Lauer, Montague, Lunsford, and Emig (1991); Mayberry (1999); McMeniman (1999); R. K. Miller (1999); Scharton and Neuleib (1993); Trimbur (1999).
3. Clauss (1999) does take up Toulmin's emphasis on context, but he focuses on describing historical and intellectual contexts for Toulmin's work.
4. The term data became grounds in Toulmin, Rieke, and Janik's textbook An Introduction to Reasoning (1979, 1984).
5. The program director was beginning to complicate “Evidence” even further by stating that readers do not see any “real” evidence in papers but an author's representation of that evidence. Hence, readers might question shady techniques such as those examined in the classic book, How to Lie with Statistics (Huff, 1954/1993).
6. At the time of this study, the term qualifier was still used occasionally, but it was not one of the five main categories. We discussed qualifiers primarily during the lecture on Acknowledgment/Response.
7. My current analysis does not address issues of gender and ethnicity/race extensively; however, I would like to note the demographic information as well. The morning session had 1 female and 4 male students; the afternoon session had 3 female and 2 male students. The group appeared ethnically/racially diverse. Although I did not ask students about their cultural heritages, I can report how 9 of the 10 identified themselves: 1 as Korean; 1, African-American; 2, Hispanic; 1, Indian; 1, Jewish/Caucasian; and 3, Caucasian. All three instructors were identified as Caucasian.
8. To the extent that I could, I chose pseudonyms that reflect how students' real names indexed their racial/ethnic heritages: Rich (Korean), Isabel (Hispanic), Miriam (Jewish/Caucasian), and Emily (African-American). Andy could be described as a person of color, but he did not mention his heritage in class.
9. The director added line numbers to course readings along the left margins so that students and teachers could refer to particular sentences easily. For the same reason, students were instructed to set their word processors to number the lines of their essays; if they forgot, they added the numbers by hand.
10. It is possible that Rich sides with Andy (“oh”), because the person leading an in-depth critique would often adopt a paper as though it were his/her own. However, I cannot be sure who speaks at this moment on the tape.
11. Some of the lowercase “ok's” are very soft and perhaps inaudible to students, although the lapel microphone records them.
12. As stated in Appendix C, italicized words appearing in transcripts of dialogues indicate verbal emphasis. Unless a speaker was verbally stressing the title Common Sense, then, it is not italicized in the transcripts.
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