Justice Dumlao

WP2
11 May 2016
Muslims: Murders or Maytrs?: An Analysis of rhetorical Moves
Banning all Muslims from the United States sounds like a great idea! No? Sadly
this idea is a very serious proposal from Donald Trump, the hopeful republican
presidential nominee. Islamaphobia has plagued this nation since the dawn of its
existence, but the extent of its presence has only become more visible since the 9/11
attacks in 2001. Since then the lives of Muslim American people have been anything but
easy. People tend to have some very strong misconceptions about the faith known as
Islam; Four in 10 Americans have an unfavorable view of Islam, five in 10 believe Islam

Zack De Piero 5/15/16 2:28 AM

Comment: Wooo! Great start, Justice.
You're establishing some serious
momentum and flow.

is more likely than other religions to encourage violence, and six in 10 believe Islam is
very different from their own religion. All this despite the fact that seven in 10 admit they
know very little about Islam (Read). In Muslims in America by Jennan Ghazal Read she
talks about deconstructing these toxic ideals and stereotypes through the means of
recognizing them and discovering the truth about these diverse peoples. But people often
get so caught up in doing such that they neglect that there is more than one issue that
impacts this community. In an article entitled Understanding Islam, Islamism, and
Islamic Feminism (UIIIF) by Margot Badran from the Womens History Journal she
discusses the adverse effects of misunderstandings of Islam and Islamism and how those
impact women in the Muslim community. Talking about the Muslim community is not
only reserved to those with degrees who publish in peer reviewed journals. VICE just
recently published an article giving some insight into the life of an Arab Muslim

Zack De Piero 5/15/16 2:30 AM

Comment: Is this one of the sources
you're using for this WP2? I'm asking
because -- although these are powerful
stats, they're also taking up 4 lines... and
this isn't really a paper about
Islamaphobia, per se, so much as it's an
analysis of how certain disciplines/writers
*write about* Islmaphobia. That's a superimportant distinction that I want you to be
able to remember.
Zack De Piero 5/15/16 2:30 AM
Comment: Plus, I'm not loving the pagelong paragraph to open up your paper -it's pretty overwhelming from a reader's
perspective.

American through the use of anecdotal evidence. Each of these articles represent a
different genre which are made up of particular rhetorical conventions and moves -certain
things that the authors do in their work in order to illicit a specific reaction from the
reader-, by taking a closer look at the similarities and differences between each we will
be able to better understand the purposes of these articles and how effective these writing
styles are for their intended audiences.
First we will look at the rhetoric conventions of Muslims in America and UIIIF.
Author of Backpacks and Briefcases Laura Carroll proposes a system of rhetorical
analysis in which we start with context -comprised of examining exigence, audience, and

Zack De Piero 5/15/16 2:34 AM

Comment: Can you find a way to
"quicken" this up a bit?
Zack De Piero 5/15/16 2:35 AM
Comment: When you're typing in MS
Word, if you type two hyphens like this-and then keep typing, it'll automatically
turn it into a dash. You're *using* it
correctly on a functional level, but it looks
like a hyphen, not a dash. Small, but
potentially consequential. Each little piece
o' punctuation adds meaning for your
readers clearly understand your thoughts.
Zack De Piero 5/15/16 2:38 AM
Comment: Justice, I'm not totally sure
what you're arguing here.
What about their styles? Who are the
audiences? And what *are* the similarities
and differences?

constraints. Both articles have the same exigence -the problem/issue the article is

Someone might say: they're different,

OK.... why does that matter? They're
similar.. OK, so what?

responding to- which is that Muslim people have certain obstacles they must face as a

How can you raise the stakes of this

argument?

direct result of islamaphobia. The exigence is important because it gives the articles a
clear purpose, which in this case is to deconstruct the obstacles that Muslim people face
through educating people on the misinformations of modern society. Next we look at the
audiences.
For Muslims in America we have to consider where it was published to see who
the intended audience is, in this case it is Contexts (a sociology publishing company), so
we can assume that the audience is for people of higher academic standing most likely in
the field of sociology. For UIIIF it is a very similar audience, this article was also
published in an academic journal, but in this case the journal is specifically for Womens
History. We can postulate that the intended audience is also people of higher academic
standing but in the field of Womens History. Audiences are important to recognize
because authors use different language according to their audiences, for example both

Zack De Piero 5/15/16 2:42 AM

Comment: What "both" articles? Your
topic sentence told me that you this
paragraph was going to address "Muslims
in America and UIIIF..."
Zack De Piero 5/15/16 2:42 AM
Comment: Ahhh... now I'm realizing that
they're two different pieces. Can you find
a way to make this clearer?
Zack De Piero 5/15/16 2:40 AM
Comment: OK, this is super-huge, and
I'm glad that you're bringing it up, but I
think you can take this a bit further.
*HOW* are they being deconstructed? Is
it the same way, or are their differences -even if they're subtle?

articles use very scholastic words like socioeconomic, multiculturalist, patriarchal,

and many more. These types of words portray a more academic setting and give a more
serious tone.
Lastly there are constraints, in both cases the constraints include, but are not

Zack De Piero 5/15/16 2:43 AM

Comment: Why is this significant? Why
are you bringing this into your paper?
How -- and why -- does it relate to your
argument?

limited to: professional language, content must be corroborated by other scholarly

sources through means of citing work, and formatting must conform to the standards of
wherever they are trying to publish. They must each have a references or works cited
page as well, that is a necessary component of being published in an academic journal, so
if the article cannot exist in the genre without it then it should be considered a constraint.
You may have noticed that these two scholarly articles have many rhetorical conventions
which are very similar. This is largely due to the fact that they belong to similar genres
and if the genres they belong to are similar then it makes sense that the way in which they
are constructed are going to be similar as well. These rhetorical conventions are not the
only things that make these articles fit within their genres there are also specific moves
that are employed to help convey the messages of the authors.
In Muslims in America Read uses moves both to break conventions and to
reinforce them. It is easiest to start off by identifying the more common moves. Divide
and Conquer is when section subtitles are used to help the reader more easily discern
new topics. For example she has one section called some basic demographics where

Zack De Piero 5/15/16 2:44 AM

Comment: Think back to our lesson on
parallelism -- see if you can work some of
that in here.
Zack De Piero 5/15/16 2:44 AM
Comment: I haven't. I need evidence
and specificity for this. Help me SEE what
you want me to see.
Zack De Piero 5/15/16 2:45 AM
Comment: This may be a personal pet
peeve of mine, but Id like to advise you to
steer clear of things in academic writing
(maybe even all writing!). Its suuuuuuper
vague. Academic writing requires
precision and specificitybe direct and tell
me exactly what youre talking about. Pick
the 1 word that really captures the idea(s)
that you want to get across.
(Did I mention that to you last time?)

Zack De Piero 5/15/16 2:46 AM

Comment: Take a look at this again:
could you see how someone might think
the title is "Muslims in America Read"?
How could you solve this possible sense
of confusion?

Zack De Piero 5/15/16 2:46 AM

Comment: What are moves? Worth
defining/describing how you're using them
here?

she, surprise, talks about basic demographics. Because of the nature of this article there is

Zack De Piero 5/15/16 2:47 AM

Comment: Ha!

lots of Introducing Standard Views (Graff) for example, Americans generally,

But, on a more serious note, what *kinds*

of demographics? And how/why might
they be significant?

Muslim Americans also tend, and things of that nature. This move is very simple it
just does what it is named after, introduces a standard thought. Visualize it this is when

I want you to be on the lookout for how

these different folks are understanding this
idea of Islamaphobia -- what do they
VALUE in their
writing/reporting/researching of it?

Read delineates the data that has been collected what shortly follows is a graph of the
data, this simply helps to show the reader the data in a more consumable way. What
follows the data is also a move which I call The Explainer and in They Say I Say a
similar move is called Explaining Quotations (also pretty self explanatory) this is
when Read just explains what the data means and why it is important to the topic. The
last few moves, I feel, are very important to the article. The FYI is when she uses
parentheses to give that little touch of further explanation like in this example, they held
mainstream American values (think Italian, Irish, and Polish immigrants) (Read), these
little pieces of information really do help the reader to not only understand information
better. The NOTICE ME happens when the author puts a quote from her own writing
in the paper but makes the font size much bigger and changes the color of the text also,
this effectively shows the reader some information that is important to the piece while
also acting as an attention grabber to pull the reader in and make them read more. Last,
but certainly not least is the Covering the Bases, this move describes when Read uses
hedged language. Using this type of language is important because it shows the audience
that the author acknowledges that they wont be able to know everything, but this is what
they do know from the findings. Reads piece is not the only one to have moves.
Just like Read, Badran also has some moves of their own. One move she uses that
is one of my personal favorites is the Question Master in this move she asks the
audience rhetorical questions in order to try and engage them more in the reading and
spur the reader to think more on their own before reading more of the material. She uses
that move here very well, Should we use the term fundamental- ism or Islamism
when referring to political Islam? (Badran). Because this is a very complex topic she

Zack De Piero 5/15/16 2:48 AM

Comment: Are all these moves the
same? Could you find a way to
classify/categorize them? that could help
you form more paragraphs and more
"digestable" thoughts.

also uses a move I like to call Explain it when there is term that someone might not
know off the top of their head she gives a short explanation following. For example,
protagonists call progressive Islamism in South Africa (a movement of political Islam
that emerged out of apartheid and Islamic reformist struggles) (Badran). This makes it
so that the reader can understand the piece more easily and does not have to stop reading
and look up a word just to understand what is going on. Badran also uses some moves
from They Say I Say, like Embedding Voice Markers in this move the author just uses
language that signifies their voice, like in this excerpt, I agree with her that under the
name of multiculturalism or any other rubric we should not accept the unacceptable
(Badran). These little blurbs of the writers voice help us to see what the author is
thinking and it also helps to make the writing all the more relatable. One important move
that she makes is the Signaling Who is Saying What (Graff), this is kind of like a
preliminary first step move because when she does this she is setting up the scene by
telling us who said what ever information she is about to tell everyone, then from there
she can turn that move into another move by either agreeing, disagreeing, or both. This is
important to do because as it is part of her goal to address the ideas of others and inform
us of the truth behind Muslim peoples and demystify the misconceptions. While these
two scholarly articles both use different moves and conventions to effectively educate
their readers the constraints on the pieces cannot do what a pop culture article can.
In Sarah Harvards article in VICE about the story of one mans experiences both
pre and post 9/11 we can see that there are very distinct differences in both the
conventions and moves of this article as compared to that of the scholarly ones. The
exigence of this piece is similar to that of the others as it is also about Muslim identities

Zack De Piero 5/15/16 2:55 AM

Comment: OK, I'm liking this a lot -- can
you weave this sort of approach
throughout your *whole* paper? Cab you
make this the central thread of your
argument?

and you cant really talk about Muslim identity without having to also talk about the
obstacles they face. The audience here is for everyone who is teenaged and up, we can
discern that because it is published on this public website which is accessible for a very
wide range of ages and because of the language it uses, like the hook about finding good
food as contrasted to the hook of Muslims in America which was a bunch of alarming
statistics. The use of a more friendly hook brings in a wider range of people because,
well, everyone likes food. Then we also have the constraints, in this article the constraints
are far fewer than that of the scholarly article. For example in this article they quote a
man they interviewed saying cuss words, this is something they would most likely omit
from a scholarly article because it has no place there, but there it gives the audience more
relatable language and eases the tone. The VICE article can also use different and similar
moves, for example a move I like to call Picture This in which they embellish the piece
with pictures that relate to the article in order to give the reader a change to visualize
what they are talking about, somewhat similar to the use of graphs in the Muslims of
America piece. The Storyteller this move is used in this article when the author uses
personal experience to relate to and analyze what is happening in the mans life, she says,
The story of Dearborn hits close to my heart. I grew up not too far from the town
(Harvard). The ability to use personal narrative in the writing like that shows very much
how much more relaxed this genre is compared to the scholarly articles.
Genre can be a very complex and fickle concept. When we looked at the scholarly
articles we saw that even though they are from two different disciplines that they still
were very similar to each other and when we looked at the VICE article we definitely saw
more differences in the way it was written, yet it still had some similar elements of the

Zack De Piero 5/15/16 2:57 AM

Comment: Ok, I'm noticing here that this
piece/paragraph is focusing on more of the
"1 specific person" human element. How
is this simiilar/different to the other pieces?
What does this suggest about how these
writers/researchers understand (the face
of) Islamaphobia?

scholarly articles as well. Genres, evidently, can overlap in many cases and still have
their very own unique distinctions, which almost reminds me of how people can be
similar but are ultimately unique in their own ways. These pieces each did an amazing
job of addressing the audiences they were intending to reach by employing certain
conventions and moves to give that extra shine.

(again, sorry this is late I hope you saw my note on gauchospace)

Works Cited
Badran, Margot. "Understanding Islam, Islamism, and Islamic Feminism." Journal of
Women's History 13.1 (2001): 47-52.

Carroll, Laura Bolin. "Backpacks vs. Breifcases: Steps toward Rhetorical Analysis."
Writing Spaces: Readings on Writing, Volume 1. Vol. 1. N.p.: Parlor, 2010. 4558.
Graff, Gerald, Cathy Birkenstein, and Russel K. Durst. "Index of Templates." "They Say/I
Say": The Moves That Matter in Academic Writing: With Readings. New York:
W.W. Norton, 2012. 681-95.
Harvard, Sarah. "How America's Muslims Have Handled 15 Years of Post-9/11
Islamophobia"VICE. VICE, 10 Mar. 2016. 11 May 2016.
Read, Jen'nan Ghazal. "Muslims in America." Contexts 7.4 (2008): 39-43.

Writing 2 Feedback Matrix for WP2

Table of Textual Features and Qualities

Did Not Meet

Expectations
Thesis Statement

Met
Expectations

Use of Textual Evidence from

Genres

X+

Use of Course Readings

Analysis

Organization/Structure

Exceeded
Expectations

Attention to Genre/Conventions and

Rhetorical Factors

Attention to Moves

X
At the start

Exploration of Disciplinarity

X
At the end

Sentence-level Clarity, Mechanics,

Flow

Comments and Grade

Justice,

Solid work here, and youre well on your way to submitting a badass WP2 for your portfolio.
I hope my comments can guide you in a productive direction.

My overall piece of advice is: find a more cohesive argument and tie the pieces more tightly
together. Think long and hard about how all of this adds up and, most importantly, why it
matters. Its gotta all be relevant though: dont just lay down any/every sort of information
you can -- pick your points.

Id also like you to give your organization and paragraph-by-paragraph structure a bit more
thought. What are some ways, plural, that you could construct your paper/argument? Then,
once youve got options (plural again!), choose which one you think makes the most sense
for you AND for the reader.

Also, I counted 7 paragraph for a 6-page paper. Part of this is, for sure, my own subject
preferences, but yikes!!! Youre such a cool and smart and friendly dude -- I swear,
paragraphs arent that bad. Please make friends with them.
Z

7.5/10 - 0.5 for being late = 7/10