Writing I-10 Development by Example
杨茜希 农大外语学院 课件仅供我们英语双学位同学使用，谢谢大家请勿挂网上哦
Perhaps you’ve heard a friend complain lately about a roommate. “Tina is an inconsiderate boor, impossible to live with,” she cries. Your natural respon might be to question your friend’s rather broad accusation: “What makes her so terrible? What does she do that’s so bad?” Your friend might then respond with specific examples of Tina’s innsitivity: she never washes her dishes, she ties up the telephone for hours, and she plays her radio until three every morning. By citing veral examples, your friend clarifies and supports her general criticism of Tina, thus enabling you to understand her point of view.
Examples in an essay work precily the same way as in the hypothetical story above: they support, clarify, interest, and persuade.
In your writing assignments, you might want to asrt that dorm food is cruel and inhuma
n punishment, that recycling is a profitable hobby, or that the cost of housing is rising dramatically. But without some carefully chon examples to show the truth of your statements, the remain unsupported generalities or mere opinions. Your task, then, is to provide enough specific examples to support your general statements, to make them both clear and convincing. Here is a statement offering the reader only hazy generalities:
①Our locally supported TV channel prents a variety of excellent educational shows. The shows are informative on lots of different subjects for both children and adults. The information they offer makes channel 19 well worth the public funds that support it.
Rewritten, the same paragraph explains its point clearly through the u of specific examples:
②Our locally supported TV channel prents a variety of excellent educational shows. For example, young children can learn their alphabet and numbers from Sesame Street; imaginative older children can be encouraged to create by watching Kids’ Writes, a show on which four hosts read and act out stories written and nt in by youngsters from eight t
o fourteen. Adults may enjoy learning about antiques and collectibles from a program called The Collector; each week the show features an in-depth look at buying, lling, trading, and displaying collectible items, from Depression glass to teddy bears to Shaker furniture. Tho folks wishing to become handy around the home can u information on repairs from plumbing to wiring on This Old Hou, while the nonmusical can learn the difference between scat singing and arias on such programs as Jazz! And Opera Today. And the money-minded can profit from the tips dropped by stockbrokers who appear on Wall Street Week. The information offered makes the and other educational shows on channel 19 well worth the public funds that support the station.
In some cas you may find that a ries of short examples fits your purpo, illustrating clearly the idea you are prenting to your reader:
③In the earlier years of Hollywood, actors aspiring to become movie stars often adopted new names that they believed sounded more attractive to the public. Frances Ethel Gumm, for instance, decided to change her name to Judy Garland long before she flew o
ver any rainbows, and Alexander Archibald Leach became Cary Grant on his way from England to America. Alexandra Cymboliak and Merle Johnson, Jr., might not have t teenage hearts throbbing in the early 1960s, but Sandra Dee and Troy Donahue certainly did. And while some names were changed to achieve a smoother flow (Frederic Austerlitz to Fred Astaire, for example), some may have also been changed to ensure a good fit on movie theater marquees as well as a place in their audience’s memory: the little Turner girl, Julia Jean Mildred Frances, for instance, became just Lana.
What’s the difference between with exemplification and without?
Try the—
*** (Wednesday/ Thursday/ Friday) is the darkest day of the week.
My *** (cell phone/ computer/ alarm clock…) is sometimes unreliable.
No one could be more scruffy than ***(someone you know/ have met before).
Sample Essay:
RIVER RAFTING TEACHES WORTHWHILE LESSONS
1 Sun-warmed water slaps you in the face, the blazing sun beats down on your shoulders, and canyon walls speed by as you race down rolling waves of water. No experience can equal that of river rafting. In addition to being fun and exciting, rafting has many educational advantages as well, especially for tho involved in school-sponsored rafting trips. River trips teach students how to prevent some of the environmental destruction that concerns the park officials, and, in addition, river trips teach students to work together in a way few other experiences can.
