Points: 75
Page requirement: five full-pages minimum
MLA Documentation required (in-text citations and a Works Cited page)
Source requirement: One source minimum, Eating Animal
Please go through these videos before starting(I would really appreciate it)
Writing Assignment #5: Argument Analysis and Evaluation Essay
Points: 75
Page requirement: five full-pages minimum
MLA Documentation required (in-text citations and a Works Cited page)
Source requirement: One source minimum, Eating Animals
Purpose and Overview
This writing assignment is going to be different than the previous four because this time you are going to be writing a formal essay. In the previous assignments, I was focusing on the content, not the form of your writing. In this essay, I will be focusing on both the content and the form of your writing. Just to be clear, this essay needs to follow standard MLA format and standard essay organization.
Writing Task
Analyze and evaluate Foer’s argument in Eating Animals.
To analyze is to break something down into its parts. For example, we can analyze how the digestion system works: the mouth grinds the food; the esophagus channels the food-mush to the stomach where it mixes with ac- ids that further breakdown the food into usable and unusable parts, which are passed to the intestines where the usable parts are absorbed into the body and the unusable parts are sent out the exhaust pipe. When you analyze an argument, you break it down into parts and explain how they fit together to construct a coherent system of support for the main claim. When analyzing, remain as objective as possible and make sure your representation of the argument is accurate and complete.
To evaluate is to judge the quality of something. When you evaluate an argument, you are trying to determine
if it is strong or weak, if it is persuasive or not. In a sense, the analysis serves the evaluation — we analyze
in order to evaluate. This means that your evaluation needs to be the primary focus of your essay. To do this successfully, you first must make sure that you accurately analyzed the argument; the quickest way to botch an evaluation is to misunderstand the argument. A strong analysis can easily transition into an evaluation. Once you see how each part fits together, you can identify the weak parts and disconnects, or on the other hand, you might see how each claim is firmly supported by air-tight logic and verifiable facts. Observing your own response to his argument will help you evaluate it: why did he or didn’t he persuade you?
Rough Draft Workshop: Wednesday, April 20. Submit your rough draft on Canvas.
Peer Review: To get all the points for the rough draft, you will also have to complete a peer review by Friday, April 22. If no peer review is completed, you will lose 7 of the 10 points possible on the assignment.
Writing Assignment #5: 75 Points Possible Focus: five points
Support: forty points
Organization: ten points
Style & Mechanics: ten points MLA Documentation: ten points
Late Paper Policy: If your essay is late, ten points will be deducted from the score for every day that it is late.
Example : underdeveloped
In his case against factory farming, Foer discusses the topic of animal abuse and
malpractice within factory farms. This can be seen in his chapter “hiding/seeking” where
Foer gives a first hand account of what exactly the conditions are inside of a factory farm.
Foer describes in his account, “Because there are so many animals, it takes me several
minutes before I take in just how many dead ones there are. Some are blood matted; some
are covered in sores. Some seem to have been pecked at; others are as desiccated and
loosely gathered as small piles of dead leaves.” (Foer 89). Foer uses his testimony of the
poor living conditions of animals in the poultry industry to paint a grim picture to the
reader of how factory farming really is. By using these graphic details that readers may
have been previously unaware of, such as poultry being “blood matted” and “covered in
sores”, it helps in support of his claim to how these animals are really treated. In
conjunction with this, Foer discusses factory farms and a different kind of malpractice in
animal production. Foer makes the claim that factory farming is not only harmful for the
animals they produce, but possibly for the consumer. An example of this is in the chapter
“Influence/speechlessness”, where he describes what is known as ‘fecal soup’. In the text,
Foer discusses fecal soup being “massive refrigerated tanks of water, where thousands of
birds are communally cooled…water in these tanks has been aptly named ‘fecal soup’ for
all the filth and bacteria floating around” (134-135). He goes on to explain, “water
chilling causes a dead bird to soak up water (the same water known as ‘fecal soup’)”
(135). Not only does Foer use this as further insight to the mistreatment in animal
production but the dangers to the consumer from these products. Both of these examples
used, are to strengthen his argument in the malpractice of factory farms as well as send a
message to the reader that change needs to take place.
Example: fully developed
Jonathan Foer explains the lives of animals in factory farms by breaking it down into
parts: poultry, pigs, cows, and fish. Foer claims that not only are the lives of these animals cut
short, but they are also contained and slaughtered with brutality. He explains that birds are held
in sheds that are “45 feet wide by 490 feet long, each holding in the neighborhood of 33,000
birds” or “larger sheds up to 60 feet by 504 feet, housing 50,000 or more birds” (129). He states
that pigs are held in crates so small they can barely move. He also reveals how sows are
treated when giving birth or “farrowing”: “The farrowing crate, like the gestation crate, confines
the mother in a space so small she cannot turn around. Sometimes she will also be strapped to
the floor.” (185). Foer explains that cattle used to be kept on the range “for four to five years,
today they are slaughtered at twelve to fourteen months” (226). Fish are kept in small tanks
crammed against one another. The tanks are filled with dirty water which is contaminated with
sea lice that eat holes through the fishes’ faces (189-90). Foer illustrates not only the lives of
these animals but the deaths of them as well.
Once their time is up the animals go through the slaughtering process. Poultries are
dragged along conveyor belts, electrocuted/stunned, cut by mechanical blades, and
occasionally boiled alive (133). Pigs are stunned by electric prods to the head, hung upside-
down by their legs, and stabbed in the neck and left to bleed to death (155). Cows are first led
into the “knocking box” where a stun operator shoots an electrified bolt between the cow’s eyes
rendering it unconscious, killing it, or just making it dizzy. Some cows are still conscious and/or
wake up when they are chained and hoisted up by one leg and moved along a conveyor belt to
have their throats cut open by a mechanical blade (229-32). Fish are slaughtered by having
their gills sliced open before being thrown into a water tank to bleed to death (190). Foer claims
not only do the animals suffer from the factory farms’ methods of slaughter, but they also
generate health risks towards consumers (141-3)
