Narrative as Argument

Narrative as Argument makes a strong case for English teachers adopting a wider conception of argument, one that recognises the legitimacy of both narrative and non–narrative forms of argumentation. What this book demonstrates is that the kind of conviction that narrative argumentation aims to produce necessarily involves both "heart" and "head" and is no less "reasonable" for not being the result of a process of sequential reasoning.

Beginning with Harriet Beecher Stowe's powerful anti–slavery novel Uncle Tom's Cabin and concluding with Des Colquhoun's "Angling for a Haul of Moggies", Narrative as Argument provides students with seven workshops, each of which is devoted to exploring in depth the use of a particular narrative strategy for creating new forms of ethical and critical awareness. Each Student Workshop is accompanied by a comprehensive Teacher Resource which provides background information and introduces key concepts. A wide range of texts — narrative and non–narrative, prose and verse, written and visual, contemporary and historical — is included.

Written with The Australian Curriculum: English in mind, Narrative as Argument will enable teachers to comprehensively address the requirements of the national curriculum for Years 10, 11 & 12.

Contents

• Preface
• Part 1. Empathy, Sympathy, Guilt: the power of the moral emotions
• Introduction to Part 1: The importance of Uncle Tom's Cabin — then and now
• Teacher Resource Workshop 1: Awakening sympathy for the Other
• Student Workshop 1: Uncle Tom's Cabin — Eliza Harris
• Teacher Resource Workshop 2: Promoting the recognition of Self–Other overlap
• Student Workshop 2: Uncle Tom's Cabin — George Harris
• Teacher Resource Workshop 3: Creating the need to act on behalf of the Other
• Student Workshop 3: Uncle Tom's Cabin — Augustine St. Clare
• Part 2. Defamiliarization: challenging accepted ideas, attitudes and beliefs
• Introduction to Part 2: Ostranenie — Viktor Shklovsky's indispensible idea
• Teacher Resource Workshop 4: Adopting an 'alien' perspective
• Student Workshop 4: Black Beauty by Anna Sewell
• Teacher Resource Workshop 5: What if the boot were on the other foot?
• Student Workshop 5: "The Limits of Trooghaft" by Desmond Stewart
• Teacher Resource Workshop 6: Reversing the irreversible
• Student Workshop 6: "Unchopping a Tree" by W. S. Merwin
• Teacher Resource Workshop 7: Perspective by incongruity
• Student Workshop 7: "Angling for a Haul of Moggies" by Des Colquhoun
• Links to The Australian Curriculum: English
• Bibliography