21.1 辩论
21.1A 辩论场合和论题选择
1） 有两种场合的辩论：非正式辩论和正式辩论。两个汽车司机狭路相逢，几乎相撞，于是双方下车争论谁是谁非；哥哥和妹妹吃完饭后都不想洗碗，并为之争执起来。像上述这类场合的争论都属于非正式辩论，往往越争论越离开正题，相互指责甚至谩骂。这样非正式的辩论不属本章所讨论的问题。我们这里讨论的辩论属于正式辩论（Formal Argumentation），它具有两个特点：
一是辩论双方可能会争得面红耳赤，但不失去控制，不作人身攻击；
二是坚持依靠推理和论证阐述自己的观点，力图在辩论中说服对方。
2） 在论题选择上要注意辩论的对象和范围。例如在论述本地区的建筑规划时，论题应集中在公共建筑上，而若论述学校建筑，则应集中谈教学区、生活区、办公区及文体设施上，不应论述范围过泛，更要避免脱离本题。此外，有的论题很容易得到答案（如“Swimming is a healthful and enjoyable activity”，“George Washington was six feet tall”），有的论题属于个人爱好 （如“Blue is a prettier color than green”，“Basketball game is more interesting than football game”），也不应进行辩论。
21.1B 两种辩论题旨与三种逻辑推理策略
1） 进行辩论的主旨有两种：
一种是为了说服对方接受自己的观点、信仰、主张等，这叫做“Proposition argument”：提出自己的主见后，接着陈述理由和加以论证，这和说明文体有相似之处，但重点是强调对方接受与否的利害关系。
另一种是提出问题和解决方案，这叫做“Problem-solution argument”，突出说明自己提出的为什么是最佳方案。例如：
I can sum up very briefly my position with regard to the question we are discussing. I am dissatisfied with the present Freshman English course in its typical form; but I am convinced that any radical amelioration must wait on, not precede, changes in the English curriculum in high school. Attempted coercion of high school English teachers would get us nowhere. They would like to do a better job of teaching writing quite as much as we would like to have them do it; but we must help them, working with them as equals on a problem neither they nor we have so far been able to solve properly. If our combined efforts lead to the results we want, the need for this present Freshman course would disappear — but not the need for a new Freshman course that would take advantage of and build upon the revised high school courses. I would argue that such a course ought to be at least as much value to the Freshman as any other course he might take in that year — valuable because it would concentrate on trying to raise the level of his writing skill from competence to distinction, and valuable also because it would contribute significantly to his liberal education through the continued study of literature and language. Both of these are rightful concerns of an English department.
Indeed, I think they are obligations.
（Albert R. Kitzhaber）
在1959年全美英语教师理事会上，Warner G. Rice教授提出取消现设的一年级英语课程，持相反观点的Albert R. Kitzhaber教授则主张加以改革。上面是他的发言的结尾段落，他扼要说明了为什么改革的方案比取消的方案更为实际和有效。
2） 虽然辩论的主旨可能有所不同，但都离不开逻辑推理（Logical reasoning）。在进行逻辑推理时，有3种基本策略：
一是激发读者/听话者的兴趣和感情；
二是引用公认的权威论点；
三是提出有力的证据。
例如：
The Almighty has His own purposes. “Woe unto the world because of offenses! For it must needs be that offenses come; but woe to that man by whom the offense cometh.” If we shall suppose that American slavery is one of those offenses which, in the providence of God, must needs come, but, which, having continued through His appointed time, He now wills to remove, and that He gives to both North and South this terrible war, as the woe due to those by whom the offense came, shall we discern therein any departure from those divine attributes which the believers in a living God always ascribe to Him? Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bondman's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with a sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said, “The judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.”
With malice towards none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in — to bind up the nation's wounds — to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow and his orphan — to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.
（Abraham Lincoln）
21.1C 两种推理方式与四种三段论结构
1） 前面20.2A介绍了说明体的两种格式，即“演绎”和“归纳”，这也是进行推理的两种基本方式，而且在具体场合往往是将两种方式综合应用。
所谓“演绎法”（Deduction）,是从一般情况推论到个别情况。
例如：
Determined People who live in huge homes, have servants, and drive expensive cars are wealthy.
Generalization The Johnsons live in a huge house, have servants, and drive an expensive car.
Conclusion The Johnsons are wealthy.
而“归纳法”（Induction）正好相反，即从个别情况推论到一般。例如：
Individual This supermarket-brand item is cheaper than its comparable name-brand item.
Instance Each of these other seventeen supermarket-brand items is cheaper than its comparable name-brand item.
Conclusion Supermarket-brand items are cheaper than comparable name-brand items.
2） “三段论”（Syllogism）是建筑在演绎法上的推理方式，由主前提（Major Premise），次前提 （Minor Premise）和结论（Conclusion）3部分组成，这里介绍三段论的4种基本结构。
第一种结构为“ALL”式：
All freshmen are dorm residents.
（All A's are B's.）
All the members of the Green Team are freshmen.
（All C's are A's.）
Therefore, all the members of the Green Team are dorm residents.
（All C's are B's.）
第二种结构为“SOME”式
No graduate students are dorm residents.
（No A's are B's.）
Some older students are dorm residents.
（Some C's are B's.）
Therefore, some older students are not graduate students.
（Some C's are not A's.）
第三种结构为“IF”/THEN”式
If the stadium is finished, then the team will open its season there.
（The stadium is finished.
Therefore, the team will open its season there.）
第四种结构为“EITHER/OR”式：
Either the Common Market succeeds or Europe falls.
（The Common Market is succeeding.
Therefore, Europe will not fall.）
21.1D 推理中应注意的几个问题
1） 要注意前提本身的正确性、合理性，否则必然得出不恰当的结论。例如：
Abortion is a form of murder.
All forms of murder are wrong.
Therefore, abortion is wrong.
显然，笼统说“abortion is wrong”的结论是不正确的，而结论的毛病又来自前提。
2） 要注意主、次前提之间逻辑的严密性，防止话题转移并导致荒谬的结论。例如：
Major premise: All property owners favor reduced real estate taxes.
Minor premise: Janet favors reduced real estate taxes.
Conclusion: Therefore, Janet is a property owner.
3） 注意了解、研究应用三段论的范例。例如：
Our society has moved illogically in this direction by virtually institutionalizing adultery; a growing number of spouses permit each other complete sexual liberty on the conditions that there shall be no “involvement” and that the extracurricular relations are not brought to their attention. It is beginning to institutionalize ritual spouse exchange.
（Alex Comfort: Sexuality in a Zero-Growth Society）
上面这段话可以用“三段论”格式表示为：
A society that encourages ritual spouse exchange is a society that institutionalizes adultery.
Our society is a society that encourages ritual spouse exchange.
Our society is a society that institutionalizes adultery.
又如：
The cases of Adolf Beck, of Oscar Slater, of the unhappy Brooklyn bank teller who vaguely resembled a forger and spent eight years in Sing Sing only to “emerge” a broken, friendless, useless, “compensated” man — all these, if the dignity of the individual has any meaning, had better have been dead before the prison door ever opened for them. This is what counsel always says to the jury in the course of a murder trial and counsel is right: far better to hang this man than “give him life.”
（Jacques Barzun: In Favor of Capital Punishment）
上面这段话也可以用“三段论”格式加以表示：
An experience that takes away individual dignity is worse than death.
Long imprisonment is an experience that takes away individual dignity.
Therefore, long imprisonment is worse than death.
这里需要说明：上述逻辑推理固然符合三段论的要求，也有一定的道理，但存在着明显的片面性和表面性，因为“死刑”是在一定历史时期内解决特殊社会矛盾的一种极端的法律手段，是否采用它，应以维护社会安定和群众生命财产安全为准则，而不能只从个人尊严角度着眼；对于长期监禁，也要看到它们的必要性和积极方面，不宜一概否定。总之，如果能从不同方面分析问题，就会更有说服力。
21.2 记叙
21.2A 展开记叙的两条线索
1） 前面19.2B2讲到时间次序（Temporal Order），这正是开展记叙文的一个基本线索。在叙述文中，我们经常使用表示时间的词语，如when, once, at the same time, now, while, then, before, after, next, all the time, during, on such occasions, simultaneously, soon, suddenly, 等等。正是这些表示时间次序的词语把一系列的动作连接起来，形成一个完整的记叙。例如：
When we got the ham home, my mother immediately stripped off the white paper and the string in the middle of our chipped white-enamel kitchen table. There it lay, exuding heavenly perfumers — poud, arrogant, regal. It had a dark, smoked, leathery skin, which my mother carefully peeled off with her sharpened bread knife. Then the old man, the only one who could lift the ham without straining a gut, placed it in the big darkblue oval pot that was used only for hams. My mother then covered the ham with water, pushed it onto the big burner and turned up the gas until it boiled. It just sat there on the stove and bubbled away for maybe two hours, filling the house with a smell that was so luscious, so powerful as to have erotic overtones. The old man paced back and forth, occasionally lifting the lid and prodding the ham with a fork, inhaling deeply. The ham frenzy was upon him.
（Wanda Hickey）
2） 前面19.2B3讲到的空间次序（Spatial Order）是开展叙述文的另一条线索。通过一部分到另一部分的叙述（其中交织着描写），给读者一个立体的概念。这种记叙往往仍然以时间序列为线索。下面是记述几个人乘一叶小舟航行于正在溶化的南极冰山之间的一段动人经历：
They rose and fell on the heaving sea, drawing deceptively apart, then closing with a thud that would have smashed our boat like a gas-mantle between thumb and finger. Castles, towers, and churches swayed unsteadily around us. Small pieces gathered and rattled against the boat. Swans of weird shape pecked at our planks; a gondola steered by a giraffe ran foul of us, which much amused a duck sitting on a crocodile's head. Just then a bear, leaning over the top of a mosque, nearly clawed our sail. An elephant, about to spring from a Swiss chalet on to a battleship's deck, took no notice at all; but a hyena, pulling a lion's teeth, laughed so much that he fell into the sea, whereupon a sea-boot and three real penguins sailed lazily through a lovely archway to see what was to do, by the shores of a floe littered with the ruins of a beautiful white city and surrounded by huge mushrooms with thick stalks. All the strange, fantastic shapes rose and fell in stately cadence, with a rustling, whispering sound and hollow echoes to the thudding seas, clear green at the water-line, shading to a deep blue far below, all snowy purity and cool blue shadows above.
（F. A. Worsley）
21.2B 构成记叙的三个要素
1） 情节（Plot）、背景（Setting）和角色（Character）是叙述文体的3个要素。
“情节”是整个记叙的支柱和框架，由一系列精心安排的事件组成。在较长和较为复杂的记叙中可能有两个或更多的重要情节，它们相互配合或穿插，次要情节服务于主要情节，以形成故事的主线。
“背景”指故事发生的时间和地点，以及有关的周围情况。例如讲述一个足球明星的故事时，可能讲到他出身运动员世家，甚至其父年轻时就是足坛新秀；还可能讲到他的家乡，那里足球运动很普及，等等。背景有助于烘托故事情节，也为人物的出现交代了客观背景，从而使人物更为真实和可信。
“角色”包括人或物，大多数的故事都有几个角色，其中有主要角色和次要角色。角色必须有自己的个性和特征。
2）“背景”的叙述要简明扼要。对情节要善于剪裁和安排，避免繁琐和平铺直叙；一般事件一笔带过，以便有足够的篇幅容纳情节高潮。例如：
For two weeks we camped on the banks of the Truckee. During the days we went fishing for trout and perch; at night we cooked the day's catch, drank hot chocolate, and told stories around the campfire. Usually, before dinner we would gather at the campsite and mend each other's wounds — the various scratches, rashes, bruises, and contusions that camping out causes. Weary but content, we would then retire to our chores, followed by dinner, storytelling, and then sleep, in down bags laid out on the pine needle cushion of the forest.
在较快地交代了两个星期的活动情况以后，转向叙述最后一天所碰到的事，并使故事达到高潮：
On the final day of our trip, I decided to take a walk beside the Truckee and to follow a straggly path that burrowed into the undergrowth ...
3） 角色的成功与否是故事叙述是否成功的关键。背景和情节都是为塑造角色服务。在塑造角色时要抓住三个关键：一是形象描写，二是语言特色，三是想法和行动，而这三个方面都需与情节有机地结合起来。下面一个故事情节简单，人物只有三个，整篇故事四个段落，第一段为背景，后面三段分别叙述英国人、法国人和富兰克林的祝酒词，在故事高潮时表现了富兰克林的高度机智和胆识：
Franklin was dining with a small party of distinguished gentlemen, when one of them said: “Here are three nationalities represented. I am French, and my friend here is English, and Mr. Franklin is an American. Let each one propose a toast.”
It was agreed to, and the Englishman's turn came first. He arose, and, in the tone of a Briton bold, said, “Here's to Great Britain, the sun that gives light to all nations of the earth.”
The Frenchman was rather taken aback at this; but he proposed, “Here's to France, the moon whose magic rays move the tides of the world.”
Franklin then arose, with an air of quaint modesty, and said, “Here's to our beloved George Washington, the Joshua of America, who commanded the sun and moon to stand still — and they obeyed.”
21.3 描写
21.3A 描写体的特征和使用场合
1） 描写的目的是通过语言给读者或听者以生动、鲜明的形象。这些形象虽然是以文字描写出来的，但有时比具体色彩绘成的形象更有感染力，因为它们不但有人或物的形状，还会让读者或听者感到声响，思维变化以及颜料无法表达的一些韵味。
前面19.2B和21.2A都提到时空（Time & Space）概念，这在描写中更有集中体现；虽然同记叙相比，记叙更重时间，而描写更重空间，从而使被描写的对象形象鲜明和具有立体感。这里是法国女作家Francine du Plessix Gray笔下的一座小城堡：
The landscape out of Aunt Charlotte's window was as flat as any in my memory; there was not a hillock, not a rock, to disturb the monotonous platitude of its horizon. A serene, dead-straight alley of luxuriant chestnut trees stretched from the little castle to the country road. To the left, stood some dilapidated buildings that had once served as stables and servants' quarters. The old greenhouse to the right of the entrance had also been abandoned since the war, when the family fortune declined sharply. In the flower beds circling about the castle's entrance, only the simplest and most tenacious of flowers — hydrangeas, geraniums — fought their way nobly through tall clumps of weeds.
2） 描写文体常见于下述四种场合：
第一是在日常谈话或商业广告中对有关对象的某些主要特征加以简要描写，这种描写方法叫做 Popular method；
第二是在旅游胜地介绍和小说中对有关对象的多方面特征加以合理组织和富有技巧的描写，从而推出鲜明丰满的艺术形象，这种描写叫做Artistic method；
第三是在科技文章对有关对象的特性加以完整、准确的描写，如同摄影和复印一样，目的给人以真实的印象，这种描写叫做Scientific method;
第四是在诗歌和其他一些文艺作品中通过描写激发读者或听者的联想，并通过自己的想象得到艺术享受和启迪，这种描写叫做Suggestive method。
当然，这四种方法是指基本特征而言，不可将它们截然分开，因为在实际使用中也会相互渗透的。
21.3B 写好描写文的两个关键
1） 好的描写一定要抓住两个关键：突出的印象和丰实的细节。试比较下面两个描写主题句：
（a） The student lounge is a place where students congregate in a leisurely fashion and as a consequence it is not always attractive and neat.
（b） The student lounge is a messy room.
上述（a）句过于松散，主题被冲淡了，给读者的印象模糊，而（b）句简练有力，messy一词立刻抓住了读者的注意力：怎么样的一个messy room呢？
接下去就是要做好细节描写。如照上述（b）句进行描写，就要紧紧围绕messy着笔，不要写学生如何做功课，也不要写墙上有什么彩色画报，而要写诸如吐在地毯上的口香糖、肮脏的桌子上抛下的蛋壳、三明治包装纸、塞满烟灰和烟蒂的饮料盒，等等。
练习二十一 （Exercise Twenty-one）
I. Preview Questions:
1. What are the two types of argumentation?
2. Can you tell the difference between “proposition argument” and “problem-solution argument”?
3. How many basic tactics should you bear in mind in logical reasoning?
4. Which, between deduction and induction, is the approach of reasoning from a general idea or set of facts to a particular idea or facts?
5. Syllogism refers to a reasoned argument in which there are two statements leading to a third statement. Do you know how to call these statements?
6. What are the four basic structures in Syllogism?
7. Why is it important to make sure that the major premise must be correct?
8. What two basic orders can you follow in Narration?
9. How many basic elements does Narration consist of?
10. Are the four basic methods in Description separated from or integrated with each other?
