About the Book

<body>  <a href="#lastcrumb" title="Skip Breadcrumb Navigation" onfocus="expandMenu('breadskip');" onblur="hideSkip('breadskip');" ><img src="/wps/media/styles/1480/_skins_/D/default_blue/pixel.gif" width="1" height="1" alt="Skip Breadcrumb Navigation" border="0" hspace="0" vspace="0"></a><div class="submenu" id="breadskip"><span class="breadcrumbs">[Skip Breadcrumb Navigation]</span><noscript>: <a href="#lastcrumb"><span class="breadcrumbs">[Skip Breadcrumb Navigation]</span></a></noscript><br> </div> <table border="0" cellspacing="2" cellpadding="0"> <tr align="left" valign="top">  <td align="left" valign="top"><a href="/long_alexander_an_1/27/7031/1799965.cw/index.html" target="_top" class="breadcrumbs" >Home</a></td>  <td align="left" valign="middle"> <img src="/wps/media/styles/1480/_skins_/D/default_blue/breadcrumb_arrow.gif" alt=" arrow " width="21" height="9" hspace="0" vspace="2" border="0"> </td>  <td align="left" valign="top"><span class="breadcrumbs"><a name="lastcrumb" id="lastcrumb">About the Book</a></span></td> </tr> </table> <p /> <span class="breadcrumbs">No Frames Version</span><br> <span class="homepageTitle">About the Book</span><p /> <P><i>Argument Now</i> is designed to help you help yourself develop, strengthen, and explore your writing skills. The chapters in <i>Argument Now</i> reflect our belief that good writing instruction will orient you toward thinking about writing as a process of playfulness and creativity, introduce you to various writing situations you will encounter in college (and beyond), and offer you advice and strategies for taking your writing to such specific "destinations" as publishing, either in print or on the Web. The first section, <b><i>Writing Orientations</i></b>, contains two chapters. The first reviews the basics of the <b>writing process</b>, thinking throughout about how computer technologies can help us develop useful writing processes for a variety of writing situations. The second chapter introduces you to <b>academic writing</b>, the primary kind of writing you will encounter in college-level courses. The next section, <b><i>Writing Situations</i></b>, offers three chapters exploring <b>argumentative</b> writing, <b>research</b> writing, and <b>visual literacy</b>, which is an increasingly important skill to develop given the number of media—from television to the Web—that rely on visual cues to communicate. Finally, in the remaining two chapters, grouped under the heading <b><i>Writing Destinations</i></b>, we'll invite you to put into practice what you have been learning throughout this book and ask you to consider writing projects that combine <b>research and argument</b>, as well as projects that involve <b>writing for the Web. </b><p> Also, at every step, we will look at how various computer technologies can assist us with a multitude of writing tasks and projects. We have several reasons for emphasizing writing with computers in this book. Writing and communicating in academic and professional life are increasingly mediated by computer technologies—which is largely why we call this book <i>Argument </i><b><i>Now</i></b>. Learning those technologies—how to use them effectively, how to manipulate them, how to be creative with them—is quickly becoming vital to your survival as a literate person in the contemporary world. Beyond that, we believe that computer technologies can greatly aid in developing various writing skills. For instance, most word processors have tools such as spell-checkers, text-summary programs, and other features that are frequently useful in working through a variety of writing tasks. Moreover, writing in a <i>networked</i> environment can allow us to share writing, confer with others, create innovative writing spaces, and even gain access to vast amounts of information on the World Wide Web, which has some superb<i> </i>resources for developing writing and communication skills. </p> <p> Here's something to keep in mind throughout your reading of both the textbook and this Companion Website: <i>Argument Now </i>alone cannot teach you how to write, and it certainly cannot teach you everything you need to know about computers. As you use the book and this site, you will soon learn that developing effective writing skills and becoming an intelligent, thought-provoking writer depend on a number of factors—particularly the assistance of other people, such as your instructors, your peers, and the advice of professional tutors and writers. Fortunately, computer technologies such as the Internet can greatly facilitate our discussions and work with such people. </p> <p> With that in mind, we invite you to take up the challenge of challenging yourself to build on what you already know about writing and to expand your sense of the possibilities of writing—in a variety of contexts, personal, professional, and academic. And since the best writing benefits from carefully considered feedback, we also invite you to send us your comments about both the book and this Web site. You can easily reach us by e-mail: for Jonathan, try <A HREF="mailto:jamma@fuse.net" >jamma@fuse.net</A>, and for Margaret, try <A HREF="mailto:margaret.barber@colostate-pueblo.edu" >margaret.barber@colostate-pueblo.edu</A>. We look forward to hearing from you. </p> <P>See the book's <A HREF="/long_alexander_an_1/27/7031/1799967.cw/index.html" TARGET="_top" >catalog page</A> for more information.</P> <br> <p /> <ul> <li> <a href="/long_alexander_an_1/27/7031/1799966.cw/sitenav/index.html">Site Navigation</a><br /> <li> <a href="/long_alexander_an_1/27/7031/1799966.cw/leftnav/index.html">Navigation for About the Book</a> <ul> </body>