Purpose

For this Spotlight, write a paragraph that summarizes and responds to a source that disagrees with your point of view.

Content

First and foremost, bear in mind that your argument should be the focus of everything in your paper. This means that in order to complete this Spotlight, you’ll have to already know what your main claim for your paper will be. Once you have that in mind, you can begin approaching this paragraph.

There are two tasks that you’ll have to perform in this paragraph: first the “They Say,” and then the “I Say.”

The “They Say” part will be introducing and explaining your source’s point of view—that is, the idea that you disagree with. You’ll need to explain what the writer says, and some of their reasoning, as fairly as you can. Remember, this is “They Say”—you’re summarizing their ideas, not presenting your own.

Once you’ve presented their ideas fairly and accurately, then it’s time to respond. Present your response to their statement. Explain why you think this writer is wrong. Provide your reader with evidence and reasoning to show why they’re wrong and you’re right. You’ll likely find that you need to use evidence from other sources to show why the person you’re responding to is wrong.

Where It Fits

This kind of paragraph is another common task that writers undertake. While there are a lot of different places it can happen, there are two places where it most commonly fits.

The most common place you’ll find a paragraph like this one is introducing a paper or a section. We’ll often see essays where the writer’s argument is built around responding to someone else. (See, for instance, Paul Krugman’s article “The Real Poverty Trap).” Presenting other writer’s opinions, or commonly held beliefs, is a common way to introduce a piece of writing that challenges those ideas.

The second common place you’ll find a paragraph like this one is after a writer has presented their own case. Often, a writer will present her own argument, explain their point of view, and then turn to this kind of paragraph as a way of helping overcome readers’ objections. You can think of this as a sort of “I know what you’re thinking” paragraph—where the writer acknowledges that you’ve heard what she has to say, but that you might have a reason to object to what she’s saying. At that point, she can respond to that objection directly, making her argument stronger.

Both of those places can work for this Paragraph Spotlight.