Writing Analytically, 6th Edition - Rosenwasser, David & Stephen, Jill [92]
Here are two key principles:
Everything means; that is, everything in life calls on us to interpret—even when we are unaware of doing so.
Meaning is contextual; that is, meaning-making always occurs inside of some social or cultural or other frame of reference.
WHAT INTERPRETATION DOES
Offers a theory of what X means, not fact
Supplies a context for understanding X that is suggested by the details
Strives for the plausible, not the certain: explains individual details
and patterns of evidence
Supplies reasons for why evidence means what you claim it means
MOVING FROM DESCRIPTION TO INTERPRETATION
Throughout this book, we have been defining analysis as a search for meaning, a search conducted primarily through discovery of significant patterns in your evidence. In Chapter 3, Analysis: What It Is and What It Does, we noted that the process of noticing, of recording selected details and patterns of detail (analysis), is already the beginning of interpretation. Analysis differs from description and summary because it triggers larger interpretive leaps.
As we also argued in Chapter 3, the first step toward arriving at and persuading others to accept your interpretation is to make the most of the observation stage by following these two rules:
Describe with care. The words you choose to summarize your data will contain the germs of your ideas about what the subject means.
In moving from summary to analysis and interpretation, look consciously at the language you have chosen, asking, “Why did I choose this word? What ideas are implicit in the language I have used?”
Your readers’ willingness to accept an interpretation is powerfully connected to their ability to see its plausibility, that is, how it follows from both the supporting details you selected and the language you used in characterizing those details. An interpretive conclusion is not a fact, but a theory. Interpretive conclusions stand or fall not so much on whether they can be proved right or wrong, but on whether they are demonstrably plausible. Often, the best you can hope for with interpretive conclusions is not that others will say, “Yes, that is obviously right,” but “Yes, I can see where it might be possible and reasonable to think as you do.”
A major point of this chapter is that interpretive contexts are suggested by the material you are studying; they aren’t simply imposed on it by a writer. Explaining why you think a subject should be seen through a particular interpretive “lens” is an important part of making interpretations reasonable and plausible. Our discussion will illustrate how, once an interpretive context is selected, a writer goes about analyzing evidence to test—as well as support—the usefulness of that context.
Different interpretations will account better for some details than others, which is why it enriches our view of the world to try on different interpretations. Ultimately, you will have to decide which possible interpretation, as seen through which plausible interpretive context, best accounts for what you think is most important and interesting to notice about your subject.
HOW TO INTERPRET
Organize the data (do The Method)
Move from observation to implication (ask So what?)
Select an appropriate interpretive context
Determine a range of plausible interpretations
Assess the extent to which one interpretation explains the most
MAKING INTERPRETATIONS PLAUSIBLE ACROSS THE CURRICULUM
As we note at various points in this book, the practices governing data gathering, analysis, and interpretation differ as you move from one academic division to another. In the humanities, the data to be analyzed are usually textual—visual or verbal details. In the social sciences, data are sometimes textual, as would be the case, for example, if you were analyzing the history of a particular political theory or practice such as free speech. But much analytical thinking