Claims of policy in editorial column of “The New York Times” newspaper

ABSTRACT

In term of academic writing, claim is used in argumentative essay. It is essential and have significant role. It can be a tool for distinguishing between what is true and what is false, what is valid and what is invalid. For this research, I focus on the claims of policy in which the specific policies should be stated as solutions to the problems. The purposes of the research are to identify the method used by the writers of editorial column on The New York Times Newspaper in presenting their claims of policy and the ways of the writers defending their claims of policy.

The claim analysis is limited to the text in editorial column from March to May 2010 on educational issue. The design employed is descriptive qualitative analyzing the way of the writer presenting and defining their claims of policy. To get the convenient and systematic data, I as the researcher become the main instrument by browsing the internet, reading and classifying the data. Then the data are presented and analyzed by using Rottenberg’s theory of claim.

The finding shows that the writers rarely state the claims explicitly in introductory paragraph. None of the essay used the method of quotation, question, paradox, definition and humour in introducing the claims of policy. They often use funnel type to give general statements about the subject in order to attract reader’s attention before coming to the thesis. The way the writer’s defense their claims of policy are as following: first, the data are not always stated explicitly in introductory paragraph. Second, the writer establish the changing of phenomenon happened in all data by order some suggestions and solutions to face the problem. Third, the writer considers the opposing argument then gives his opinion how to solve the problems. Fourth, the readers get distinct benefits from the solution given by the writer. Fifth, the writer gives some facts, interpretation and opinion as the solid data, moral consideration and common sense reason to support the policy. Moreover, the writer had shown using all patterns in ordering of the evidence. One uses chronological order, two use climatic and topical order.

Based on the findings above, it is suggested to be valuable source or reference for the students, lecturer, and also further researcher who need to sharpen their argumentative writing skill. The students can be trained to respond critically the writer’s argument and analyzed how to urge readers to follow a course of action. In addition, the result of this research is hopefully can help to cope the bewildering issue and used as a source to analyze claims of policy deeply.