223 Learning to analyse
In this chapter you will learn:- that of all the thinking skills, analysis is probably the most useful in
opening up rich sources of ideas for you to use in an essay; - how to free yourself from your own preconceptions, so that you can
think more freely and see more of the implications of questions; - how techniques similar to the three-step technique have been the
source of some of the most important intellectual achievements.
Of course, not all the questions you tackle will offer up their concepts
so easily as the authority/power question. In many of them the concept
will hide, lurking behind the most innocent word. And in some ques-
tions it will be difficult to decide whether it’s worth analysing the
concept at all – it may not be central to the issues the question raises,
taking you in a direction that’s irrelevant. In these cases you just have
to take the concept and analyse it carefully to see what’s there. In most
questions you’ll find that by doing this you will open up a treasure of
all sorts of ideas you can use. The question just seems to unfold before
your eyes and you know exactly the arguments to pursue and the
research you need to do.
But, obviously, the key to this is to learn to analyse the concepts well.
Of all the thinking skills we use this is the most neglected, even though
it’s probably the most useful. Without it we have no means of seeing
a problem clearly, so that we can use our creative abilities to fashion
a solution. Similarly, we have no means of seeing what it is about an
argument that we dislike, so we can go on to criticise and improve it.
In fact almost every intellectual activity begins with some form of
analysis to make it clear what we’re trying to tackle. It gives direction
and purpose to our work. Without it we’re likely to be at a complete
loss as to how to set about the question.HTW3 7/26/01 8:45 PM Page 22