This unit gives students the opportunity to build skills essential to crafting and communicating effective arguments. Every academic discipline and profession values the ability to articulate a clear argument and to support it with logical reasons and persuasive evidence. Achieving the learning outcomes of this unit will therefore enhance students' experiences of learning activities and assessment tasks in other units. The unit is based on the premise that arguments are essential in multiple contexts, including but not limited to education, the law, business, the media, politics and public policy, and everyday life. Knowing how to describe and defend (or indeed, concede) a particular point of view is important because it enhances individuals' capacity and confidence to express and refine their ideas. Further, argument is a means of inquiry: a process for grasping the nuances of any issue and for evaluating the relative strength of different perspectives. Students in this unit will: analyse a selection of polemical essays, speeches and other resources in order to better understand the techniques and strategies used by expert communicators to persuade audiences of particular points of view; learn how to respond critically and confidently to arguments presented by peers and in the public arena; and practice writing and speaking persuasively by completing a series of formative assessment tasks.