Summary vs. Critique

In the following introduction paragraph, the student author uses summary at the beginning as she engages the reader with the topic of the essay she is about to critique. (See underlined section.) Later, she moves from summary to critique; that is, she makes a judgment about how the Brandt essay works (and doesn’t work). (See italicized section.)

Religion Vs. Kids

Who needs religion? There are many people in the world who do not believe in any religion. There are also parents who do not teach their children any sort of religion either. This is the dilemma raised in Anthony Brandt’s essay called “Do Kids Need Religion.” He looks at all the particulars in religious parents and children, and non-religious parents and children. Brandt also asks questions such as “What does a secular society offer a child,” and “ What do parents with no religious beliefs do when their children start asking those difficult questions about where Grandpa has gone, or why Jesus was crucified, and why people are so mean, and what will happen to them when they die?” (192) As one could see, this is a very controversial problem, which raises a lot of diverse questions, and this dilemma could be hard to take a side on. This is the main problem that Anthony Brandt seemed to have while writing his essay, just as most of the people he interviewed did and his readers did too. Although he makes the essay interesting, he never directly states where he stands in the argument. The use of psychologist’s opinion in his essay also makes the article uneasy and leaves the readers left out in the cold. If Brandt wrote the essay to overcome his own indecisiveness, he did not accomplish it in this essay.