David Zarefsky is the Owen L. Coon Professor of Argumentation and Debate and Professor of Communication Studies at Northwestern University, where he has taught for over 30 years. He received his Bachelor of Science, Master's, and Ph.D. from Northwestern University. From 1988 through 2000, he served as the Dean of the School of Speech.

A nationally recognized authority on rhetoric and forensics, he is a past president of the National Communication Association (NCA) and recipient of the Distinguished Scholar Award in 1994 and the Distinguished Service Award in 2001. On no fewer than 12 occasions, his outstanding lecturing skills have been recognized by the inclusion of his name on Northwestern’s Associated Student Government Honor Roll for Teaching.

Dr. Zarefsky has authored five books, edited three more, and has published over 50 scholarly articles and reviews. He received the 1986 National Communication Association’s Winans-Wichelns Award for Distinguished Scholarship in Rhetoric and Public Address for his book President Johnson’s War on Poverty: Rhetoric and History and the same award again in 1991 for Lincoln, Douglas, and Slavery: In the Crucible of Public Debate.

What is effective argument?

* It is Abraham Lincoln at Cooper Union in 1860, marshalling many lines of evidence to make the case that Congress has the power to regulate slavery.

* It is Franklin D. Roosevelt in a 1940 "fireside chat," employing a vivid analogy to convince Americans to lend war equipment to Great Britain, then battling Nazi Germany alone.

* It is the U.S. Supreme Court in 1954, using complex reasoning to decide unanimously that segregated schools are unconstitutional in Brown v. Board of Education.

* It is any individual or organization, drawing on the theory of argumentation to reason through a position and make the best possible case for it.

Argumentation: The Study of Effective Reasoning, 2nd Edition, is a rigorous introduction to the formal study of argumentation—communication that seeks to persuade others through reasoned judgment.

In 24 lectures you learn the building blocks of an argument, the different categories of argument and the issues that are at stake in each, the kinds of evidence that serve as proof in an argument, and many other aspects of argumentation and reasoning, illustrated with examples from some of the most famous speeches, debates, and controversies in American history.