Page 19 - Sociology and You

Identifying Central Issues
Identifying central issues will help you organize information and assess the most important concepts to remember.
Learning the Skill
To identify a central issue, follow these steps:
1. Understand the context in which the reading was written.
2. Skim the material to identify its general subject. Look at headings and
subheadings.
3. Read the information carefully to pinpoint the ideas that the details sup-
port.
4. Identify the central issue. Ask what part of the reading conveys the main
idea.
Read the following excerpt from a paper entitled “The Crisis of the Young African American Male and the Criminal Justice System.”
In recent years policy attention regarding the crisis of the African American male has focused on a variety of areas in which African American males have suffered disproportionately from social ills. These have included education, housing, employment, and health care, among others. Perhaps in no other area, though, have these problems been displayed as prominently as in the rate of crime and
Good debaters must identify the central issues in a topic and in their opponents’ arguments. Do you think political candi- dates do this well?
Sociology Handbook HB-5