Original text: Academic Argument Defined
Academic writers use argument as a tool for understanding how the world works or ought to work and how we attach meaning to our actions and creations. Within the university, an argument is undertaken less as an expression of disagreement than as an effort to build knowledge. Researchers—your instructors included—make observations and present findings as written arguments to be published in journals or delivered to colleagues at conferences. They know as they write that others may raise challenges and that, when challenged, they themselves will respond. Through this process of argument and counterargument, researchers build knowledge and make decisions.