Rhetorical Analysis Reflection

I wrote my rhetorical analysis on the essay “On Dumpster Diving” by Lars Eighner. I actually enjoyed writing this because it was one that involved more critical thinking and had more depth than what I was used to writing in high school. Writing this paper really helped me hone in on my skills in analyzing pieces of writing and show me where I need to improve. Most importantly, it showed me what strategies of mine worked when writing a rhetorical analysis. I’ve always viewed a rough draft of a paper as a final draft with grammatical errors. As such, I always think the rough draft has to be perfect and I run into major writing blocks. But, in writing this essay, I discovered a strategy that has really helped me formulate my ideas better and smooth over the writing process. On this essay I wrote my analysis in chronological order of how it was written in the book. This made my ideas flow faster because it meant I didn’t have to scatter my attention to different parts of the book and organize my essay at the same time. After I finish getting all my ideas down I already know how I want to arrange my essay. I doubt that this is a new discovery, as teachers have probably been trying to get me to do this for years. It’s definitely better that I started using this strategy late instead of never.

I’ve always had difficulty writing effective conclusions because I always get stuck thinking that I’ve already said everything that I want to and don’t know how to finish the essay. Getting my paper back confirmed that I need to work on my conclusions. In the conclusion I just repeated some of my main points and in the future I’ll have to work on finding a way to put all my ideas together so that it gives the essay closure and progresses it a little bit further. I think that to get better at writing conclusions it will just take practice, in addition to reading and analyzing papers that have model conclusions.

The only other major problem I had in this essay was concerning syntax. Most of my favorite authors write in a stream-of-consciousness style, which I enjoy reading. This can tend to influence my writing without me knowing it. I believe this adds to my problem with grammar and punctuation. Sometimes I’ll write my thoughts instead of translating them to literary English and I have to go back and edit my phrasing until it’s clear. Reading back over my paper when it was handed back helped me see the areas where I needed punctuation or better phrasing of an idea. Fixing my problem with syntax shouldn’t be too difficult. Double and triple checking my essays, in addition to reading them out loud will help a great deal with this issue and help me get better at spotting sentences that don’t sound correct.

Overall, this paper really helped me learn to express my ideas a lot better. It also showed me what I needed to work on and how I should manage my time during future papers.

Conscious of consciousness by minding the mind

I read “Allegory of the Cave” and thought it was a great piece. It was a narrative about a discussion Plato had. In this discussion he describes a situation where people spend their lives in a cave and one man is set free. Throughout the story he makes the point that the reality of one person isn’t necessarily the reality of another. I also read “The Banking Concept of Education” and I believe that it had many smart ideas. The author tries to make the point that the system of education where the teacher simply “dumps” knowledge onto the students. He then poses a better solution to the problem, a solution in which both the students and teacher benefit and learn more than just facts.

Both of these essays are focused on the philosophy of though and perception. In “Allegory of the Cave” it is implied that greater understanding of life in general comes from having a clearer picture of reality. “The Banking Concept of Education” expresses the theory that to have a true education students must see the world not as static and filled with facts, but as a dynamic process which if full of problems and solutions.

It isn’t too complex of a task to memorize facts and equations but I think true advancement can only be attained once an important ability is acquired. This ability is being able to understand that what one thinks is reality isn’t necessarily what is truly real. The reality that a person perceives is called a paradigm. A paradigm can inhibit progress if somebody “knows” that something is impossible. An example of this can be seen in the cave that Plato describes. The people in it believed that what they saw were the only things that existed and they would never be able to move or leave. Perhaps if they had believed that there was possibly something else out there and escape was possible their thinking wouldn’t be so limited and they could have found a way out. I think a good lesson to be learned from these stories is that things are never as limited as they seem if you learn to entertain the idea that the impossible is possible.

Synthesis

The article “Blue-Collar Jobs Disappear, Taking Families' Way of Life Along” and Michael Moore’s documentary were very similar subject matters. The article was about a town in Ohio where many of the major employers were leaving. This meant that many people were laid off and had to get low paying, entry level jobs, if they could get one at all. Moore’s documentary, “Roger and Me,” was about the same concept. The people of Flint, Michigan were all left in a horrible economic condition after a General Motors plant decided to shut down.

Both of these reports focused on small towns that were devastated because of a lack of employment after the status quo changed. The reporting relied on the personal stories of people who became poor to try to emotionally appeal to the audience. The common trend in these towns is that a major employer left and destroyed the local economy. Perhaps it’s not a good idea for towns to rely too heavily on one business or another. The market is always changing and there’s always a chance that a factory will have to shut down or a business will have to relocate. When a town puts all their eggs in one basket it leaves itself open to numerous disasters. The town plays a part in it but business ethics play a large role in these situations too.

It can be argued that these businesses were wrong for just moving and leaving these towns in poverty, an opinion that I, personally, agree with. Businesses have rights too though; it doesn’t seem fair to say that once a factory is made somewhere that they aren’t allowed to close. It also doesn’t seem reasonable for a large factory to close and leave everybody unemployed. I think that the best solution would be that when a large employer closed they offered new jobs, even if the positions were out-of-state, to the people that work there. That may not be a great solution but at least it would help those who are in desperate need of a job. In conclusion, I think that many economic situations are full of compromises where it is very rare that everybody wins.

Blue-Collar Jobs Disappear, Taking Families' Way of Life Along

The article I read was called “Blue-Collar Jobs Disappear, Taking Families' Way of Life Along”. This article was about Jackson, Ohio and the problem they are currently having with good employment. Many major employers in this area have left which means that many people there have to settle for low paying jobs. This is happening because an economic disaster struck the industry in that area years ago and they never fully recovered. This leaves the people in that area with very few options in terms of where to work. One woman said, “If you don't work at Wal-Mart, the only job you can get around here is in fast food.'' Families who used to make enough money to live comfortably now barely scrape by because they have to settle for low paying jobs that can’t fully support them. The article is filled with stories of people who had comfortable lives and were laid off. They all had to move to a low paying job, sometimes two, which requires no skill. Most of the people had done well at their previous jobs and were laid off without warning.

This ties in very closely with what happened in “Roger and Me” to the town of Flint, Michigan. In both areas major employers were removed and this left families living on welfare or just able to make enough money to survive. Also, in both cases nothing is really being done to help solve the problem of unemployment. It’s sad that this is happening in so many places and that the government isn’t taking more action to reduce the poverty that’s taking over towns like these.

"Blue Collar Jobs Disappear, Taking Families' Way Of Life Along"

Roger and Me

I've seen "Roger and Me", by Michael Moore, before but after recently watching the documentary again I appreciated it more than I did last time because I was able to rhetorically analyze what he was doing and why. His documentary is about how there thousands of workers were laid off in a small town when a General Motors decided to close its car plant there. This act almost completely destroyed the small town economically. Moore makes extensive use of pathos and logos in his documentary as he travels around the little town with his camera. His use of logos is especially apparent and helps his case a great deal.

Moore’s most evident use of logos in the film is how he brings up the point that after the auto plant closed the town saw a drastic increase in crime, poverty, and welfare. The best illustration of this is when Nightline tries to do a live news story on the plant closings somebody steals their van which halts the broadcast. Additionally, the sheriff is filmed evicting many of the residents of the town and Moore interviews a woman who sells rabbits as pets and food to be able to scrape by. These are both rhetorically good scenes because the make use of the logos by showing the cause and effect of the plant closing and they evoke a strong emotional response via the pathos at the same time.

The strongest part of the film comes at the end when the GM’s CEO, Roger Smith, is giving a speech near Christmas about generosity. While playing the speech, Moore intersperses scenes of families being evicted from their home as a result of the layoffs. This ending emphasizes the irony of what Smith is saying and reminds the audience that his decision caused a great deal of poverty. Overall, I think that “Roger and Me” was a good documentary and an excellent piece of rhetoric.

Passing Before Life’s Very Eyes

“Passing Before Life’s Very Eyes” was a slightly confusing graphic novel upon the first reading. Once you understand the concept and everything that is going on you begin to realize that this is a very deep and existential. It is essentially a story of an old man on his death bed and his experiences as he slowly fades from conciseness. Wolfgang makes great use of his words and images to appeal to the pathos of his readers throughout the comic.

He starts by making you feel sorry for the old man by showing him alone in a hospital bed with his eyes closed. This connects the reader to the man emotionally by showing his sad situation. You then see the “spirit” of the old man leave his body and go through various past memories of his life. The author appeals to the pathos by showing that the old man had a very fulfilling and joyful life. Wolfgang does this by showing happy and warm scenes such as the old man reading stories to his grandchildren, walking with his wife, playing catch, getting married, and so on. He meets himself as a young boy and his younger self begins to explain what is happening.

Near the end the images make you feel bad for him as you can see he is losing his mind. He begins to talk to himself as a young boy, each frame is wildly different and random compared to the last one and are filled with him in different forms. This tells the audience that he is nearing death, as random memories dominate his thoughts. The final words and page apply very strongly to the pathos. When he asks his younger self what happens after death he replies “More than likely, things just sort of-“ and the next page is blank. The reader is left not feeling sorry for the old man because of death but instead knows that the old man lead a great life and dies in a very content, painless way. I found “Passing Before Life’s Very Eyes” to be an entertaining, interesting and rhetorically sound piece.

The Southland

I thought that The Southland, by Henry Miller, was a well written piece. It is a short essay about the South in the United States. It aims to reach readers of all different backgrounds, genders, and races. It mainly seeks to talk to those who dislike the South for any reason. He tries to convey all the hidden beauty in the South to everybody who has yet to experience it themselves. He does this through the use of vivid imagery throughout the entire essay to try to get the reader to let go of some of their reservations about the South and see it through Miller’s eyes.

All of the imagery in this essay does a great job of appealing to the pathos. He describes the scenery and feeling of the South in a way that gets the reader to momentarily see past their dark history and appreciate the beauty of the land. Miller also makes use of ethos by constantly informing the reader that he visited those places and seen all the sights with his own eyes. He describes visiting and traveling all across the South and makes sure his audience knows he has extensive firsthand experience in the South. Miller doesn’t attempt to appeal to the logos enough, this may be because the beauty he is trying to describe can’t be conveyed though facts. Overall, I think this was a well written piece full of great imagery that kept me interested until the end.

Apple.com Analysis

The website I chose to analyze is Apple’s site. When the page first opens you’re greeted with a large picture of their new notebook and at the top there are a few links to their major product areas. If you scroll down you see a headline ticker and a couple small pictures of some of their newer products. The creator of this page is Apple Inc and this is made fairly obvious by the sleek, simple, businesslike design of the page. They created this website for all their consumers so that they could get the latest information of Apple’s new products directly from the source. Their audience is the consumers and prospective customers. They clearly made this site for them and this purpose because the only things on there are pictures of products and links to more in-depth information about everything.

The main appeal of the website when you first visit is to the ethos. They have their logo and products up in a very plain design. This is meant to show the audience that they are dealing with a professional company who knows what they are doing. The main page does very little to appeal to the pathos but they do try to appeal to the logos. They accomplish this by advertising a couple main benefits of their products. This tries to convince the viewer that this is the best thing to buy and that Apple has a wealth of great products. Overall, I believe that Apple has a very well designed site. They keep it focused on the products and extremely easy to use and navigate.