Rhetoric in Modern Media

When I think of a specific piece of media that abuses rhetoric, I think of America’s Got Talent. With every act that is good, they always try to sell the fact that that person has a tragic backstory and it makes the audience want that person to do good, and when they do, it’s all the more satisfying to see. AGT uses pathos and appeals to the audience’s emotions to try to enhance the person’s act.

In-Class Blog – The Cleanest Line

In the article, “The Art of Loss”, I learned about Zaria Forman, an artist that uses art as a way of conveying the modern day issue of climate change. She talks about a theory in “behavioral psychology” that says emotions, more than anything else, move us to action. I thought of this concept and found it to be very interesting. People do not see anything for what it is by just blatant statistics, they need to “feel” something. Forman says that by making an art piece like this, she can show people the power of climate change and how it is critically affecting our world.

While doing research for her art piece, she came across a scientist who grew up with an artistic background. He says he “knows the importance of communicating data in a way that antiseptic numbers can’t”. This was really interesting, because even the scientists themselves agree that you cannot influence people through numbers and studies alone, you need to be able to get people to act through sending a message of sorts.

Global warming has become such a big issue. Not only are we harming the animals in the polar ice caps by destroying their habitats, but we are also harming ourselves essentially through rising sea levels. It has gotten so bad that we have almost reached a point of no return where we cannot simply “go back” to the way it was before. All we can really do now is to make sure that the situation we have put ourselves in does not get any worse.

What Is “Academic” Writing? – Reading Response

In high school, there was always a clear-cut outline of what the teacher wanted. But now in this class, it seems like the assignments are going to be a lot more “free form” in terms of how we are are allowed to write. Also, it seems like we will go over more abstract topics like ones we have not talked about before, so we will probably have to do more studying than ever before in high school. Because my previous school was so strict on the use of “I”‘s, it made the writing very boring for me, with academic writing however, it looks like there is some ease on the use of “I” so that might be interesting for me.

Its very hard to find instances where two different essay assignments were done in a different way, as they were all done in almost the same fashion; one introduction paragraph, three body paragraphs, and finally a conclusion. It wasn’t always the same amount of body paragraphs however, sometimes we would do five instead of just three. There was one teacher however that taught writing in a different way. I remember that she would have us write our rough drafts over and over every week, revising and critiquing our work as well as others’. It was a tedious process, but it made our essays turn out great in the end.

An assignment that were going to be doing later this semester is an assignment on “Rhetorical and Argumentative Analysis”. Our audience will most likely be the professor and the other students, and the occasion is probably the professor trying to teach us about this specific topic. I do not know if we are going to have personal opinions towards this subject, but if we do, I’m guessing it has something to relate towards how we write our papers.

Introduce Yourself (Example Post)

This is an example post, originally published as part of Blogging University. Enroll in one of our ten programs, and start your blog right.

You’re going to publish a post today. Don’t worry about how your blog looks. Don’t worry if you haven’t given it a name yet, or you’re feeling overwhelmed. Just click the “New Post” button, and tell us why you’re here.

Why do this?

  • Because it gives new readers context. What are you about? Why should they read your blog?
  • Because it will help you focus you own ideas about your blog and what you’d like to do with it.

The post can be short or long, a personal intro to your life or a bloggy mission statement, a manifesto for the future or a simple outline of your the types of things you hope to publish.

To help you get started, here are a few questions:

  • Why are you blogging publicly, rather than keeping a personal journal?
  • What topics do you think you’ll write about?
  • Who would you love to connect with via your blog?
  • If you blog successfully throughout the next year, what would you hope to have accomplished?

You’re not locked into any of this; one of the wonderful things about blogs is how they constantly evolve as we learn, grow, and interact with one another — but it’s good to know where and why you started, and articulating your goals may just give you a few other post ideas.

Can’t think how to get started? Just write the first thing that pops into your head. Anne Lamott, author of a book on writing we love, says that you need to give yourself permission to write a “crappy first draft”. Anne makes a great point — just start writing, and worry about editing it later.

When you’re ready to publish, give your post three to five tags that describe your blog’s focus — writing, photography, fiction, parenting, food, cars, movies, sports, whatever. These tags will help others who care about your topics find you in the Reader. Make sure one of the tags is “zerotohero,” so other new bloggers can find you, too.

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