TOW #13 - Flab to Fab - Visual

Today, we're going to look at an utter failure of a rhetorical text. This title-less visual advertisement which I have titled "Flab to Fab" based on its most outstanding text has no defined author, let alone a company or individual taking credit for its production. This lack of information on its origin is simply the beginning of this advertisement's problems. Let's take it from the top - at the top of this advertisement, it contains a quotation in multicolored, glaring text testifying to whatever is being advertised - information on that is absent. Most of the time, testimony is a rather effective tool, but when the quote comes from an uncited source, it loses any and all credibility The next outstanding issue with this ad are the images - which were a good idea, images are sometimes the quickest way to effectively communicate a point to an audience (whom is also completely undefined). However, the image represents this mysterious weight loss "something" in a very poor fashion. The first image, subtitled "before", displays a morbidly obese woman. The second image, subtitled "after", shows a slightly less obese woman. For a product trying to advertise dramatic weight loss, showing two obese people will not effectively communicate your point. The "before" and "after" points are also nullified by the first and second images containing people of obviously different skin color, thus proving the before and after subtitles to be falsifications. All in all, this advertisement is a poor attempt at creating an attention catching advertisement for a mysterious product - the mystery attempting to arouse curiosity in people, but only breeding disinterest. None of the apparent rhetorical devices are effective in the slightest, yeilding an ultimately ineffective text.

TOW #12 - The God Delusion - Richard Dawkins (IRB)

The God Delusion is a book written in 2006 by Richard Dawkins, a world renowned scientist and advocate for atheism and secularity. He is well known for his contributions to the science world, and holds an alma mater of Balliol College, Oxford. Given all of this, Dawkins begins The God Delusion with a large portion of automatic ethos. However, he does not rely solely on this throughout the first half of The God Delusion. Dawkins makes sure to support every argument he makes with innumerable statistics and facts. There is a notable lack of ethos throughout the book, but considering that this is a book focusing on science, the lack of emotional support makes sense. The heavy use of statistics, mostly probability calculations and supports for evolution, serve as undeniable evidence in support of Dawkins' claims. In any other book, the sheer number of facts and pieces of information that he cites throughout the text may seem overwhelming and unnecessary, but in a book that's topic is religion, there must be no shortage of information, because in a debate so heated, any gap in one's argument will be exploited. One problem with Dawkins' writing and arguments that is also present in many of his other works is that its tone can easily be interpreted as condescending. While this may not bother readers who already share some of his ideas on the topic, those who are of the opposite mindset and read the book will feel snubbed by this tone, and become biased towards others of similar mindset to Dawkins', thinking that everyone of that ilk is as condescending and arrogant. Thus, The God Delusion's argument to this point is effective, but largely nullified by its tone.

TOW #11 - Effects of Music on Society by Andrew M - Written

I do not know who Andrew M. is. I just know that he is somebody who decided to have an essay published on the internet.  I find this lack of instant ethos to be really interesting, and overall beneficial to Andrew M's rhetoric. The lack of any background knowledge of his origins and whatnot casts away any bias one could have towards him, leaving it up to him to establish his point, regardless of outside information, and he does that fairly well throughout this essay. One of the most effective strategies that Andrew uses in this essay is the quotation of reputable sources and studies for his information, establishing both ethos and logos at the same time. This focus on these two, and the neglect of pathos, is okay - this is a more factual essay; it presents raw informationa and interprets it. Another thing that is done quite well in this essay is the presentation of an unbiased argument through the use of varied studies. Over 6 different studies are cited throughout the paper, and all of them present unbiased arguments presenting the positive and negative effects of music on society today, which is his thesis - presenting just how important music is to our society. Overall, Andrew M. does a great job convinving his audience of the importance of music in society, using ethos that is built from the ground up, reputable studies, and varied studies throughout the paper.

TOW #10 - Porsche Advertisement - Visual

Porsche cars are widely renowned as some of the better luxury cars for their price range. They are quality vehicles that are quite expensive, but serve their uses with beautiful aesthetics and high performance. This advertisement uses several different tools to convince the reader that a Porsche is the right car for them. Amongst these are appeals to Pathos and Ethos. The strongest of appeals is that of an appeal to nostalgia. The ad calls upon reader's senses of nostalgia by asking them if they really dreamed of owning a nissan or a mitsubishi, both mid-price "decent" cars. This serves as both an appeal to Ethos and Pathos, reinforcing the Porsche brand by comparing it to two other brands of cars seen as being inferior. It appeals to Pathos by calling upon the reader's past, when they still had dreams and optimism and happiness, and connecting the Porsche brand to those happy feelings. Another appeal is to the user's sense of aesthetics. The layout of the advertisement is in grayscale, and has a very clean appearance to it. Cleanness and good aesthetics are things that people look for in cars, and Porsche uses these two in the advertisement to again connect its name to these things. By using these positive feelings and associating them with their name, Porsche forges a strong advertisement that is effective and subtle, making use of nostalgia and aesthetics to reinforce their name and reach readers' emotions.

TOW #9 - The Death of a Moth - Virginia Woolf (Written)

Virginia Woolf was an acclaimed novelist throughout her life, which started in 1882 and ended in 1941 by suicide. She suffered with mental illness her whole life, and it eventually ended it. Her essay, The Death of a Moth, was published a year after her death in 1942. It is a short essay whose topic is, well, the death of a moth that Woolf happened to see on her window. Whilst that is the obvious, first-level subject, the true subject is mortality in general. Taking into account the fact that this was written shortly before she died, it is easier to see that this is an essay about mortality. She uses her description of a moth as a metaphor for the life of a human being with bipolar disorder with stunning accuracy. At first, she describes the moth as a pitiable being, after watching it flutter about for a while, she realizes that it has none of the freedoms that she would have imagined it having before considering its significance. This symbolizes a sort of "death of innocence" that comes to a lot of people when bipolar sets in around age 18 for most people who have it. She then describes it standing still for a while, not really moving, struggling a bit against some force that she can't see. This represents the depressive phases that are encountered by sufferers of bipolar disorder. She then describes the death of the moth, her realization that it isn't moving because it's trying not to die. She documents its short time spent struggling to get up and continue moving, but then interprets its motions and eventual ceasing as an acceptance of death, which is what many bipolar sufferes eventually succumb to, Overall, given some background knowledge, this is effectively a suicide note from Woolf, and it communicates that quite effectively through the use of a dying moth as a metaphor for the life of a bipolar sufferer, probably being herself.

TOW #8 - How to Win Friends and Influence People (IRB)

How to Win Friends and Influence People is a book by Dale Carnegie, a writer and lecturer who focused a lot on self-help and social improvement. Many of his works focus around the idea that one can influence and change the behavior of others by changing your behavior towards them. After completing the text, I can only vouch for the effectiveness of the ideas Carnegie puts forth in How to Win Friends and Influence People. Whilst the content in the second half of the book is, of course, different from that of the first half, the rhetorical devices used to support it are by and large the same. Many anecdotes from successful people are used to back up each "strategy" that Carnegie propoese will help you to win friends and influence people. This is the same as any other form of endorsement in marketing or the likes. Having successful people's names and ideas in your work will make people connect said work to success. There is also a wry, subtle humor spread throughout the book. This humor is not too frequent, but appears just often enough to keep readers' attentions during some of the drier portions of the book. Both of these strategies appeal to ethos and pathos, without any logos. That is because this book is about people, and the interactions between them, two very intangible concepts that are nearly immeasurable, rendering any form of logos in a book like this moot. All Carnegie needs to do is keep you interested (Pathos) and make you trust that what he says for you to do will be good (Ethos). He achieves both of these very well, and in turn, writes a helpful and convincing book.

TOW #7 - 3 Most Important Things in Life - Harlan Ellison (Written)

Harlan Ellison was, at the time of the anecdote he references in this essay, a "Nice quiet Jewish kid from Ohio... a published author... well into terminal destitution. Poverty would have been, for me, a sharp jump into a higher-income bracket." He introduces himself as such to give the impression that he's been in many walks of life, and that he's experienced many things. This is a good way of establishing ethos bit by bit throughout the entirety of the essay. Most of the essay, however, is focused around getting to readers' emotions through the use of humor and vivid descriptions of the environment, both physically and emotionally. This focus on pathos seems appropriate for the topic of the essay, being the importance of Sex in one's life, with sex being a thing of emotion, not logic. The essay was originally published in a porn magazine, which matches the lack of true philosophical depth in the essay - though the title claims to speak on the subject of the importance of sex in one's life, the true purpose is to simply tell a story. Ellison does so with stark clarity, using descriptive but simple diction to get the events that he's relating across with style and grace. He also makes great use of humor throughout the essay in order to keep his readers interested. He uses surprising events and descriptions to evoke humor, such as the end of the essay, whereupon tying his date to the ground, naked, in the kinkiest of positions, instead of furthering his conquest, he leaves. Another funny bit of surprise is when his date suddenly asks him to hit her. These humorous moments, coupled with vivid descriptions that truly put you in Ellsion's shoes, come together to help Ellison achieve his true goal of narrating an entertaining anecdote quite well.

TOW #6 - She's a W.O.W. - Visual

The following image, called She's a W.O.W., was illustrated by a man named Adolph Triedler. He was a fairly well-known artist from the beginning of the 20th century through 1981, when he died. He illustrated in several different "genres" - he did a large number of magazine covers and commissioned advertisements in his time. She's a W.O.W. is one of these commissioned pieces. The poster was created in 1942 to attempt to get more women to help in the war effort for WWII by becoming Woman Ordnance Workers, or WOWs, or in simpler terms, weapon makers. The image evokes emotions of guilt and then confidence in order to persuade women to join the war effort. The image was produced in 1942, in the midst of WWII, one of the most brutal wars that the world had seen to date. Many men had gone off to war and left their families behind, and people were feeling as if they weren't doing enough to help their country. The poster plays on this by referencing "The girl he left behind", targeting in specific the wives and girlfriends of the men who went off to war. Calling them "The girl he left behind" is a way to make it seem like the women are staying at home and not doing their part. However, after this guilt, the image offers up a solution - a way to give the "women who were left behind" a chance to help out and be useful. The use of the phrase "Still behind him" acknowledges the fact that the women working will not be at the forefront, but still helping. They show an empowered-looking woman, standing tall, shoulders square, looking upwards and onwards, saying "you can be this empowered, if you become a WOW". Overall, it's failry effective given the gender roles that were present and accepted at the time, it showed something that women could do to feel powerful, and used that want to be useful to get workers for the war effort.

TOW #5 - Damn it Feels Good to be a Gangster (written)

Damn it Feels Good to be a Gangster is a song by the 90's rap group The Geto Boyz. Like many others of the time, The Geto Boyz worked in a genre called gangster rap. Songs within the genre often tackled two general topics: the definition of and the degree of being a gangster that the authors of the song have achieved, and modern politics. Both of these topics are heavily delved into throughout the text. The first topic is adressed at the very start of the song, with the lyrics "Damn it feels good to be a gangster." Spoken by Scarface. Right out of the gate, defining himself as a gangster, saying it as if everyone knew it to exude an air of confidence in his being  gangster. Shortly thereafter, he defines being a gangster as being a relaxed, non-confronttional, unbragging, philosophical person. All of these points are made with direct statements, delivered in a didactic tone so as to convince people that these things are the definition of a gangster without any real, direct proof. In a later verse, Scarface goes on to say that gangsters are decisive and "pull the trigger" without talking about it much, and that real gangsters don't run away from their problems. He uses the sme rhetorical devices from the first verse to this one. The last verse, spit by J. Prince, is one that adresses the topic of modern politics. At the time of release, George W. Bush was the president of the United States of America. J. Prince takes a negative stance towards Bush's presidency, and makes many accusations that are mainly supported by ethos. He calls Bush a gangster, something that one wouldn't want their president to be. He then accuses Bush of "Lettin' a big drug shipment through (and sending it) to the poor community so we can bust you know who." This accusation of purposefully letting drugs into the poor community on purpose in order to keep them down and catch drug dealers is a very strong statement, and is guaranteed to raise strong emotions of support in the audience, which was mostly intended to be consumers of gangster rap, who tended to be anti-Bush. This appeal to ethos in people who are already in support of J. Prince's ideas is guaranteed to get Prince's desired effect. Overall, Damn it Feels Good to be a Gangster is a successful rhetorical text in its goals to define a gangster and criticize George W. Bush, but mostly in its intended audience of gangster rap consumers. To anyone outside of that consumer base, the first point may be even more successful in that the audience is solely basing their opinion on what a gangster is on what Scarface is saying. The second point may be far less convincing, however, because of the baselessness of the claims made towards Bush's behavior.

TOW #4 - How To Win Friends and Influence People (IRB)

How to Win Friends and Influence People is a book by Dale Carnegie, a writer and lecturer who focused a lot on self-help and social improvement. Many of his works focus around the idea that one can influence and change the behavior of others by changing your behavior towards them. That idea is very present in How to Win Friends and Influence People. One might even say that its one of the central pillars of the book so far. Well, I'm saying it. The book is a self-help book, but I feel like that title does both the book itself and its audience injustice. The book is accessible to literally anyone who wants to improve their social skills, be it for solely interpersonal reasons, or if they want to succeed more in the business world by networking better. The book has been a standard for improving social skills since the 30's, when it was released. Its advice has stayed relevant even until today. The book utilizes many, many many anecdotes from successful people supporting exactly why the strategies Carnegie suggests would work, which is a strong appeal to ethos. I feel like the book so far is sort of lacking in logos, but that makes sense. Social "science" is more abstract than any other science, and this book was written in the 30's, so some of the information about how the brain acts in social situations wasn't available, so an imbalance in Ethos and Logos is okay. Overall, I find that Carnegie has been achieving his purpose very effectively. His purpose is to help people to function better in social situations and to interact with people more effectively without any sort of malicious manipulation. He achieves this well, because I've been using some of the strategies he outlines in the book, and I feel like I've been overall better in social situations. It's a book that's gained popularity from the testimony of those who were affected by it, and I'm tossing my lot in with them.

TOW 3: Serial Experiments Lain: Weird (visual)

Serial Experiments Lain is a sci-fi TV show from the late 1990's. It is regarded for its artful direction. ambitious atmosphere, and a plot that is up for any sort of interpretation. It was produced by the now defunct Triangle Staff and directed by Ryutaro Nakamura, who has worked on over 29 different major projects over his career. This is the first episode of the series, so its purpose is to mainly set the scene and mood for the rest of the show. Considering that the first scene is the suicide of a middle-school aged girl, the audience is presumably a more mature group. Lain was produced in the era when Macintosh computers were just beginning to take over the world with their sleek, smooth designs, and their advanced capabilities. Lain focuses on that technological rush of the time, making the internet one of its main topics. As I mentioned earlier, the show begins with the suicide of a middle school girl. Shortly after this exposition, her classmates begin recieving emails from the girl who just committed suicide, saying that she left the corporeal world to become more present in The Wired, a construct that seems to be very similar to the then growing internet. It sets a dark, technological pretense over the episode, and gives the impression that the rest of the show is going to be this way. In scenes where Lain is traveling to and from school, be it by walking or on a train, there is always a faint electrical humming noise in the background, and power lines and cables are almost always overhead, adding to the technological theme of the show. The music in the show is very conservatively placed, and if there is music playing, it is very faint and ambient. Just like the music, dialogue and speech is kept to a very low threshold, usually being quiet and austere. All of the shadows in the show have a shifting red and black effect to them, as if to say that the shadows could be concealing anything. Many scenes involve several different angles of a room, following the same event in relatively quick succession, a direction choice by Nakamura that truly fleshes out the atmosphere of every scene. Very little plot advancement occurs in this episode, aside from Lain deciding to explore the idea of getting a computer and exploring the Wired that her dead classsmate spoke of. Instead, it uses its time to layer a dark, spacey environment in which every element is open for interpretation. Weird sets a great tone for the rest of Serial Experiments Lain.

TOW 2 - Team Ben: A Year as a Professional Gamer

Team Ben: A Year as a Professional Gamer is about Chris Fabiszak, or as he is known in the competitive gaming world, "Wife", and his experiences as a professional gamer. He was, and still is to an extent, a professional gamer, and this is his memoir as both one of the driving forces behind and a participant in the "golden age" of Super Smash Bros. Melee. The book is mostly aimed at members or potential members of the competitive Super Smash Brothers scene, but can also be appreciated and understood by those who aren't really a part of the competition. Wife's purpose in writing the book is to tell his story while giving readers a little more understanding of just how technical Smash is. He achieves this by using a mainly narrative tone and having didactic interludes with frame data about the game - describing what exactly happens in the game is it happens, frame by frame - one sixtieth of a second at a time. This frame data provides much to his argument that Melee is an extraordinarily technical game, giving a strong backdrop of Logos to his argument. He tells the story as if it were an annotated paper - all of his thoughts about the situations he was in are on the page in front of you, giving you a truly first-person look at competitive smash through his eyes. Everything is thoroughly described, and we can feel his mind racing when he's in a match, and his mind wandering into realms unknown when he fantasizes about what smash could become. All in all, it's a great book that puts into words Smash's deep complexity and the wonderful experiences that one can have at the many tournaments that are hosted worldwide. I know this because I have lived a lot of what he talks about, and I feel that he puts the thoughts and feelings of a Smash player on paper better than I ever could.

IRB Intro 1 - How to Win Friends and Influence People

How to Win Friends and Influence People is a book by Dale Carnegie, and it was written in the early 30's. However, one still hears about it and its effectiveness, and any book that maintains its power after 80+ years must be very well written. I've heard great things about it, and its topic is something that I've been trying to work on recently - interacting with others and motivating yourself. It seems like its going to be full of different rhetorical strategies for me to analyze, so I think that it'll be a great fit for this class.

TOW 1 - How to Say Nothing in 500 Words

Paul Roberts was an author who focused on English as a topic, approaching it with a very serious viewpoint. His helpful writings gave some ideas to approach writing as an art, not a task. This is made apparent by his writing in How to Say Nothing in 500 Words, a passionate guide in writing. The piece puts forth a situation, being given a prompt and the instructions to write 500 words about it. He then goes on to explain some of the things that people do in order to extend their writing when given a word count, and says that these extensions will only get you a poor grade. After this is an elaborated list of things one can do to avoid saying nothing in 500 words. With the example of a college student preceding the majority of the piece, this is written for students, in order to help them be more effective and engaging with their writing, and to keep them from wasting their words. The author uses several subtle but effective rhetorical devices in order to make his writing a more effective means of communication to his audience. The first we see is immediate, right off of the bat, putting the reader into a position that would make it easier for them to understand the author's points, a position that, given the intended audience, would probably have been experienced several times by said audience. This immersion helps readers better see from the author's perspective. Another rhetorical device that the author uses well is alternating humorous and didactic tones. This means that the author weaves together humorous writing that both keeps readers interested and makes them open to suggestion, and didactic writing, which takes on a more sage, authoritative tone that makes people feel like their being taught, and puts them in a mindset to remember what they're being told. Overall, it's a very effective and useful piece of writing, and I know I'll be using this throughout the year.

John Muir - Stickeen

     John Muir was primarily a naturalist, one who spent a lot of time in nature and with animals. He published many of his accounts of several expeditions and explorations through nature, and has lots of experience with animals and all things having to do with the wilderness.

     John Muir’s Stickeen is an essay about his adventures through a harsh Alaskan glacier, named the Brady Glacier, and its terrain with a dog named Stickeen as his companion. The story takes place in 1880. They go through a fairly perilous experience together, with one helping the other along the way. Both Muir and Stickeen are both changed after their experience together. That brings me to Muir’s purpose – although most of the essay is spent describing the events that took place on the Brady Glacier, I find that the most important part of the essay comes from one of the last lines, “Thereafter Stickeen was a changed dog. During the rest of the trip, instead of holding aloof, he always lay by my side, tried to keep me constantly in sight, and would hardly accept a morsel of food, however tempting, from any hand but mine.” Muir’s message is that tragedies and difficult situations can bring two souls together. This message was probably intended for other naturists and animal lovers like Muir himself, considering that almost all of his work was published in naturist’s publications. Muir uses a huge amount of description and figurative language to put you in his position and make you understand exactly what he was experiencing, all to make you better understand the ordeal, and in turn better understand what it was that brought Muir and Stickeen closer together.

Muir's story of Stickeen and how hardships can bring people together reminded me a lot of rescue efforts following natural disasters, and how it brings people together against a common enemy that is found in the form of a tragedy.

Image from nyc.gov

William James - The Moral Equivalent of War

William James was a philosopher and psychologist who lived from 1842 to 1910. He was the first educator to offer a psychology course in the United States. In his time, he was widely known to be the “Father of American Psychology”.

     William James’ The Moral Equivalent of War is a rumination about how James thinks that society should reform itself into one where everybody is enlisted into an army, but not one that fights other armies. He suggests a mandatory army that fights against what he calls nature – more specifically, the concept of everything that mankind struggles against. James wrote this essay to express his opinion and philosophy for what he believed would be close to an ideal society in which nobody fought each other, but banded together to fight common enemies in the forms of any challenge that any man faced. He uses the idea of an army to fight an enemy who does not feel pain.

This essay was originally a speech he gave at Stanford, so it is most likely intended for students and intellectuals, people who could appreciate the depth of his philosophical ruminations and possibly ask questions that would either allow him to go further into the reasoning of his opinion, or perhaps even make him revise it.James makes great use of theoretical discussion, putting forth ideas for what may happen as opposed to actual tests which would be impossible to do. The very basis of most philosophical discussion is theoretical discourse, so theory is very effective at getting his ideas across. I think that James does a good job expressing his ideas and theories. He’s very clear and straightforward in his explanations, particularly about how his proposed army would not really be an army at all, and how “nature” is not just natural events, but any challenge that mankind faces.

     This essay came from someone who lived through the Civil War and remembers its horrors. James published this in a time when he was older than most people, and he saw World War I coming, and knew it would be waged by people who hadn’t seen war before. The essay comes off a bit like an elder giving an apprentice advice.

Just like this album cover, William James suggests a Fragile Army - One that doesn't fight with weapons, but just by working together to a common cause.

Cover credited to the Polyphonic Spree.

Mark Twain - Corn Pone Opinions

Owen Reilly

Great American Essay Blog Posts

Mark Twain's Corn Pone Opinions is an essay that deals with the topic of most people having an opinion that is shaped by the majoirty of people around them. The driving quote behind the essay is, “You tell me whar a man gits his corn pone, en I’ll tell you what his ‘pinions is.”

Mark Twain, whose real name was Samuel Clemens, was an author and journalist who lived from 1835 to 1910. He has written over 500 literary manuscripts, 30 published books, and countless letters and other writing works.

The story is a fairly humorous writing that also contains a great deal of social commentary and opinions. It begins with an anecdote about him and his friend, a slave who remain unnamed. He speaks about how this slave was a wonderful speaker, and how one of his speeches has stayed with Twain throughout his life: “You tell me whar a man gits his corn pone, en I’ll tell you what his ‘pinions is.” This means that most men get their opinions from the people surrounding him and his environment.

Twain wrote this essay in order to point out a comical inconsistency between the definition of opinion, meaning an individual thought, and the fact that most people’s opinions are not their own, but gathered from the people around them.

Twain’s intended audience was probably a group of people that enjoyed social commentary and comedy with a serious message behind it, so Corn Pone Opinions, although never published during his lifetime, was probably intended for readers of a magazine, or other more select literary pieces.

Twain uses anecdotes and examples as supporting evidence along with humor to help bring his point across to readers. Anecdotes and examples make it easier for readers to understand and see from his viewpoint by putting them in a place he was once standing, while humor helps to lighten the story and make readers more receptive to his opinion.

With all of the examples and logical ideas Twain puts forth in this essay, I think he gets across to potential readers very well. He uses several rhetorical devices to great effect, and he makes a sound argument for his point that most people’s opinions are, on the surface, from everyone around them.


                                        The common man, according to Mark Twain
                                   From Wikipedia user Jack Hynes, in the public domain.