Although I’m not exactly sure what topic I would like to focus on for my second assignment, a topic I had in mind that Vonnegut constantly addresses is the idea of fate and a pre-destiny. It comes up throughout the whole book. The main basis of the belief of Bokonon is the idea of everyone having their own karass. This idea, in itself, has hints of that fate or a pre-destiny is present in everybody’s life. Even on the very first page when explaining his name he mentions the idea of fate in that his name would’ve been Jonah no matter what. He says, “…I would’ve been Jonah still–not because I have been unlucky for others, btu because somebody or something has compelled me to be certain places at certain times.” All the important occurences in the book even have come up by chance. Even the members of his karass were all people that were closely involved with the creator of the atomic bomb. His adventure in trying to write his book about the day the bomb was dropped ultimately led him to an island, San Lorenzo, where Bokonon originated. Various characters that he introduces are introduced by chance. For instance in chapter 41 he introduces the Mintons who, by chance, end up being his seat-mates. It’s intersting because Horlick Minton is the American Ambassador for the Republic of San Lorenzo and later on in the book Jonah ends up getting involved in the government of San Lorenzo as well. Even with Mona his future wife ended up being an idea of fate. He first saw her picutre somewhere else an thought she was so beautiful then on the plane to San Lorenzo he finds out that she is to be married to Frank, member of his karass, but in the end he has to end up marrying her and her ideas and beliefs doesn’t exactly match with his. The idea of the cat’s cradle is the main focus in this book and the idea of fate/pre-destiny really intertwines with this main idea because although he really thought Mona was beautiful and would be perfect for him and she ended up not being what he expected. I think that Vonnegut really believes in fate and that things happen the way their supposed to happen; everyone is connected to everyone in some way, shape, or form and if whether we anticipate it or not we can’t really help certain circumstances.
Making Human Junk: Reflection February 23, 2010
I had taken AP Language & Composition last year at my high school and I thought that whatever would be required of me from this class would be a piece of cake compared to what I had to do last year. However, this first assignment was actually really difficult for me. It started pretty simple with just blogging about three different rhetorical situations we could find in the advertisement. Then we had to share our ideas with the class and that wasn’t too bad either but once I had gotten to actually sitting down and writing the paper I felt like I had exhausted all my ideas; I had said everything that needed to be said. Although the blogging and the presentation did help a little bit with my paper, my original thoughts got old really quick. I approached this paper like I would approach any paper. Most times I will write down all my ideas everything that I see and think about pertaining to the main topic. This process was already done through the blogging and the presentation. Therefore, I started by referring back to my blogs and I decided which three situations I really wanted to focus on and make a connection. I at first thought the purpose of the paper was to highlight the connection between three different situations and briefly mention the other two situations. That’s was I did in my original paper and I then realized that I failed to go into depth with the situations of audience and genre so I had to revise my paper so all situations had equal exposure and were all talked about in depth. I also had a problem with detail and making generalizations. After my conference I went back and tried to take a closer look at my advertisement and find more things that I did not see or realize before. After revising my new submission came a little bit shorter than my last but I think it will still be sufficient enough. Another little trick I use when writing is I make the font really small and I type single space and I just type everything I wanna say until I can’t say anymore. Then I change the font back to the proper size and double space and I realize that I wrote a lot more than I thought I could. I do this method especially when I worried about meeting a certain length requirement. The easiest part for me was analyzing the media/design and using that as I huge basis in developing a strong stance and purpose. The most difficult part in writing this paper was analyzing the genre and describing how the genre effects the other four situations. I still had a hard time, on the last submission, trying to really highlight it and include examples that we see everyday so that it was really clear that my ad was a advocacy ad. I also had trouble with developing a strong audience. I was really generalizing in this area and assuming that society believed everything that I believed. I had to suppress a lot of my own beliefs and focus on what type of people would progressive reformers might want to gain the support of. I enjoyed writing this piece and although it was challenging I’m sure I will be presented with even more challenging topics.
Making Human Junk: Purpose February 2, 2010
“Making Human Junk” ad has a few purposes. Like any ad it is trying to persuade and to achieve this it includes images and a rhetorical question. Both of these work together to force the audience to look at the perception of society that is being displayed in the ad and ask themselves if it is right and hopefully, work towards improving the situation. Through the use of photographs of very young children being put into a very adult environment and showing the repercussions of that system the ad is trying to stir emotions. This method is more powerful than just telling the audience what they want them to feel. This ad is also informing its public of a problem that society otherwise were not aware or just plain ignorant to the situation. Maybe some of the public did not know that children were even working in factories and after coming across this ad they now know and have received a negative image of it. This ad is communicating a problem with child labor and through this, is trying to attracted supporters for is cause. To communicate the child labor issue and be persuasive this ad is very straight and to the point. The ad itself is very matter-of-fact in a way because there’s no real authority or supporting evidence it is its own authority and supporting evidence. This ad does not even cater to the other side of the debate on child labor. It simply shows negative effects of child labor and the audience should not allow “industry…to put [any] cost on society’!!!!!
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