Documentary Rhetorical Analysis 3

1. In Bully, Hirsch draws a clear connection between bullying and suicide. Using the two deaths of Ty and Tyler, Hirsch makes a claim that death is a common result of bullying. At first, the tearful interviews from the parents and testimonies of their peers had me in agreement with Hirsch. His outstanding utilization of pathos made his claim very legitimate and credible. However, upon further research, Hirsch's claim was a little skewed. The documentary made it clear that the only reason for Tyler's suicide was bullying. Students said that his head was smashed into lockers, his food was spit on, and he was called terrible names. However, after police officers re-watched one of the 42 video cameras located around the school, the one that was near Tyler's locker, there was no head smashing. In addition, Hirsch left out a major detail about Tyler; he was diagnosed with ADHD, bipolar disorder, and Asperger's. This major omission skews the details to make it seem as though bullying was the only factor of Tyler's suicide. However, research shows that both Asperger's and bipolar disorder have a strong link to suicide. This information must be taken into account in figuring out the motives behind Tyler's suicide. Yes, Tyler may have not been treated kindly at school, but his victimization is not the only factor in his suicide. Hirsch's claim that Tyler's suicide was solely because of bullying makes it much more powerful to the audience. However, relevant details should also be included. Tyler's bullying was probably a large factor in his suicide, but, other major pieces of information, such as his mental instability, should be taken into consideration. 

2. Modern modes of communication, such as films and documentaries, have been positively received by the community. They are utilized as ways to share information. In this case, the rising issue of bullying in schools was shared. It shares to the audience the often unseen reality of bullying. This mode of communication has been positively received, as seen through Bully's awards and many screenings at high schools. This documentary was used as a modern mode of communication to raise awareness of and gain supporters to stop bullying. 

Bully took on the challenge of portraying one of the biggest issues in society today, bullying. This hour and a half documentary, filled with testimonies, interviews, and actual scenes of bullying reflect the rising concern of this issue in society today. This documentary is a reflection of society as it takes and targets a hot and widely concerned issue in our present society. 

Documentary Rhetorical Analysis 1

1. Bully. Dir. Lee Hirsch. Perf. Alex, Kelby, Je'Maya. The Winstein Company, 2011. DVD.
Bully is a documentary about bullying in schools. It follows the lives of three students, Alex, Kelby, and Je'Maya, all victims of bullying. It includes interviews from the victims and the victims' families, day to day lives in school, and steps taken to end bullying. This documentary makes clear the lack of initiative the schools have taken to end bullying. Through ignorance and even denial, the superintendents and teachers are strong contributors to the continued bullying that the students face. Truly allowing the audience to feel the pain and difficulty the victims endure, we gain a deep understanding of the horrible reality of high schools and push us to strive for change. 

2. One of the rhetorical devices used by Hirsch is perspective. Specifically using the observational mode, the camera does not intrude on the happenings of the scene. When Alex is on the school bus and getting cursed at and physically harassed, the cameraman does not interfere. Instead, he shoots from a "fly on the wall" perspective and allows the events to happen. In order to create an ordinary environment, one which Alex faces everyday, the cameraman does not budge in. This allows the bullies to harass as they always have been, and allows the audience to view the crude scene of bullying that is commonplace in high schools nationwide. This use of perspective truly gives a wake up call to anyone that denied the existence of bullying in high schools, as the whole scene of hurtful remarks and physical abuse unfolds before their eyes. 
Another rhetorical device used was editing. Including interviews from the victims and their families in casual settings, the interviews were segments of the documentary that generated much emotion. With the victims and their families revealing their true feelings of hurt, pain, and sadness, these emotions were able to transcend the screen and allow the audience to feel them, too. Carefully placed in between the documentary, the interviews had a large impact on allowing the audience to understand how terrible bullying is and how it must stop. Seeing those young children contemplate suicide and self-harm, and actually revealing such horrible feelings, really urges us as the audience to fight for change. 

Bul

TOW Reflection

A noticeable trend in my TOWs is the shorter summaries. In the earlier TOWs, the summary of each article was rather lengthy, totaling about 8-10 sentences. However, the summary of my more recent TOWs has been cut down to about 4-5 sentences. In addition, my more recent TOWs pertain to the hot issues of today. The more recent articles have been on issues that spark many debates, such as abortion, North Korea's nuclear threat, and relationships between students and teachers. Whereas my earlier TOWs focused largely on scientific breakthroughs or interesting health articles, I took a larger focus on global issues and the back-stories behind the hottest news of the day on my latest TOWs. For example, I read an article that was not seen often in the news; the Cleveland police department's failure to rescue the kidnapped girls earlier. Rather than focusing on news exclusively in the United States, I also read some articles on foreign nations, such as Peru and North Korea. This interest in the affairs of foreign nations arose after studying more recent history in APUSH. As much globalization occurred in the late 20th century and I studied this extensively in class, it allowed me to foster an interest for not only what happens in America, but also the events in other countries.

While reading many articles and novels and analyzing picture documents, I mastered spotting rhetorical devices. Even while skimming through a text, I am able to determine and point out specific rhetorical devices that the author used, such as subtle ethos or explicit parallelism. Because of the wide variety of documents I analyzed both in class and through TOWs, my eye for rhetorical devices has been very well sharpened and put to good use.

Every author has a specific intended audience for the article. Although a wide variety of people may read it, the author targets a specific group. However, determining the targeted audience is difficult. It is easy for me to believe that the author wrote the article for the general public, but every author has an audience that he wishes to strongly impact. Now determining exactly who that audience is, is a task that I am attempting to master.

It is impossible to cover every single article of every single genre in class. In order to create a sense of responsibility as well, TOWs are assigned to broaden the scope of our knowledge. The articles we chose to read and the pictures we chose to analyze benefit us with a wider exposure to many different genres and topics. Although the intended meaning was not necessarily this, TOWs are also extremely beneficial to the SATs, as many of the articles we read can be easily used as examples to supplement our argument. In addition, the TOWs also allow us to analyze more in-depth and spot and identify rhetorical devices easily and quickly. Time is precious, especially during the AP exam, and our weekly practice of analyzing gives us needed practice. Also, the requirement of a TOW on a picture document  is very helpful. The synthesis essay in the AP exam almost always has a picture or graph as one of the sources, and our exposure to analyzing pictures in many different ways allows us to identify the author's purpose for using a specific color, specific positioning, etc.

These TOW assignments benefited me in that I was exposed to a wide array of news. I learned information that I would previously not have purposely sought out. I also learned many new rhetorical devices, as well as gained further knowledge on how authors strategically use them to achieve a purpose. However, the fact that I have the freedom to choose articles is also a downside. As I usually choose articles that interest me, I seem to remain in the genre that I am most interested in. For example, I don't really follow basketball or football, so none of my articles were on sports. I would have gained an even wider range of knowledge if different topics were assigned for me to research and write about.

TOW 30: Doctor Found Guilty of First-Degree Murder in Philadelphia Abortion Case

With abortion as one of the most controversial topics right now, this article was a major letdown for the pro-choice party. Dr. Kermit Grosnell was determined guilty of first degree murder in his abortion clinic in a rough area of Philadelphia. He is accused of performing countless abortions after the legal 24-week stage, cutting the spinal cords of newsborns, hiring no professionals, including a teenage student, to perform operations, and reusing supplies to cut down on costs. His clinic had not been inspected in many years, and it was described as a "house of horrors."

This article is from CNN, and written by Sarah Hoye and Sunny Hostin.

This article is significant in context. It has given much credence to anti-abortionists, while slandering the cause of the pro-choice group. This article sheds light on the harsh and illegal practices of abortion, and shows that Grosnell is not the only doctor practicing such murders.

The purpose of this article was to tell a shocking story of a doctor performing illegal abortions, way after the limit on when abortions can be done. The article further reinforced how controversial the topic of abortion is.

The audience of the article is the general public. As most Americans take a general stance on the issue of abortion, this article affects both opposing sides. It lays out the harsh reality behind abortion, and also reminds the audience that Grosnell is not the only one doing such illegal things.

A rhetorical device used in this article is description. In order to get across the horrendous things that Dr. Grosnell was doing in his office, his charges were explicitly outlines. His accusations of reusing supplies, severing the spinal cords of newborn babies, and hiring un-registered, inexperienced workers to perform serious abortion operations were very clearly and descriptively outlined.

The author's purpose was achieved. The article clearly explained the case and went into detail, allowing the audience to gain a complete understanding of the case.

TOW 29: Cleveland Police Criticised as City Asks: Why Were Women Not Found Sooner?

Although the media has been bombarding us only with the good news of rescuing the three young woman after ten years of captivity, there is a small detail that it has missed. The Cleveland police was called multiple times after multiple reports of strange happenings at the location where the young women were, and the police even personally visited the house two times. This has led to widespread criticism for the police department's lack of care, that they were unable to detect that there were three kidnapped women in that very home.

The article is from The Guardian, written by Tom McCarthy in the U.S. and Ed Pilkington in Cleveland. Both are reporters, and The Guardian is a credible source.

This article was significant in context. With the recent news of the three young women being found after ten long years, this article tells of and criticizes the police department's failure to recognize that there were women being held at the house they visited several times.This article tells a slightly different story than the ones that are being told on the news.

The purpose of this article was to reveal that although the news of the rescuing of the women is great, the police are partially at fault for not rescuing them sooner. Even after many different reports and calls to the police department to check out the strange home, not enough was done by the police.

The audience of the article is the general public, as this article aims to tell of a minimally known fact behind this case.

In order to gain credibility that the police had failed to properly act, the article utilized ethos by including testimonies from those that had actually called to report strange behavior at the house. Several people were quoted and they told of what they had witnessed and that they had called. This usage of direct quotes was used to get across the message that the police had not taken the reports seriously, which led to the prolonged stay of the three women at their kidnapper's home.

The author's purpose was achieved. The police department's failure to act quickly and efficiently was displayed as several people testified that they had called. In addition, this article was interesting in that the news and media sites did not tell of such a backstory but instead only revealed the happy reunion of the women with their families.

TOW 28: When Your Data Wanders to Places You’ve Never Been

Did the thought ever cross your mind that the short surveys or questionnaires you fill out are being sent to numerous third party companies? Well this is what happens when you answer personal questions; your personal data will be sent out to companies you have never ever heard of. Senator John D. Rockefeller IV of West Virginia suggested a policy that he calls Do Not Track which would allow computer users to turn on settings to prevent their personal information from being sent to third parties. However this policy does not protect the details that companies have gotten of thousands of American adults.

This article comes from The New York Times and is written by Natasha Singer.

This article is significant in context. This article sheds light on the many ads that bombard our Internets about filling out a simple questionnaire in order to win an extravagant prize or the seemingly harmless act of filling in private information while paying for online merchandise. The information that people had believed to be useless or did not think twice about is coming back to haunt them. For example, one woman took an interest in multiple sclerosis and she suddenly began to receive pamphlets about the illness and began to be associated with the disease.

The purpose of this article was to tell of the far-reaching effects of disclosing information. Even something as small as signing up to receive emails from a favorite store can link a person with his private information, which can be shared. This article also told of some attempts at progressive measures, as shown through Rockefeller's Do Not Track policy. 

The audience of this article was the general public, but especially those that utilize the Internet frequently. This article serves as a warning to those to be more careful about the information they choose to disclose, or the topics they choose to search. 

The rhetorical device of tone was used in this passage. Singer utilized a more casual and conversational tone in this article, as opposed to a very serious or urgent one. The reasoning behind using such a tone may be as this information may come off as bit of a shock (it did to me), she lessens the blow a bit by adding the measures that are in the process of being taken. If she utilized a tone that sounded very serious, this information would come off as an even bigger issue.

The purpose of this article was achieved. Singer was able to warn readers about the effects of disclosing information on the Internet, while preventing total commotion and shock by including the steps that are being taken to stop the disclosure of information.

TOW 27: PRY: The danger of dismissing North Korea’s nuclear threat

With the commotion around North Korea and its nuclear threat, this article provides a fresh perspective on the whole issue. It criticizes Obama's administration for greatly downplaying the threat the North Korea poses. The government has been minimizing and even denying the existence of North Korea's nuclear missile threat. However, the article argues that Obama should follow in the footsteps of previous presidents Dwight Eisenhower and Lyndon B. Johnson and instead warn the people of a potential threat. America must realize that North Korea poses a huge threat and instead of denying this fact, be proactive about this threat.

This article comes from The Washington Times and is written by Peter Vincent Pry.

This article is significant in context. With America's intense fear of terrorism, this threat is an explicit example. In order to coax the citizens into thinking that everyone is safe and sound, the government has been denying the existence of a threat, when in reality, North Korea has great potential to cause harm. This article gives readers a glimpse into the reality of things by exposing that North Korea actually does pose a threat with its nuclear weapons program.

The purpose of this article was to criticize the Obama administration for its lack of truth on the issue of North Korea. The article urges and argues that the president should be proactive, pointing to John Kennedy's presidency in which he created ICBM programs to deter the Soviet Union from escalating the Cold War into a full out nuclear war. Like Kennedy, Obama should be more proactive and create ways in which to prevent North Korea from launching its weapons.

The audience of this article is the general public, but primarily Americans. This article reveals the flaws of the Obama administration specifically during this crucial time.

The rhetorical device of ethos was utilized in this article. In order for people to believe the point that the government of the United States is incorrect and that one writer is correct, Pry provides many examples of evidence. First, he references a leaked Defense Intelligence Agency report that states that North Korea does have ballistic missiles and expands upon this fact by stating that the administration is attempting to conceal it. In addition, he refers to previous presidencies to show the positive effects of being proactive and launching programs to prevent nuclear war. He also refers to events during the Cold War with the Soviet Union in which America was able to swiftly avoid a full out nuclear war by creating and enacting programs.

The article's purpose was achieved. By clearly getting  across the point that North Korea does in fact pose a threat to not only America but other foreign nations, Pry instills a feeling of urgency and determination to overcome this issue.