Material Practice May 30, 2007

One of our class discussions/readings last week focused on writing concisely. Therefore I choose to practice this area of my writing. I decided to approach two different topics and concisely explain the issue/my feelings etc. in under 150 words each. We will see what happens.

Why fans should not support Barry Bonds.
According to ESPN Barry Bonds is third in the fan polls of this year’s All-Star team. Such fans must however realize the negative effect Barry Bonds has on baseball. Admit it, Bonds cheats. There is no other way around it. Bonds has used steroids in order to get to where he is today. According to ESPN The Magazine Bonds told Ken Griffey Jr. this several years ago. This has tainted all he does. If fans support steroid use, steroids will become the only way to get to the big leagues because players are not competing with each other but with their drugs. All the greats we admire like Mays, Ruth and DiMaggio will become distant memories to future generations because they will not understand the incredible feats these men accomplished. By supporting Bonds we support steroids which will ultimately lead to downfall of baseball because the tradition will be lost.

The hymns as scripture
Many prophets and apostles have requested that members have in their homes a copy of the Hymnal, many have called them scripture and request that we think of it as such. However the hymns are not written by prophets and apostles so how can they be considered scripture? In the hymns we find music that builds our souls and leads us to faith and repentance. Wasn’t this the goal of Nephi? “For…mine intent is [to] persuade men to come [to]…God.” Why else sing praises to God which build our faith then to come closer to him? I believe that like the scriptures the hymns were written by inspiration from above. That is why we can get so much good from them and why the spirit can speak to us through them. It is obvious that everyone needs to treat the hymns just as they would any other word of God.

Rhetorical Analylsis May 29, 2007

Far
We've been traveling far
Without a home
But not without a star
Free
Only want to be free
We huddle close
Hang on to a dream
On the boats and on the planes
They're coming to America
Never looking back again
They're coming to America
Home, don't it seem so far away
Oh, we're traveling light today
In the eye of the storm
In the eye of the storm
Home, to a new and a shiny place
Make our bed, and we'll say our grace
Freedom's light burning warm
Freedom's light burning warm
Everywhere around the world
They're coming to America
Every time that flag's unfurled
They're coming to America
Got a dream to take them there
They're coming to America
Got a dream they've come to share
They're coming to America
They're coming to America
They're coming to America
They're coming to America
They're coming to America
Today, today, today, today, today
My country 'tis of thee(Today)
Sweet land of liberty(today)
Of thee I sing(today)
Of thee I sing(today)

In this song Neil Diamond is addressing the current citizens of America. This is apparent by the use of his terminology “they’re”. Neil’s primary tool in persuading his audience is emotion. He is able to create a sense of compassion by describing some of the awful situations in which people come to America. His description of longing for freedom and being so grateful for the ability to come to America are very effective in his targeted audience. This is because many Americans have ancestors who went through so much in order to come here. Many people have sacrificed a lot for the principals of the United States and Neil uses the vivid imagery of refugee’s fleeing to America to remind people of the sacrifice made by such honest men and women. He is also able to appeal to his audience’s emotions because his audience is familiar with TV shows and newscasts which show in real life the plight of many refugees and people who have almost no freedom at all. The emotional appeal is essential in achieving his goal. In the song Diamond’s goal is to make people have more compassion and sympathy on those who are coming to our country for the first time. In this sense the emotional feelings he has created make his audience want to accept these people and help them. Another goal with the song is to help people remember how blessed they are to live in a free nation. Neil is excellent in this regard as well. His portrayal of America, the flag, and the American dream make those who have been born and raised in this country think more deeply about how much they truly cherish their freedoms.

Freewrite 26 May 2007

With Memorial Day approaching I can’t stop and wonder what has become of this wonderful holiday. As a young child I remember spend what seemed like hours at the cemetery placing flowers on ancestors’ graves. At the time it seemed extremely boring and I could never wait until we went and played at the park. I wonder however if many people even think about their deceased on Memorial Day. Understandably many people are limited in paying their respects because they live far away from where their ancestors are buried or other such circumstances. I am however reminded of a friend whose family was in just such a situation. When said that her family would go to the graveyard and put flowers on graves that had none and thus spend at least some time commemorating those who passed on before. I am not suggesting Memorial Day be like the old European holidays in which all day was spent at graves and in sorrow because they were "respecting" the dead. I am however suggesting that Memorial Day like many other holidays is now an excuse to fish, swim or barbeque with little thought as to the significance of the holiday. I currently am at just such a crossroad. My parents are currently away on a cruise. I have come home to Idaho Falls to be with my brothers and sister over the weekend. I am the oldest and feel a great question as to what we should do this Memorial Day. Should we go back to the cemetery as we always have done or just stay home because there will be no one home to care. Do poor teenagers and a college student go buy flowers for the dead or just stop by to pay our respects? The question is up for debate and in such a day where the traditional feeling of Memorial Day is waning this question may have implications on how a generation younger then I honors and respects their forbearers.

Practice Summary v Anaylsis May 24, 2007

Eric Neel’s recent column on ESPN.com is an attempt to prove that the legends in baseball are more about character then numbers. He sites catfish hunter as one example. He was a pitcher almost 40 years ago and while Catfish never put up hall of fame numbers like many other players he is in the hall of fame nonetheless. Neel then demonstrates that it is an aura that players have which makes them memorable. Numbers fade memories do not. He sites for example Derek Jeter and mentions that although he has troubles defensively and is amazing behind the plate his countenance and simplicity are what he and others form our day will be remembered for.

In his column Neel is writing to baseball fans and is trying to convince them that the numbers are not what matters. The emotional appeal which he makes is significant. Many baseball fans can remember their favorite players and memorable moments. Often as fans we see the charisma of different individuals and the ease at which they perform. Neel reminds his audience about this in a way they will understand. It is catered especially to them. His use of Barry Bonds is a good example because it is current and most fans have mixed feelings. It is unlikely that although Bonds has high numbers he will be in the hall of fame. This makes the notion that although a player has high numbers and great statistics they may not be a memorable player. Such arguments are effective to the audience because they are current and something that fans can relate too. He would defiantly convince a majority of his audience that players are remembered more on style then numbers.

Rhetorical Analysis May 21, 2007

This week I asked a friend to try and convince me to do something in order to have an experience for my analysis on experience. I let her pick the topic and felt as though her topic and logic showed great awareness of her rhetorical situation. She tried to convince me to look up a girl in my ward directory and ask them on a date. First I felt that she was able to use great awareness because she specifically said that “Honestly girls are flattered when a guy takes the time to ask them out.” This I felt was a realization of her role as a girl speaking form experience to a guy. It also built her credibility because she was able to speak from firsthand experience on the subject. Another way in which she demonstrated outstanding awareness of her rhetorical situation was that she used words specific to the audience (i.e. myself). Several phrases such as “the perpetual party” and “your Wal-Mart date” were phases which would not have been understood in several contexts yet were meaningful and special to the specific audience addressed. The largest detriment to my friend’s argument was an appeal to my logical senses. While such phrases as “you got the idea all you need is a girl” seemed to make lots of sense and be logical alone the argument as a whole was presented in a somewhat unorganized fashion. This was a major detriment to the argument because there was no climatic ending or definite decision. Another logical fallacy was an appeal to have me double with a roommate in order to not make it as awkward. I felt as though this problem came because of alack of information on her part. I would never double with one of my current roommates so although logical to have others there the choice of who it was specifically was problematic. As far as effectiveness I felt that in achieving her goal she was ineffective I have no more desire to look up some random person in my ward and ask them out the I did before. However in making me more open to ideas and strategies of dating she was very successful. Also because of this conversation it may convince me to go on another date sooner then I would have considered before.

Freewrite 19 May 2007

Today I would like to tell a story. Not about a man named Brady but about one time when I thought I was going to die. I was 18 at the time and was the director of the archery range at Camp little Lemhi, a Boy Scout camp in eastern Idaho next to the Palisades reservoir and the Snake River. I used to tell the scouts the worst thing they could do was dry fire the bows. (That means you shoot a bow without an arrow in it and if it does not kill you it may very possibly kill the next guy.) Well one day I learned there was one other thing that would make me even angrier. I was downrange behind the tarp that the boys were shooting at looking for an arrow. I had told them to stop shooting and done the whole safety thing then all of a sudden I heard this loud TWANG! “Oh no” I thought, “do I stay behind the tarp and hope that an arrow does not come through or do I go around and hope an arrow does not hit me there?” I decided to yell and boy did I yell, “Who shot that arrow?!” I could hear the silence fall over the range. As I then walked around the tarp I yelled aging in the best mean voice I could muster, “Who shot that arrow!?” everyone looked at the culprit and with a timid voice he replied, “I did not shoot an arrow I dry fired the bow.” Well to make a long story short he was fairly retentive so I only kicked him off the range for a few minutes. However that day I was extremely grateful that I did not end up with an arrow through my skull.

Audience Awarness 17 May 2007

One of our discussions in class last week focused on audience awareness. I had a discussion with a girl this week about cars and she mentioned how I was the only one who could get on her level and explain the problem it made me think about audience awareness and how we communicate to an audience. Therefore this week I have decided to try another experiment in audience awareness and try to explain Chemical Bonding to a group of 5th graders.
We all know that everything is made of something smaller. For example your pants may be made of a button, thread and a zipper. But what is the thread made of? Scientists would say atoms. Atoms are like super small balls that we cannot see with our eyes but make up everything around us. You may not believe that such small things make up the world around us because you cannot see them but imagine you are standing on a big grassy field. If I drop one snowflake in the middle you cannot see it, right? But what if I drop lots and lots of snowflakes all over the place? Then you can see all the snow. The same happens with atoms, lots and lots of them makes something like the thread of our pants that we can see. In order to make all the stuff we see around us the atoms stick to together in special ways. Each atom has something around it called electrons. Think of it like this if we put tape around one ball and Velcro around another the tape ball will stick really well to the wall while the Velcro ball would stick really well to the carpet. You probably already know that cookies and bread have a lot of the same ingredients but taste very different. That is because like with the balls the sugar, flour, butter etc. stick together in different ways. All of the different ingredients are like different balls or different snowflakes that hook together in different ways in order to make bread for your sandwich or a cookie for desert. Scientists call this Chemical Bonding. The way all these different atoms stick together makes up everything you see. So the next time you put on your pants or make cookies you can remember that if it were not for atoms sticking together your life would be very boring.

Rhetorical analasis May 15, 2007

An interesting fact to be added is that even Comcast, 50 percent owner of The mtn., is not offering the channel outside of Utah, Colorado and New Mexico. Kind of sends the wrong statement to the satellite guys, don't you think? I went to make good on my threat to DirecTV and switch to Comcast here in Northern California, until I found out that it would do me no good. I also think it is too late for the phone calls to the TV distributors. I think CSTV and the MWC had their most bargaining power the last couple of days before BYU's first home game. By today they should have assessed the situation and dropped their demands to whatever it took to get the channel on the air. Then if it gets ratings they are in a better position in the future. It can't be much of a cost issue, since CSTV will have to produce the games either way. It is time for the MWC and CSTV to do the deal, whatever it takes.
Reed Smith


This Article was taken from a group of other such opinions published in the Salt Lake tribune fall 2006. I would tend to say that it is not a very good opinion editorial and the use of rhetoric is very poor. First the audience is unclear. I seems as though he is writing mostly in an informative way to the fans. However towards the end he mentions the MWC and CSTV. I would say that he wants them to take charge and do something but is trying to raise awareness of this “unknown” issue at hand. I think his Logical approach is lacking the most. He describes problems but falls short of answering the why question why is it a problem, how can it be fixed, who needs to fix it, what is the benefit of fixing it etc. Next to look at the emotional appeal I feel it would appeal fairly well to any major sports fan because he describes a problem which plagues many fans that they cannot see their team play. I would say of all the rhetorical tools his ethos is the best because he discusses what happened to him as an expert however phrases such as “I think” defiantly do harm to his ethos because he does not know. Lots of people think this or that but why should I listen to what you think. I think his thesis is as unclear as his audience we realize form his writing that this is a problem but what exactly we need to do about it is unclear to me. I do not think this would be very effective to the target audience because I think most of his audience has already experienced this first hand and already realize a problem exists.

Style Practice 12 May 2007

One of the Stylistic elements we talked about this week was sentence length therefore I thought I would overwork this a little and try to write in all short sentences (5-10 words) as a change in style to see if anything good comes of it let’s hope it does not sound like a 5th grader.
This week I was invited to go on a date. Sadly the date fell through. Therefore we went hiking instead. I was with people I had never met. They were very friendly though and we had a blast. We hiked up to a cool waterfall. While there we ate and took pictures. I was able to get a picture under the falls. It was cool and wet down there. When we finally decided to leave there were two groups. One went back the way we came. The other took a different route. The second group was much faster. Therefore I was grateful I was in that group. There was also a way nice girl in that group. It was the perfect day for hiking. The sun was high all day. Yet it never got too hot. It was especially nice by the falls. The mist was beating across our faces. That felt great. I love hiking but have not been for a while. So, I was glad to do it again. The best part was that it was short. That made it possible for me to come home. When I got home I was could do some schoolwork. Overall it was great day in the mountains. Hopefully I can go again soon. Who knows maybe it will come with more girls too.

Freewrite 10 May 2007

I would like to begin by saying that whoever it was that came up with the idea that we should be allowed to write about whatever we want at least one time a week was a genius. It makes this part of the assignment not only easier but way more fun too. Today I would like to explain my complete and total joy that the Yankees are six games out of first place in the American League East division and that they are also behind by two and a half games in the Wild Card race. For anyone who is reading this if you hate baseball or could care less I apologize because I realize that not everyone has my same interest. Nonetheless I will proceed. In 2006 the Atlanta Braves (who are my favorite baseball team) did not make the playoffs. This ended a 14-year run by the Braves. No other team in major professional American sports has ever matched that record. And before 2001 only 2 other teams (the Celtics and Lakers) had accived 9 consecutive playoff appearances. However as the record stands now the New York Yankees will tie the Braves record in 2008 if they go to the playoffs each of the next two years. It could be said that only a miracle will keep the Yankees form achieving 14 consecutive playoff appearances but the miracle is happening. The most dominating team over the last two decades is not only losing they are losing badly. If the season continues as it is right now the Yankees will not go to the playoffs and the Braves Record will be intact. Oh Happy day.

Rhetorical Analysis for May 8, 2007

Everyone loves a good pizza and therefore the pizza making industry is well saturated. This gives great incentive to convert individuals to become life long customers of a specific pizza chain and one recent Pizza Hut commercial is focused on just that. The commercial is focused on those people who like pizza but are not regular Pizza Hut customers. The reason they focus so intently on this specific group is that they want to get more people to try their pizzas and hopefully create lifetime customers. THE ad opens with a Pizza Hut delivery boy delivering a pizza to the home of what seems to be an ordinary family. Near the end of the transaction the wife grabs the delivery boy and violently jerks him into the house. A moment later her husband shows up from work and has a Papa Johns coat on. They then proceed to have short discussion about how Pizza Hut has the best pizzas. In order to appeal to the target audience the commercial uses several different rhetorical approaches. First it has a logical appeal. Toward the end of the commercial it mentions how Pizza Hut pizzas had won a national taste competition over both Dominos and Papa Johns. This both appeals logically to people but at the same time builds the ethos of the company, making them seem more credible and reliable. The greatest appeal though is the emotional appeal. The irony and humor in the ad create a relaxed feeling and a positive feeling toward the company simply because it made the future customer happy. Another effective emotional appeal is introduced by showing well made delicious looking pizzas. This creates a desire to buy the pizza for no other reason then it looks good. The underlying theme of the commercial is: Buy your next pizza form Pizza Hut. As for the target audience it seems as though it would be very effective in getting them to try Pizza Hut next time they wanted a pizza. Creating a lifetime customer however will take more then just this ad.

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