Wendy AP Language

In Johnathan Swift’s essay, the point at which I began to realize that his proposals are not representative of what he really believes was when he stated that he has “been assured by a very knowing American of my acquaintance in London, that a young healthy child well nursed, is, at a year old, a most delicious nourishing and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled.”  Before this point, he was making very logical statements, about the overpopulation of the country and the burden that children put on their poor parents.  He is simply setting up the situation/problem so that he can propose his solution, but as soon as he begins to introduce the solution, the reader immediately senses the sarcasm in this piece.  At this point, one can begin to more fully understand the actual statement that Swift is trying to make.

I think that the underlying argument is that there is a problem in his society, and the example he uses is that the poor beggars don’t even have enough money to support their children because the wealthy are dominating society.  He has in his best interest the common good of the public and that it is something that needs to be focused on.  Although eating babies is not the solution that the actually thinks would be probable, he is just saying this issue cannot go on unnoticed.

This article uses humor to address the current state of our country (in 2006) and the government itself.  It points out the flaws in the spending of the federal money, and how there has been no profit in nine years and mainly accuse Bush of “its fate.”  The article sets up a situation in which the U.S., which is described to be like some sort of department store, is having its final close-out sale.  The United States must shut down because of major debt, so everything must “go, go, go.”  What makes this article funny, along with most of the other Onion articles, is that although they are ina sarcastic tone, they describe events as if they were true.  “Quotes” from the president and US citizens are used to make the article seem even more realistic.  Americans even look a little unintelligent when one man states that he doesn’t know what will happen once the US shuts down.  “Who’s going to deliver the mail or put out my house if it catches fire? I guess we’ll have to switch to Verizon or something.”

The article describes everything that is going to be sold and that even the “50 states will be sold at an aution.”  Because it targets the massive debt and government spendings, I see it as making a parallelism between the US and a large store going out of business because they went bankrupt.  The way the article makes references to things in history, and in the United States, makes the article humorous, but at the same time points out an issue of the possible path our country is heading.  It compares the way our country is right now to previous administrations saying things like “I distinctly recall a going-out-of-business sale during the Reagan Administration.”  The article is basically saying that our country is so far in debt that something needs to be done in order to turn this around.  Maybe a final close-out sale isn’t exactly what we’re looking for, but you get the idea.

For my expanded argument, I am planning on going into more detail on my original argument of evaluation.  I felt like I could have gone into much more detail on this one, saying the common perception of what popularity is, and evaluating what it means to me. There are probably some things I can fix, also, depending on what you thought about it.

** Mr. Ehret, have you graded this one yet?  I never got to read it in class because I missed class the day we did, so that would be really helpful if I could get some feedback from you if you’ve already read it.

For my causal argument, I would like to look into the effects that come from the drastic increase in technology in our world today.  This is a very broad topic, seeing as there are a million things that have come from technology-good and bad.  However, I was leaning more towards people’s impatience when it comes to their behaviors.  For example, any time I am listening to my iPod in the car, I am constantly flipping through the songs, rarely staying on a single song for its duration.  My mom always gets onto me saying things like, “Can’t you just enjoy the whole song?  Back in my day we didn’t even have the choice to skip through songs with records and cassette tapes; we were able to enjoy the whole song.”  I usually blow this comment off and just keep skipping, but sometimes if I really think about what she has said, I find it true for many things.  Everything in society is FAST today.  We have TiVo so we can fast-foward through all those pesky commercials.  If the internet takes more than 7 seconds to load, it is running “slow.”  Here’s another thing I have noticed: remember on VHS tapes how the credits were at the beginning, and you would see all of the credits before the movie began?  Well now they are at the end, and most people just turn the movie off and do not sit through the credits.  Communication is fast with texting and e-mail.  Heck, we can’t even wait to go back to our computers to check an e-mail anymore, we have to have it right there on our phones!  So, this is the direction I am trying to go in with my argument, and I will possibly go further to say that this is having a profound impact on our society and could be something much worse than impatience.  But my overall point in this argument is to show the cause: rapid increase in technology and one effect it has: impatience.  I’m not sure if that is exactly right because there are many other effects that have come with technology.  It is a cause and effect situation though so I think it will make sense.

Overall, both of the causal arguments were pretty effective.  (Shut up Katie..) When I first read the title “Why Literature Matters,” I cringed a little, but the essay proved to be more interesting than I thought it would be.  However, I found “What Makes a Serial Killer?” more compelling because it was an engaging topic.  It is our human nature to be more interested in blood than books.  Gotta keep our gators fed, right?  The essay clearly decribed the effect, serial killers, and explored different reasons that may have caused their violent behavior.  I thought it was interesting the way it described practically the same scenario, but two ways in which it could be interpreted.  This essay kept me curious and wondering about whether the actions of a serial killer come in their blood, or what kind of events or situations may cause them to act in that manner.  The author showed many different causes that all lead to a single effect, and he did this effectively.

I also have to add that I was actually interested in “Why Literature Matters.”  The way that the essay explained a problem and laid out the facts on how crucial reading is to our society actually made me want to read more myself.  Before I read this essay I basically just had the idea that yes, reading is important, but mainly because it improves your vocabulary and engages your mind, blah blah blah.  But the essay pointed out so many crucial things in our society that depend on reading, and although it was a little boring, I had never really thought about just how important reading really is.

I think I would have to add to the necessary cause that the SUV was much larger than the Miata and had something to do with the fatality involved in the crash.  Just like it says “without driving, then no accident” you could also say “without the distinct size difference in vehicles, then no fatality.”  Other than that, this causal analysis accurately lays out all the information needed.  It clearly states all the reasons that had an effect on or led up to the traffic fatality.

And here is my causal analysis….

Event: Wendy falls asleep in class.

Immediate Cause: Wendy is very tired.

Necessary Cause: Wendy did not get enough sleep the previous night.

Sufficient Cause:  Wendy had a lot of work and saved it all for the wee hours of the night.