Fatal

When reading chapter 12 for this week it was all about your research paper. It talked about formating your sources, bibliography, and expanding your ideas. So for my blog I wanted to take a recent event that happened in the news and see if I could format into a research topic.

I live in Chesapeake, VA and just last month two young men were killed in a dirt bike accident. When I first heard this news I immediately thought it was false. The two boys were riding back bye there house around seven and collided with one another coming around the corner. Neither of the boys were wearing helmets and it was dark outside. Brandon died at the scene where KC died at the hospital the next day. I ride motocross and hearing about someone get hurt due to stupidity just makes me even more sad. I'm sure if they were both wearing helmets they would still be here today.

I wanted to use Burke's Pentad to establish cause for this article. In this, he uses a series of five questions to figure out possible reasons for why this happened.

1. Act: What was done? What took place in thought or deed?- Two boys were riding with no helmets at night and it caused them to lose there lives.

2. Scene: When or where was it done? What is the background or scene in which it occurred?- It occurred January 28, 2010 on a back road in Chesapeake, Virginia.

3. Agent: Who did it? What person or kind of person performed the act?- Both of the boys did the act of riding the dirt bikes.

4. Agency: How was it done? What means or instruments were used?- It was done by the two riders not communicating and having a head on collision. The instrument that was used was a dirt bike and not having a helmet on contributed to it.

5. Purpose: Why did it happen? What was the main motivation?- It happened because they were riding when they were not supposed to be riding and did not have the right gear on to protect themselves.

PICTURE

ARTICLE

School Rules

In class a newspaper article was brought up about how a Great Bridge High School teacher showed a class Macbeth without parent permission. A student named Morgan, did not like seeing the nudity or graphic images in the movie. She felt uncomfortable because the other students in the class were making noising during the nudity scene. Morgan had a problem with the movie from the beginning because she learned about Polanski, the director of Macbeth, in theater class. Director Polanski was arrested for a rape case from a long time ago with a 13 year old in 1977. She then went home and told her father what had happened in school, the father was not happy. He then called the school because he wanted the teacher to have consequences for his actions.

When reading this article i was shocked because this was my high school i graduated from and knew the teacher who showed it because he showed it to us too. We handled it maturely and did not care about having parent permission because we were getting out of work. I am surprised that he got caught with this and has consequences for his actions.

This week we have read about the Toulmin Model and what it is composed of. First, the claim is a thesis, proposition, or a conclusion. Subclaims are the reasons, main ideas, and arguments. The support is evidence, opinions, and data. And the warrants are assumptions, general principals, and widely held values. We use these to explain and understand an article.

In this article the Claim is teacher shows a video to senior students that are mature enough but the dad does not agree. The support would be: 1. They are seniors 2. They have the access to worse things 3. Almost 18. The Warrants in this article would be the teacher assuming the students are mature enough to handle a movie like this.

ARTICLE PICTURE

Our reading this week on chapter 9 was very interesting on how visual arguments work. Most arguments come from an image and then the words are formed to tell that argument. As mentioned in Perspective on Argument, it says that to discover an issue you must ask if this issue has been solved. After asking yourself that, if the answer is no than you have an argument. Every issue has two sides to chose, both of them might be ride and a compromise may be needed.

In the picture to the right, its says "No illegals, No Burritos (You better think twice America)." When seeing this poster I had to think to myself and research if this issue has been solved, turns out it has not. This brings up the argument of keeping illegal immigrants or not allowing them in the country. When we think of both sides, they have their negatives and positives as follows:

If we keep the illegal immigrants then we can also get the culture that comes with them. It is amazing how much illegal immigrant bring to this country even though they are not welcomed. Most of our food is not even ours. America is like one big happy family in a sense of all the different cultures. I feel that if we got rid of them then they will be hostile and even start some sort of battle.

If we get rid of all the illegal immigrants then many jobs will be without workers and the culture will be gone. The workers will not be able to support their family back in Mexico where the work does not pay. This will make that one big happy family go away and that other culture is not present.

Mentioned in US IMMIGRATION SUPPORT, they talk about the main reasons are for mexican illegal immigrants coming to America. The people in Mexico notice how nice America is and how easy it is to get in. Many of them just come to America to get a job because it is better pay than in Mexico.

PICTURE

In class this week we mentioned how on the bottom of Forever 21 shopping bags was a bible verse. This bible verse is John 3:16 and it says "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him shall not perish, but have everlasting life." The whole bible verse in not printed out so it is not very noticeable. As you can see in the picture to the right, it is just John 3:16 printed.

As mentioned in a Los Angeles Times article, the owners of Forever 21, Jin Sook Chang and Don are intense Christians. They have given a lot of money to their church and attend services early in the mornings. So they express their faith by putting a bible verse at the bottom of every bag to show others what they believe.

When the owners do this, they may be choosing a particular audience to come into the store. Even though I did not even know that this was located on the bottom of the bag and I'm not fully Christian. It may be a hidden audience they are trying to achieve. They should be careful because some people may be upset with this bible verse at the bottom if they are not Christian. This would then cause controversy and even loss in customers.

I am sure this happens with a lot of things that you do not really notice. We also talked about how on military guns they are putting this same bible verse on the gun. They engrave it on he side. This may have inspirational purpose to the audience to never give up or may have a negative effect if a non Christian soldier uses it. Whatever the reason is for engraving this verse on the side of a gun, it is notice just like the Forever 21 shopping bag.

LA TIMES

January 17th Blog

When trying to figure out what to talk about on my blog, visual arguments was the first thing to come to mind. Talking about visual arguments in class was very interesting to me because that is the type of argument that I am usually involved in. When I send my mother a text message and it sounds wrong, which she can't see me, she starts to argue with me. She says that i was rolling my eyes or something that does not make sense just to start that argument. Even driving down the road with a friend can bring up an argument on a bill board and what it is trying to say. One person may be wrong or both might be right.

In this picture to the left, it is advertising smoking and how a girl will like you if you smoke. This ad is a stand alone visual argument. It is just one picture with few words to explain why there product is the best and also created arguments. It says "Blow smoke in her face and she'll follow you anywhere." -This will cause an argument because why would smoking make you more attractive or less attractive? This add causes the audience to be more immediate to smoking, instead of words they express it in a picture. This way is more compelling to the audience and catches their attention.

As mentioned in http://smoking.ygoy.com/how-advertising-impacts-smoking/ more and more young adults are being exposed to these ads. When a young person is exposed to this it caused then to either A) be grossed out or B) want to start smoking. This argument can go back a forth about the effects on young people with visual advertisements. Even with cold hard facts about this topic, their will still be an argument formed by it.

Visual arguments do certain things for the audience for example, makes them more immediate, compelling, and convincing. These traits are very important because they seem very effective in delivering to the audience.