Stephen Cruz

Eli Pardue
9/26/07
AP Lang Comp
LaMags

Stephen Cruz

Cruz is a prime example of a person who has made the American dream a possible notion for minorities or people who are lower in the class ladder. He is the first in his family to go to college and also the first to enter the business world and become a successful man. At the end of the essay, he was making fifty-plus thousand dollars a year before he became a professor.

The Problem that Stephen Cruz sees wit the American dream is that it is minority biased. due to the Civil Rights Act, companies and corperations are required to give preference over a Mexican with the same credibility as a white man when bot ha re applying for the same job. Because of this, it was very easy for Cruz to get a job in his career, and upper management job offers flew at him. However, the business world is also biased against minorities, and it can be very difficult to hold a lower position for minorities in the lower position because of generalization about the education and pesonal drive of those individuals.

Engaging the Text #2 pg. 322

Eli Pardue
9/26/07
AP Lang Comp
LaMags

No. 2

Yes, Mantsios does not make a case that rich people exploit poor people. In the relationship that Mantsios makes between Harold Browning, Bob Farrell, and Cheryl Mitchell, he makes the point that The upper class, people such as Harold Browning, need people like Bob Farrell and Cheryl Mitchell to keep their status as upper class citizens. If there was no one to provide the lesser jobs in the economy that took less skill land required less pay, then eventually all jobs would be given the same pay, and that is closer to communism.
Matisos gets sidetracked in his explanation, however, and needed to devote much more of the paper to his point, as he could have gone much deeper on the topic. It is also very difficult to back his argument, however, because the spectrum of salaries in the USA is so broad, it is silly to classify them in middle, upper and lower class. Would it really be the same thing to call one who has an income of ninety thousand as in the same calss as one who makes three-hundred plus dollars a year?

visual arguments

Eli Pardue
9/20/07
AP. Lang. Comp.
LaMags

Visual Arguments

Yes, i belive that our society is becoming a visual society more and more as the decades go by. The mass media is becoming increasingly more visual through the use of television newscasting and internet blogging. More than half of the populaton of America gets their daily news from a visual source. Beyond the news, image is also becoming increasingly important. The fashion industry has never been more important with the introduction and mass apeal of designer labels such as Prada, Gucci, Ralph Lauren, Dolce and Gabbana, and Louis Vuitton. In addition, television has incorperated fashion into the programs, nost prominently with America's Next Top Model and the Shopping Network. Even Mac computers emphasize thier sleek appearence.
Visual arguments in this day and age are more useful when targeting the public as the public is more likely to see a massive billboard on the way to work than it is to read a paper before going to work. it takes less time to absorb, and while advertisements are not technically arguments (being completely one sided, i.e., buy this product) they are more useful in presenting a point.
Society is becoming more visual because of the increasd speed at which things occur. Information streaming runs faster than ever because of the internet. Convinience is everywhere, such as drive through fast food restaurants, self pump gas stations, and faster cars. People just dont stop and read the paper or take the time to read the newspaper anymore, which is why visual add and aassstant are so important.

ethical reponsibility

Eli Pardue
9/19/07
AP Lang Comp
LaMags

Ethical Responsibility

An author’s ethical responsibility relies in the credibility that they have to give the information to the audience they have singled out. For example, Patricia Hampl has perfect eligibility in telling her story because she was the one who experienced it, and it is her interpretation of that story that she is telling. On the other hand, an example of someone with poor credibility would be a freshman in high school writing a paper on psychology versus a professor of psychology writing that same paper.
Also, an authors ethical responsibility is weighted by the bias they have on what they are writing about. For example, the views on the affects of alcohol could be extremely different when comparing a partying college student with a Mother Against Drunk Driving.

pseudo arguments

Eli Pardue
9/18/07
AP Lang. Comp.
LaMags

Pseudo arguments

Pseudo arguments are statements that are unable to be backed up by further claims and evidence, and are therefore often statements of opinion. Pseudo arguments are unfortunately something that I encounter in everyday life. Whether it is with my mother, my brother, or friends, I am always at conflicting interests and opinions with others.
One example that stands prominently in my mind is the near everyday conversation that I have with people on whether Mac or PC computers are better. Each side has good points. Macs are very safe and reliable, and are also backed with a great damage and protection warranty. Macs have the most simple operating system, and are also more practical in everyday use with applications such as Safari, iPhoto, iMovie, GarageBand, and iTunes included in every computer.
PC’s, one might argue, are much more affective for networking business work. They also contain multiple programs more than Macs, and are a must have for editing media, and when it comes to gaming, they are unequaled. They are also much more cost affective, in some cases costing half of what a Mac of the same technical specifications would.
This argument is much more like a conflict because it is completely based on opinion. While much of the hardware in PC’s is better suited for gaming, Macs have a much more interactive operating system, making it easier to control other things on the computer besides the game. Both of these statements are fact, but they do not lead to any conclusive truth because they lead to the formation of opinions.

Pathos

Eli Pardue
9/17/07
AP Lang. Comp.
LaMags

Pathos is a powerful rhetorical device…

Pathos is a term referring to some aspect of an argument that sparks the emotions of the audience, and makes them relate to the desired side of the argument. It is used specifically to makes the audience sympathize with that side through the experiences of the audience, and how those past experiences relate to the argument, therefore sparking sympathy. Or, pathos could be used to play with the morals of the audience, as Michael Levin did in “A Case For Torture." An example from that essay is whether you would advocate the use of torture to gain information about missing babies (and no one sane wants babies to die).
Pathos is a powerful rhetoric device because it plays with the audience’s emotions to help them accept a particular side of an argument. A writer must be careful when injecting pathos into an argument because if they appeal to the wrong emotions, then an audience can become less inclined to that side of the argument. It is difficult to lose support about torture when talking about babies dieing, but if you are talking about political parties, which today can be a precarious ledge to balance on when trying to remain neutral, it can be much more difficult to remain neutral or attract the correct party. There is also a fine line between democrat and republican as liberality becomes more and more accepted.

explicit and implicit arguments

Eli Pardue
9/7/07
AP Lang. Comp.
LaMags

Implicit and Explicit Arguments

Explicit arguments are the most stereotypical arguments. They are direct confrontations between two sides of a controversial claim, and both are supported with points and reasons. Or, in the case of a paper, one controversial claim supported by points and reasons. the most rtecent article we read in class was "A Case For Torture," which is a perfect example of an explicit argument.
Implicit arguments are not displayed by the arguer putting forth a claim and then supporting in a frontal and unhidden manner. Implicit arguments are portrayed by a political cartoon, a poem, a story, or anything that can hold a point without telling it in direct terms. They can often be more effective as arguments because they do not provide means to disagree with the claim made. It still moves an audience towards a preffered point of view, but through subtle means.

Eli Pardue
9/4/07
AP Lang. Comp
LaMags

Writing Arguments Chapter 2

The article written by Lisa Turner in Better Nutrition used the “public affairs and niche magazine articles” genre. This genre is beneficial to her argument because, though it took more than a moment to read, made its point clear and concise with the first paragraph, and then went on to explain more in depth the benefits and consequences of genetically altered food. It then went on to explain how the consequences outweigh the benefits. Her genre makes the article she wrote more prone to be read by the readers of nutrition magazines, in this case Better Nutrition. That being said, this article was written with a bias die to the readers of that magazine, which would be a bias toward the point that genetically altered foods are potentially bad for our health and the health of the environment.
The cartoon on page one also uses its genre to affective means. The cartoon displays an overweight hippy (anti genetically altered food) taking drought resistant food from a starving African boy because it is genetically altered. The point that this cartoon makes is that genetically altered food can bring food to Africa and save starving people. The visual argument is a striking picture, and holds the ethics of those who are anti-genetically altered food at trial, because they are technically withholding the prospect of abundant food from the starving. The saying “a picture is worth a thousand words” is perfect for this instance because of the sharp image portrayed.