Gents:
For homework tonight, find your documentary and start watching/analyzing it for rhetorical appeals. I decided to push back the reading of Achebe and blog writing on the film to Monday so that you can have time to find your film. Your first draft of your paper will be due on Wednesday of next week.
In class today, we reviewed some work on DyKnow dealing with syntax and diction, demonstrating the Close Reading / Microscopic Skills that you read about in LoC Chapter 2. In particular, we focused on this set of sentences from Heart of Darkness:
Marlow sat cross-legged right aft, leaning against the mizzenmast. He had sunken cheeks, a yellow complexion, a straight back, an ascetic aspect, and with his arms dropped, the palms of hands outwards, resembled an idol (Conrad 18).
In particular, we focused on:
For homework tonight, find your documentary and start watching/analyzing it for rhetorical appeals. I decided to push back the reading of Achebe and blog writing on the film to Monday so that you can have time to find your film. Your first draft of your paper will be due on Wednesday of next week.
In class today, we reviewed some work on DyKnow dealing with syntax and diction, demonstrating the Close Reading / Microscopic Skills that you read about in LoC Chapter 2. In particular, we focused on this set of sentences from Heart of Darkness:
Marlow sat cross-legged right aft, leaning against the mizzenmast. He had sunken cheeks, a yellow complexion, a straight back, an ascetic aspect, and with his arms dropped, the palms of hands outwards, resembled an idol (Conrad 18).
In particular, we focused on:
- the connotations of the word "ascetic," a tough-sounding word that paints Marlow as a contemplative loner
- the second sentence as a loose sentence, or one that gives the main clause at the start and adds subordinate clauses to layer meaning as the sentence continues. In the sentence above, this helps to mirror the increasing darkness, as the narrator focuses on more general elements (by the end, Marlow's silhouette as a Buddha-like figure) as the Thames and the London skyline grow darker.
- the potential effects of viewing this sentence as a series of sentences instead, leading to a discussion from Kyle's point about the "what" of the sentence being no different, even though changing the "how" (I.E. how Conrad placed words and phrases together) demonstrates a vast difference in conveying the message.
Next class, we'll continue watching King Leopold's Ghost and l