TOW #3: Curtis Freedom by Anna Haverly

Anna Haverly is a thirteen year old girl from Mancos, Colorado.  Although just a young teenager, she has been published, and is even the author of the featured story of the month, in Stone Soup, a magazine with illustrations and stories written by children.  Since she’s a kid, she’s not very credible.  However, in her story, Curtis Freedom, she makes sure to include factual evidence to support the plot, making her have some credibility.  Up until slavery was abolished in 1865 due to the Thirteenth Amendment, it was common in America, and Harriet Tubman was an escaped slave who managed to free other slaves, just as she does for Curtis in the story.  Curtis is a twelve year old boy who’s a slave that dreams of freedom.  He was separated from his parents and hopes to be with them again, especially his father.  He travels with Tubman to Canada, where he finally reunites with his father and his freedom that he wanted for so long is granted.  By portraying Curtis’ journey, Haverly’s purpose is clearly to entertain her audience, a general one of all ages, with a story about hope, freedom, and a young boy’s search for his father.  In order to achieve her purpose of entertaining readers, which she does accomplish, Haverly appeals to pathos, uses a comparison, uses a second person point-of-view, and uses dialogue.  Haverly makes the audience feel bad for Curtis by portraying him as a slave who is subject to harsh treatment and has been separated from his family.  The hope that he has to be free and find his family gets transferred to the readers as they start to wish the same for him.  Haverly also includes a comparison of Harriet Tubman to Moses because they both freed slaves.  This comparison made a lot of sense and is very intriguing.  The second person point-of-view helps Haverly entertain the audience because it makes it possible to show the movements of all of the involved and not just have Curtis’ thoughts.  By using those rhetorical devices, Haverly writes a story entertaining to all readers.  

African American Child Slaves

http://blackamericaweb.com/120552/little-known-black-history-fact-plantation-games/

TOW #2: Dance Dance Revolution Disney Mix by Konami

Dance Dance Revolution is a virtual dancing game that was first released by Konami, a Japanese company known for releasing many animes and video games, such as Yu-Gi-Oh!, on November 21, 1998.  Since its first release, Dance Dance Revolution has been installed in numerous arcades across the globe.  It is at those arcades that young kids saw older adolescents playing the game and wanted to join in.  However, Dance Dance Revolution games are generally geared toward older adolescents and teens.  The ratings on the majority of the games says that the games are for everyone ten years of age or older.  The reason for that being the suggestive clothing of the characters and suggestive song lyrics.  Therefore, those young kids looking at the game in awe were usually not allowed to play or purchase the games by their parents.  That is why Konami started to make other editions of the game, such as the Mario version and this one, the Disney edition; to have younger players and to make more of a profit.  By using the Disney characters, Konami appeals to both ethos and logos.  Although the younger kids may have already wanted to play Dance Dance Revolution, Konami understands that they will most likely enjoy it more by being able to compete with characters that they are familiar with.  However, the Disney group is also dressed up in a way that would normally appeal to the older demographic, but it entices the younger demographic to the game even more because it makes them feel older.  Also, by using family friendly characters that parents know, love, and trust instead of more vulgar characters, they have no reason to forbid their young children from playing the game.  As a result of creating the Disney version of Dance Dance Revolution, Konami has managed to reach its audience, the parents of young child gamers, and has effortlessly convinced them to buy their product.  Therefore, the purpose of Konami to get younger children to play Dance Dance Revolution was achieved.  

TOW #1: Guns made for kids: How young is too young to shoot? by Matthew DeLuca, Staff Writer, NBC News

Matthew DeLuca is a credible author because he is writing for NBC, a news agency  whose purpose is to inform the public news happening in the United States.  Besides Guns made for kids: How young is too young to shoot?, DeLuca has written numerous articles for NBC.  In Guns made for kids: How young is too young to shoot?, DeLuca’s purpose is to have the audience answer his title question about how old they believe people, more specifically kids, should be before they are allowed to use guns.  On Tuesday, April 30, 2013, a five year-old boy in Kentucky shot his two year-old sister accidentally with the use of a gun that was a present to him.  Currently, there are many children under the age of 18, including that boy, that use guns, and there are many laws on the topic of children gun usage.  Anyway, the author was able to accomplish his purpose by sharing different perspectives about the issue from numerous sources so the audience could compare and contrast their points of views and by discussing the laws surrounding the subject.  For example, DeLuca included Josh Sugarmann’s, executive director of the Violence Policy Center, quote, “There’s a recognition that the majority of the American public has concerns about putting guns in the hands of children.”  Later, DeLuca would include quotes from Andy Fink, editor-in-chief of a magazine called Junior Shooters that focuses on the benefits of kids using guns.  The people and their points not only are used for comparison but contradict each other well, as do other quotes in the article.  DeLuca appeals to authority by using quotes from well-known and knowledgeable people related to children gun usage as well as discussing laws, he appeals to emotions by sharing the story of an innocent 2 year-old girl being shot, and he appeals to logic by using data to support different points-of-views on the topic, such as a survey conducted by Hunting Heritage Trust and the National Shooting Sports Foundation in January 2012.  DeLuca is unbiased so the audience can make a choice for themselves, which they do.  

Children Using Guns for Takeover?

 

http://knutwoerner.onsugar.com/kid-gun-3546339?page=0,0,0

 

Marking Period One Independent Reading Book Intro Post

For the first marking period of AP English, I will be reading The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson.  Daniel Burnham was a successful architect while Holmes was a doctor who was also a serial killer.  While Burnham helped build The Chicago World's Fair of 1893, or "The White City",  Holmes built a mansion next to it and lured in young women and killed them.  All the while, the fair masked his wrongdoings.  I chose to read this book because...honestly, there is no real reason except that it seemed interesting.  After my teacher said in class that we had to read non-fiction, I thought about different non-fiction works that I knew about or had read.  Not a single one seemed interesting.  When I got home that day, contemplating what to read, I kept going back to the idea of mysteries.  The idea seemed appealing because I love detective shows and murder mysteries.  Therefore, I thought it would be interesting to read about a real life murder mystery that I had never heard of before.  So I searched online and found a list where this book was either the first or second one there.  It looked pretty good.  Anyway, what I hope to gain from reading this book is to gain a better appreciation for non-fiction writing as well as to learn how to incorporate aspects of good storytelling into my own writing.