Ap Language & English Composition Summer Assignment
Ap Language & English Composition Summer AssignmentAssignment 1 1. The dehumanizing effects of slavery. 1 2. The rhetorical strategies in Dougl...Read More
~Posted on
Mar 2018
Ap Language & English Composition Summer AssignmentAssignment 1 1. The dehumanizing effects of slavery. 1 2. The rhetorical strategies in Dougl...Read More
~Posted on
Mar 2018
Assignment 1
1. The dehumanizing effects of slavery.
2. The rhetorical strategies in Douglass
narrative.
Assignment 2
9. Reach out and Elect Someone
Narrative
of the Life of Frederick Douglass is
an autobiographical account about the author’s unpleasant and harrowing
experiences as a former slave. Credited as one of the best narratives of its
time, the book narrates in brutal honesty, the excruciating and agonizing
events that took place in his early life as a slave. As slavery and the banning
of it was closely tied to American history, the work is considered as a
prominent and persuasive piece of literature that stoked up the movement for
abolishing slave trade in the United States of America.
“I was not allowed to
be present during her illness, at her death, or burial. She was gone long
before I knew anything about it”
These
few words which appear in the first chapter of the narrative, Douglass explain
how his master had separated him from his mother as soon as he was born.
Douglas surmises the cause of this separation as a way to estrange a child with
its mother. By removing an infant from its mother, Douglass points out the
darkest shades of human selfishness and how inhuman a person could be.
The
extreme pain and anguish of the author is expressed in the words above as he is
uncertain who is more uncompassionate. The reason why he is sceptic about the
morality of the slave is because he doubts how far an individual who is
alienated from his family, especially his mother from birth could have normal
feelings and compassion as others.
"The hearing of those wild notes always depressed my spirit, and
filled me with ineffable sadness. I have frequently found myself in tears while
hearing them...To those songs I trace my first glimmering conception of the dehumanizing
character of slavery."
Douglass discloses how the slave songs influenced
him during his childhood. The songs of the slaves were often heard while they
were working in the fields and he always found these songs disturbingly
alluring. He could never neglect the pain and sorrow of these songs and never
could understand them completely.
He associates listening to these
songs made him realize how dehumanizing slavery could ever be. Though it was an
expression of the pain and angst of the slaves, the owners would consider these
songs as something which the slaves sang when they were happy. Douglass could
never fathom this insensitive and callous selfishness of humans. He would carry
the pain and anger he had of slavery and would associate these songs to the
torture and hardships of slavery.
“There were horses and
men, cattle and women, pigs and children, all holding the same rank in the
scale of being, and were all subjected to the same narrow examination.”
This is another passage which
describes the extreme indignation and contempt that Douglass had towards
slavery. The passage explains an instance where Douglass had to bear witness to
his fellow brethren being inspected during ‘valuation’ a process in which it
was decided whom the slave would be owned to. He uses very sharp words like
‘brutalizing’ to describe the harrowing experience where humans; man and women
alike, were treated like animals and were being marked for valuation just like
commodities. This was one of the periods when the slaves had to undergo the
worst turmoil of their lives, as slave owners would strip them off the friends
or relatives, just by a nod of their head.
“That cheerful eye, under the influence of slavery, soon
became red with rage; that voice, made all of sweet accord, changed to one of
harsh and horrid discord; and that angelic face gave place to that of a demon”
In chapter six, Douglass explains
his experiences of living with Mrs. Sophia Auld, who had become his new slave
owner. He was astonished at first to see how different Mrs. Auld was from the
other slave owners. She was kind hearted and never had the grim rigidity of a
slave owner. She was even kind enough to teach him alphabets, without the
knowledge of her husband.
But Douglass reasoning about Mrs.
Auld changes as there is a change in her attitude, which he believes was
brought about by the disparity of slavery. He puts forward the irresponsible
power that slavery had given, changed the behaviour of his owner Mrs. Auld. He
laments over the fact that the lack of respect and tenderness towards slaves would
turn even the most cultured and matured persons to change themselves into
unreasonable human beings.
A rhetoric strategy is a method by
which a writer tries to persuade his readers to a particular opinion. The
opinion would be established by use of sentences or words that consolidates a
rational argument. A rhetorical argument can be established by an author by use
of strong words that connect to the reader and makes him associate with the
view points of the writer. It is a crafty method adopted by writers to
establish a point of view and align the readers thought to the same.
Douglass biography reveals his
ability to express with words his strong contempt and opinions against slavery
that existed in America before the Emancipation Proclamation. The main
rhetorical devices that Douglass illustrates in his narrative are ethos,
pathos, irony and anecdotes. Different strategies to garner evidence about a
concept is used, such as slavery in this context and makes a logical sequence
helping the reader connect to the authors thought process and associate with
the arguments that he puts forth. The three main rhetorical devices that
Douglass puts forth in his biography that has influenced the readers has been
discussed below:
Ethos is a rhetorical device which
convinces the reader of the integrity and authority of the writer to validly
discuss about a topic of his choice. The narrative by Douglas is laced with a
lot of anecdotal references of his own experiences that he had to face with at
the hands of his slave owners. The author has made a few startling revelations
about the brutality of slavery and how he experienced and witnessed a lot of
incidents from his childhood. Having lived the life of a slave himself, Douglas
exhibits no restraint in admitting the derogatory experiences he had to undergo
all his life. The readers could connect to his narrative, as all the
experiences that have been explained has either been undergone by himself or
someone close to him. As soon as the narrative begins, the personal accounts
touch a chord in the readers mind and create a sense of trust that the writer
has some honest and grim experiences to share with them
Pathos
is one of the strongest rhetorical devices and could be used by an author to
provoke strong emotional responses from the reader. Pathos if used effectively
can be a persuasive factor for the writer as emotional responses tend to remain
at the minds of the reader for a long time. The author can create an emotional
bonding with his readers in a narrative if personal accounts or experiences can
be depicted in a manner in which the readers can associate themselves with.
“if you teach that nigger (speaking of
myself) how to read, there would be no keeping him. It would forever unfit him
to be a slave. He would at once become unmanageable, and of no value to his
master.”
This is one of the instances where Douglas
shares his experience as a kid at the house of one his owners, Mr. Auld. He
depicts the view of his master Mr. Auld when he learnt that his wife was
teaching young Douglas the alphabets. He was sceptical about the whole thing
and restrains his wife from doing so. The reasoning behind his thought was that
a slave would become uncontrollable if he had more intelligence and ability.
The words have been used with great care and portray the anguish of a young
child who has been refused a basic privilege like education.
In conclusion, it could be inferred from the narrative that Douglass
was deeply enraged by his own experiences of slavery and wanted to bring to
light the bitter experiences he had to suffer from his childhood.
Assignment 2
In the opening chapter Postman tries to persuade
the reader with his opinions as to how the American way of thinking has changed
drastically. He believes that the exposure to broadcasting mediums has changed
the way journalism had been viewed, accepted and acknowledged. His notions are
mainly against the influence of Television and the impact it has on the
American public. The power of a visual medium is that it could be more oriented
towards the physical aspects of anything, which according to him is just peripheral
and very trivial. He especially points out the obsession of televised
journalism to take the focus on the looks and physical characteristics of even
Politicians. He delicately suggests that a visual media such as Television
could not be taken seriously due to its overt emphasis on entertainment and
advertising. He expresses his concern of the shift in significance of knowledge
attainment through reading to something like Television which gives too much
importance to ocular perception.
Postman does not refuse to accept the influence of the visual media in
reporting. He has strong convictions about the type of information that a
particular medium should carry. He states that the actual emphasis should be n
the information passed by the medium than the medium itself. He draws a clear
distinction between the type of content that gets generated due to the type of
medium and the actual content that gets delivered.
The main point of discussion by Postman in the second chapter
is about the migration of the people’s interest from newspapers to television.
Postman strongly opposes this transition and states that the intelligence of
the people has dwindled. He sarcastically puts forth facts to reinstate that
the conversations has changed from being sensible and relevant earlier to
ludicrous and unreasonable nowadays. As an example of the impact a medium can
have on culture, he gives an example about an African tribe whose fundamentals
were based on an oral culture. Following an oral culture means the main form of
communication and conduct depended through speech. Being heavily dependent on
an oral culture reflected in every wake of their life even at the way they
carried out punishments by their judicial system. The main way of punishing for
this pride was by means of proverbs that decided their code of conduct. The
punishment a criminal could get would thus depend upon the proverb the judge
could remember at that particular time.
Postman points out that the usage of proverbs in an
American court scenario would be hilarious. As there are more efficient modes
of documenting present in American culture, the collection of evidence its
analysis and administering judgment would follow an entirely different method.
This makes Postman reckon that media is one platform where our knowledge could
be extended to distinguish between information and opinion. Postman’s major
concern throughout is the dwindling of a reading culture which he thinks has
been caused due to the influence of television. Many of his statements give an
opinion that knowledge can never be gained through a visual medium such as
television. Knowledge can be gained by different means and the methods of
acquiring it could be boundless. These thoughts were proved to be inaccurate in
many ways and would be proved that any medium be it visual or typographical
could be used to garner more knowledge in a more sophisticated manner.
“the only communication event that could produce such
collective attention in today's America is the Superbowl.”
In this
chapter, Postman holds a very high regard of America during the seventeenth
century. As from his previous opinions, it is clear of his affinity towards the
literary gains that could be garnered by reading. He emphasizes that America in
those days were far better and idealistic in terms of its literary gains. It
could be noted that though he has taken pride in the literacy rate of the
Americans, he has conveniently sidelined the hardships and neglect of studies
by the slaves and the indigenous native tribes. In the quote Postman
sarcastically suggests the difference in interests of the people in both the
eras. While Thomas Paines ‘Common Sense’ was a book that was considered to be
an instant hit among the Americans of the past, another thing that could garner
peoples interest in such proportions could only be the American Super Bowl due
to the emphasis on advertising and getting lost in the visual media culture.
“When Dickens visited America in 1842, his
reception equaled the adulation we offer today to television stars,
quarterbacks, and Michael Jackson.” (p.
39)
In chapter 4 of the narrative
Postman summarizes mostly about the talks that Abraham Lincoln and Stephen
Douglas had. It was recorded that the talks were very long and lasted for close
to three hours. He expresses his surprise and appreciation of the audience
general intellect in showing patience to imbibe what either of the great men
were trying to convey with their oratory skills. He also compares the love and adulation
that Charles Dickens received during his visit to America. He compares the
reaction of the people to those that could only be enjoyed by only TV stars and
sports people. He also implies in this chapter about the many advantages of
printed language which was papraphrasing. According to Postman, readable
content would be more rational because it was paraphraseable.
“the potential of the telegraph to transform information into a
commodity might never have been realized, except for the partnership between
the telegraph and the press”
