DESCRIPTION FL20Required Texts: Gatto, “Against School” / Pollan, “End of Cooking” / Wallace, “Consider the Lobster” / Eighner, “On Dumpster Diving” / Gay “Bad Feminist”Due Date: October 9thby 5p.m.via CanvasW.P. Percentage: 40%Beforeyoutake the plunge into analysis, it is important to understand the difference between analysis and description. So often, we think we’re offering an analysis and nuanced understanding about a piece when we are actually just describing what is obvious. For this assignment, you will practice understanding the difference. First, you will provide a 1-page description of the essay you have chosen for the upcoming rhetorical analysis. Some questions you might consider in this description are: who is the author?;what is the publication and target audience; what is the argument about?; what evidence is provided? After the description, you’ll start some movement towards your analysis by answering questions that might get you started (the answers should be about aparagraph long—no less than4 sentences):
1.)What are some patterns or areas of interest you’re starting to notice within the essay
2.)Why do you think some of those elements are being used with their target audience in mind?
3.)Start to form a thesis draft. How might you move those elements of how the author argues into an overarching argument for your essay?
4.)Who is YOUR audience? Do they differ from the author’s? If so, why might they care about this argument and analysis? If not, why do they need to understand the essay in the way you’re analyzing it? (A bit of advice: avoid the “My audience is my instructor, and she will care because she wants me to do well in the course.” Think further about the makeup of the classroom and why they might care, for example, about the implicit issue of gender in one of the readings.)
