Diamonds from Sierra Leone

"Diamonds from Sierra Leone" is a song published with its music video by Kanye West 2005.  While the  song never reached the status of a "hit," its music video has had a huge impact on society.  West decided to write this song and publish this music video in order to bring awareness to conflict diamonds, specifically in Sierra Leone, the center of blood diamond harvesting.  In addition, West encourages viewers to make sure that they purchase conflict free diamonds in the future.  This video was made soon after they world began to gain awareness of blood diamonds.  In Sierra Leone and some other African countries, child labor forces are being used to mine for the valuable jewels.  These children are forcably taken away from their families and are then supervised by extremist soldiers.  The kids are rarely given breaks, and hardly ever even see the light of day.  If uncooperative, the children will have their hands cut off by soldiers, or they may be forced to kill their own families.

Because of this threat to human society, Kanye West felt it important to bring awareness to this issue.  He mainly focused on Americans, the major consumers of diamonds and West's largest group of followers.  In order to do this, Kanye relied heavily on pathos to get his point across by portraying the pain and suffering of the children of Sierra Leone.  Before the song even starts, a native's commentary on the situation is played, along with footage from the diamond mines.  This makes the reader sympathize with the children right off of the bat.  This also establishes ethos by incorporating someone who has experienced the tragedy first-hand into the video.  From there, West uses imgery to help the reader see the devastation in Sierra Leone.  For example, a woman receives an engagement ring, and as she puts it on, blood rushes from her finger and engulfs her arm.  Standing next to her is a child from the diamond mines.  A repeated image or symbol in the video is the fully dialated and fully-black eyes of the child slaves.  This is because they never see light; they are in the mines during all hours of the day.  This image haunts the viewer and further adds to the effective us of pathos.  West is effective at portraying his point because of the haunting and devastating images he shows to the viewer, convincing them to forever stay away from conflict diamonds.

Electoral Spending

            This article was about the spending in the past overall election, including the senate races, the representative races, and the presidential race.  Overall, the spending reached $4.2 billion, with Romney and his campaign spending $1 billion and Obama spending only one tenth less than that.  Other main points included the fact that most spending was used to produce negative ads, and that the general trend was that the more a candidate spent, the better they did in the election.  Ethos was used in order to establish credibility throughout the article; the CNN reporter constantly referenced the reliable Center for Responsive Politics.  This article was written only a week after the election, so it is possible that these estimates will change.

            In writing this article, the author used the statistics and facts from the election in order to show that money is becoming an overwhelmingly accurate predictor for the outcome of an election.  Concentrating on Romney having the first $1 billion campaign, the article notes that this may be the new bench mark for candidates to reach in order to be elected.  This article relies on the enthymeme that’s major premise is that elections should be based on facts, not on propaganda and advertisements.  Intended for the American people, the article intends to educate voting-eligible citizens on the big business of politics, hopefully making them a little bit more aware of how their decisions are influenced.  Because of the intelligent use of logos, the article is very effective.

Link to Article

Boomerang Part 2

            Michael Lewis’s Boomerang is a non-fiction text about the global financial collapse of the 2000’s.  As stated in the previous post about this book, the text examines the crisis starting with the extreme depreciation of the American real estate market, and then delves into the result that crash had on the global financial community.  After reading the book in its entirety, it is clear that the purpose of the book is to not only describe the nature of the financial collapse that sent the world into a global recession, but also to examine the nature of society today that caused this collapse.  The first post stated that Lewis used humor early on when commenting on cultures such as in Iceland to describe the people there.  As the novel explores Greece, Ireland, Germany, and eventually the United States, social commentary remains a common sight.  However, it becomes apparent that this commentary serves a greater purpose: to make a statement on the selfish nature of society that shot itself in the foot, leading to the largest global recession since the Great Depression.

            The end of this novel takes a break from examining the financial side of the crisis and moves on to show the social effects that the recession had in a town in California.  Lewis uses this as a snapshot of America because of its drastic devastation due to the recession.  Through this, Lewis states that humans are programmed to hoard as much of scarce resources they can (in this case money).  In doing so, people only consider the instant gratification of their actions instead of considering the long-term effects.  In the recession, people bought and sold over-valued mortgages and other securities that did not hold true to their value.  However, using the rebound of the fire station in that small town in California, Lewis leaves the reader with a positive spin, stating that people can be optimistic and successfully work towards rebounding and coming back from devastation.

            A repeated metaphor throughout the story is comparing something to a symptom of a disease.  In the first parts of the book, symptoms are just used to describe the effects of the financial crisis and the toll that it was taking on countries around the world.  At the end, just like the topic of the book, the financial crisis as a whole becomes a symptom of the behavior of society.  Also, the book does a good job of breaking down the whole (financial crisis) into its parts (effects on different places and countries).  This helps the reader understand the vast impact that it had and also the different results in countries around the world.  Ultimately, the book was very creatively and well-written, making the author effective at communicating his purpose by the end of the novel.

Hurricane Sandy

            This article was about the effects that Hurricane Sandy may have on the East coast and the precautions that people were taking.  It focused on tips on how to prepare for the storm and on what to do once consequences of the storm were experienced, such as power outages.  This article was written collectively by the staff of CNN, each person located in a different part of the country.  This helps show all of the effects and sides of the hurricane.  When this article was written, Hurricane Sandy had just hit the Caribbean and was headed up towards the United States.  It was still unknown on which exact direction the storm would take.

            This text was created for the people living in areas where Hurricane Sandy could potentially hit.  This is because the article wanted to make sure that people were informed enough to prepare and protect themselves during the storm.  It stressed being safe and getting through the storm.  In order to do this, the article used pathos through pictures of devastated villages and towns in the Caribbean that were struck by Sandy.  They consisted of wrecked houses and buildings along with people looking extremely sad.  This creates the effect of making people think about the consequences (even though they are extreme for the United States’ situation) before the storm, and it makes them more likely to prepare.  Also, the article used quotations from normal citizens getting ready for Hurricane Sandy by evacuating or purchasing special goods.  This makes other Americans think that if people in their area are preparing, they should to.  The article was sure to include the possible threat of Hurricane Sandy becoming a super storm and increasing in strength and length.  Because of the casual use of these strategies, the author was able to accomplish their purpose of informing and persuading people to prepare for Hurricane Sandy.

Link to Article

Enterprise College Athletes Commercial

            This commercial published by Enterprise showed how the company supports college sports and makes the claim that they hire former college athletes frequently.  The commercial does not focus on the actual functioning of the company, but rather just emphasizes how they support college sports.  There are many implied employees holding pictures of themselves playing their sport.  A major message from the commercial was that teamwork is carried over from sports to the customer service world.  This commercial was shown (and viewed by me) on the Big 10 network during the Michigan, Michigan State college football game. 

            As seen by the subject and the time that the commercial was aired, the advertisement is directed towards collegiate sports fans that could possibly be looking to travel or rent a car for another situation.  It tries to relate the viewer to the company through the use of sports.  The main intention of this advertisement is to attract potential customers to Enterprise; more specifically, it intends to attract people to the friendly service at the company.  In order to accomplish this, besides using sports as a connection, Enterprise uses a diverse set of people and sports in the commercial.  This will appeal to the maximum number of people possible.  There were no words in the commercial besides the logo at the end, forcing people to concentrate on the many, smiling employees talking about their college days.  As the commercial was well placed and shown, and the desired message was clear in the commercial, Enterprise accomplished their purpose in this advertisement. 

Link to Commercial 

Cave Made a Classroom in Syria

            This article is on the changes that Syria has had to make in their educational system because of their Civil War.  There have been bombing raids on over 2,000 schools in Syria, and because of that, one school decided to move their classes into a cave.  Although it was from CNN, the article is not completely credible as all of the facts are based off of social media websites (it was too dangerous for reporters to go investigate).  Therefore, there are some hesitations that must be taken when evaluating the facts of this text.  The civil war currently going on in Syria makes everyday life impossible for citizens there.  This prompted CNN to cover a story on the struggles that are normal life in Syria. 

            Intended mainly for people living outside of Syria, the article intended to portray the devastations that are occurring there.  In order to do this, as one would expect, the author uses both pathos and logos in order to shape the readers’ views on the subject.  Pathos was used in describing the dire situations and turmoil, and logos then backed up the descriptions with facts and quotations.  Also, the reader compares and contrasts the situation of the school with some of the beauties in Syria.  This is done to make the reader realize that the Syrian children and educators have lost the beauty and fun in their lives.  Even though the author uses these rhetorical devices well, he does not accomplish his purpose of trying to portray the harshness of Syrian life to the reader.  This is because his diction is very imprecise and his placement of ideas is poorly thought out.  For example, the article states in talking about the teacher, “While the cave's stone walls and its remote location offer protection, he says, it is still dangerous for the children to go to and from school. He groans about the lack of supplies, the small blackboard and the dim lighting” (Brumfield 12).  These two statements draw two completely different emotions from the reader when they read them, and it makes both of them ineffective.  Also, the title makes the article sound like something interesting and impressive that a school in Syria has done.  It was very shocking to realize the situation which put the students in the cave.

Link to Article

Boomerang

            Boomerang, written by Michael Lewis, is a non-fiction text about the financial crisis of 2008.  The book includes the development of the crisis, its extent and “symptoms,” as well of the global implications that it had, which is the main focus of the book.  The book shows how the crisis was much more than just the housing collapse in the United States; it stemmed from global investments in assets with inflated values.  Michael Lewis, the author of this book, was also the author of The Blindside and Moneyball, along with many other non-fiction works on economics.  This book was written in 2011, after the global economy suffered the worst of the effects of the recession. 

            A major repetition throughout the book was that nobody was looking at the correct data in order to foresee the downfall of the global economy.  Therefore, Lewis writes this novel in order to inform people on what they did not pick up on in the past.  However, most people who would take something away from this book would have at least a basic prior knowledge on the topic.  Lewis writes informally, yet technically and intelligently and the audience must be able to interpret the information.  In order to portray his purpose, Lewis develops ethos early and often by stating his background along with those of the people he quotes in the book.  Also, he uses humor and social commentary on different cultures that he experienced in order to keep the reader interested and entertained.  He splits up the book by focusing on one or two major places around the world (such as Iceland and Greece) for a chapter and hits them in a chronological order.  Because of the intelligent design and tools that the author uses to keep the reader engaged, Lewis does a good job of leaving an impression on the reader.