- Oct 2016
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www.insidehighered.com www.insidehighered.com
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Jeffrey J. Williams is a professor of English and of literary and cultural studies at Carnegie Mellon University. His most recent book is How to Be an Intellectual: Essays on Criticism, Culture, and the University (Fordham University Press, 2014).
Why do you think this information is included? What's its rhetorical purpose? Discuss.
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working class
New definition of "working class" is proposed; not textbook definition, but lived actuality. Arguably the real definition of "working class."
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It’s useful to keep in mind that massive student debt is only a recent development, arising since the 1980s, and 10 years ago, the idea of abolishing it or enacting free public higher education were considered pie-in-the-sky proposals. But they’re on the agenda now, and we have to keep working to accrue the data, build the narratives and devise policies that aim toward more equality.
Takeaway? If so, to what end? DISCUSS.
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Debt-free college
Is this a good idea? Why/why not? DISCUSS in terms of CAUSE/EFFECT:
- If debt free college were to become an actuality (a cause)--what might be some potential effects?
- Consider bothpositive and negative effects.
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Draut herself was a working-class beneficiary of higher education: the daughter of a steelworker, she went to a public university near home in Ohio, which sent her on her way to a job in advertising, then with Planned Parenthood, and since 2001 with Demos, a progressive think tank, where she started as a researcher and is currently a vice president. Demos was founded in the 1990s as a counterweight to the many conservative think tanks, and it has produced reports such as “The Great Cost Shift,” about the draining of public support for higher education, and “The College Compact,” about enhancing public support. Draut first worked on studies of credit-card and student loan debt, which spurred her earlier exposé, Strapped: Why America’s 20- and 30-Somethings Can’t Get Ahead (Doubleday, 2006). She learned a lesson from the battle over credit cards. In seeking reform, as she recalled in an interview with me, “there’s a beltway mentality, ‘Well, that’s never going to happen; we’re never going to regulate the credit-card companies.’” But she proudly attended the 2009 signing of the Credit Card Act, which regulates rates and fees and has helped those in debt. As she quipped, “I got the last laugh on that one,” and she sees the same possibility for higher education: “Debt-free college is now a real idea and part of the political debate.”
DISCUSS:
- What is the rhetorical function of these 3 paragraphs?
- Why do these three paragraphs follow the counter argument paragraph citing Marsh?
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John Marsh
Counterargument. What's its function in this piece? Discuss.
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it is largely female, about half Latino and African-American, usually nonunionized, and struggling to make ends meet at or near minimum wage while laboring in home health care, fast food and retail, which have gained the bulk of new jobs.
Sources? Citations? How does this change your understanding of "working class"?
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the key is to change the narrative
DISCUSS. Is this enough? Does this have the potential to bring into effect real, tangible change? Connection to words and language as technologies? Homo Narrans?
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That has effectively shut the working class out of public representation or political power
Followup to EFFECTS note above. Is it really as bad as it seems? Are Williams and Draught correct?
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The cultural divide has two daunting consequences.
EFFECTS. (1) media careers come from college degrees; (2) political interns/congressional staffers come from college degrees. Discuss the implications here.
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the class divide is not just a matter of money but also one of culture
Interesting point. Unpack and discuss.
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.
Devil's Advocate: Is there another way to interpret this data? Why else might these statistics be so distinct when comparing 1970 to 2000?
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tuition prices
If a central marker of "college" is "tuition prices," then perhaps community college does not apply to this argument re: new class divide as effect of access to "college." Thoughts?
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contrary to college standing as an open thoroughfare for Americans wanting to rise, it has become a gated toll road primarily available to those from middle-class and upper-class families.
Does Williams mean university here exclusively, or does community college apply as well?
What's the difference between COMMUNITY COLLEGE and UNIVERSITY?
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Tamara Draut
Primary source of academic research for this essay.
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College and the New Class Divide
DISCUSSION QUESTION 1: In what way(s) is this a Causal Analysis argument (i.e. a cause/effect argument)? Explain your answer.
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Contrary to college standing as an open thoroughfare for Americans wanting to improve their lives, it has become a gated toll road primarily available to those from middle-class and upper-class families, argues Jeffrey J. Williams.
DISCUSSION QUESTION 2: Do you agree that college (cause) is responsible for creating a new class divide (effect)? Explain.
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lti.hypothesislabs.com lti.hypothesislabs.com
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T
INTRO: PARAGRAPH 1. Thread your reply here. Use the handout to SUMMARIZE the argument/central idea of this paragraph and MAP how this paragraph functions within this section of the paper (i.e. the Introduction).
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As
CONCLUSION: PARAGRAPH 20. Thread your reply here. Use the handout to SUMMARIZE the argument/central idea of this paragraph and MAP how this paragraph functions within this section of the paper (i.e. the Introduction).
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For
CONCLUSION: PARAGRAPH 19. Thread your reply here. Use the handout to SUMMARIZE the argument/central idea of this paragraph and MAP how this paragraph functions within this section of the paper (i.e. the Introduction).
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But
CONCLUSION: PARAGRAPH 18. Thread your reply here. Use the handout to SUMMARIZE the argument/central idea of this paragraph and MAP how this paragraph functions within this section of the paper (i.e. the Introduction).
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The
CONCLUSION: PARAGRAPH 17. Thread your reply here. Use the handout to SUMMARIZE the argument/central idea of this paragraph and MAP how this paragraph functions within this section of the paper (i.e. the Introduction).
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But
CONCLUSION: PARAGRAPH 16. Thread your reply here. Use the handout to SUMMARIZE the argument/central idea of this paragraph and MAP how this paragraph functions within this section of the paper (i.e. the Introduction).
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In
CONCLUSION: PARAGRAPH 15. Thread your reply here. Use the handout to SUMMARIZE the argument/central idea of this paragraph and MAP how this paragraph functions within this section of the paper (i.e. the Introduction).
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What
CONCLUSION: PARAGRAPH 14. Thread your reply here. Use the handout to SUMMARIZE the argument/central idea of this paragraph and MAP how this paragraph functions within this section of the paper (i.e. the Introduction).
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Perhaps
CONCLUSION: PARAGRAPH 13. Thread your reply here. Use the handout to SUMMARIZE the argument/central idea of this paragraph and MAP how this paragraph functions within this section of the paper (i.e. the Introduction).
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It
CONCLUSION: PARAGRAPH 12. Thread your reply here. Use the handout to SUMMARIZE the argument/central idea of this paragraph and MAP how this paragraph functions within this section of the paper (i.e. the Introduction).
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The
CONCLUSION: PARAGRAPH 11. Thread your reply here. Use the handout to SUMMARIZE the argument/central idea of this paragraph and MAP how this paragraph functions within this section of the paper (i.e. the Introduction).
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Few
CONCLUSION: PARAGRAPH 10. Thread your reply here. Use the handout to SUMMARIZE the argument/central idea of this paragraph and MAP how this paragraph functions within this section of the paper (i.e. the Introduction).
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Woody
CONCLUSION: PARAGRAPH 9. Thread your reply here. Use the handout to SUMMARIZE the argument/central idea of this paragraph and MAP how this paragraph functions within this section of the paper (i.e. the Introduction).
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Toy
CONCLUSION: PARAGRAPH 8. Thread your reply here. Use the handout to SUMMARIZE the argument/central idea of this paragraph and MAP how this paragraph functions within this section of the paper (i.e. the Introduction).
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Far
CONCLUSION: PARAGRAPH 7. Thread your reply here. Use the handout to SUMMARIZE the argument/central idea of this paragraph and MAP how this paragraph functions within this section of the paper (i.e. the Introduction).
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Toy
CONCLUSION: PARAGRAPH 6. Thread your reply here. Use the handout to SUMMARIZE the argument/central idea of this paragraph and MAP how this paragraph functions within this section of the paper (i.e. the Introduction).
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Like
CONCLUSION: PARAGRAPH 5. Thread your reply here. Use the handout to SUMMARIZE the argument/central idea of this paragraph and MAP how this paragraph functions within this section of the paper (i.e. the Introduction).
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For
CONCLUSION: PARAGRAPH 4. Thread your reply here. Use the handout to SUMMARIZE the argument/central idea of this paragraph and MAP how this paragraph functions within this section of the paper (i.e. the Introduction).
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This
CONCLUSION: PARAGRAPH 3. Thread your reply here. Use the handout to SUMMARIZE the argument/central idea of this paragraph and MAP how this paragraph functions within this section of the paper (i.e. the Introduction).
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Sharing
CONCLUSION: PARAGRAPH 2. Thread your reply here. Use the handout to SUMMARIZE the argument/central idea of this paragraph and MAP how this paragraph functions within this section of the paper (i.e. the Introduction).
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If
CONCLUSION: PARAGRAPH 1. Thread your reply here. Use the handout to SUMMARIZE the argument/central idea of this paragraph and MAP how this paragraph functions within this section of the paper (i.e. the Introduction).
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INTRO: PARAGRAPH 4. Thread your reply here. Use the handout to SUMMARIZE the argument/central idea of this paragraph and MAP how this paragraph functions within this section of the paper (i.e. the Introduction).
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P
INTRO: PARAGRAPH 3. Thread your reply here. Use the handout to SUMMARIZE the argument/central idea of this paragraph and MAP how this paragraph functions within this section of the paper (i.e. the Introduction).
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INTRO: PARAGRAPH 2. Thread your reply here. Use the handout to SUMMARIZE the argument/central idea of this paragraph and MAP how this paragraph functions within this section of the paper (i.e. the Introduction).
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Notes
Notice how NOTES are used to enhance the argument.
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These films transform the interstitial space between man and his graven objects (robots and toys) into a virtue, exploiting its uncan-niness to provoke a distant kind of fear while maintaining an innocent and un-censorable narrative.
Thought provoking (and thought extending) closing.
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While its uncertain jitters are less obvious than the uncontrolled movement of a child, there is a sense in which adulthood is less about gaining control than about steadily losing control. It is about, as Woody and Buzz discuss, managing to fall gracefully rather than to fly.
Well said.
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Thus, these Pixar features exploit the tendency of the ratings system to judge the “adult-ness” of a film based on its sex and vio-lence quotient alone. They remind us of something that the rating system appar-ently doesn’t know: that sexual titilla-tion and violence are not the only wages of adulthood. They are only manifesta-tions of far deeper crises and struggles. The films revive a broad cinematic discourse open to child and adult alike about the strange, imaginary life of ob-jects and the complexity of the project of material being
Compelling closing argument.
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For the adult spectator, facing their own crises and resultant revisionings of the mean-ings of love, obsolescence, childhood, aging, and life, these films both avoid and, oddly, abstractly materialize the real life and existential questions that adult viewers face. As such they provide a unique set of spectatorial experiences that while not strictly pleasurable pro-vide the relative pleasure of distanced contemplation while still insisting on confrontation of the very adult stuff R-rated films exploit by visualizing with an overt, superficial, and sometimes overwhelming directness.
Food for thought.
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The encouragement these toys offer each other to stop struggling and accept death undermines the hope-fulness of previous Toy Story texts, be-cause it reminds us that these toys will ultimately become maimed, broken, and tortured “junk.” It reminds us of the du-bious status of the object—and of the objectified—in a culture built around commodity fetishism. It encourages a kind of revisionist mental return to the previous texts, revising their innocent themes and visual pleasures against the weight of so dreadful a demise. What is more, it places spectators in the position of identifying with the toys in their help-lessness and in their reversion to junk
Powerful--and thought provoking--final claims.
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bricolage
See Dictionary.com
noun, plural bricolages [bree-kuh-lah-zhiz, ‐lahzh] (Show IPA), bricolage. 1. a construction made of whatever materials are at hand; something created from a variety of available things. 2. (in literature) a piece created from diverse resources. 3. (in art) a piece of makeshift handiwork. 4. the use of multiple, diverse research methods.
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Reflect-ing perhaps Western concerns about the artificial extension of life through ma-chines, the Toy Story series represents a fear not so much about life’s brevity as about its unendurable length amidst hardly bearable changes.
Bold claim. Smart reading of the films.
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nihilism
See the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
Short explanation from IEP: Nihilism is the belief that all values are baseless and that nothing can be known or communicated. It is often associated with extreme pessimism and a radical skepticism that condemns existence. A true nihilist would believe in nothing, have no loyalties, and no purpose other than, perhaps, an impulse to destroy. While few philosophers would claim to be nihilists, nihilism is most often associated with Friedrich Nietzsche who argued that its corrosive effects would eventually destroy all moral, religious, and metaphysical convictions and precipitate the greatest crisis in human history. In the 20th century, nihilistic themes--epistemological failure, value destruction, and cosmic purposelessness--have preoccupied artists, social critics, and philosophers. Mid-century, for example, the existentialists helped popularize tenets of nihilism in their attempts to blunt its destructive potential. By the end of the century, existential despair as a response to nihilism gave way to an attitude of indifference, often associated with antifoundationalism.
It has been over a century now since Nietzsche explored nihilism and its implications for civilization. As he predicted, nihilism's impact on the culture and values of the 20th century has been pervasive, its apocalyptic tenor spawning a mood of gloom and a good deal of anxiety, anger, and terror. Interestingly, Nietzsche himself, a radical skeptic preoccupied with language, knowledge, and truth, anticipated many of the themes of postmodernity. It's helpful to note, then, that he believed we could--at a terrible price--eventually work through nihilism. If we survived the process of destroying all interpretations of the world, we could then perhaps discover the correct course for humankind.
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“Why prolong the inevi-table? We are all one stitch from here [the shelf] to there [the yard sale].”
Note how the brackets are used for editorial clarification; to make the quote make sense.
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It may be that the single most impor-tant theme in the Toy Story series is ob-solescence
This seems important.
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“toying” with a host of uncomfortable moments
Punny. Clever writing.
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suggesting the toy world’s dystopian relatives are just next door
Clever pun.
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Jessie perhaps best ar-ticulates the pleasure of being a toy, an object used for the innocent pleasure of others: “Even though you’re not mov-ing, you feel alive because that’s how they see you.” With this statement Jessie highlights with a disarming frankness the philosophy of being the animated toy. She reveals how remote, ocular con-trol paradoxically creates a kind of inti-macy and movement that is enviable—revealing self to self through shared, pretend movement.
Claim. Evidence (Quote). Analysis. This is an excellent model for how to work with primary source material in your arguments.
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Perhaps more persuasive even than these final lines, are the final shots of the film in which the sparkling out-fits of the sequined trio of Barbie dolls mix with the starry wall-paper of the room, suggesting the space-like infinity to which Woody refers.
Note the scene description and analysis here.
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these films call spectators to meditate on consumer objects but not in ways that always directly moralize consumerism. Instead they prompt adult spectatorial identification with the consumer object.
Nice. Great point.
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With optimism, these films suggest that these objects—and perhaps with them, their adult human viewers—can potentially exceed the limits of their frame and return to a position of har-mony with the surrounding beings and objects that define them.
Interesting assertion.
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homosocial bond
Per Webster: "of, relating to, or involving social relationships between persons of the same sex and especially between men"
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(sitting on a bench to watch the sunset, riding a gondola, capturing her beauty through art)
Again, note the use of parentheticals here.
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Alongside this sheer pleasure in ma-teriality and movement, Pixar operates with a nostalgia that is both regressive (in its reliance on traditional notions of gender, class, and morality) and liberat-ing (in its embrace of an ironic, detached view of the present).
Note the use of the parentheticals here to further clarify the author's point.
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mise-en-scen
Film studies terminology. See this reference guide:
MISE-EN-SCENE Mise en scène encompasses the most recognizable attributes of a film – the setting and the actors; it includes costumes and make-up, props, and all the other natural and artificial details that characterize the spaces filmed. The term is borrowed from a French theatrical expression, meaning roughly “put into the scene”. In other words, mise-en-scène describes the stuff in the frame and the way it is shown and arranged. We have organized this page according to four general areas: setting, lighting, costume and staging. At the end we have also included some special effects that are closely related to mise-en-scène.
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Pixar films illustrate that this gap is being bridged as much by animated, fantasy films becoming more like the standard adult feature as it is by live-action, adult films taking on digital techniques to “perfect” the image.
Pixar filling a gap.
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the materi-ality of things and a connection to the material world
Running theme in this article: materialism. See also current research on New Materialism such as Object Oriented Ontology, Speculative Realism, and Actor Network Theory.
A materialist himself, famed critic and philosopher Slavoj Zizek offers this criticism of Object Oriented Ontology (OOO).
For more on ontology and OOO, see here. Philosopher and theorist Ian Bogost offers an explanation of OOO for "ordinary folk" here.
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Much as widescreen cin-ema altered the scale of perception, mak-ing it possible to perceive minute details and epic grandness, digitalization has made possible the careful construction of a cinema of impossible scale—and for the creation of an atmosphere that is graphically “clean” and carefully con-trolled down to the most microscopic, barely perceptible detail
Emphasis and importance of MEDIUM. In this case, "digital" as it pertains to film/cinema medium.
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Kinesthetics
see Dictionary.com
noun
- the sensation of movement or strain in muscles, tendons, and joints; muscle sense.
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Cinema of Attractions
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“making strange,” as Brecht would have it
Note how Scott uses/introduces another thinker's (in this case Brecht's) terminology.
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phenomenologies
See Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
Short explanation: "Phenomenology is the study of structures of consciousness as experienced from the first-person point of view. The central structure of an experience is its intentionality, its being directed toward something, as it is an experience of or about some object. An experience is directed toward an object by virtue of its content or meaning (which represents the object) together with appropriate enabling conditions.
Phenomenology as a discipline is distinct from but related to other key disciplines in philosophy, such as ontology, epistemology, logic, and ethics. Phenomenology has been practiced in various guises for centuries, but it came into its own in the early 20th century in the works of Husserl, Heidegger, Sartre, Merleau-Ponty and others. Phenomenological issues of intentionality, consciousness, qualia, and first-person perspective have been prominent in recent philosophy of mind."
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That is, Pixar’s films encourage adult audiences to both encounter and deny each film’s veiled dark content and its implications for them.
Note how Scott restates her point here; clarification is always important.
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to raise a perhaps even more unsettling set of questions about being, existence and materiality
Potential for stakes and takeaway here.
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deniable rep-resentation
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:
Note the source setup and use of the colon. This is an excellent rhetorical strategy for citation.
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While much research has been dedicated to understanding the system of represen-tation under Hollywood’s Production Code, less research has gone into the particular pleasures formed around this “encoded” spectatorship.
Putting sources into conversation. Building historical conversation (academic precedent) on this topic. Also points to another gap in the field that needs to be shored up.
Strong arguments work to fill in gaps left in the current research.
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he G rating, more than any other rating, requires the inter-nalization of censorship into the process of production.
Link back to central thesis. Article focuses on the unique work Pixar encodes into the G-rating = genre based argument of sorts. Focus here is on genre and generic connections.
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existential issues
Existentialism seems to be the running theme of this article. I was wondering if the philosophical term would be used directly.
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not enough has interrogated the ways in which acceptable, “norma-tive,” “clean” screen material works as “soft censorship,” silently affirming and defining the standards of the current regime of acceptability. Specifically, the modern version of the principle of deniability has created patterns of adult spectatorial address that give adults an unusual viewing experience, allow-ing them to identify with the object, to distance themselves from “grown-up” cinema, and to contemplate adult fears through the guise of animation.
GAP in the field of media studies scholarship. The gap this particular article attempts to fill.
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This paper explores how Pixar films (Wall-E and the Toy Story trilogy [1995, 1999, 2010]) expand the limitations that have traditionally bound “family enter-tainment” under the G-rating by em-ploying a postmodern adaptation of the “principle of deniability,” a producer-designed multivalence that flourished in Hollywood from 1930–1968 under the Production Code (Vasey 104–13).3
Overview of argument. Quick sell; elevator pitch.
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Pixar has motivated animation toward addressing the most difficult of twentieth-century problems, including mortality and mate-rial dissolution, in a way capable of alle-viating the squeamishness of conserva-tive parents at signs of “obscenity,” and politically progressive critiques of prin-cess culture.2
Cultural issues addressed in Pixar films. Put another way: Pixar's cultural "work" or cultural critique/commentary.
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Though Pixar films don’t attempt to show sex or violence, the cultural work they have done rede-fining family film fare is an important by-product of contemporary regimes of film industry self-regulation. With the fourteen feature films Pixar has made over the twenty-seven years since its inception, it has garnered not only ex-tremely high box office figures but also (at least until 2011 with Cars 2) aston-ishingly uniform critical praise.1
Again, addresses and supports the why examine Pixar question(s) some skeptical readers may have.
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The films frankly admit that the toys are fighting a losing battle against death, obsoles-cence, and outside control—forces far more nebulous than cartoons’ typical evils.
Underlying argument about the usefulness in examining such films. Pixar and existentialism.
Addresses the why focus on these pop culture texts aspect of the argument.
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Although on the surface Pixar’s Toy Story (Dir. John Lasseter, 1995) and WALL-E (Dir. Andrew Stanton, 2008) are “innocent” animated film about ob-jects, their value as cinema lies in their ability to complexly address human—and sometimes wholly adult—fears about meaninglessness, apocalypse, and oblivion.
Note the "Although...[but]" argument construction here. Rhetorical framework that pushes for deeper meaning and engagement--i.e. "You think A, but instead B is the case."
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Toy Story 3 (2010) be-gins with Andy’s toys playing pretend. The setting is the Old West. Sheriff Woody fights the Potato Heads-cum-bandits to rescue a moving train full of orphan trolls. The Potato Heads escape the train in Barbie’s dream car. But the train is headed toward the precipice at the end of a dynamited trestle. Despite Woody’s efforts, the train plunges off the edge. We hear it thud below and see smoke rise from the chasm. Cow-girl Jessie’s jaw drops in utter disbelief and disappointment. For several long seconds as the energy of the action se-quence diffuses, we believe that Woody has failed. Then Buzz lifts the train out of the hole. But the threat is not, as we had imagined, contained but is instead reanimated and escalated. The toys are assailed by a mushroom cloud of “death by monkeys” and finally an unnamed threat behind a red button in Evil Dr. Porkchop’s dirigible.
Notice how the opening example is used as an entry point into the argument. It demonstrates the argument, i.e. it SHOWS rather than TELLS. Also notice how Scott follows the scene description (as example) with followup analysis--here in the form of argument framing.
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synechdochically
"synecdoche" (dictionary.com)
noun, Rhetoric.
- a figure of speech in which a part is used for the whole or the whole for a part, the special for the general or the general for the special, as in ten sail for ten ships or a Croesus for a rich man.
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lti.hypothesislabs.com lti.hypothesislabs.com
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Television genres scholar Jason Mittell defines the situa-tion comedy as featuring “an established setting and small group of ongoing char-acters who each week encounter low-stakes comedic mishaps that are happily resolved by the end of the half-hour epi-sode” (248).
Scholarly definition of "situation comedy."
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situation comedy genre
Genre is central to this argument. Why? see p. 197 re: definition and social function of sitcom genre.
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learn.maricopa.edu learn.maricopa.edu
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Test annotation.
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