10 Keys to Preventing Childhood Obesity
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/food-revolution/childhood-obesity-10-keys-to-preventing-it_b_1902717.html?utm_hp_ref=health-news&ir=Health%20News
This article is about something that has been a rising issue for many years: Childhood Obesity. The article, by Keeley Drotz, gives readers the 10 keys to preventing childhood obesity. Drotz uses different methods and techniques from the rhetorical situation, such as diction, details and syntax, to get the message across that childhood obesity is a rising problem, and that there are ways to prevent it.
You can see one of these methods just from the first sentence. She starts with, "Obesity has reached epidemic proportions around the world, not only among adults, but in children and adolescents as well," and the diction that she used in this sentence really helps grab the readers attention. Using words like "epidemic" makes the topic sound very serious, and many people are more likely to pay attention if you used a word like that as opposed to something not as strong, like the word "big". That would be an example of a pejorative word, a word that gives a sentence a kind of negative feel to it, that she uses to convey the message.
I also noticed some details that Drotz used. In the sentence, "In American alone, rates of obesity skyrocketed over the course of a few decades primarily as a result of changes in lifestyle habits," I could see some details that Drotz put there for a reason to help her readers understand the severity of the issue. She chose to put the fact that in America alone, obesity has skyrocketed. This creates meaning because she is saying that this is happening all around the world, but just in one country, so much damage has occurred in not that much time. Also, she added some detail when she put in the bit about the changes in lifestyle habits over the decades. That creates a lot of meaning for the whole article because it is where she got down to the root of the issue.
As for syntax, I saw Drotz use in the article was putting emphasis on the shorter sentences in the article. We learned that shorter sentences often convey actions and ideas more forcefully than longer sentences. The sentence, "These are issues that the medical community never imagined possible," is one of the shorter sentences in the article. This conveys more meaning because of the fact that it is one of the shorter ones, and it gives the reader the idea that this is actually a very serious issue.
Mehar--I enjoyed how you effectively explained how both diction and details were used in your article. One aspect of your essay that could some use work is you introduction. In my opinion you should make a separate paragraph for it, and introduce the two topics you are going to analyze(in this case diction and imagery of the article). You have excellently given examples from the text and after that have analyzed the meaning behind it. When you said, "as opposed to something not as strong" when referring to the word epidemic, it made me wonder what types of words you were talking about. Maybe include some possible words that would make the meaning weak. Also I liked how you used "pejorative" to describe that diction that the author was using. I would maybe explain what the word means and what it does to the piece of writing because many people, like myself, would have to look it up. Overall I really enjoyed you ideas of diction and details in this post.
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ReplyDeleteMehar—I would consider splitting this piece into multiple paragraphs. By putting it all in one chunk, you’ve made it a little more difficult for your reader to process the different sections of your analysis. Additionally, I think the lack of paragraphs made some of your thoughts a little more stilted, simply because you had to put in the topic word every time you discussed it—for example, when you were talking about details, you kept repeating the word. If you structured this in paragraph format, you wouldn’t have to include the topic word quite so much, since we would know the topic of your paragraph, and the whole piece would flow much more smoothly. On a lighter note, I agree with Saloni that your strong use of the word “pejorative” was effective—shoot for that sort of specific vocabulary; I thought it was a highlight.
ReplyDeleteI appreciated your thorough use of evidence and warrant to support each of your three claims concerning Drotz's use of diction, details, and syntax. When you analyzed the article's use of diction, not only did you specify which word you liked ("epidemic"), but you also explained the effect that the word had. Good way to use evidence AND warrant!
ReplyDeleteThere were a couple minor things that you should make sure to fix. Early in your essay, you say, "You can see some of these methods just from the first sentence." But when you start talking about Drotz's first sentence, you only talk about one method, diction. You should change the wording of this sentence or write a different sentence.
And in the last part of your analysis you say, "Some examples of the syntax...was putting emphasis on the shorter sentences in the article." This is a number disagreement between your noun and verb. You should change "Some examples" to "One example."