TOW #27: Give Blood (Visual Text)

With a student-council-sponsored blood drive coming up soon at Wissahickon, I decided to look at some Red Cross “give blood” posters for my TOW. Also, I am entirely out of good TOW ideas. The Red Cross is a humanitarian organization that provides assistance in the case of disaster or emergency. They often hold blood drives in which average American citizens can help the American Red Cross to help others through the donation of blood. Naturally, the idea of giving blood is not extremely appealing to most people, so the Red Cross must make their mission clear in posters, and use persuasive methods to get people to donate.

In this particular poster, the focal point is two band-aids, crossed over the center padded part to make a cross, similar in shape to the red cross symbol. The image shows that something very simple can make a big difference. In other words, the donor gets a band-aid, a fix to a small injury, and that small injury can help the Red Cross fix a much bigger injury in a person who really needs the help. The image is powerful in this sense. To accompany this image are two italicized words: “Give blood.” The short sentence emphasizes the power of the image, as its simplicity implies that all that needs to be said has been said already. The emotional appeal of the image in combination with the two words below make it effective. If one requires more information, there is a short paragraph below the image and the two words that describes the aim of blood donation. Using pronouns likes “we,” the American Red Cross includes the potential blood donors in one unit of people, creating a sense of togetherness that works for emotional persuasion. The paragraph also addresses the impact that the blood will have: “When we come together, we can become part of something bigger than us all.” Most people ultimately strive to be part of something bigger, whether that is some advancement of mankind, or a community, or a club, people love to feel they have a greater purpose. The idea that giving blood can make a person part of something larger makes it more appealing even to the queasy, like me. Thus, I believe, the poster was rather effective.

(for poster, see 2007 APELC synthesis question)

TOW #26: Letter from a Previous APELC Student (Written Text)

I was too stressed about mocks to look for a good TOW article (because a rhetorical analysis of an AP chemistry textbook does not quite sound like my idea of a good time. Also, I’ve already done a TOW on an AP chemistry prep book, and I wouldn’t want to be too repetitive!). I decided to Google “TOW AP English Blog,” figuring I would find someone else’s blog, choose one of their TOWs, find the article about which they were writing, and write my own TOW about it. Yes, as I’m writing this, I am realizing that if I were more of a dishonest person, I could quite easily have just copied someone else’s TOW instead of writing my own, but I wouldn’t do that, and did not even think about that as an option until just now. Anyway, I found something to write about! It seems that at the end of last year, students were assigned to write a letter on their blogs to future APELC students. I read one of the letters (why didn’t we get to read these at the beginning of the year?) and decided I would rhetorically analyze it.
The writer of this particular letter is Kayleigh Y. Kayleigh (woah, I can use her first name because I know her personally!) seems to be writing not so much to inform future students about what the year will entail as to quell the fears she had at the beginning of the year. She establishes a laid-back tone from the beginning, addressing a “Future APELC-er.” Her use of the fabricated word, “APELC-er,” as opposed to “AP English Language and Composition student,” makes her writing feel much less formal, and much more like a conversation between peers. Making her audience comfortable with her as a friendly speaker is essential to her achievement of her purpose, as a relaxed former student shows future students that APELC is for anyone with motivation, not just pretentious, but articulate writers, who are proud to be called “AP English Elitist Snobs” (that’s the Euro kids). Another strategy Kayleigh employs is the use of personal anecdotes. For example, she introduces herself as a student who had never, before junior year, taken any AP courses. Many juniors are in the same position she was in, so having a personal testimony from a student they know is much like them could help the “future APELC-er[s]” relax about the year ahead. Kayleigh closes her letter with the words “Most importantly though, don't be scared. You will be fine. :)” At the beginning of her letter, a future APELC student might not have believed that he or she would be “fine,” but by the end of Kayleigh’s description of the course, I think he or she would be much more inclined to believe her words. Overall, I not only think she achieved her purpose, but also, being an APELC student close to the end of junior year myself, agree with her.

TOW #25: Four Basic Rights (Written Text)

Eleanor and Franklin Roosevelt were generally forward-thinking for their time. The First Couple has a legacy of remembering the “forgotten man.” Even when FDR, afflicted with polio, became too disabled to travel around the country, his wife Eleanor became his eyes and ears, advising him in his role as President, while also taking up social issues of her own. Eleanor Roosevelt was a lifelong advocate of equal rights, and used her position as First Lady to further that idea. However, she was always faced with some opposition along the way. When she received a letter from a white American woman expressing concern about sharing public restrooms with African Americans, she responded with the four basic rights she believes every American should have. Her tone, as well as her very logical argument helped her to be quite persuasive.

Throughout her letter to Miss Frizielle, the woman who had expressed her concerns about desegregation, Eleanor Roosevelt holds a polite, yet matter-of-fact tone. She uses rather brief sentences with minimal artistic additions, all ending in periods. This contributes to the creation of her matter-of-fact tone, as can be seen to be established in the first paragraph: “I have not advocated social equality between colored and white people. That is a personal thing which nobody can advocate.” She is short and to the point, but never strays into disrespect. She evenly counters Miss Frizielle’s argument throughout, but does not attack the woman for her beliefs. In fact, as shown in the first paragraph, she expresses that one cannot force another to change his or her beliefs, and would never advocate for such a thing.

Additionally, Eleanor Roosevelt bases her argument strongly on logic. Though she has no facts to prove her point, she uses inductive reasoning to reach her conclusion. “I am sure it is true that here in Washington you have found some discourteous colored people,” she writes. “I have found colored people who were discourteous, and I have also found white people who were discourteous.” She aims for Miss Frizielle to see that if there are some discourteous white people and there are some discourteous colored people, it is fair to say that skin color is not a good indicator of one’s personality, thus invalidating that part of Miss Frizielle’s argument. She makes a similar inductive argument at the end: “If you have to use the same toilets and wash basins where you work, then all of you must have to take physical examinations.” She is thus saying that if your restrooms are desegregated, you must also have equal health requirements, and therefore you are not any less safe than if you shared your restrooms with only other white women. 

Eleanor Roosevelt’s use of a polite, but even tone, as well as a logical argument, helps her to effectively convey her message to Miss Frizielle.

http://ap.gilderlehrman.org/resources/eleanor-roosevelt%25E2%2580%2599s-four-basic-rights-1944?period=7