“Texting while driving”-- Attractive and Effective

English 200

3/5/2010

     
    As we all know, vehicles are essential to American’s daily life, which follows with the driving safety problem. “Texting while driving”, which has caused and has been blamed for numerous deadly traffic accidents in the past few years, is obviously not a wise idea for drivers. Unfortunately people are not aware of the severity of this problem and many of them still do it, especially young drivers, the group for whom texting is part of normal, everyday communications, making texting while driving more likely. Aiming at this serious and nationwide issue, the political cartoon called “texting while driving”, whose author was Mike Luckovich, a former “Pulitzer Prize” award-winner for Editorial Cartooning, was published at Atlanta Journal-Constitution in 2009. 

     This black and white cartoon is combined with two equal-sized pictures. On the left side, a man with glasses is sitting in a car holding a cell phone, and the texts “Im txtng while drvng,” within a dialog box at the top that shows what he is doing at the moment. There is another car right in front of him, suggesting there will be a car crash which was not noticed by the driver. From his appearance, we can say he is mid-aged, it showed this visual argument is not only targeting teenagers, but also at some careless adults, which expanded the audience rank. So the primary audience can be identified as relatively young-aged vehicle drivers, which is a smart choice to remind people who see it that—“it’s not just a matter of teens, it could have been you”. On the right side, there stands a tall and skinny man with a hidden face, shrouded in a long hooded cloak wielding a scythe. From this appearance, we can identify him as Grim Reaper, the man who brings death. He is also texting, but simply sent an acronym message “Lol” (meaning laughing out loudly). Reading from left to right, we can easily get the meaning of this cartoon --a man is texting while driving, and he got the message back from Death. It showed the claim and the reason of the visual argument at the same time with humor—do not text while driving, or you will be killed. 

     I think this is a very attractive and effective visual argument. It is superior in Pathos by its dramatic humor and Logos by its suggestive and obvious understandability. It did a great job on catching attentions by showing the connection between “texting while driving ” and death wittily, and sent the strong message “ don’t text while driving” to the primary audience—relatively young drivers. Later in this paper, I will stress on analyzing this cartoon’s simple understandability, profound contrast and humorousness on image, which are also the main successes of this visual argument.

     First of all, the author Mike’s use of type, and layout made his visual argument straightforward and outstanding. Political cartoons are usually mini-narratives and sometimes without textual explanation, which makes understandability very important. To a cartoon with only a few texts like this, audience must read the caption to get a first quick look -- in this cartoon they are apparently SMS (short message service) “Im txting While drving” and “Lol”-- they are in sans serif fonts within two big, quadrate dialog boxes, which are quite well-marked. Then we know it is a texting scene without even reading the whole picture. In the meantime, the layout which consists of two same-sized pictures informs us that the two figures are equals in this situation. Additionally, the order and content of the texts obviously tell us the left man sent SMS first and the right one responded. 

     Secondly and most importantly, Mike’s use of images and color made his visual argument funny, vivid and profound. Let’s clear the logic and train of thought in this cartoon. According to the timeline, “texting while driving” on the left part was the beginning and the cause; meanwhile the color was mainly in white, which associates with light and life in western culture. However, Grim Reaper who signifies death, on the right part, was the response and also the consequence to the left part; in addition, the main color black also associates with darkness and death. If Mike created a multi-colored cartoon, the effect would be much more attenuated.

    In addition, we can see, both the man and Grip Reaper are smiling, and the meaning and differences between their smiles indeed increased the irony and humor—they have nothing to do with their friendship. The former facial smile showed the man’s ignorance, the latter literal smile showed Grip Reaper’s vicious nature and his sneer at his human “friend”. 

    Furthermore, there’s a deeper thought which cannot be seen from the picture immediately, but helped to make the humor come to a climax. Meaning that, the man must know who the recipient is so that he could send SMS, which also means he knew he was sending a text message to the evil Grim Reaper, but he still did it—wasn’t he stupid? This actually coincides with the irony in reality, most drivers know how dangerous and improper it is to text at the wheel, but some of them still do it. 

     In brief, the suggestive images, especially the image of Grim Reaper, portrayed the issue of this visual argument dramatically and humorously. It gave the reader a grin of understanding and a shock of insight; it helped us as both good Logos and Pathos to get the essence of this cartoon, and it’s the key point of its success. Below is a small chart of the analysis of the image and color.

	Cause	Consequence
Image	A man is smiling and texting SMS “Im txtng While drvng” while driving Another car was in front	Grim Reaper respond with “Lol” (laugh out loud)
Color	Mainly white	Mainly black
Literal meanings	The man knew what he was doing and he still did it smilingly An accident was about to happen	Grim Reaper didn’t show his face but literally smiled Death came fast, quiet, and cruelly
Underlying → funny irony	The man must text to someone he knows, which means he knew the recipient is Grim Reaper, which made him an idiot	Grim Reaper’s not stupid, he is not texting and driving '‘Lol” made the humor of the cartoon come to a climax

Conclusion	Texting while driving → death
Claim	Don’t text while driving, because it kills

    Finally, I have to mention that, this visual argument used good Karios appeal at present. In the past weeks, the U.S. Federal government formally bans truckers and bus drivers from texting while driving, and so far 19 states have outlawed texting while driving, and 6 prohibit using hand-held cell phone while behind the wheel. The effect of this political cartoon can be more influential and instructive than it was before.

     In conclusion, “Texting while driving” is a great example of visual argument. It did a very good job on getting attention from people who see it, and sends strong message to the primary audience—relatively young-aged vehicle drivers, letting them laugh and reflect to make the right choice. First, it perfectly reveals the potential danger of death by “texting-while-driving” in the use of well-marked type and layout, suggestive images, vivid contrast, and humoristic atmosphere, which made it superior in Pathos. Besides, the obvious understandability of the issue from the image showed the author’s good use of Logos. In addition, it also has a creditable resource—Atlanta Journal-Constitution and an authoritative author—a former “Pulitzer Prize” award-winner, which is a good use of Ethos. What’s more, this visual argument has a good Karios at present in consideration of the texting while driving ban in the states lately. These excellent features together, made it is an attractive and effective visual argument. 

From instructor: A

This is a very well written paper.While there are a couple of places where you expect the reader to do the work of making the connection between the example and the rhetorical elements, you still show a clear understanding of t he material. 

Normally I would advise against charts, however yout chart is effective.

You analyzed this iamge at a deeper level than most would, making the irony easy to understand to the audience.

 

Their Eyes Journal 1

How is Janie's story/Bildungsroman similar/ different from Jane's?

Similar :

1. Their parents died very early, they were raised up by relatives.

2. They were both teased or bullied by peers.

3. They have desire of freedom.

    Both of they didn't realized what they really want and make changes until certain incidents happened—

To Janie, it's her grandma's and the failure of her first marriage.

To Jane, it's Miss Temple's leaving and the boredom of life at Lowood. 

4. They fought for what they wanted through their lives and didn't care other's judges.

5. They were both fulfilled in themselves in the end of the story.

Different :

1. There's also difference in the 3rd similarity (see the underlining sentence earlier): 


Jane is more determined than Janie, she took action (advertising to get a new job) right after her sense of changes in heart.

Janie didn't turn to the shift point until her big fight with her first husband Logan.

I think the reason for this is the difference of their living environment which influenced their disposition → see my following points.

2. Janie's grandma raised her up and cared for her, they inhabit a house in the backyard of a white couple, who were their master and treated them well.

Jane has lived by her aunt's through for a couple of year during her childhood; her aunt's family never treated her well.

3. Janie's teenage life was not as severe and strained as Jane's,

   Janie's temperament is more girly than Jane's.

• Janie went to school and played around with kids; she loved flowers, trees and anything beautiful in nature. She could feel sweetness of life and had dreams. She was not distant from guys and got her (first) kiss at sixteen. Basically, Janie was not a lonely and unhappy person through her teenager life.

• However, Jane was pretty much isolated from the society and people; she had fantasy rather than dreams which is her way to escape from the reality, she immersed herself into studies and school routines.

4. Jane had only one romantic relationship with one person and got married with him in the end.

Janie had three relationships with three men and 2 of them were dead, she was alone in the end.

Jane Eyre Journal 5

       I do think Bronte endorsing colonialist attitudes through her depictions of characters and events in the last part of novel.

1. From the depictions on St. John.

 

      The never-sun-set empire, as a strong colonizer, needed to get knowledge of the colonies and control them by setting rules for them, including the imposition of language, law and culture. “The missionary activity is one of the social practices through which the British established their dominance” (Pg.12)

Bronte gave efforts describing St. John’s greatness for scarifying himself going to India to do missionary job. She beautified St. John’s character and his missionary career, and this actually covered the nature of Britain imperialism’s cultural aggression. 

2. From Bertha’s image and her end in the story

      We have discussed Bertha's characteristics—savage, crazy, “pigmy intellect”, “contamination”, which are all negative compared to Jane's. 

      In consideration of Bertha's origin—as a Creole from a Spanish Town of West Indies (the colony of the U.K), she was totally a devil in Bronte’s description. Bronte does not pay sympathy to Bertha but only stands on Rochester’s side in the novel—Bertha is the beast and the one who gained a marriage by cheating. What’s more, she was locked up in Thronfield and ended up dead by jumping out of the roof.

     What interesting is, there was a rule that widows should sacrifice themselves in India. There was an opinion by Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak (an Indian literary critic and theorist) that “Bertha's suicide is constructed in a manner that reflects her inferiority through imperialism”[1] , and her self-destruction was an innuendo to Indian widow's sacrifice.

---

[1] Issues of identity between Jane Eyre and Antoinette-Bertha in the books Jane Eyre and Wide Sargasso Sea http://www.helium.com/items/1067613-issues-identity-between-jane-eyre-antoinette-bertha-books-jane-eyre-wide

Jane Eyre Journal 4

Three monents of “Mr. Rochester to Jane Eyre”

(J=Jane, R=Rochester, B=Blanche)

     One of the most interesting and challenging things (at least to me) to do with a romance is to catch the moment that hero and heroine fell in love with each other and who is the first one to recognize the feelings. The boundary of “when exactly” is always blurry because of different understandings, but I think all readers would agree—there're some moments before the hero and heroine made clear confessions, and it's those moments and the later process made them pile up their feels which confuse themselves but also help clear their minds. After reading those moments again and again, the readers will suddenly really, “wow, he/she has fallen in love with her/him at that time”.

 

       In Jane Eyre, what I firmly believe is Mr. Rochester got initiative at the beginning of the relationship, because--

• He is the master and experienced one,
• He is interested in Jane in the first place and started all conversations with Jane (because of curiosity and instinct)
• He exposed his past and stories to Jane first-- on account of his words and deeds, Jane was aware of her strong feelings for him.

       I concluded briefly with three moments and also dialogue between Jane and Rochester which symbolized R's confession to J. In all of these conversations, Rochester wished to express more but paused. I call them “the unfinished”.

Moment 1 (end of Chap.15):

the night that fire incident happened, in Mr. Rochester’s bedroom. R held J’s hand and with warm words and special looks.

Key sentence: “What! You will go?”

→ The blaster of love (direct cause of J's feeling). 

Moment 2 (end of Chap. 17):

Jane felt uncomfortable in the party (hearing the rich’s comments on governess) and quickly quitted with depressed look. R comforted her and gave her excuse to leave. 

Key sentence: “Good night, my—”

→ What is it after “my—”?

1) My Jane? Did he think Jane was or would be hers (possess of love)?

2) My love/ darling something like that? Is it appropriate?

→ Why did he pause?

1) He was afraid to confess this love despite age differences

2) He realized that she was not hers (yet).

→ At this moment, R realized there’re still distance between Jane and him. 

Moment 3: (The interesting part I chose to analyze,from Chapter 21, Page 223-226): the dialog between Mr. Rochester and Jane before Jane's leaving for Gateshead to see her dying aunt. 

Here is my summary of this dialog's lead and Mr. Rochester's response

1. J inquired of R, calling Blanche “that person”:

R's face was curious, strange and equivocal → both of J & R recognized B’s special existence

2. J asked for absence:

R showed concern and asked for detailed reasons

→ R was surprised J didn’t tell him about her family 

3. R's compromises and nervous tone inch by inch :

stay “as short as possible” → only “a week”

→“at all events will come back”

4. R mediated and ask for departure information(time and safety)

5. Money /salary issue:

R gave J money more than her asking → J bargained

→ R used salary unpaid wage as a “bait” to “ensure” her coming back

6. J’s new job and R’s “potential marriage” issue:

“Go straight to ‘Devil’” → “shouted” → J didn’t want his help → R got angry, spoke bitterly: “walk up the pyramids of Egypt” → R played childish: “Little niggard” Wanted his money back → R claimed to make arrangement for J

7. R asked J to teach him the ceremony of parting:

“Farewell” → “must I say?” → “is that all?”

→ it’s “stingy”, “dry”, “unfriendly”

→wanted more, even handshake was not enough

→ “blank and cook—‘farewell’ ”

I am especially interested in the 7^th point. 

R apparently knew how to act as a gentleman in a parting situation, but he still asked Jane, what was his intention?

 

My understandings are:

• It's polite to say some formal good-bye. It seemed make sense to say something about parting in a situation like this.
• His abnormal behavior and upset feeling was agitated by Jane’s leaving. And his unbeknown childish side could only be evoked by Jane!
• He was nervous and couldn’t come up with other better topics, but still wanted to stall for more time with Jane before she left.
• He just couldn’t help expressing his feeling using irrelevant

Jane Eyre Journal 3

      In chapter 15&16, Mr. Rochester held Jane’s hand after she saved his life from the fire. There was a special moment between them, something feelings were growing, but Mr. Rochester paused and Jane was too inexperienced to admit it—“the first taste of love”. She wished and feared to see Mr. Rochester the next day; however he was gone and left all those confusing and complicated feelings to her.

 Here is the interesting passage I chose to analyze（from Chapter 17 Page 166）--

“You have nothing to do with the master of Thornfield, further than to receive the salary he gives you for teaching his protégée, and to be grateful for such respectful and kind treatment as, if you do your duty, you have a right to expect at his hands. Be sure that is the only tie he seriously acknowledges between you and him: so don’t make him the object of your fine feelings, your raptures, agonies, and so forth. He is not of your order: keep to your caste; and be too self-respecting to lavish the love of the whole heart, soul, and strength, where such a gift is not wanted and would be despised.” 

        I think every girl who read this passage of Jane’s interior monologue would feel a blow on the heart, especially those who once bore a secret love for someone. This is Jane’s second time to say such harsh words to herself (the first time was in Chapter 16); this time was after Mr. Rochester’s leaving for ten days, she “was beginning to feel a strange chill and failing at the heart”.

 

      We can image how hurtful it is when Jane, who had no love experience and for the first in the life, felt a connection and warmness with someone, but couldn’t read and understand his feeling. She spent her restless night on thinking about those vague signs instead of seeing any actual respond, all she could do to stop this romantic despair, was ending up with a conclusion—it was an impossible and hopeless love. 

     To make this conclusion convincing, she had to be heartless to herself by using all kinds of reasons, by considering herself sentimental and foolish, by recognizing the reality and drawing a clean line between her and Mr. Rochester. These words let us see the tender part of a girl’s heart. — She didn’t degrade or blame Mr. Rochester but herself. From this, we can see her pure feeling for Mr. Rochester, and deep down inside, she did some inferiority complex when thinking about him, the man she started to fall in love.

Jane Eyre Journal 1 & 2

 

Note: comments in green and yellow colors are from Classmates & Professor

Journal 1 :How would Jane like Mrs. Mallard in The Story of An Hour ?

I don't think Jane would like Mrs. Mallard, she might even contempt her. 

Jane is what one may call a feminist. (perheps!)She is an independent and educated woman. She is brave and has a strong will to live. 

What Jane and Mrs Mallard in common is both of them long for freedom.(agree)
What differentiated them is Mrs. Mallard submitted to the reality. 

Mrs. Mallard lived a oppressive life, that's why she felt a new life when she thought her husband was dead which was not true. 

However, Jane chose the resistant life path.(I'm curious to see if you think she will keep up this resistance?) She is a unyielding character.

I urge you to think of Jane for a second, did she live an oppressed life as well？
Perhaps Jne is the version of Mr. Mallard prior to her marriage even. Both women are obviously independent and crave the satisfaction that derives from it.

Journal 2:What kind of story is Jane Eyre?

     The novel was written in the first person form, which made it sound like an autobiography of Jane Eyre(right)—she was telling people her stories, how she read life through her eyes, how she responded to those experience, and how she grew up and become what she was later. 



     As a good example of intelligent, brave and independent woman, Jane Eyre's story was also a history of her striving and development. There might be some descriptions of her unfortunate childhood and the secrets of Mr. Rochester's past, which made the mood in the story a little dark,(critics call it Gothic) but those served as a foil to her shining characteristics.



     From story between Mr. Rochester and Jane, we can also call it a romance in a way. But as the title of the novel showed, Jane Eyre was the main key to the theme of book-- she was the protagonist, and it's a life story of her pursuing liberty, dream and happiness.

1.

I like  how you emphasized Jane throughout the whole story. It's an interesting point that that the other characters are foils to augment the reader's impression of Jane.

This is a life story and therefore it contains elements of life (coming of age, romance,etc.).But ultimately  Jane is the main focus--good point.

2.
Good point on the autobiography. Bronte does throw in Jane's present thoughts as if she is analyzing and telling the story of life.