AOW #3: Banksy Painting

Summary: This painting was done in an urban area of England.  It shows a little girl with a heart-shaped balloon that she's letting go of.  On the right side of her is "there is always hope" written.
Author: Banksy, a famous graffiti artist in England, drew this picture.  This is only one of the many paintings by Banksy all over the world.  Even though he is famous worldwide, nobody has actually ever seen him.   Even though he keeps his identity hidden, his art has been sold and books have been published with his work. Banksy is considered one of the most unique and talented artists of our decade.
Context/Exigence: The context of this painting is hope and believing in something beautiful and innocent which most of the time is not.  The exigence is that many people in this area may not have hope, so Banksy painted this to bring some light to them.
Purpose: The purpose of this painting was to send the message that there always is hope, and was purposely placed in a poor looking area to send this message to people.  It also shows how graffiti can be beautiful instead of trashy and covered up.  All of Bansky's graffiti is artistic and has a message to it.
Audience: The audience is anyone who lives in this bad, urban area of England that is on the streets.
Rhetorical Elements: This painting appeals to pathos, because one's hope and belief is usually related to emotion.  It also emotional because of the little girl, your eyes are drawn to her because she looks lonely but innocent, letting go of her beloved balloon.

AOW #2: Code Blue

This week I read the article Code Blue.  This story was about an oceanographer named Sylvia Earle who has a new and unique idea; make ocean sites national parks.  One particular site she has in mind, The Sargasso Sea, is two-million square miles and in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean.  This area is unlike any other in the sea because massive mats sargassum, a waterborne golden-brown seaweed.  Earle claims this is "the golden rainforest of the sea" because light reaches below the mats on millions of coral eggs. She is trying to make this area marine protected in order to keep it beautiful and safe.

This article was from TIME magazine and written by Bryan Walsh.  TIME magazine has won countless top awards for magazine excellence.  Bryan Walsh first worked for TIME Tokyo and Hong Kong before moving to New York.  He writes about environment, energy, and alarming diseases for the magazine.

The exigence for this article is that previous to Sylvia Earle's idea, no one had thought of making any part of the ocean a national park.  It is a very unique idea that could change our environment.  The purpose of this article is to try to make the public aware of this new idea, and help with this positive cause.  If more people know about it, more will then support it.  Walsh wrote this article to apply to one's ethos, pathos, and logos.  It is logical because we already have national parks on land, so we should have them in the ocean too.  It is emotional because the site is beautiful and supports living creatures, and it is also credible because Sylvia Earle is an oceanographer who has been studying the area for years.  Walsh did accomplish his purpose, because I strongly agree that the site should become a national park.

http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,2020806_2020805_2020796,00.html

IRB Book

Title: The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
Author: Rebecca Skloot
Section 1: pgs. 1-82
Section 2: pgs. 83-165
Section 3: pgs. 166-248
Section 4: pgs. 248-328
Why you chose this book: I chose this book because my mom recommended it to me.  After reading a summary of it I was interested that it was about a woman who played such a big role in medical advancements yet many people have no idea who she is.  I am interested to find out who Henrietta Lacks really was.

AOW #1: Lady Gaga

This week I read an article from Vogue magazine entitled: Lady Gaga: Our Lady of Pop.  The article was an interview with the pop star written by Jonathan Van Meter, after experiencing a concert on her Monster Ball Tour.  He describes how she curses, calls her fans "little monsters," and dresses in elaborate outfits.  When he interviews Lady Gaga, she bluntly introduced the man she was with as her boyfriend and describes how she was bullied when she was a child.  She was extremely open with her life and opinions but at the same time considered herself an artist and a talented performer.

Vogue magazine published this article on February 10, 2011.  The magazine has been published since 1892, when it was founded.  Jonathan Van Meter is an editor of Vogue and is a regular contributor of The New York Times magazine.  He has also written for Vanity Fair, The New Yorker, and Esquire.  Not only is this article in a magazine read by millions across the country, but the author is extremely experienced and writes for other credible magazines and newspapers as well.

The exigence of this article is to present Lady Gaga, one of the fastest rising stars (and most intriguing) of our generation.  The purpose of Van Meter writing this piece was to show readers how unique Lady Gaga is.  She is straight forward and open with her fans about her life and her most personal thoughts, yet she is a musical genius who plays multiple instruments, writes all her own songs, and decides how she wants to perform them herself.  Prior to the pop star, the typical celebrity was very concerned with their privacy and were not nearly as musically talented.  The author uses rhetorical devices such as irony, allusion, and hyperboles in this article.  Van Meter did accomplish his purpose considering anyone who reads this article would be fascinated with Lady Gaga's uniqueness, open personality, and true talent.