Saturday, September 26, 2015

Evaluation of Rhetorical Situations

In this blog post I will be analyzing three different texts that provide answers to my research questions laid out in the previous blog post. 


Charis Tsevis "Tim Cook: Looking Forward." taken on December 5th, 2013 via Flickr  Attribution Generic 2.0


Article 1(link)

Author: This article is actually an interview regarding the question of is computer science is in fact a science, The person being interview is Peter Denning, a pioneer in the creation of virtual memory. He is an advocate of computer science being referred to as a science. While the speaker is Denning, the author is also Denning. He is trying to explain and give reasons on why computer science is a science because this is a belief that he holds deeply. 

Audience: The primary audience of this interview is the people who do not regard computer science as a science. Denning is attempting to explain to these people why in fact, it is a science. The secondary audience would be those who do believe it is a science. They are interested in the audience and read it to see how their beliefs line up with a man of computer science fame like Denning. 

Context: The context of this article is interesting because it is presented as an interview. This allows Denning to share his opinions by answering the questions asked. The interview is older, dating back to 2007 but it's purpose and information is still very relevant. It is still applicable to the argument of whether computer science is a science or not. 

Article 2

Author: The author of this article is not Tim Cook, CEO of Apple but the person this article revolves around is Tim Cook. He is discussing the lack of diversity in computer science and what needs to be done to change it and make the field more diverse. Tim Cook is a highly admired authoritative figure in computer science as he is heading what might be the biggest technology company, Apple. He lives in Silicon Valley. 

Audience: The audience of this article would be those who are interested as to why the computer science field lacks diversity, and those who are interested as to what the authoritative figures are doing to add more diversity. It is clear that this is the audience because Tim Cook is talking at the people who are trying to educate themselves on the issue of diversity in computer science. I would describe the audience as individuals who are trying to learn more, or are interested and have noticed the lack of diversity in computer science. 

Context: This article was published in June of 2015, making it pretty recent. This demonstrates how diversity it is still an issue in computer science. The medium used are direct quotes from Apple CEO Tim Cook. They are taken out of an interview he did on the subject matter. The movement that is occurring is to add diversity into computer science. Tim Cook is helping with this movement by adding emphasis on getting more interest out of people other than white males in computer science.

Article 3

Author: The authors of this article are Pat Yongpradit and Beth Schwartze. They are both active in the computer science community. Yongpradit is an advocate for teaching computer science in elementary schools and argues this point in this article. Schwartze is the opposite, opposing the idea of teaching computer science in schools. She argues for that side in this article. 

Audience: The audience of this article would be the people who are interested in the debate surrounding computer science in elementary school. I know this because one author is for and one is against the topic of teaching computer science in elementary schools. This means that it gives the pros and cons of both sides which will educate the reader and let them pick a side on the debate. 

Context: The article is from November of 2014, meaning that it is still a very relevant discussion. The way each other gives their argument is by discussing why they support, or do not support the topic at hand. This topic plays into the lack of diversity in computer science. If it was taught in elementary school and introduced to students at a younger age, the field of computer science would be much more diverse. The audience finds this topic important because it could effect their children or their children's children. 

Reflection: After reading the blog posts of Olivia and Bailey, I feel as if I did a good job of giving my viewers a good idea on the types of articles and rhetorical situations in computer science. I saw that Bailey struggled to find sources that can be on the level of any reader. When a topic is revolving around science that is difficult to comprehend it can be difficult to find an article for your average reader to have. This made me aware of making sure I'm looking for sources that my readers will understand. I also need to find sources that the reader personally related to like Olivia did with the Chipotle article.

4 comments:

  1. I think that either the second or third article you have linked to seem to have the most compelling arguments. I think that those, especially the third one, have pretty controversial topics and the third one involves a specific age group. I think that the first one didn't seem as compelling and it just seemed to not be surrounded around as much of a controversial topic.

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  2. I didn't really find the first article as helpful as the other two just because the format seemed like it would make it much harder to rhetorically deconstruct than the other two. However I definitely liked the third article a lot because it took a definitive stance on the topic and backed up their claims very well, and seemed passionate about the topic. The second one was also very good because it contained a lot of information, but it didn't seem to be backing up its statements necessarily, more just making the statements and stopping there.

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  3. These articles all pertain to your topic well but I think the third article would be the best to choose for the project. It brings the topic you are discussing into a relatable light for many different people, especially adults with young children. This is interesting because it seems to interrelate two different topics which is a good twist on things rather than something like the first article which just specifically talks about computer sciences and gives more a of a specific look at that one topic.

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  4. I agree with everyone so far that the third article would fit the project best. I think that picking something with significant controversy and clear arguments would be best. I discovered this in my last project, which I picked a topic that was not very controversial and didn't have enough evidence for either side of the argument. I think picking something where you can deeply analyze what motivates their views will work best.

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