Zarei Garcia: MWA1 Genre

Analysis
Persuasive Essay- English 1120
Persuasive Essay
What is a persuasive opinion essay? Well, persuasive writing is simply “text
written with the intent to persuade or convince the reader of something.”

“Persuasive writing, also known as the argument essay, uses logic and reason to show that one idea is more legitimate
than another. ... The argument must always use sound reasoning and solid evidence by stating facts, giving logical reasons,
using examples, and quoting experts.”
Genre Conventions

Clear
Thesis Conclusi
Inference
Statement Premise on
Premise
This is basically the thesis statement.
It is the fact or opinion of what your
paper is going to be about.

This then leads to giving evidence in

support of your premise.
Inference Conclusion
This is going to follow the premise and be your This is your ending claim after your argument/opinion
reasoning. And leads to your ending statements. has been clearly stated with evidence to support it.
 Focused
Article Title
Persuasive Article The title of the essay I have solely focused all my
attention towards is Technology is Driving us to
Distraction by James Williams. I chose this essay
because there are many pieces of evidence that
show persuasion and categorize this genre like so.

Purpose
The this document has contributed to my personal
understanding of this genre using the conventions
previously talked about along with language and
tone to touch my emotions and make me deliberate
the subject as correct. Also how I should feel, which
was the goal of the writer.
 The Content
The thesis statement is in the title Technology is Driving us to Distraction. This is the premise and it’s
clear on what the paper is going to be about, and that is why technology distracts us.
Next it gives throughout the article plenty of reasoning. An example is he talks of a “thought
experiment” with the foundation of a device called an “iTrainer”. He goes on to give real life scenarios of
how these “iTrainers” negatively impact our society, and it’s quite obvious he is using sarcasm and
relating this “thought experiment” to mobile devices called iPhones. “Now, the iTrainer might make
people’s lives harder to live: it would no doubt get in the way of the effective pursuit of their desired tasks
and goals. Even though you created it, you probably wouldn’t let your kids use one.” In this quote from
the text he is stating that these devices are distractions, and goes on to say “What if you wanted to make
everyone even more distracted, angry, cynical – and even unsure of what, or how, to think? What if you
wanted to troll everyone’s minds? You’d probably create an engine, a set of economic incentives, which
would make it profitable for other people to produce and deliver these rewards – and, where possible,
you’d make these the only incentives for doing so.”
The tone being used is negative such as the language “distracted, angry, cynical” He concludes by
restating the problem and giving a brief concluding statement about how it can be fixed. “Doing so
requires hacking together new ways of talking and thinking about the problem as well as summoning the
courage necessary for advancing on it in inconvenient and unpopular ways.
Other Articles
In the article Why using Fear to promote Covid-19 Vaccination and mask wearing can backfire,
the thesis is stated in the title which is the opinion as to why that can backfire. There is then
evidence such as “Early behavioral research concluded fear backfired. An early, influential study,
for example, suggested that when people became anxious about behavior, they might tune out or
even engage more in dangerous behaviors Early behavioral research concluded fear backfired. An
early, influential study, for example, suggested that when people became anxious about behavior,
they might tune out or even engage more in dangerous behaviors”. This article is then concluded
with a suggestion of how the problem can be fixed. “Instead, public health officials should boldly
urge and, as they have during other crisis periods in the past, emphasize what has been sorely
lacking: consistent, credible communication of the science at the national level.”

In the article The Argument Against Headphones by Virginia Heffernan, the thesis statement is
“One in five teenagers in America can’t rustles or whispers, according to a study published in
August in the Journal of the American Medical Association” which also includes evidence from a
reliable source. It gives multiple examples of negative effects of headphones on young people which
uses pathos to set a tone of caution and fear. “Maybe the danger of digital culture to young people is
not that they have hummingbird attention spans but that they are going deaf.”
Language & Audience
In Technology is Driving us to Distraction, it’s clear that the intended
audience is for any average person that owns a piece of advanced
technology. Language such as “we and our” are bringing us together as a
whole. The author is speaking to us and asking questions such as “Think
back on your goals from a moment ago. Now try to imagine what your
technologies’ goals are for you. What do you think they are?”. The author
is asking engaging questions that he knows the answer to in order to
persuade the audience.

In Against Headphones, the intended audience is young adults. The

language is “One in five teenagers” and “danger of digital culture to young
people”. The author gives evidence of how young people are negatively
affected in order to persuade us towards their argument because it drives
fear inside of us.
 Reflection
● The genre I chose to analyze was a Persuasive Essay. Yes my focused document clearly
demonstrated the genre conventions. My document had a clear premise, evidence, and final
conclusion.
● In my specific genre a person is providing an argument and trying to persuade the audience. Every
claim made was backed up with evidence.
● I efficiently accomplished this project by researching and piecing together facts and evidence as to
how this specific genre is made up, into the appropriate medium for presentation.
● The medium affected the outcome positively because through this slideshow I was able to ease into
my introduction and give lots of detail and evidence separately in order to keep the attention of my
audience.
● The hardest part of using this technology is using 2 mediums such as inserting my slideshow into my
website. I overcame these challenges by persevering. The easy part was being able to research
definitions and multiple articles really quickly.
● I would say my weakest point of this project is not having more documents as evidence, if I had more
time I would’ve found as many more as I could’ve. I would’ve also pulled more textual quotes. I got a
bit confused about how to write the intended audience and medium but peer review gave me a better
understanding and idea of what to do.
SLO
I accomplished the use of SLO: Writing as a Process in this project. It took planning to think of the
genre I was going to analyze, and then research conventions and articles that were perfect examples. I
composed together a rough draft. And then my peers reviewed and gave me their feedback which was a
big help. I then incorporated their feedback and edited my entire rough draft to create the best
presentation I could.

SLO

I also practiced SLO Rhetorical Situation and Genre by analyzing specifically what makes up the genre
of a persuasive essay. An in text example is when I went into depth on the convention premise “This is
basically the thesis statement. It is the fact or opinion of what your paper is going to be about.”. I pieced together
this slideshow which is a good medium in order to give a presentation. The rhetorical situation was to break up
the genre and effectively explain how and I did so. I chose this essay because there are many pieces of evidence
that show persuasion and categorize this genre like so.
Citations
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/may/27/world-distraction-dem
ands-new-focus
https://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/09/magazine/09FOB-medium-t.html
https://theconversation.com/why-using-fear-to-promote-covid-19-vaccination-and-
mask-wearing-could-backfire-153865
https://valenciacollege.edu/students/learning-support/winter-park/communication
s/documents/ElementsofPersuasive.pdf
https://apps.prsa.org/Intelligence/Tactics/Articles/view/6C-020917/101/The_Elem
ents_of_Persuasion_Three_principles_that_w#.Ygv9we7ML9E
https://bid4papers.com/blog/persuasive-essay/argument/
https://pdst.ie/node/586
https://jukebox.esc13.net/vgcdeveloper/TEW/handouts/TALAW_Handouts_L5S1.
pdf
https://bid4papers.com/blog/persuasive-essay/argument/#:~:text=A%20persuasiv
e%20argument%20is%20the,using%20in%20your%20argumentative%20essay.