Purpose of an exposition

The purpose of an exposition is to present one side of an argument and persuade the
reader or listener to agree or take action to solve the problem. An exposition persuades a reader
or listener by presenting one side of an argument by taking a point of view and justifying a way
to convince others to see only that side of an issue. Some expositions speculate as to what might
be and persuade others as to what should be.

Advocacy
is an activity by an individual or group that aims to influence decisions within political,
economic, and social institutions. Advocacy can include many activities that a person or
organization undertakes including media campaigns, public speaking, commissioning and
publishing research. In addition to the definition of advocacy, here is a reminder of what
advocacy is (as well as what it’s not)
• is active promotion of a cause or principle
• involves actions that lead to a selected goal
• is one of the many possible strategies, or ways to approach a problem
• can be used as a part of a community initiative, nested in with other components
• in not a direct service
• does not necessarily involve confrontation or conflict

These are several ingredients you need for effective advocacy:

• The rightness of the cause
• The power of the advocates
• The thoroughness with which the advocates researched the issues, the opposition, and the
climate of opinion about the issue in the community
• Their skill in using the advocacy tools available (including media)
• Above all, the selection of effective strategies

CRAFTING AN EFFECTIVE ADVOCACY MESSAGE

1. Open with a statement that engages your audience.

Make a statement that gets your audience’s attention right away, perhaps
using a dramatic fact. This is your lead-in and should be only a sentence or two.
2. Present the problem. Describe the problem, who it affects, it impacts
3. Provide facts, data about the problem. Data is important to demonstrate that a problem exists
and to support your position. Look for facts that are relevant to your audience.
4. Share a story or give an example of the problem. An example or story puts a human face on
the issue and makes it real and more compelling. Again, make sure the example is relevant to
your audience.
5. Connect the issue to the audience’s values, concerns, or self-interest. Show your audience how
this interest fits with what they care about, want or need. Learn what you can about the person.
6. Make your request (the “ask”). Clearly state what you want the person to do.
One of the strategies to promote advocacy is through campaigns. Let us find out what campaigns
are.

Campaigns are organized actions which are done for a purpose.

• often the main way that you interact with the public and get your
organizations message out to people
• used to mobilise and involve people in your work, pressurise decisionmakers, educate the
public and change behaviour

Claim of value, fact, and policy

A claim of fact is a statement about how things were in the past, how
they are in the present, or how they will be in the future. These are also
statements that report, describe, predict, or make causal claims.
A claim of value is an arguable statement concerning the relative
merits of something which is measured subjectively. These are also
statements that advance judgments about morality, beauty, merit, or
wisdom.
A claim of value is a statement regarding the merits of a course of
action to take. It urges that an action be taken or discontinued.

Read and analyze the following sentences:

You should eat more vegetables because they are healthy.

The modal should expresses necessity.

She looks tired; she must take some days off.

The modal must expresses strong recommendation.

I’m not sure but Jane might come to visit me this afternoon.
The modal might expresses less or remote possibility.

What other examples of modals do you know of?

Can – expresses ability, permission, or request

Examples:

Heat waves can cause heat stress in both animals and plants.
My grandmother is eighty-five, but she can still read without glasses.

Could – expresses past ability, polite permission or request, suggestion,

Possibility

Examples:

There was a time when I could stay up very late.

Could I use your phone please?
We could go to the new restaurant.
She could be at home.

Will – expresses simple futurity and willingness

Examples:
I haven’t decided yet where I will spend my next holiday.
Will you take care of my dog for a day?

Would – expresses invitation, conditional, or past possibility.

Examples:
He would ride his bike before he hurt his knee.
I would ride the bike at night, if it had a light.

Shall – indicate simple futurity, formal invitation, and obligation in legal documents

Examples:

The defendant shall pay a fine of 200 dollars.

Shall we begin?

May – expresses future possibilities mixed with doubt and uncertainty. It also
expresses permission or a wish.

Example:
May I have a look at those shoes in the window, please?
Food may become more expensive as climate change mitigation efforts
increase energy prices.
❖ A modal does not change according to the number or person of the subject.
Examples:
He can learn. I can learn. You can learn.
They can learn. We can learn.

❖ A modal is always used with a verb in its basic form. The modal takes the tense while the
main verb remains in its dictionary form.
Examples:
I can run. I may run.
I could run. I might run.

❖ Modals can be used alone in response to a question.

Examples:
Can you sing? I can.
Will you sing? I will.
Will you come? I may./I will.

❖ Modals, when joined with ‘not’ to form a negative, can be contracted.

Examples: I cannot run. I can’t run.
I do not run. I don’t run.
I will not run. I won’t run.
We can also form the negative of each modal by adding the word “not” after each modal.
Example: He speaks many languages, but he cannot speak Chinese.

Modal Adverbs add a sense of possibility. They show how certain the
speaker is about what they are saying. This is called modality.
For example:
I will definitely be there. (certain)
I will probably be there. (certain)

The Divine Comedy

The poem, The Divine Comedy, is about a journey of the author himself, towards God. It has
three parts: Inferno (Hell), Purgatorio (Purgatory) and Paradiso (Heaven). Each part consists of
thirty-three cantos. Such division reflects the medieval theology specific to Christianity. The
purpose of Dante’s Divine Comedy was to show people the horrors their souls would go through
if they did not obey God's laws and did not live their lives righteously.

Why is Dante's Inferno called The Divine Comedy?

Dante chose to call his poem a comedy (commedia in Italian) because it ends happily. The
poem follows a pilgrim who journeys through the afterlife to salvation and a vision of God under
the guidance of the souls of the Roman poet Virgil, Dante's literary model, and his beloved
Beatrice.
What is The Divine Comedy about summary?

The plot of The Divine Comedy is simple: a man, generally assumed to be Dante himself, is
miraculously enabled to undertake an ultramundane journey, which leads him to visit the
souls in Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise.

What is the main point of The Divine Comedy?

The purpose of Dante's Divine Comedy was to show people the horrors their souls would go
through if they did not obey God's laws and did not live their lives righteously. There is a lot
of symbolism in connection with numbers throughout the novel. Number three is one of the most
common and important ones.

Dante’s Divine Comedy Summary

In Dante’s Inferno, he finds himself lost in the forest and realizes that he has died. Virgil helps
him on his journey, accompanying him throughout Inferno and Purgatorio. He encounters the
horrors happening within Inferno and goes through the nine circles of it. We will take a closer
look at each of the circles of hell and determine their specifics and differences, as well as look at
Dante’s Inferno—Satan himself. Purgatorio is a part of The Divine Comedy in which Dante and
Virgil travel through the seven terraces of the mountain, each of them representing a deadly sin.
In Paradiso, the main character, with the guidance of his beloved Beatrice, travel through the
nine celestial spheres of Heaven. As opposed to Inferno and Purgatorio, in the last part of the
poem the protagonist encounters virtues, not sins.

Nine Circles of Hell:

1. Limbo
The first circle consists not of sinners, but people who are not baptized; either they lived before
Christ when baptism had not yet spread, or they never got baptized. They reside in a castle with
seven gates, symbols of the seven virtues. Technically, it is an inferior form of Heaven where
pagans are stuck and punished for eternity. Here, Dante and Virgil meet many Greek and Roman
philosophers, poets, and artists, such as Homer, Ovid, Socrates, Cicero, and even Julius Cesar.

2. Lust
The second circle has a more traditional appearance of Hell. It is dark, full of screaming noises,
and suffering. Near the entrance to the second circle stands Minos, a huge beast who decides
where souls should be sent for torment. The second circle holds people who were lustful
throughout their lives. They are punished by strong winds blown over them, throwing them back
and forth. These winds symbolize the restlessness and instability of people guilty of lust. Dante
and Virgil notice many people of Greek and Roman antiquity, mythology and history—such as
Cleopatra, Tristan, and Helen of Troy. Among other sinners punished for lust, they meet the
souls of Paolo and Francesca da Rimini—a couple condemned to Hell for their adultery and
numerous love affairs.

3. Gluttony
In the third circle of Hell, Dante and Virgil encounter souls whose sin is gluttony. A worm-
monster, Cerberus, watches over them. They are punished with icy, slushy rain that pours all
over them without stopping. They are not permitted to stand, so the slushy water covers their
entire body as they lie. The slushy rain is a symbol of personal destruction and the inability to
stop eating. People who are in this circle of Inferno have weak will and cannot resist the earthly
pleasures of indulgence—food and drinks. Here, the protagonist meets the soul Ciacco, his
political opponent from Florence.

4. Greed
The fourth circle of Dante’s Inferno is guarded by Pluto, a Roman god of the underworld who is
also regarded as the god of wealth. Here, the sinners are divided into two groups: those who
hoarded their possessions, and those who spent sumptuously. Their punishment is to push very
heavy weights up a mountain—mostly boulders, which symbolize their lust for never-ending
money and possessions. There, Dante recognizes many people he is familiar with, such as
clergymen, popes, and cardinals—all of whom have been greedy throughout their lifetime.

5. Wrath
In this circle of hell, Dante and Virgil encounter people who are guilty of wrath and fury. Those
found guilty of being angry and impatient are immersed in the river Styx, or simply are forced to
fight among each other on its surface. They gurgle the water of the river, struggle, and drown.
The water is made up of a black toxic liquid and they are left there to suffer. Dante encounters
another political enemy of his, Filippo Argenti, who confiscated his possessions when he was
banished from Florence. He tries to climb up into a boat, but gets pushed away.

Phlegyas is the boatman who helps Dante and Virgil get across this river. They are stopped by a
group of fallen angels. Furies threatens to summon Medusa so that she can turn Dante into stone,
because he does not belong in the world of the dead. An angel arrives and opens the gate for
them before Medusa is able to get to them.
6. Heresy
The sixth circle of Inferno is for heretics – people who have contrary opinions to Christian
beliefs. There, they lie in tombs that burn them alive. Dante talks with Farinata degli Uberti, a
political leader and his contemporary, who did not believe in God. He also sees Epicurus, Holy
Roman Emperor Frederick II, and Pope Anastasius II.

7. Violence
The passage to the seventh circle is blocked by a Minotaur—half-man, half-bull. Virgil insults
him, and the minotaur bursts into a violent outrage, letting Dante and Virgil sneak past him. The
seventh circle of Hell of Dante’s Inferno is divided into three rings. Nessus is a centaur who
carries the protagonist through the first ring. In this circle, they see a forest inhabited by harpies
– mythological creatures with birds’ bodies and womens’ heads. Dante tears off a branch from a
tree that shrieks in horror and pain. The tree turns out to be the soul of Pier della Vigna. He
ended his life because he was accused of conspiracy against the emperor. They blinded him for
treason and threw him into jail where he killed himself. He explains that all the souls who
commit suicide are kept in the seventh circle and become trees. There, their leaves are eaten by
harpies, which cause the trees a lot of pain.

In order to get from the seventh to the eighth circle of Inferno, Virgil and Dante get help from
Geryon – a giant Monster of the Fraud. He has a dragon-like body and wings, the paws of a lion,
and a human face.

8. Fraud
This circle is divided up into ten Bolgias – ditches with bridges between them, that are placed
around a circular well. Malacoda is the leader who guards the entrance to the eighth circle of
Hell. He lies and deceives both the poet and Virgil by telling them that there are bridges in this
circle, and that they have nothing to worry about. Nonetheless, their path is very dangerous. Each
Bolgia has different kinds of people who sin is fraud:

They encounter panderers, seducers, sorcerers, false prophets, corrupt politicians, hypocrites,
thieves, evil counselors and advisers, alchemists, counterfeits, and perjurers. Pope Boniface VIII,
Dante’s political enemy, is among the sinners they meet in this circle. In the journey from the
eighth to the ninth of Dante’s Inferno circles of hell, they get help from Antaeus, a giant who
carries them down the well, which is the path to the ninth, and final circle of Hell.
9. Betrayal

This circle is made up of a lake – Cocytus. The sinners here are submerged in ice, only their
heads stick out. Dante sees Bocca degli Abati, a Florentine traitor, who is so ashamed of his sins,
he does not want to tell Dante his name, at first. As Dante and Virgil proceed through the lake,
they see the giant figure of Lucifer, also stuck in ice. Lucifer is the Prince of Hell. He has three
mouths, and in each of them he holds a sinner: Judas, Brutus and Cassius:

In order to get out of Inferno Dante and Virgil must climb Lucifer’s body. They manage to crawl
out of the hole and find themselves on an island where they see a lot of bright stars, and Mt.
Purgatory. This ends the Dante’s Inferno book.

Hendecasyllabic – line of 11 syllables

Rhyme scheme – tercets, abc bcb cdc ded
Iambic pentameter – 1 unstressed, 1 stressed, 5 syllables

Divine Comdedy composition

- 14, 233 lines

- Divided into three major parts/sections
- 33 cantos each part

3 parts

- Hell/inferno
- Purgatorio
- Paradiso

Argumentative essay vs. Persuasive essay

Argumentative:
- Logic based
- Minimum of 8 paragraphs
- Argumentative writers maintain a tone of fairness and reasonableness. Their attitude is
respectful, tactful, and formal.

Persuasive:
- Emotion based
- Persuasion has a single-minded goal— Get what the writer wants. It is based on the
writer's personal conviction that his way of thinking is the best.
4 elements of an argument

- Claim
- Evidence
- Counterargument
- Refute

Composition

- Manner
- Matter
- Method

 Logos – the content

 Ethos – you as a writer
 Pathos – values and beliefs of the audience

1/18/2023
HIGH SCORES CUTIE
- Andrea N. Cielo