Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen

http://www.imdb.com/video/imdb/vi2100888345/

Audience: Tweens to middle aged movie watchers who like action movies, and who saw the first Transformers movie. This trailer was specifically for those watching the Superbowl, so it narrows it down to those who are also football fans-so more men than women.

Argument:
WATCO watching this movie on how much fun you have.
Claim: watching this movie will increase the amount of fun you have (during this time).
Reaseon: because if you don't watch this movie you will miss out on lots of action packed sequences full of good-looking people and robots, and you would never find out if the evil transfomers take control of the Earth!

Goal: Get people to go see the movie.

How:
Pathos: This movie trailer is fast-paced and gets your adrenaline going-you feel the suspense and tension, especially when it flashes the word REVENGE two or three times. The music puts your nerves on edge, and it cuts from action scene to action scene. The only dialogue is: "you don't stop, you don't hid, you run" it makes you feel like you are part of the action -and makes you want to see more. If you saw and liked the first Transformer movie then you are already attached to the characters and want to know if they make it out ok. The audience feels concerned about what is going to happen to them.
Logos: They make sure to show clips of the most popular (and best looking) actors: Shia LeBeouf, Megan Fox, and Josh Duhamel. If they are in it then it must be a pretty good movie, or at least you'll enjoy watching them. Also, it makes sure you recognize that this is a sequel, so if you liked the first one, then you should like this one. The graphics they show you are also high quality, which makes you believe that if they did well on that, then they should do well in other areas of the movie.
Sufficient: Although the clip is only about 30 seconds long, it shows a several different scenes-all as thrilling as the one before. Who knows how many more scenes like these the movie will have?! It has sufficient evidence that it should be cool.

Effective: I think this trailer is definitely effective. I know I'm excited for it to come out. It piqued my interest, but doesn't tell enough to spoil the movie. It's fast paced and visually stimulating.

Spring breaks a good thing we could have

"And Your Point Is..." 1 of 2

Chris Dunham

Issue date: 3/27/08 Section: Opinion

Oh how the big picture gets overlooked.

Students seem to think "ooh, a week off…me likey" and don't understand what that week off costs them. The break is truly unfair to professors and students.

This is why I propose that SSU does away with Spring Break. Give me a chance to state my case before rioting.

Though SSU would be unusual for not having Spring Break, it wouldn't be alone. Brigham Young University (BYU), is an institution that does not have a break like this. They, like SSU, are on the semester system, and don't want to disadvantage their students by taking a break.

Not having a break allows students to wrap up their year earlier than other institutions. BYU's last day of final exams this year will be April 23, and they will have their commencement ceremonies before May 1.

For anyone counting, that puts their final exams ending 17 days before ours do at SSU.

The benefit of adding a couple weeks to a multiple month summer vacation? Firstly, our students would be out and able to look for jobs in their hometowns earlier. Most high schools wrap up their year in mid-May. Our students, when they go home, find themselves competing with a number of high school students from the community for summer and seasonal jobs.

By getting out of class those extra weeks, our students would be able to get a head start on their respective home towns' youths in the job search.

Adding to the break would make summer vacation nearly four months. Think what a person can do with that time. They could work to make money, do an internship, independent research, or even be lazy in that third of a year of free time.

The change would also give students that go year-round an actual chance to breathe in the summer. By adding a week of break either before or after summer semester, students that attend college year round can feel like they've had some sort of separation from their college workload before coming back to class.

During the semester, with the timing of the break, professors have been forced to use Spring Break as a guide for mapping out a schedule.

The break forces each professor's hand when forming a syllabus and making a test schedule. Most classes took an exam the week before Spring Break. Many did so on their last session before break.

I've heard of and seen professors that have stretched out material over more class sessions than they'd like to so students would be able to take an exam in the last week before break. There have also been professors who try to squeeze extra material into the time before break so they can get an exam over with.

The goal of a university is to educate, not to adjust material to suit a break.

With the student side of the break, I'll stay away from the whole underage drinking and wild parties issue of Spring Break and stick to academics.

The break, for students, completely throws them off course for the semester. For those that didn't take a mid-term right before the break, they probably lost a great deal of the knowledge they have been expected to retain throughout the semester.

I concede the fact that Spring Break is a good time for students for relax and unwind from the pressures of the semester.

But what good does this temporary escape really do? This week, coming back, I feel no different from the way I did before the break. A week is not long enough for students to be removed from their stress, but is long enough for students to forget what they learned before break (leading to more stresses).

Let's stop wasting our week and help students get on to summer earlier.


Audience: Students who enjoy their spring break and want to keep having it.
(I think he actually has two audiences, one is for the professors who like spring break, and he makes a separate argument to them, I am going to focus on his argument for the students).

Argument:
WATCO spring break on students' stress.
Claim: spring break causes more stress on students.
Reason: because by not getting out of school earlier than the high schools students have to compete to get jobs in the summer.

Goal: Convince SSU to get rid of spring break.

How:
Ethos: I think that the writer struggled to build a relationship with his audience. I kind of talks down to them, especially when he puts words in their mouth: "ooh, a week off…me likey."
It's not a very intelligent phrase and it makes it seem like his audience must not be very intelligent. Then he asks them to hear him out before they start rioting, so he realizes that they aren't going to like his position, but he he is placing himself on the opposite side from his audience. He automatically pits himself against them. He is a student, which makes him more credible since he does go to school with them, but he could have used that more to his advantage if he wanted to.
Sufficient: He uses BYU as a source of a school that doesn't have a spring break, but compared to all the other schools that do it doesn't seem like enough, especially since BYU is very different from most other Universities. I think he could have used more sources to help convince his audience, but he doesn't do that bad of a job.
Logos: It makes logical sense to want to get out of school early if you are going to be needing a job in the summer and if you want a longer summer break. As long as they can take take their emotional attachment to spring break out of the picture, than he makes a pretty good argument that is relevant to one of the things they worry about.

Effective: I don't think this is going to convince many students to give up their spring break. If a student has had a hard time in the past getting a summer job, than it would be more effective on them, but otherwise students assume that they eventually will get a job (although that might change along with our econmic crisis...)

Imagine by John Lennon

Imagine there's no heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today...

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace...

You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will be as one

Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world...

You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will live as one

Audience: John Lennon fans who want world peace. Most likely hippies. It was written in 1971 after he left the Beatles, so his audience was people who loved the Beatles which were in their college age years, but some are probably older at the time this song came out.

Argument:
WATCO Abandoning religion, government, and materialism on world peace.
Claim: Giving up religion, government and materialism will make it possible to have world peace.
Reason: Because by giving up you religion, government, and materialism there will be nothing to fight over.

Goal: Get the audience to give up their differences (religion, government, possessions) and strive towards world peace.

Relevant: This song was extremely relevant for its time. The country was in the middle of the Vietnam war. Much of Lennon's audience will either be drafted or have friends who are drafted to go fight in the war. Many people wanted peace, and this song voiced that opinion.
Ethos: Since John Lennon was in the Beatles, he already had a strong fan following when he came out with this song. They knew he his talent was legitimate and many cared what he had to say. Also, his repeated use of the word 'you' connects him with his audience. If he had sung about how he had imagined all the people...the listener would have had a harder time imagining what he was saying.
Pathos: This song appeals to the audience's feelings of desire for peace. The actual music is easy on the ears, and very calm. It is a beautiful song that isn't screaming in their face. The listener can hear the peace he is talking about.

Effective: I think this song probably was effective for his audience. Much of his audience actively looked for ways to avoid fighting in the war, many didn't work because possessions didn't really matter (all you need is love!) and religion was considered bogus.