Sherry Turkle’s article in The New York Times “The Flight From Conversation”, she disputes that we need to put down the technology and rehabilitate our ability to converse with other human beings because we are replacing deep relationships with actual people for casual encounters on technology. Turkle tries to convince young and middle age individuals who are so enthralled by the technology that they are losing the ability to communicate in a public setting. Sherry Turkle unsuccessfully persuades her audience to put down the technology and engage with others in public through her strong logos appeal that overpowers her weak logos and doesn’t reliably represent herself and her research. Turkle lacks any success in her rhetorical appeal to ethos …show more content…
Turkle throughout her papers has a claim and reasons that support her claims, but her backing and warrants are non-existent, which leads to the emotional rants that make up the article. The audience in general isn’t moved to think her way when all they get from her paper is the rant with nothing to strengthen her points. She also doesn’t give the other side of the argument a chance and continues to bash it without letting it have its fair chance. One of the many examples of her rant structured arguments is “Texting and e-mail and posting let us present the self we want to be… not too little- just right.” (Turkle). This argument wants people to see how much we can change from who we really are in real life to how we perceive ourselves over the internet. It doesn’t have a backing or any other supporting methods just a claim and a lot of emotion that she hopes will convince you of her main argument. With this Turkle hopes that the audience will be swayed without any effort put into the argument. Instead of being moved to think the way Turkle does, the audience members question the validity of any of her claims due to the fact they are emotionally heavy and do not provide any substance to truly back up her main point in the
Media such as movies, video games and television, in general, are all created to support some form of social context. This helps with generating popularity because people are able to relate to the form of media. In Greg Smith’s book What Media Classes Really Want to Discuss, he describes 6 different representational strategies that justifies people’s way of thinking. The trope that I will be amplifying is the white savior tactic. In addition, I will connect this strategy to the movie The Blind Side. There are clear examples throughout the film where racism and low-income cultures exist in which the white family is there to help. The Tuohy family from the movie “The Blind Side” serves as the white savior for the progression of Michael
In the book Into the Wild, Jon Krakauer wrote about Christopher McCandless, a nature lover in search for independence, in a mysterious and hopeful experience. Even though Krakauer tells us McCandless was going to die from the beginning, he still gave him a chance for survival. As a reader I wanted McCandless to survive. In Into the Wild, Krakauer gave McCandless a unique perspective. He was a smart and unique person that wanted to be completely free from society. Krakauer included comments from people that said McCandless was crazy, and his death was his own mistake. However, Krakauer is able to make him seem like a brave person. The connections between other hikers and himself helped in the explanation of McCandless’s rational actions. Krakauer is able to make McCandless look like a normal person, but unique from this generation. In order for Krakauer to make Christopher McCandless not look like a crazy person, but a special person, I will analyze the persuading style that Krakauer used in Into the Wild that made us believe McCandless was a regular young adult.
Elie Wiesel’s “The Perils of Indifference” speech, discusses a point on how oppressed people should be considered as human beings and not just as outcasts in the world. Wiesel applies the pathos appeal, ethos appeal and logos appeal in his speech to prove to the audience that indifference is a problem not only in America but the whole world. He wanted people to change in a way for others to feel good about themselves. Each of the different types of appeals gives a reason to why he believes things have to change. Along with the appeals, Wiesel utilizes fallacies in his speech, such as the many use of an overly sentimental appeals and either or choices.
In “Connectivity and its Discontents,” Sherry Turkle discusses how often we are found on our technology. Turkle states in her thesis “Technology makes it easy to communicate when we wish and to disengage at will.” In the essay are interviews on several different people, of all ages to get their view on the 21st century. Teens are starting to rely on “robot friendships,” the most communication teens get are from their phones. Are we so busy trying to connect to the media that we are often forgetting what is happening around us?
Are technology and the media shedding the very fabric of the existence we have known? As technology and the media spread their influence, the debate over the inherent advantages and disadvantages intensifies. Although opinions vary widely on the subject, two writers offer similar views: Professor Sherry Turkle, director of the MIT Initiative on Technology and Self, in her article “Can You Hear Me Now” and Naomi Rockler-Gladen, who formerly taught media studies at Colorado State University, with her article “Me Against the Media: From the Trenches of a Media Lit Class.” Turkle asserts that technology has changed how people develop and view themselves, while at the same time affecting their concepts of time management and focus (270). Similarly, Rockler-Gladen believes media and its inherent advertising have had a profound effect on the values and thinking of the public (284). I could not agree more with Professor Turkle and Ms. Rockler-Gladen; the effects technology and media have worried and annoyed me for quite so time. The benefits of technology and media are undeniable, but so then are the flaws. People are beginning to shift their focus away from the physical world to the virtual world as they find it easier and more comfortable. The intended purpose of technology and media was to be a tool to improve the quality of life, not shackles to tie people to their devices. I no longer recognize this changed world and long for the simple world of my youth.
Rhetorical Aspects of Social Isolation The American Psychological Association is the largest scientific and professional organization representing psychology in the United States of America. It holds work and research from thousands of professionals, and has the ability to be used by professionals and students alike. The American Psychological Association is a type of discourse community, we share basic values and assumptions in this field, and we also have ways of communicating those goals in a specific context (APA format). To get these points across, we use the term rhetoric to target a specific audience with those specific goals. As for rhetoric, rhetoric can be defined as the study of making texts that effectively persuade an audience towards change (Arola).
Miller’s stance on socializing and empathy will be useful in my research because it directly relates to my argument that people ought to not lose their ability to hold conversation in person. Her argument addresses certain issues on technology that I will be discussing in my research paper. Her argument also relates to that of Turkle whom also believes that social skills are a rarity in today 's society, especially with our young. Turkle and Miller’s arguments also relate in the fact that neither believes that technology is the problem, but the ability of people to assimilate to the technology around them without losing their human touch is.Miller uses reliable sources like David Deming, associate professor of education and economics at Harvard University and Michael Horn, co-founder of the Clayton Christensen Institute throughout her article to get her point across to her
In Sherry Turkle’s, New York Times article, she appeals to ethos, logos and pathos to help highlight on the importance of having conversations. Through these rhetorical devices she expresses that despite the fact that we live in a society that is filled with communication we have managed to drift away from “face to face” conversations for online connection. Turkle supports her claims by first focusing on ethos as she points out her own experiences and data she has collected. She studied the mobile connection of technologies for 15 years as well as talked to several individuals about their lives and how technology has affected them. Sherry Turkle also shows sympathy towards readers by saying “I’ve learned that the little devices most of us carry
In the world today, people are constantly surrounded by technology. At any given moment, we can connect to others around the world through our phones, computers, tablets, and even our watches. With so many connections to the outside world, one would think we have gained more insight into having better relationships with the people that matter the most. Despite these connections, people are more distant to one another than ever. In the article, “Stop Googling. Let’s Talk," author Sherry Turkle details her findings on how people have stopped having real conversations and argues the loss of empathy and solitude are due to today’s technology. Turkle details compelling discoveries on how technology has changed relationships in “Stop Googling. Let’s Talk,” and her credibility is apparent through years of research and the persuasive evidence that supports her claims.
Dhruv Khullar’s article “How Social Isolation is Killing Us,” published by the New York Times, addresses the public about the dangers of the growing epidemic. Utilizing various sources, studies, and even his own stories, Dr. Khullar discusses the health effects and mental effects on a person who is considered socially isolated. He improves the article by discussing how treating social isolation is hard and gives examples of programs that help those who feel alone. The article “How Social Isolation is Killing Us” is a thorough and well-constructed argument that clearly explains dangers of social isolation through the author’s use of logos, pathos, and ethos.
Turkle provides dialogues of individuals who avoid social interactions at all cost and would rather communicate through technology, as it is just an inconvenience to have direct confrontations. These dialogues strongly support Turkle’s argument that we’re creating a greater gap between others and ourselves. The reason we are lonely is because we place less effort into building relations with others.
Studying a university degree is one of the biggest achievements of many individuals around the world. But, according to Mark Edmunson, a diploma in America does not mean necessarily studying and working hard. Getting a diploma in the United States implies managing with external factors that go in the opposite direction with the real purpose of education. The welcome speech that most of us listen to when we started college, is the initial prank used by the author to state the American education system is not converging in a well-shaped society. Relating events in a sarcastic way is the tone that the author uses to explain many of his arguments. Mark Edmunson uses emotional appeals to deliver an essay to the people that have attended College any time in their life or those who have been involved with the American education system.
“Technology is supposed to make our lives easier, allowing us to do things more quickly and efficiently. But too often it seems to make things harder, leaving us with fifty-button remote controls, digital cameras with hundreds of mysterious features.” (James Surowiecki) Whether or not is known, technology has become too heavily relied on. It is replacing important social factors such as, life skills and communication skills. While technology is created to be beneficial, there must be a point in time where we draw the line. Once face-to-face conversations begin to extinguish, this means that there is too much focus on the “screen culture”. In her writing, “Alone Together”, Sherry Turkle talks
Although, her constant fail to back up her claims continues to hurt her overall credibility and persuasion tactics. Another example of this would be, “A 16-year-old boy who relies on texting for almost everything says almost wistfully, ““Someday, someday, but certainly not now, I’d like to learn how to have a conversation”” (Turkle pg. 2). This quote is very relevant and could have strongly supported Turkle’s main claim but, she leaves out some very crucial information. For example, my first thoughts were, “who is this 16-year-old boy? Why should we as an audience find this teenager to be a credible source? And why does what this one boy say even need to be taken seriously?” If Turkle would have first stated something along the lines of, “95% of 12-to-17-year-old in Britain have a mobile phone and 87 percent of those have smartphones” (Butler pg. 2). And then later decided to use this quote from this unknown 16-year-old boy the quote would have seemed much more relevant and given some credibility to her and the argument as well. This is true because it would have helped Turkle’s overall argument by showing a statistical number of the children who are being effected by this technology phenomenon and why it is important to try and prevent any further damage to these social
This demonstrates how the points that Turkle wrote about are not based on how people feel about technology but based off the effects of technology that Turkle presented to them. Basically, she interviews people that have the same stances as her; which proves that it’s not an accurate representation of how people perceives technology.