ENG4UCritical Response Writing Name:
______
A critical response is a relatively short piece of writing (approx. 250-500 words). Many professors assign daily or weekly critical responses to ensure students are reading the assigned texts and to help students think critically about the texts they are reading.
The main purpose of composing a critical response is to show your understanding, opinion and analysis of a text or some theme/topic discussed in class. Critical responses do not simply summarize the textor evaluate whether or not you like it; they are a focused analysis, argument, or interpretation about the text that formulates and/or develops your ideas. Further, “critical” doesn’t necessarily mean negative; it means to engage objectively with a piece as you analyse it.
Your Task: After watching multiple clips and having read the two essays about youth, “Don’t You Think It’s Time to Start Thinking” by Northrop Frye and “Insolence Lost” by Chuck Klosterman, you will write a short critical response exploring the ideas, perspectives, and themes in one or multiple texts.
You should take notes as we are watching various clips, reading and discussing texts to help find specific quotations, ideas, and incidents to which you may want to respond critically. You may also supplement your ideas with other examples from the news, pop culture, and your own experiences and/or background knowledge.
Organization:
You can organize your critical response however you’d like, but here is one suggested structure:
1)Begin with a brief overview/summary of the original text (story, article, episode or idea). What are the main points, ideas, or arguments? What is the primary purpose of the work?
2)Write a clear and argumentative statement that establishes how you feel about/interpret this text (point)
3)Analyze the text and provide evidence for the argument you are making (proofs)—counterarguments, facts, personal anecdotes, etc. Here you may want to consider whether there are sections you don’t understand; if any of the evidence is weak or insufficient; if there was an idea that you thought was particularly noteworthy or misguided;the context of the piece; any assumptions the author makes; anything you are excited or surprised about, or any contradictions you find in this text
4)Provide an interpretation of your evidence in relation to your argument (explanation)—do not just summarize the issue under discussion; try to answer “so what?”
5)Write a strong concluding statement that reinforces your ideas and/or offers up some questions for future consideration
Modern Womenby Ms. Levely
I picked up the article “10 of Prime-Time’s Most Fabulous Females” by Rob Salem, which intends to celebrate the modern women of comedy and drama who inspire fans and challenge conventions. I decided to reserve judgment until after I had read it in its entirety. My first assumption was that it would be a male entertainment writer's condescending attempt at giving recognition to the oft-overlooked female “talent” on television. I read through and my instinct was right.
Within the first three paragraphs, this quotation troubled me: “ 'It’s not just the man’s journey,' applauds Modern Family’s Julie Bowen, 'with the woman standing there shaking her finger, waiting for him to come back from, like, his fart fest with the guys...That is a huge change from the old standard Jackie Gleason format.' "
I know she's on Modern Family, but has she watched Modern Family?
Both female leads—Julie Bowen's Claire and Sofia Vergara's Gloria—are hot stay-at-home moms who are paired with arguably less appealing male counterparts: Claire's husband, Phil, is an average-looking uber-dork who drools over his step-mother-in-law Gloria within plain eyesight of his wife, and Gloria's husband, Jay, is an old curmudgeon 20 years her senior.
The show may not portray only the man's journey, as Bowen naively lauds, but it certainly portrays the women as standing there shaking their fingers—I'm pretty sure this is actually one of Gloria's standard moves when she chastises Jay and her son, Manny—and waiting for them to come home. The only difference is that they're not coming home from "fart fests with the guys," they're coming home from work, a place to which neither woman ever goes. Claire is college-educated but feels she is needed around the house (despite the fact that her youngest child, Luke, appears to be in middle school and her teenage girls are old enough to take the city bus or drive themselves; either way, they certainly don't need someone driving them to soccer practice or baking cupcakes for their class). Gloria stays home, too, but I'm not sure why she is needed there. She is not at all domestic—she can’t, not does she desire to, bake or clean—and her precocious son, Manny, seems to raise himself.
I firmly believe that if a family is financially able to, of course one partner has every right to stay at home in order to give their children the most nurturing and enriching environment and bond possible. But why, in twenty-first century TV viewing, is it still the woman, even when her children have far surpassed a need for her to help micromanage the minutiae of their lives? There is something tragic about the prospect of a middle-aged woman, who is less than a decade away from experiencing the sense of loss and insecurity that comes with Empty Nest Syndrome when her children go off to college and the workforce, who has nothing with which to replace them—no job, no discernible hobbies, and few pastimes besides rolling her eyes at her idiot husband.
Writer Rob Salem congratulates Claire for being as "goofy and neurotic" as her husband, Phil, but neurosis is a stereotypically female quality (ask Freud), and Phil is painted as an effeminate character who is matched only by equally neurotic gay couple, Mitchell and Cameron. Only Jay, the patriarch of the family, is portrayed as the adult voice of reason in a family of feminine—both female and male—nuts.
I actually like watching Modern Family, but I acknowledge it for what it is: certainly not a groundbreaking formula that gives women an opportunity to challenge preconceived notions of traditionally female roles and responsibilities. It's just funny.Let's not pretend it's anything else.
The Death of Embarrassment or the Resurgence of Anxiety?By Ms. Levely
I was just reading an article in an online journal called In Character. The article, “The Death of Embarrassment,” by Christine Rosen, laments what she perceives to be the death of embarrassment in North American society—from people getting laser teeth whitening in the middle of a shopping mall to people obnoxiously cuddling and making out all over the place. She cites other journalists' studies which blame social networking sites like Facebook, online sharing sites like youtube, and reality television shows for our collective desensitization to embarrassing situations and thus our subsequent ability to up the ante of our own personal tolerance for embarrassment.
What she fails to acknowledge, however, is how contrived all of these media actually are in the first place. On Facebook, people's profile pictures, status updates and comments are carefully chosen (“That’s me in front of the Eiffel Tower! Aren’t I sophisticated and well traveled!?”) and increasingly constructed (tilt head slightly to the left, raise chin to avoid looking unnecessarily plump, hold iPhone at appropriate distance from head—don’t forget to pretend you’re looking at something off camera, pout sassily, or really go for it with everyone’s fave, duck lips—and snap, as if the lens just happened to capture your image without your consent).
On Jersey Shore, Big Brother, and an array of sickening MTV and TLC “reality” shows, the producers cast the fill-in-the-blank (GTL, redneck, overprivileged) “stars,” make suggestions to them in terms of how to behave, tempt them with copious amounts of booze/drama/poverty, and continue filming even when things escalate far beyond the level of ordinary embarrassment to which the rest of us are accustomed. When Snooki “fist fights” a group of girls who show up one night on the group’s patio, it is difficult to feel actual embarrassment for her because I know how fake the experience is in the first place and how pride, the antithesis of embarrassment, is Snooki's primary emotion (though how she developed it, I’ll never know). Garnering attention is her objective, and thus it would be a waste of my own feelings of embarrassmentfor her.
One pressing question I have: with the alleged death of embarrassment, why do so many of us suffer from anxiety, which seems, at times, like an extreme and almost preemptive version of embarrassment? We are so excessively worried about what others will think or say about us that we have panic attacks before leaving the house. This is like extreme embarrassment—embarrassment that hasn’t even happened yet, yet we are so stressed that it might potentially happen.
Perhaps instead Rosen should be questioning the death of shame, not embarrassment. We don’t seem to have an individual or collective sense of shame either—shame for being so self-absorbed, so ignorant, and so easily entertained by these other shameless pseudo-celebrities.
Anti-Intellectualism and Consumerismby Kai Fan
It is a sad truth that our society’s interest in literacy has lessened over the years. In “Don’t You Think It’s Time to Start Thinking” Northrop Frye attributes this declining interest to “the powerful anti-intellectual drive” in our society. Although he is partially correct, the underlying factors that contribute to our lack of interest in literacy are far more complex.
Our society’s anti-intellectual drive is only a side effect of the ways in which weendeavor for “the ultimate goal”—monetary profit. Historically, our parents, teachers, and political leaders were the most influential figures in our everyday lives. Today, our most influential figure is not a person; it’s a cult comprised of a series of ideas, plans, and fake promises collectively known as the media, and this cult has become the single most influential figure in all of our lives. The media wants to make money, just like every other organization in our world. But the media makes their profit in a very unique way: today’s media has succeeded in achieving something that literacy has failed to do—the provocation of most humans’ inner desires. By attacking our “weak spots”, the media looks into the human psyche, and ostentatiously advertises ideas or objects in a way that sparks our endless desires. This indirectly compels all of us into investing unnecessarily in luxurious items.
This has come at a great cost: the privileged are living a wasteful consumer lifestyle that we see highlighted by the media; and the working poor, just a paycheque away from poverty, also strive to possess the same outward signs of status as their wealthy or middle class counterparts. The irony is that if these people focused more on developing literacy skills in themselves and in their children, they could perhaps earn a better income and buy some of these luxury items without risking bankruptcy, shelter or malnutrition.
Or, even better, they would perhaps achieve self-confidence and contentment, realizing that they can overcome the media’s empty distractions and refuse to buy their message of inadequacy and self-doubt.
ENG4UCritical Response RubricName:
80-100% / Level 3:
70-79% / Level 2:
60-69% / Level 1:
50-59%
Knowledge and Understanding
Voice 2.2 establish a distinctive and original voice in their writing, modifying language and tone skilfully and effectively to suit the form, audience, and purpose for writing
5 marks / - Voice and style are highly appropriate for critical response (academic, critical, inquisitive, analytical) / - Voice and style are appropriate for critical response / - Voice and style are somewhat appropriate for critical response / - Voice and style are not appropriate for critical response
Thinking
Extending Understanding of Texts 1.5 extend understanding of texts, including complex and challenging texts, by making rich and increasingly insightful connections between the ideas in them and personal knowledge, experience, and insights; other texts; and the world around them
Analysing Texts 1.6analyse texts in terms of the information, ideas, issues, or themes they explore, examining how various aspects of the texts contribute to the presentation or development of these elements
10 marks / - Analyses and assesses ideas, themes, concepts, arguments, and the influence of social/cultural values in an in-depth, unique, highly insightful and mature way / - Analyses and assesses ideas, themes, concepts, arguments and social/cultural values in an insightful way / - Somewhat analyses and assesses ideas, themes, and concepts,
but often relies on clichés or does not fully explore issues / - Analyses and assesses ideas, themes, etc. in a shallow or vague way
Communication
Organizing Ideas 1.4 identify, sort, and order main ideas and sup- porting details for writing tasks, using a variety of strategies and selecting the organizational pattern best suited to the content and the purpose for writing
Producing Finished Works 3.7produce pieces of published work to meet criteria identified by the teacher, based on the curriculum expectations
10 marks / - Carefully organizes, synthesizes and revises significant information and ideas to suit the critical response (including both content and style: sentence structure, transitions, spelling, grammar and punctuation) / - Organizes, synthesizes and revises information and ideas to suit the critical response / - Attempt to organize, synthesize and/or revise information and ideas to suit the critical response but some mistakes remain / - Does not sufficiently organize, synthesize, and/or revise information and ideas to suit the critical response
Application
Research 1.3 locate and select information to fully and effectively support ideas for writing
5 marks / - Selects and uses significant and compelling evidence from texts to support critical analyses / - Selects and uses evidence from texts to support critical analyses / - Attempts to use some evidence from texts to support critical analyses / - Does not use evidence from texts to support critical analyses