Unit 8 Overview

Take a look at the image below. What do you see?

Source: Getty Images

Most people see the same image in this picture: two people, maybe a
mother and daughter. There isn’t much room for disagreement at this obvious
level. People simply agree the image shows two women and the conversation
stops there.
Now examine this zoomed-in, close-up section of the image. With the
image modified this way, you can see that the picture is not just two people,
but hundreds of people. This view is from the upper right-hand corner of the
original image. When you look more closely at the image—and pay attention
to the specific parts that make up the whole—you see the details that went
into creating the whole. You get a sense of the people by looking at their faces,
their clothing, their positions, their activities, and their relationships to one
another. None of that insight is possible when you view the image from the
initial perspective.

462 ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION: AP ® EDITION

 Argument—from the perspective of both reader and writer—works in
much the same way. An obvious or simplistic presentation of a claim grinds
the conversation to a halt. There is no further discussion of evidence, cause-
effect hypotheticals, or significance over the long term. But think of each
specific photograph in the image above as a strategic word choice, sentence
arrangement, or audience acknowledgment. Together, these elements form a
worthwhile argument and contribute to a far richer conversation.
A critical reader recognizes and appreciates the elements of style that make
an argument effective and convincing, that account for complex perspectives,
and that allude to deeper issues underlying the surface argument. An effective
writer, once initial ideas are generated, focuses on fine-tuning and honing
the argument so it delivers those elements to readers. In this unit, you will
refine your understanding of an argument in its context and how rhetorical
strategies—specifically the blend of word choices, sentence and paragraph
organization, comparisons, and conventions—fit within that context.

Close Reading: Professional Text

“On Morality” by Joan Didion

Following is an essay by American writer Joan Didion. Didion’s style,

defined as “new journalism,” communicates facts and real-life experiences
through narrative storytelling. Over the years, she has often used this technique
to comment on elements of pop culture, such as the dangers of California
subcultures in the 1960s. The following essay, “On Morality,” was written in
1965 in the midst of the war in Vietnam, the civil rights movement, the Cold
War and nuclear tension, and political division throughout the United States.
The anchor icon next to the heading tells you that this essay is a reading you
will return to throughout this unit. For now, read it to understand the main or
central ideas Didion expresses as she discusses her interpretation and implied
definition of morality. Take your time reading it. When you encounter a word,
term, or name you don’t know, use the footnotes to help you figure out the
meaning.
1 As it happens I am in Death Valley,1 in a room at the Enterprise Motel
and Trailer Park, and it is July, and it is hot. In fact it is 119°. I cannot seem
to make the air conditioner work, but there is a small refrigerator, and I
can wrap ice cubes in a towel and hold them against the small of my back.
With the help of the ice cubes I have been trying to think, because The
American Scholar2 asked me to, in some abstract way about “morality,” a
word I distrust more every day, but my mind veers inflexibly toward the
particular.

1 Death Valley: a desert in eastern California, one of the hottest places on Earth.
2 The American Scholar: a general-interest journal published by the Phi Beta Kappa society.

USING STYLE STRATEGICALLY 463

 2 Here are some particulars. At midnight last night, on the road in
from Las Vegas to Death Valley Junction, a car hit a shoulder and turned
over. The driver, very young and apparently drunk, was killed instantly.
His girl[friend] was found alive but bleeding internally, deep in shock. I
talked this afternoon to the nurse who had driven the girl to the nearest
doctor, 185 miles across the floor of the Valley and three ranges of lethal
mountain road. The nurse explained that her husband, a talc3 miner, had
stayed on the highway with the boy’s body until the coroner could get over
the mountains from Bishop, at dawn today. “You can’t just leave a body on
the highway,” she said. “It’s immoral.”
3 It was one instance in which I did not distrust the word, because she
meant something quite specific. She meant that if a body is left alone
for even a few minutes on the desert, the coyotes close in and eat the
flesh. Whether or not a corpse is torn apart by coyotes may seem only a
sentimental consideration, but of course it is more: one of the promises
we make to one another is that we will try to retrieve our casualties, try not
to abandon our dead to the coyotes. If we have been taught to keep our
promises—if, in the simplest terms, our upbringing is good enough—we
stay with the body, or have bad dreams.
4 I am talking, of course, about the kind of social code that is sometimes
called, usually pejoratively, “wagontrain morality.” In fact that is precisely
what it is. For better or worse, we are what we learned as children: my own
childhood was illuminated by graphic litanies of the grief awaiting those
who failed in their loyalties to each other. The Donner Reed Party,4 starving
in the Sierra snows, all the ephemera5 of civilization gone save that one
vestigial taboo, the provision that no one should eat his own blood kin.
The Jayhawkers,6 who quarreled and separated not far from where I
am tonight. Some of them died in the Funerals7 and some of them died
down near Badwater8 and most of the rest of them died in the Panamints.
A woman who got through gave the Valley its name. Some might say
that the Jayhawkers were killed by the desert summer, and the Donner
Party by the mountain winter, by circumstances beyond control; we were
taught instead that they had somewhere abdicated their responsibilities,
somehow breached their primary loyalties, or they would not have found
themselves helpless in the mountain winter or the desert summer, would
not have given way to acrimony, would not have deserted one another,
would not have failed. In brief, we heard such stories as cautionary tales,
and they still suggest the only kind of “morality” that seems to me to have
any but the most potentially mendacious9 meaning.

3 talc: a mineral used in talcum powder and other products

4 Donner-ReedPparty: A group of 87 people who tried to cross the mountains into California
during the stormy winter of 1846. The 47 who survived ate the flesh of those who died.
5 ephemera: passing niceties
6 Jayhawkers: Another group of easterners heading to California to mine for gold.
7 The Funerals and the Panamints are mountain ranges close to Death Valley.
8 Badwater Basin has the lowest elevation in North America.
9 mendacious: untruthful

464 ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION: AP ® EDITION

 5 You are quite possibly impatient with me by now; I am talking, you
want to say, about a “morality” so primitive that it scarcely deserves the
name, a code that has as its point only survival, not the attainment of
the ideal good. Exactly. Particularly out here tonight, in this country so
ominous and terrible that to live in it is to live with antimatter,10 it is difficult
to believe that “the good” is a knowable quantity. Let me tell you what
it is like out here tonight. Stories travel at night on the desert. Someone
gets in his pickup and drives a couple of hundred miles for a beer, and he
carries news of what is happening, back wherever he came from. Then he
drives another hundred miles for another beer, and passes along stories
from the last place as well as from the one before; it is a network kept
alive by people whose instincts tell them that if they do not keep moving
at night on the desert they will lose all reason. Here is a story that is going
around the desert tonight: over across the Nevada line, sheriff’s deputies
are diving in some underground pools, trying to retrieve a couple of bodies
known to be in the hole. The widow of one of the drowned [young men]
is over there; she is eighteen, and pregnant, and is said not to leave the
hole. The divers go down and come up, and she just stands there and
stares into the water. They have been diving for ten days but have found
no bottom to the caves, no bodies and no trace of them, only the black
90° water going down and down and down, and a single translucent fish,
not classified. The story tonight is that one of the divers has been hauled
up incoherent, out of his head, shouting—until they got him out of there
so that the widow could not hear—about water that got hotter instead of
cooler as he went down, about light flickering through the water, about
magma,11 about underground nuclear testing.
6 That is the tone stories take out here, and there are quite a few of
them tonight. And it is more than the stories alone. Across the road at the
Faith Community Church a couple of dozen old people, come here to live
in trailers and die in the sun, are holding a prayer sing. I cannot hear them
and do not want to. What I can hear are occasional coyotes and a constant
chorus of “Baby the Rain Must Fall”12 from the jukebox in the Snake Room
next door, and if I were also to hear those dying voices, those Midwestern
voices drawn to this lunar country for some unimaginable atavistic13
rites, rock of ages cleft for me,14 I think I would lose my own reason. Every
now and then I imagine I hear a rattlesnake, but my husband says that it
is a faucet, a paper rustling, the wind. Then he stands by a window, and
plays a flashlight over the dry wash outside.

10 antimatter: matter composed of antiparticles of ordinary matter. The meeting of matter and
antimatter in sufficient quantities would produce an explosion that could annihilate the world.
During the Cold War, the U.S. Air Force paid for studies evaluating this potential.
11 magma: melted rock; magma
12 The No. 2 hit on the popular music charts in 1965, with the refrain “Wherever my heart leads
me, baby I must go.”
13 atavistic: primitive
14 The first line of a Christian hymn: “Rock of ages cleft [split open] for me, let me hide myself in
thee.”

USING STYLE STRATEGICALLY 465

 7 What does it mean? It means nothing manageable. There is some
sinister hysteria in the air out here tonight, some hint of the monstrous
perversion to which any human idea can come. “I followed my own
conscience.” “I did what I thought was right.” How many madmen have
said it and meant it? How many murderers? Klaus Fuchs15 said it, and
the men who committed the Mountain Meadows Massacre16 said it, and
Alfred Rosenberg17 said it. And, as we are rotely and rather presumptuously
reminded by those who would say it now, Jesus said it. Maybe we have
all said it, and maybe we have been wrong. Except on that most primitive
level—our loyalties to those we love—what could be more arrogant than
to claim the primacy of personal conscience? (“Tell me,” a rabbi asked
Daniel Bell18 when he said, as a child, that he did not believe in God. “Do
you think God cares?”) At least some of the time, the world appears to me
as a painting by Hieronymus Bosch; 19 were I to follow my conscience then,
it would lead me out onto the desert with Marion Faye, out to where he
stood in The Deer Park looking east to Los Alamos and praying, as if for
rain, that it would happen:20 “. . . let it come and clear the rot and the stench
and the stink, let it come for all of everywhere, just so it comes and the world
stands clear in the white dead dawn.”
8 Of course you will say that I do not have the right, even if I had the
power, to inflict that unreasonable conscience upon you; nor do I want you
to inflict your conscience, however reasonable, however enlightened, upon
me. (“We must be aware of the dangers which lie in our most generous
wishes,” Lionel Trilling21 once wrote. “Some paradox of our nature leads us,
when once we have made our fellow men the objects of our enlightened
interest, to go on to make them the objects of our pity, then of our wisdom,
ultimately of our coercion.”) That the ethic of conscience is intrinsically
insidious seems scarcely a revelatory point, but it is one raised with
increasing infrequency; even those who do raise it tend to segue22 with
troubling readiness into the quite contradictory position that the ethic
of conscience is dangerous when it is “wrong,” and admirable when it is
“right.”

15 Klaus Fuchs fled Germany to the United States, where he worked on the development of the
atomic bomb during World War II. He moved to Great Britain to assume an important
position at the British atomic energy center. He was convicted and imprisoned for providing
atomic energy secrets to the Soviet Union.
16 The Mountain Meadows Massacre occurred in September 1857 in Utah. A group of 130 to 140
emigrants heading for California were attacked by Native Americans who were incited and
joined by Mormons angry at the treatment they had received during their earlier trek across
the continent. All but 17 children were massacred.
17 Alfred Rosenberg was a Nazi leader often called “The Grand Inquisitor of the Third Reich.” He
was hanged for war crimes in 1946.
18 Daniel Bell was a sociologist and was considered a leading intellectual following World War II.
19 Hieronymus Bosch (ca. 1450–ca. 1516), a Dutch painter of fantastic and hellish images.
20 Marion Faye is a character in the Hollywood novel The Deer Park by Norman Mailer. Los
Alamos, New Mexico, was the site of atomic bomb testing. The “it” Faye refers to is the
dropping of the atomic bomb.
21 Lionel Trilling (1905–1975), an eminent critic of literature and modern culture.
22 segue: move without interruption

466 ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION: AP ® EDITION

 9 You see I want to be quite obstinate about insisting that we have no
way of knowing—beyond that fundamental loyalty to the social code—
what is “right” and what is “wrong,” what is “good” and what “evil.” I dwell
so upon this because the most disturbing aspect of “morality” seems to
me to be the frequency with which the word now appears; in the press,
on television, in the most perfunctory kinds of conversation. Questions of
straightforward power (or survival) politics, questions of quite indifferent
public policy, questions of almost anything: they are all assigned these
factitious23 moral burdens. There is something facile going on, some self-
indulgence at work. Of course we would all like to “believe” in something,
like to assuage our private guilts in public causes, like to lose our tiresome
selves; like, perhaps, to transform the white flag of defeat at home into
the brave white banner of battle away from home. And of course it is all
right to do that; that is how, immemorially, things have gotten done. But I
think it is all right only so long as we do not delude ourselves about what
we are doing and why. It is all right only so long as we remember that all
the ad hoc committees, all the picket lines, all the brave signatures in The
New York Times, all the tools of agitprop24 straight across the spectrum,
do not confer upon anyone any ipso facto25 virtue. It is all right only so
long as we recognize that the end may or may not be expedient, may or
may not be a good idea, but in any case has nothing to do with “morality.”
Because when we start deceiving ourselves into thinking not that we want
something or need something, not that it is a pragmatic necessity for us
to have it, but that it is a moral imperative that we have it, then is when we
join the fashionable madmen, and then is when the thin whine of hysteria
is heard in the land, and then is when we are in bad trouble. And I suspect
we are already there.

Composing on Your Own

After you read, respond to Didion’s ideas in writing. What questions did it
raise about morality? What parts, if any, were confusing, and which parts
were clear? What do you think her main point is about morality? Does
she say what morality is, or does she suggest instead what it isn’t? How do
her views jibe with your views of morality? Write freely to answer these
questions and any others that occur to you. You will be developing these
ideas throughout the unit, so save your work for future use.

23 factitious: artificial
24 agitprop: political propaganda
25 ipso facto: just by the fact of it

USING STYLE STRATEGICALLY 467

 Evaluating Writing: Student Draft
Morality

Following is a student draft on morality as seen through a historical example.

It was written as a script for a multimedia presentation for a community event
called Culture Clash, sponsored by the local library. This unedited draft is
similar to the type of text in one of the multiple-choice sections of the AP®
English Language and Composition test. This draft still needs work. As you
read it, think about how it contributes to the conversation about morality. Later
you will have the opportunity to suggest ways the writing might be improved.
(1) Throughout history, when a country reaches its peak, it believed it
had to share its success with the rest of the world. (2) At no time was this
truer than during the Age of Exploration, when Spain and other European
nations stumbled upon the brave new world that was inhabited by Indians.
(3) European morality was based on the philosophy of the Catholic church
whereas Native Americans found their sense of morality to be rooted in
nature and their ancestral tradition. (4) Spain and other European countries,
under the pretense that they were saving the Native Americans by giving
them eternal salvation, worked them to death searching for gold. (5) Entire
Native American communities were destroyed, communities that had been
based on sharing and compassion. (6) The Spanish believed themselves to
be godly, yet they found themselves destroying civilizations that were built
on a natural moral code born out of nature and the strength of community.
(7) Was Hernán Cortés a moral leader? (8) He destroyed an entire
people and enslaved those who were remaining so that he could discover as
much wealth as possible. (9) Even though we know the means by which he
achieved “greatness,” Cortés is immortalized in history because he expanded
his nation’s empire while gaining Catholic followers and discovering gold.
(10) It is this characterization that is published in history books but not where
we get the real low down. (11) Montezuma, the Aztec emperor, was one of the
greatest kings in Aztec history, and he was deceived by Cortés, the Spanish
Conquistador. (12) As such, Montezuma has gone down in history as one
of the greatest fools compared Cortés. (13) Cortés goes down in history as
a quintessence of greatness for burning his own ships to prevent his men
from returning to Cuba and ultimately destroying an entire empire with his
mere 150 men. (14) Montezuma has been immortalized as the fool that lost an
empire of millions to 150 men. (15) While we think that morality comes from a
standard, innate moral code, morality is a fluid abstract notion that changes
based on who tells the story—because the stories we tell often become
evidence to prove our morality.

468 ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION: AP ® EDITION

 What Do You Know?

The rest of Unit 8 will continue to explore how the situation in which an
argument is presented influences the stylistic choices the writer makes. But
before learning new skills and information, assess what you already know about
the concepts in Unit 8 by reviewing and answering questions about the anchor
text by Joan Didion and the student draft on morality. Don’t worry if you find
these questions challenging. Answering questions on a subject before formally
learning about it is one way to deepen your understanding of new concepts.
You may wish to work with a classmate as you try to answer the questions.

CLOSE READING: PROFESSIONAL TEXT

1. Give an example of a comparison the author makes in order to connect

with her audience. How does this comparison advance her purpose?
2. How does Didion’s use of anecdotes within her essay add to the strength
of her argument about morality?
3. How do Didion’s diction and syntax influence how she is perceived?
How does Didion show her consideration of different perspectives and
contexts?

EVALUATING WRITING: STUDENT DRAFT

1. What is the author’s purpose for writing? Does the writer acknowledge
different viewpoints that might exist within the audience—such as the
audience’s beliefs, values, and needs?
2. How does the writer make use of comparisons to enhance the argument?
3. How might the writer’s syntax and word choice influence how her main
claim is perceived?

USING STYLE STRATEGICALLY 469

 Part
1

Considering Audience
through Strategic Choices
Enduring Understanding and Skills

Part 1
Understand
Individuals write within a particular situation and make strategic writing
choices based on that situation. (RHS-1)
Demonstrate
Explain how an argument demonstrates understanding of an audience’s
beliefs, values, or needs. (Reading 1.B)
Demonstrate an understanding of an audience’s beliefs, values, or needs.
(Writing 2.B)
Source: AP® English Language and Composition Course and Exam Description

Essential Question: How do the audience’s beliefs, values, and needs

inform stylistic choices regarding comparisons, syntax, and diction?

If a tree falls in the forest and no one is there to hear it, does it still make
a sound? If a text has no reader, does it still have a message? Both of these
questions center on the idea that someone must be on the receiving end for
an event, or text, to come into existence and have meaning. However, author
Joan Didion seems sure that the writer controls the meaning of the message. In
an essay called “Why I Write,” she said, “there’s no getting around the fact that
setting words on paper is the tactic of a secret bully, an invasion, an imposition
of the writer’s sensibility on the reader’s most private space.”
Yet the fact remains that communication requires a sender, a receiver, and a
message, and all influence one another, despite any bullying an author claims to
do. The audience has great influence on the message a writer presents and the
way it is presented. As you write to communicate a message within a rhetorical
situation, what you know about who will be reading it guides the stylistic
choices you make. Your stylistic choices, in turn, shape your readers’ responses.
The impact of your writing is the result of accumulated stylistic choices—how
you use comparisons, what words you choose (diction), and how you arrange
those words (syntax). Each small choice, like each of the individual photos that
make up the image on page 462, plays a role in communicating your message.

470 ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION: AP ® EDITION

 KEY TERMS

analogy dynamic
anecdote metaphor
bias simile
comparison syntax
diction unique

1.1 Effective Comparisons in Context | RHS-1.K

Putting a point across effectively in an argument or essay often requires the
writer to coax readers to think about the topic in a new way. One way writers
can accomplish that goal is by illustrating relationships among situations
or ideas using comparisons. The effectiveness of comparisons depends on a
mutual understanding of them by the audience and the writer and their ability
to advance the writer’s purpose.
Making Comparisons
Writers use different kinds of comparison—the identification of
similarities—to link their feelings or perceptions to something the reader will
understand or relate to. Comparisons are a tool of everyday living—they play a
key role in how humans make sense of the world. Authors can explain complex
subjects by comparing their ideas to things or experiences their audience
finds familiar; the audience then uses the familiar references as a bridge to
understand something less familiar. For example, in 2020, a meme began
circulating via social media during the period of social distancing restrictions
due to the coronavirus pandemic. The meme, which read: “ ‘The viral curve is
flattening; we can start lifting restrictions now’ is like saying, ‘The parachute
has slowed our rate of descent; we can take it off now.’ ” The comparison made
the point that reopening the nation to business as usual before the pandemic
was brought under control was dangerous. Readers understood that the
comparison was apt because in both situations—shedding a parachute too
soon or reopening a nation before it is safe to do so—the probable outcome is
similar: needless harm and/or death.
Similes and Metaphors
Similes and metaphors are two of the most common types of comparisons
writers use.
• A simile is a direct comparison of two different things using the word
like or as.
Anchor Text Example: At least some of the time, the world appears to
me as a painting by Hieronymus Bosch.

CONSIDERING AUDIENCE THROUGH STRATEGIC CHOICES 471

 If the reader does not share an understanding of Hieronymus Bosch’s
paintings, the comparison is useless. But for readers who do know the painter,
vivid images come to mind of a weird, phantasmagoric, sometimes joyful,
sometimes threatening universe. Think of how efficient the comparison
between the world and such a painting is; then consider how many words it
would take to create a verbal image that would conjure the same effect.

The Garden of Earthly Delights by Hieronymus Bosch

• A metaphor is an implied comparison of dissimilar things, stated

without using the words like or as.
Anchor Text Example: Particularly out here tonight, in this country
so ominous and terrible that to live in it is to live with antimatter, it is
difficult to believe that ‘the good’ is a knowable quantity.

The metaphor in this passage compares living in a desolate environment

like Death Valley to experiencing “antimatter”—which is something that
can potentially destroy matter. The comparison suggests that when our
presumptions of morality are stripped away, our carefully constructed ideas
about what is good and bad quickly dissipate into nothing. Harsh realities
undermine our moral pieties and, as Didion points out, what is considered
“the good” is no longer a “knowable quality.” In comparing the “terrible and
ominous” realities of Death Valley to the annihilating properties of antimatter,
Didion quickly conveys her ideas about the subjectivity of morality without
having to explain each conceptual step—she depends on her audience being
able to make the link between two concepts.
Comparisons are not always explicitly stated; very often they must be
inferred. For example, in his opening statement to the Senate Judiciary
Committee in 2005 after President George W. Bush nominated him to be chief
justice of the Supreme Court, then-Judge John Roberts used a metaphor

472 ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION: AP ® EDITION

implying a comparison between judges and umpires when he said, “ . . . it's my
job to call balls and strikes and not to pitch or bat.” Sometimes the comparisons
are between two things even more different than judges and umpires. For
example, you might not make an immediate connection between such vastly
different things as agricultural silos and shame. Yet the following cartoon
makes that comparison clearly and simply: shame can accumulate and cause so
much internal pressure that it needs to be vented like the over-pressurized
contents of farm silos.

Analogies
An analogy is a direct comparison between one idea or thing and another
idea or thing based on their being alike in some way. Even though the two
things or ideas are distinctly different, they share a key similarity or similarities.
Metaphors and similes are both tools writers can use to draw an analogy.
Consider the famous line from the classic film, Forrest Gump: “My mama
always said life was like a box of chocolates. You never know what you’re gonna
get.” Life and a box of chocolates are two very different things, obviously, yet they
are comparable because they both involve making decisions without knowing
the outcome. When you choose a chocolate from the box, you are unsure of
the filling. The uncertainty about the filling of a chocolate parallels the feeling
of uncertainty about life experiences. In both situations, people make choices
without really knowing how they will turn out. The analogy uses something
that nearly everyone can relate to—choosing a chocolate—to explain another,
much larger idea—having to make choices in life.

CONSIDERING AUDIENCE THROUGH STRATEGIC CHOICES 473

 In another passage from “Why I Write,” Didion compares writing to
composing a photo using camera angles. Notice that she opens with a simile
but then adds more details to create a fully developed analogy.
To shift the structure of a sentence alters the meaning of that sentence,
as definitely and inflexibly as the position of a camera alters the meaning of
the object photographed. Many people know about camera angles now, but
not so many know about sentences. The arrangement of the words matters,
and the arrangement you want can be found in the picture in your mind. The
picture dictates the arrangement.

Didion creates an analogy that compares positioning a camera to capture

an image to the ways an author uses words to capture an image in her mind.
To say that two things are analogous is to say that they are comparable in some
relevant way. Many analogies are used to explain or clarify a difficult, obscure,
or abstract concept by relating it to something that is easier to understand or
more concrete for the audience.
For example, recall Didion’s vivid analogy between writing and bullying:
“there’s no getting around the fact that setting words on paper is the tactic of a
secret bully, an invasion, an imposition of the writer’s sensibility on the reader’s
most private space.” She explains one intellectual and abstract concept—the
relationship between a writer and reader—by using a vivid physical concept—
bullying and invasion—and in so doing puts a unique and violent gloss on the
relationship. By comparing the act of writing to bullying, Didion suggests that
writing can be manipulative; the writer’s words enter the mind of the reader
and have the potential to change the way he or she thinks.
Less poetically, analogies can also be used in a line of reasoning. In Unit 3,
you read about a deductive pattern of reasoning that begins with a premise and
leads to a logical conclusion. In an argument by analogy, the deductive logic,
also called a syllogism, is meant to prove that because two things are similar,
what is true of one is also true of the other.
Here is how it might look:
1. A is similar to B in certain (known) respects.
2. A has the feature X.
3. Therefore, B is likely to have the feature X.
For example:
Jupiter’s moon Europa is similar to Earth because they both have an
atmosphere that contains oxygen.

Earth supports life.

Therefore, Europa might have life on it.

Note the qualification of the conclusion with the word might. Just because
two things are similar in some ways does not mean they are similar in all ways.

474 ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION: AP ® EDITION

 Comparisons work when two things are related in some logical way. If
a writer fails to show the reader how two things or ideas are connected, the
comparison fails. If the comparison is overly obvious, the writing may seem
simplistic or too obvious. Be aware that some analogies, similes, and metaphors
are overused and considered clichés. Writers may also fall into the trap of using
false analogies, which assume that because two things are similar in some
ways, they must be similar in all ways. You may be familiar with such dubious
comparisons in advertising; the young man wearing a certain brand of jeans
is compared to a famous rock star, or the flavor of certain type of ice cream
is compared to experiencing heaven. These overwrought comparisons cause
readers or viewers to doubt the underlying validity of the message. In another
example, many contemporary writers like making analogies between people’s
minds (or brains) and computers. Not only has this analogy become somewhat
clichéd, but it is also simplistic and fails to take into account the complexity
of the human mind, which in addition to computing data, is also creative,
analytical, tuned in to emotions, able to abstract, self-aware, and able to work
on many levels beyond what can be processed by a machine. For instance, a
computer could never recognize the expression of a loved one whose feelings
you have just hurt through a careless choice of words.
Anecdotes
An anecdote is a short, interesting story about a real incident or person.
For example, Didion begins to lay out her ideas on morality in paragraph 2
of her essay, using a brief anecdote about the aftermath of the drunk driving
accident. Although not technically a comparison like the simile, metaphor, and
analogy, an anecdote gives readers a real-life event to compare to a general
concept.
Writers often use anecdotes to shift or challenge the audience’s perception
of a subject or situation, as Didion does with her analogy between writing and
invasion. Often, the purpose of analogies is to appeal to readers’ emotions or leave
the reader with questions—questions that a good writer will investigate, explore,
and sometimes resolve by the end of the piece. In writing, an anecdote may
• present a hypothetical situation that describes a concrete example of
key ideas
• compare different perspectives about a subject
• make the argument more personal or more emotional
• connect with the audience by providing insight into the writer’s
personal experience
Didion is known for her use of storytelling within her arguments. When
exploring wrongs in society or commenting on political corruption, she
includes anecdotes as evidence or to help develop her argument. Consider
again the story Didion shares in the second paragraph of “On Morality.” She
provides a short anecdote (the drunk driving story) that emphasizes why
she values particulars, not just abstract ideas like morality. Here, she actually

CONSIDERING AUDIENCE THROUGH STRATEGIC CHOICES 475

acknowledges the power of the anecdote: anecdotes allow writers to speak in
particulars. Her argument is not about the nurse’s husband who stayed with the
boy’s body after the car accident. Instead, her argument is about morality, and
this anecdote is a specific example of morality in the real world.
Purposes and Effects of Comparisons
While all of the techniques above serve the same general purpose—to
compare explicitly or implicitly—they do so in different ways. The differences
determine which strategy will be most appropriate for the writer’s argument,
message, and audience. Similes and metaphors are especially useful when they
are concrete and describe a situation, experience, feeling, or entity that cannot
otherwise be communicated with accuracy.
The chart below shows why a writer might use a comparison to make an
argument resonate with the audience.
Purposes of comparison are . . .
• to create a body of associations in order to amplify a point
• to create a richer, layered reading
• to convey complex meaning in a few words
• to make a connection between the subject and a larger context
• to make an abstraction more concrete and accessible to an audience
• to increase emotional response

Possible effects of comparisons are that the . . .

• audience feels specific emotions
• audience relates ideas from previous texts to the ideas in the current text
• the writer connects with a larger or more specific audience
• writer connects to audience by expressing old ideas in new ways and vice versa
• writer’s attitude or perspective on a subject is conveyed
Table 8-1

Using the chart above, consider how the purpose of a comparison

influences the effect or meaning of a sentence from Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I
Have a Dream” speech, which was delivered on August 28, 1963, from the steps
of the Lincoln Memorial to a crowd of 250,000. The speech was also broadcast
on all three major networks of the time.
No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls
down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.
You might generate the following commentary about the significance of
the comparison to the message.
King compares “justice” to rolling waters and “righteousness” to
a “mighty stream.” In this comparison, King suggests that justice
and righteousness are powerful, natural, and inevitable; just as
one cannot keep back a river, laws that promote racial inequality
cannot hold back the human spirit. In addition, King, who was an
experienced minister, purposely echoes soaring Biblical language
to increase the emotional response in the audience. Many in King’s

476 ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION: AP ® EDITION

 audience would make the connection between King’s language
and the biblical story of Noah’s Ark, in which God flooded the world
to punish humanity’s misdeeds but saved Noah and his family
because of their righteousness.
Whether reading another writer’s argument or evaluating your own, ask
the following questions to evaluate comparisons.
Questions to Evaluate Effectiveness of Comparison
1. What are the audience’s beliefs, needs, and values that the writer is trying to reach
through this comparison?
2. Why might the writer want to appeal to this particular audience?
3. What are the relationships among the speaker, audience, and subject?
4. What abstraction is made more concrete, and is the abstraction characterized
positively or negatively?
5. What emotion is evoked with this comparison?
Table 8-2

Shared Understandings
A writer’s comparisons must be both shared with and understood by the
audience to fulfill the writer’s purposes. As you saw earlier, without knowing
about the paintings of Hieronymus Bosch, the reader would not be able to
take away meaning from Didion’s statement that the world appeared to her
sometimes as one of his paintings.
Following is another example that makes a comparison to a perhaps more
popular and widely known example than the Bosch paintings. It comes from
Texas Governor Ann Richards’s keynote address at the 1988 Democratic
National Convention, in which she noted she was only the second female in
more than 150 years to address the convention.
Twelve years ago, Barbara Jordan, another Texas woman, Barbara made
the keynote address to this convention, and two women in a hundred and
sixty years is about par for the course. But if you give us a chance, we can
perform. After all, Ginger Rogers did everything that Fred Astaire did. She just
did it backwards in high heels.

In this brief excerpt, Richards points out the general lack of opportunity for
women that is a factor in American politics. First, she relates her own invitation
to serve as the DNC’s keynote speaker to that of the last woman invited to deliver
the keynote, Barbara Jordan—the only other woman in U.S. history to serve the
function. She goes on to make a larger point about the general competence of
women by comparing the male and female genders with the famed dance team
of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. Both Rogers and Astaire were gifted, highly
trained dancers. But as Richards notes, Rogers had to do the same complicated
steps Astaire did, with the added difficulty of moving backwards while wearing
high-heeled, no doubt uncomfortable shoes. Richards knows that she might
make some people defensive if she immediately lectures her audience about

CONSIDERING AUDIENCE THROUGH STRATEGIC CHOICES 477

gender inequalities. So, instead of pointing out that highly competent women
often have to overcome gender discrimination to be successful, she eases into
her subject matter by wrapping her main claim inside a joke that humorously
alludes to the many difficulties women face. Often, humor relaxes an audience
and puts them in a positive frame of mind, which makes them more receptive
to a writer’s ideas—the audience can laugh together at a shared joke. With the
help of her colorful comparison, Richards is able to move into a speech about
the inequities and hard work that affect the lives of women and families in
America.

Remember: Writers may make comparisons (similes, metaphors,

analogies, or anecdotes) in an attempt to relate to an audience. Effective
comparisons must be shared and understood by the audience to
advance the writer’s purpose. (RHS-1.K)

1.1 Checkpoint

Close Reading: Professional Text

Review Didion’s essay “On Morality.” Then complete the open response
activity and answer the multiple-choice questions that follow.
1. On separate paper, make a copy of the chart below. For each column
complete the stem with specific details related to Didion’s essay. Choose
two of the following comparisons to help focus your analysis or choose
your own example from the essay: the desert, childhood promises,
Jayhawkers, bodies fallen in the hole, Faith Community Church.

The purpose of The possible effects

the comparison is to . . . of the comparison are . . .

2. Answer all the questions from Table 8-2 on page 477 about your chosen
examples.

478 ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION: AP ® EDITION

3. In context, the “social code” Didion mentions in the first sentence of
paragraph 4 refers to
(A) the promise of cautionary tales
(B) wagon-train morality
(C) immorality and amorality
(D) particulars not abstractions
(E) conventional beliefs
4. In the final paragraph of “On Morality,” Didion employs the metaphor of
“the white flag of defeat” to
(A) connect with readers by acknowledging her own unjust acts
(B) reassure readers that their mistakes are forgivable and common
(C) emphasize that claims of morality often mask selfish motives
(D) succumb to the notion that the times change and therefore
morality is harder to define
(E) exploit the common delusion that we are innately moral
5. Toward the end of the passage, the author uses the phrase “monstrous
perversion” to refer to
(A) innate immorality
(B) decisions made in the name of conscience
(C) tamped down self-righteousness
(D) primacy of personal conscience
(E) conscience that succumbs to reason

Evaluating Writing: Student Draft

Reread the student draft about Cortés and Montezuma on page 468. Then
complete the following open response activities and answer the multiple-
choice questions.
1. How does the comparison between these leaders support the writer’s
larger point?
2. Write a short response in which you develop a comparison between two
historical leaders showing that historical respect is or is not measured
by one’s morality. For example, you may choose to compare James
Buchanan and Abraham Lincoln. Both men go down in history books
with the stature of presidents, but Buchanan is remembered for his
proslavery agenda, whereas Lincoln, who succeeded Buchanan, oversaw
a Civil War that eventually ended slavery.

CONSIDERING AUDIENCE THROUGH STRATEGIC CHOICES 479

3. The writer is considering adding the following sentence after sentence 3.
While it is true that the Aztecs, one of the tribes exploited by Spain
and other European countries, sacrificed people from other tribes they
conquered or destroyed, their sacrifices did not compare to the Europeans'
mass-slaughter and the force with which they acquired the land of the
Native Americans and claimed the New World.
Should the writer make this revision?
(A) No, this detail is better placed in paragraph 2.
(B) No, this detail is redundant and therefore not necessary.
(C) Yes, the new information helps the writer show that the Aztecs
committed many immoral acts.
(D) Yes, this detail clarifies the differing degrees to which the Aztecs
and Cortés acted immorally.
(E) Yes, this detail offers a counterargument that will be refuted in
paragraph 2.

Composing on Your Own

Joan Didion uses the “particulars” of specific anecdotes and examples to
develop her definition of the abstract concept of morality. Review what
you wrote after your first reading of Didion’s essay. Choose a single abstract
or universal concept—including morality if that draws your interest
more than others—as the focus of an essay that you will develop with the
techniques from this unit, starting with analogy, anecdote, metaphor, and
simile. Realize that you, like Didion, live in turbulent times. The issues have
changed, but there are still mass protests, economic hardship, systemic
racism and sexism, divided government, and gaping wealth differences.
To focus your thoughts and narrow your topic, choose a context, purpose,
and audience to shape your rhetorical situation or create one of your own.
Write down the choices you make and the concept you choose to define.
Exigences/Contexts
• An invitation from American Scholar to write a thoughtful piece relevant to today’s times
• Witnessing an example of injustice
• A student-created TED-type talk on matters of urgent concern to young people

Purposes
• Explore your best understanding of an abstract concept
• Hold someone accountable for unjust behavior and prevent it in the future
• Engage listeners on an intriguing topic with the hope of reorienting attitudes

Audiences
• Well-read students, teachers, and other adults
• Readers of a local newspaper or members of a local government council
• Students, parents, teachers, school administrators, and community members

480 ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION: AP ® EDITION

 Once you have established the boundaries of your rhetorical situation,
make a chart on separate paper like the one below to gather evidence to support
your definition and your argument. Try to develop a variety of imaginative
examples, evidence, and anecdotes to support your definition. Didion, for
example, uses these anecdotes: “diving to retrieve bodies in an underground
pool” or “staying with a dying boy to keep him from being eaten by coyotes.”
Save your completed chart for future use.

Abstract concept to define

Analogies

Anecdotes

Similes

Metaphors

1.2 Diction and Syntax in Crafting Argument | RHS-1.L

RHS-1.M

Writers know that the words they choose and the order in which they arrange
those words influence how an audience perceives them—even to the point of
leading the audience to agree or disagree with an argument. Bias seeps through
in word choice especially, and a writer’s bias may alienate certain audiences.
For these reasons, writers choose words and their arrangement strategically.
Diction
Every word counts in an argument. A writer’s word choice—diction—can
serve to clarify or muddy the meaning (or to add no meaningful substance
at all). For example, in May 1920, one small word in a speech delivered by
presidential nominee Warren G. Harding kicked off a political and grammatical
controversy. In the speech, Harding declared, “America’s present need is not
heroics but healing; not nostrums [fake remedies] but normalcy; not revolution
but restoration….” Harding’s use of the word normalcy sparked political
pushback from people who wondered if “normalcy” meant a return to the low
wages, high taxes, and unemployment of the earlier part of the century. It led
to public ridicule and diminished credibility on another level as well—from
newspaper writers and editors, who assumed Harding simply hadn’t known
any better than to substitute a made-up word to take the place of normality.
The Boston Globe went so far as to insert normality in place of normalcy in their
reprint of Harding’s speech. (It turned out that normalcy was in fact a real word
that had existed for a long time; it simply wasn’t used as often as normality.
Since those days, normalcy has moved into relatively common usage, while

CONSIDERING AUDIENCE THROUGH STRATEGIC CHOICES 481

normality is used less often.) This example shows the power of a single word
to complicate rather than clarify a message and to negatively affect credibility.
Words also gain power when they arouse the five senses. Sensory words
help readers see, hear, feel, taste, and touch a subject, and the more they can
imagine experiencing what the writer describes, the more engaged they are
likely to be in the writer’s argument.
Diction, however, describes more than just individual word choices. Word
choices have a cumulative effect and work together to help establish a writer’s
voice. If you remember having been told to use your “inside voice” when you
were a child, you know that certain voices are appropriate for certain contexts
and not for others. Diction, one aspect of voice, is sometimes categorized
according to those contexts: for example, academic diction is the word choice
you make in formal, academic writing; poetic diction is the choice of more
flowery words to evoke feelings; informal diction is the word choice you use in
relaxed contexts; it includes slang and colloquialisms. Consider the same idea
expressed using some different categories of diction:
Academic diction: The temperature in Death Valley had reached 102 degrees
by 3 p.m.

Poetic diction: The heat strengthened throughout the morning and by

afternoon pressed down its merciless hand on the landscape.

Informal diction: It was hot this morning but it was way hotter this afternoon.
Each diction has its place; the rhetorical situation guides a writer’s word
choices and diction.

Diction and Bias The words a writer chooses to use in an argument can reflect
personal values or bias—the writer’s personal prejudices or preferences about
a topic. Writers may reveal their biases by leaving out or taking for granted
certain facts or information or using words loaded with connotation, vague
language, generalizations, or stereotypes. If an audience notices bias in the
writer’s word choice, they may be less likely to find the writer credible and
accept the argument.
For example, take a look at the following excerpt from the film Wall Street.
In one pivotal scene millionaire corporate raider Gordon Gekko addresses a
crowd of angry shareholders at Teldar Paper, a company he is attempting to
acquire through a hostile takeover. Here is the end of that speech:
The point is, ladies and gentlemen, that greed—for lack of a better
word—is good. Greed is right. Greed works. Greed clarifies, cuts through,
and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit. Greed, in all of its forms—
greed for life, for money, for love, for knowledge—has marked the upward
surge of mankind. And greed . . . will not only save Teldar Paper, but that other
manufacturing corporation called the USA. Thank you very much.

482 ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION: AP ® EDITION

 Notice the powerful, positive adjectives the speaker applies to the word
greed: it’s “right,” it “works,” it “captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit.”
It will not only save the shareholders’ company—it will save the entire nation.
Notice as well that Gordon Gekko uses the gender-biased term mankind
instead of the gender-neutral term humankind. Also think about all the things
Gordon Gekko does not mention in this speech. For example, how might his
takeover of Teldar Paper affect the company’s employees? If you are someone
who sees “greed” in its more familiar light—as the motivation for inequality,
exploitation, environmental degradation, and compromise of principles—the
words Gekko uses with positive connotations would likely alarm you and set
your mind against accepting his argument. (See Unit 6, Part 2.)
Syntax
While diction refers to the selection of individual words, syntax refers to
the grouping and arranging of words into clauses, sentences, and paragraphs.
The way a writer chooses to group words, like the specific words the writer
chooses, influences how likely the audience will be to accept or reject the
argument.
Consider this excerpt from Joan Didion’s essay “Why I Write,” which
provides some context for her idea of writing as an act of bullying.
[Writing is] an aggressive, even hostile act. You can disguise its
aggressiveness all you want with veils of subordinate clauses and qualifiers
and tentative subjunctives, with ellipses and evasions—with the whole
manner of intimating rather than claiming, of alluding rather than stating—
but there’s no getting around the fact that setting words on paper is the tactic
of a secret bully, an invasion, an imposition of the writer’s sensibility on the
reader’s most private space.

The excerpt above consists of just two sentences: one short and one very
long. The short first sentence grabs the reader’s attention with a declarative
statement that signals the reader to ask why or in what way writing is an
aggressive, even hostile act. The second sentence vividly supplies the answer.
It also subtly supplies humor in that its form follows its function; at the same
time Didion is describing the “veils of subordinate clauses and qualifiers and
tentative subjunctives,” she is creating those structures in the essay itself. At the
same time she is saying that writers evade and allude rather than making direct
statements, she provides an example of a writer—herself—doing just that.

Syntax and Sentence Length One aspect of syntax is sentence length. Compare
the syntax in the following three statements about the fate of polar bears in
an era of climate change. When reading the following examples, notice how
sentence length influences the effectiveness of the author’s argument, and pay
particular attention to how sentence length mirrors the descriptive qualities
within each sentence.

CONSIDERING AUDIENCE THROUGH STRATEGIC CHOICES 483

 Example 1: Polar bears are losing their habitat. The sea ice is dwindling. Soon
there will be no polar bears. They’ll be extinct by 2050. It will be a loss for the
planet.

Example 2: Due to enormous changes in habitat involving a precipitous loss

of sea ice, polar bears will soon find themselves without a place to live, hunt,
or raise their cubs. As a result of this sad phenomenon, many researchers
believe that polar bears will be extinct by 2050, another huge and dangerous
loss to our climate-challenged planet.

Example 3: It paddled closer, close enough now we could see it clearly,

its paws working feverishly beneath the surface of the water, its long neck
straining to keep its head above the surface, its eyes fixed eagerly on the
steel grail ahead of it, its small ears flat against the side of its head. A passing
ice floe provided welcome respite and the bear took advantage, clambering
out of the ocean, its fur thick with water. It shook itself briefly, walked from
one end of the floe to the other to stay level with the ship as the ice drifted
past, then plunged back into the water.—Kieran Mulvaney, The Great White
Bear: A Natural and Unnatural History of the Polar Bear

Example 1 uses short sentences, all about the same length, and they all
follow the same structure—subject–verb—almost like a list or an outline of
factual data. A single short sentence amidst longer sentences can disrupt the
rhythm and flow of the writing and powerfully call attention to the idea in
the short sentence. In addition, a string of short sentences can be effective for
hammering home some strong points. However, to many readers, the short
sentences in Example 1 may have the stilted, redundant cadence of a text written
for a grade-school student. The language lacks descriptive words and phrases
to engage the reader; beyond the bare facts, there is almost no language that
evokes an emotional response or helps the reader picture the subject matter.
The first example gives facts in simple sentences, but it does little else.
Example 2 consists of two longer sentences (28 words in the first sentence
and 27 in the second), and they too follow a similar structure—both begin
with this pattern: prepositional phrase–subject–verb. These sentences relate
most of the same information as Example 1, but the writer smoothly combines
the information into two sentences and includes a wider variety of descriptive
words—such as “precipitous,” “sad,” “huge,” “dangerous”—that connect
emotionally with the reader. The combination of longer sentences with more
description creates a structure with more flow and nuance than Example 1.
Example 3 has three sentences of mixed lengths—53 words, 22 words,
and 31 words. The first sentence—the longest by far—reflects the polar bear’s
struggle as it tries to catch up with the boat; the repeated and parallel phrases
“its paws . . . its long neck . . . its eyes . . . its small ears . . .” build tension through
their repetition. When the bear reaches the safety of the ice floe, the author
uses a short sentence to pause the forward narrative flow, which mirrors the
bear’s momentary respite. The level of detail provided also shows the author’s
intent observation and deep experience with his subject. Unlike the first two

484 ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION: AP ® EDITION

examples, Example 3 does not include statistical data and instead opts for a
narrative that interests the reader in the bear’s struggle—the reader becomes
emotionally invested in the bear’s survival. The crisp descriptions and varied
sentence length clearly convey the actions of the bear, which helps make the
reader more receptive to the author’s argument.
Notice how the syntax in the examples matches the descriptive style of the
writing. While in the first example the author uses short sentences to mostly
recount dry facts, the third example uses varied sentence length to match the
movements of the bear. Good writing depends on using sentences of varying
lengths: some short, some longer, and some in between. Most important, syntax
should reflect and enhance the ideas the writer is communicating.
The way a writer orchestrates sentences—whether long, complex sentences,
a series of rhetorical questions, or some other form—influences the way the
message is sent to and received by the audience. These structures and patterns
are most effective when they serve one or more of the following purposes:
• clarifying meaning
• establishing or disrupting sentence rhythm
• evoking specific emotions relevant to the specific audience, occasion,
and message
• emphasizing a point or manipulating the audience’s attention
• establishing cause-and-effect or compare-contrast relationships
Punctuation and Syntax Punctuation is an integral part of the rhythm
and cadence of the writer’s message. Writers who use punctuation effectively
can exercise great control over meaning and tone in their writing. For example,
a writer’s punctuation might serve to emphasize the syntax of a description,
calling out a modifier or a phrase.
Original sentence: The tired, hungry, and frantic polar bear paddled for his
life to get to the ice floe.

Revised syntax: The polar bear, tired, hungry, and frantic, paddled for his life
to get to the ice floe.

Punctuation to offset modifiers: The polar bear—tired, hungry, and frantic—

paddled for his life to get to the ice floe.

Punctuation such as semicolons can establish parallel relationships between

subjects, such as cause-effect relationships.
The ice melted; the habitat shrank. The habitat shrank; polar bears starved.

Syntax and Patterns and Repetition Syntax applies not only to the
arrangement of words within a sentence but also to the arrangement of sentences
within a longer passage. Repetition and patterns are especially communicative.
Consider again a passage by Joan Didion from “Why I Write,” this time with a
little more context.

CONSIDERING AUDIENCE THROUGH STRATEGIC CHOICES 485

 (1) Grammar is a piano I play by ear, since I seem to have been out of
school the year the rules were mentioned. (2) All I know about grammar is its
infinite power. (3) To shift the structure of a sentence alters the meaning of
that sentence, as definitely and inflexibly as the position of a camera alters the
meaning of the object photographed. (4) Many people know about camera
angles now, but not so many know about sentences. (5) The arrangement
of the words matters, and the arrangement you want can be found in the
picture in your mind. (6) The picture dictates the arrangement. (7) The picture
dictates whether this will be a sentence with or without clauses, a sentence
that ends hard or a dyingfall sentence, long or short, active or passive. (8) The
picture tells you how to arrange the words and the arrangement of the words
tells you, or tells me, what’s going on in the picture.

Note especially the patterns and repetitions in sentences 5–8:

(5) The arrangement of the words matters, and the arrangement you
want can be found in the picture in your mind. (20 words)
(6) The picture dictates the arrangement. (5 words)
(7) The picture dictates whether this will be a sentence with or without
clauses, a sentence that ends hard or a dyingfall sentence, long or short,
active or passive. (28 words)
(8) The picture tells you how to arrange the words and the arrangement
of the words tells you, or tells me, what’s going on in the picture. (26 words)

All the repeated words are underlined. The underlined words—

arrangement, pictures, words, sentences—offer an at-a-glance outline of the
four key ideas that are interwoven within this paragraph. Didion repeatedly
stresses that the arrangement of words is important, because it is the way a
writer transfers the thoughts—or pictures—in her head into sentences that
connect with the reader. By repeating key words, Didion keeps the reader
focused on her main idea. In addition, you might note that each sentence
starts the same way, three of them with a key idea: the picture. Sentence 5
starts with another key idea: arrangement. Sentence 7, explaining whether a
sentence will be long or short, is the longest sentence. Its length, however,
would not really even be noticed except that it is preceded by such a short
sentence. Each sentence depends on those around it for its effectiveness.
Notice that the repetition of words is not redundant; Didion still uses a variety
of descriptive words and sentence structure, and she only repeats key words
to emphasize her ideas.

Remember: Writers’ choices regarding syntax and diction influence

how the writer is perceived by an audience and may influence the
degree to which an audience accepts an argument. Word choice may
reflect writers’ biases and may affect their credibility with a particular
audience. (RHS-1.L, M)

486 ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION: AP ® EDITION

1.2 Checkpoint

Close Reading: Professional Text

Review Joan Didion’s essay “On Morality.” Then complete the following
open response activities and answer the multiple-choice questions.
1. Analyze the syntax and diction in this passage from the end of the essay
by completing the second column of the chart below on separate paper.
Of course we would all like to “believe” in something, like to assuage our
private guilts in public causes, like to lose our tiresome selves; like, perhaps,
to transform the white flag of defeat at home into the brave white banner of
battle away from home. And of course it is all right to do that; that is how,
immemorially, things have gotten done. But I think it is all right only so long
as we do not delude ourselves about what we are doing and why. It is all
right only so long as we remember that all the ad hoc committees, all the
picket lines, all the brave signatures in The New York Times, all the tools of
agitprop straight across the spectrum, do not confer upon anyone any ipso
facto virtue. It is all right only so long as we recognize that the end may or
may not be expedient, may or may not be a good idea, but in any case has
nothing to do with “morality.” Because when we start deceiving ourselves
into thinking not that we want something or need something, not that it is a
pragmatic necessity for us to have it, but that it is a moral imperative that we
have it, then is when we join the fashionable madmen, and then is when the
thin whine of hysteria is heard in the land, and then is when we are in bad
trouble. And I suspect we are already there.

Diction
(a) What descriptive words or phrases have strong connotations,
and what connotations do they have?
(b) What words appeal vividly to the senses?
(c) What do think she means by “brave” signatures?
(d) How might you describe the category of diction Didion uses?
(See page 482.) Give examples.
Syntax
(a) Identify places where Didion uses repetition to emphasize her
ideas. Explain what ideas she is trying to emphasize.
(b) Give three examples of how Didion uses different sentence
lengths in the paragraph to emphasize her ideas.
(c) Explain why “believe” and “morality” are in quotation marks.

CONSIDERING AUDIENCE THROUGH STRATEGIC CHOICES 487

2. Write a paragraph of rhetorical analysis describing Didion’s diction and
syntax and explain the effect of the items you noted in your response to
question 1 on your understanding of the essay.
3. In paragraph 6 the author uses the phrase “unimaginable atavistic rites”
primarily to
(A) provide an example of people searching for meaning and
comfort in an environment of primal darkness
(B) emphasize that she disagrees with religious prayers and songs
because morality transcends religion
(C) restate her assumption that human morality can be defined
differently by each person
(D) compare her own definition of morality to the socially acceptable
understanding of morality
(E) suggest that notions or morality evolve with the social code as
societal trends change
4. In the context of the passage, the writer’s use of “cautionary tales”
serves to
(A) warn others about the dangers of using morality as a defense of
immoral actions
(B) connect with the audience by sharing her own childhood stories
about morality
(C) suggest that our founding sense of morality comes from the
concepts we are taught as children
(D) refute her audience’s teachings on morality in order to alter their
viewpoint on the subject
(E) expose that bogus values in cautionary tales have no merit or
influence on individuals or society
5. In stating that she “distrusts” the word “morality” more every day, the
author establishes herself as
(A) an amoral if not immoral person
(B) an individual who trusts almost no one
(C) a whimsical and satirical person
(D) a person with a critical and analytic viewpoint
(E) a person with fixed and unchanging ideals

488 ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION: AP ® EDITION

Evaluating Writing: Student Draft
Reread the student draft on morality. Then complete the open response
activities and answer the multiple-choice questions.
1. Study the following sentences from the student passage:
(1) Throughout history, when a country reaches its peak, it believed it
had to share its success with the rest of the world. (2) At no time was this
truer than during the Age of Exploration, when Spain and other European
nations stumbled upon the brave new world that was inhabited by Indians.
(3) European morality was based on the philosophy of the Catholic church
whereas Native Americans found their sense of morality to be rooted in
nature and their ancestral tradition.

On separate paper, revise one or all of the sentences using the prompts
below and evaluate the changes.
• Change key words that affect the tone of the excerpt. Then explain how
changing these words changes the tone and the way the message might
be received.
• Change the structure of the sentences. You might consider adding
questions, dashes for emphasis, or longer or shorter sentences. When
you have finished, write a brief paragraph explaining how changing the
structure changed the tone and the way you think the message might be
received.

2. The student writer is considering revising sentence 1 (below) to give it

more formality and precision that specifically conveys the claim.
Throughout history, when a country reaches its peak, it believed it had to
share its success with the rest of the world.
Which of the following phrases would best accomplish this goal?
(A) (as it is now)
(B) Throughout history, there have been many examples of clashing
cultures and the rise of nations.
(C) Throughout history, when a country becomes successful, it often
feels entitled to impose its culture and values on other societies.
(D) Textbooks tell us only one side of a complicated history, so it is
very important to read with a critical eye.
(E) It is commonly presumed that a country’s duty is to tell other
countries what to do based on their own definitions of success.

CONSIDERING AUDIENCE THROUGH STRATEGIC CHOICES 489

3. The writer wants to avoid revealing any potential biases in sentences 7
and 8 (below) while still maintaining an appropriate line of reasoning
connecting the evidence and the claim.
(7) Was Cortés a moral leader? (8) He destroyed an entire people and
enslaved those who were remaining so that he could discover as much
wealth as possible.
Which of the following versions of sentence 7 accomplishes this goal?
(A) (as it is now)
(B) Remove sentence 7.
(C) Though he found riches for his country, Cortés was an immoral
leader who deserves no place in history.
(D) There are instances where one has to sacrifice the sense of
morality to ensure the greater good.
(E) Though he is remembered as a successful leader, historians
question Cortés’s moral conscience.

Composing on Your Own

Referring to the chart on page 481 you completed for Composing on
Your Own, write a first draft of your definition of an abstract concept.
Use whatever ideas from your chart work well, but you likely will not use
everything. Also, as you write, new ideas will come to mind; work those in
when they help make your point.
After you have finished your first draft, read it over, evaluating your diction
and syntax. Ask yourself these questions:
• Where could you use a stronger or clearer word?
• Do the connotations of your words reflect your ideas?
• Do any of your words convey an overly biased perspective?
• Did you use a mix of short, medium, and long sentences?
• Do the structures of your sentences enhance and help communicate
your ideas?
• Where might repetition or other patterns enhance your meaning?
• Have you used punctuation to effectively convey your ideas?
• What other revisions can you make to improve your draft?
Make revisions as warranted based on your evaluation of your diction and
syntax and save your work for future use.

490 ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION: AP ® EDITION

1.3 Unique and Dynamic Audiences | RHS-1.N
Although writers make every effort to understand the values, needs, beliefs,
and backgrounds of their audiences, audiences are never made up of only one
kind of people from identical backgrounds with identical beliefs. For example,
some in Warren G. Harding’s audience might not have agreed with the press
when they ridiculed Harding for his poor public speaking, disregarding it
completely when they voted for him—or for his opponent—for president.
Some might even have agreed with the press but decided to vote for Harding
nonetheless because other criteria related to their values and beliefs were more
important in making that decision than his public speaking. Further, some in
the audience may have been initially embarrassed for Harding when the press
pointed out what they believed to be an error in Harding’s speech but later
learned that it was after all a legitimate word.
Audiences are unique—that is, different audiences can be identified by
generally shared beliefs, values, and backgrounds, as you have been doing
when you have considered your audience as part of your rhetorical situation.
In different rhetorical situations, you will have different audiences. However,
while audiences may generally share beliefs, each member in an audience
does not share the exact same beliefs as other members. Common interests
and values may unite people into a group, but people still retain distinct
differences. Consider the speech of Governor Richards at the Democratic
National Convention. Richards knew that Democrats would likely be generally
receptive to a speech that focused on the inequities women face. But she also
knew that this receptiveness would not be universal; some members of her
audience would be more receptive than others. As a result, Richards decided
to introduce her subject matter with humor, to help create a bridge for those
more reluctant members in her audience. Imagine how differently the audience
would respond to Richards’ speech if she used the scolding language—“How
dare you!”—of Thunberg’s speech in Unit 1.
Even audiences that share most values, beliefs, and backgrounds can
change over time. That is, they are dynamic, evolving in their views and
beliefs as they learn new information, have new experiences, and consider
different perspectives. Writing that endures over time reaches audiences
very different from the original audience, and its endurance is partly owing
to the acknowledgment that audiences are dynamic. Writers try to use
evidence, organization, and language that carefully considers the multiplicity
of perspectives of the audience as well as the evolving contexts in which the
argument may be presented.
Changing Contexts
Consider the context at the time the Declaration of Independence was
written. Take a look at the edits in the excerpt reprinted below. The writers
labored over every word and phrase to ensure that the message not only
reflected their intention but also considered the perspectives of the other
colonies. For example, during the revision process, the committee chose not

CONSIDERING AUDIENCE THROUGH STRATEGIC CHOICES 491

to mention slavery or any derivative of that term directly. Their reason? They
feared that if the document took a specific antislavery stance they might lose
colonial unity.

The most important of Benjamin Franklin’s edits to the draft involved only
a few words, but it changed the entire thrust of the argument. He crossed out
the last three words of Jefferson’s observation that “We hold these truths to be
sacred and undeniable.” In their place he inserted the words that now complete
the famous phrase: “We hold these truths to be self-evident...” According to
Franklin, the word sacred implied that the message that “all men are created
equal” was religious in nature. With the removal of the word sacred, the
argument was no longer religious but human, even scientific by virtue of its
truths being objectively observable. Removing the religious sentiment helped
promote the idea of unity through something other than religion. Indeed, the
Declaration of Independence inspired the colonists to unite under a common
political ideology, which in turn would strengthen their resolve toward
independence and eventually help them gain foreign alliance and break free
of British rule.
The revisions to the original draft of the Declaration of Independence reflect
the writers’ careful consideration of the perspectives, contexts, and needs of
multiple audiences—the colonists who supported independence, the colonists
who opposed independence, potential foreign allies, their friends and family in
Great Britain, and the British king and parliament. During the revolutionaries’
process of mobilizing support, each of these audiences no doubt had shifting
and evolving views. Those initially opposed might have become supportive;
those eager for separation might have had second thoughts. The drafters of
the Declaration of Independence had to keep all these considerations in mind
as they chose the evidence, organization, and language of one of the most
important documents in Western history.
Audience Perspectives, Contexts, and Needs
Joan Didion wrote her essay “On Morality” at the request of The American
Scholar, a general-interest journal published by the Phi Beta Kappa Society. That
she was given that subject implies a need for clarity, insight, and explanation of
the term from a respected thinker. The members of Phi Beta Kappa, a highly
selective honor society, are top academic achievers in liberal arts and sciences.
Didion chose evidence for the well-educated and well-read audience of The
American Scholar who are skilled in critical reading. The immediate physical

492 ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION: AP ® EDITION

context—time and place—of her essay also influenced its content, specifically
inspiring her choices for the essay’s use of the desert as a metaphor for society
at large. Didion sits in a hot motel room (immediate context) during a time of
cultural uncertainty (broader concept). However, that she does not mention
current events directly suggests that she understands she is writing about larger
principles that would speak to later audiences whose “current” events would be
different in details but similar in moral uncertainties. The morally ambiguous
stories she includes parallel morally ambiguous times—then as well as now and
in the future—and highlight the way people use the term morality as a cover-up
for doing what they think is right.
Given those audience perspectives, contexts, and needs, what evidence,
organization, and language would best deliver Didion’s message?
Evidence Didion is not a philosopher—she is a “new journalist”—a writer
known for her personal and literary observations of society. She understood
that The American Scholar knew that about her and was looking for a piece
in her style of writing. So she did not turn to the great philosophers for their
definitions of morality and assess in what ways they were accurate and in what
ways they fell short and then write a scholarly dissection of the concept for
readers of The American Scholar. Instead, she imaginatively steeped herself
in the unusual and desolate environment she found herself in and looked for
explanations in that context. She also brought to the surface a number of other
life and death incidents from history that demonstrated moral ambiguity.
Suppose, instead, a prominent Jewish scholar had been asked to write about
morality for an audience of the highly regarded magazine Southern Jewish
Life. Such a scholar would approach the task of finding evidence in a different
way. No doubt the writer would understand that the readers have a particular
interest in Judaism and the South, though the depth of their knowledge of
both might vary. The scholar would likely consider evidence from the Torah
(the Hebrew Bible) or Talmud (the collection of interpretation of the Torah
by famous rabbis through history), possibly with examples to tie the religious-
based explanations to modern Jewish life in the South.
Organization Again, the needs and expectations of the audience, the
nature of the evidence itself, and the writer’s purpose help shape decisions
writers make about how to organize their evidence. Didion takes all three
into account in the organization of her essay. Her audience is specialized—
intellectual and critical—and she uses an organization that requires the readers
to put some effort into following her thought process.
In paragraph 1, after setting the scene in the hot desert and aided to some
extent by the ice cubes, Didion gets around to her purpose: “to think . . . in
some abstract way about ‘morality,’ ” yet she acknowledges she is drawn to
particulars rather than the abstract. Her stated purpose is indefinite enough to
allow the organization of the essay to develop in a number of different ways.
A key to her purpose, however, is that she going to “think” about morality.
She does not say she is going to define it or trace the history of philosophical
explanations of it—she is going to think about it. And although she has taken

CONSIDERING AUDIENCE THROUGH STRATEGIC CHOICES 493

great care to organize her essay, as it flows she makes it seem sometimes as if
she is thinking out loud about it.
In paragraphs 2–3, Didion lays out local examples of a type of morality she
trusts, one built on the conviction that we should keep our promises, in this
case to retrieve our casualties. In paragraph 4, Didion expands from the current
time to look back on historical examples that were the substance of cautionary
tales about what happens when we “breach our primary loyalties.” She trusts
the basic lessons behind these cautionary tales—never betray those you love—
while also suggesting that these historical examples are oversimplified so
children can easily understand them.
In paragraphs 5 and 6, Didion’s thinking takes a turn to explore why it
may be so difficult to act with morality. With some ambiguity, she writes,
“Particularly out here tonight, in this country so ominous and terrible that to
live in it is to live with antimatter, it is difficult to believe that ‘the good’ is a
knowable quantity.” Although she seems to refer to the environment as the one
she finds herself in “here tonight,” she also continues the description with “in
this country so ominous and terrible that to live in it is to live with antimatter.
. . .” (Antimatter, recall, when touched with matter, has enormous explosive
force.) “The good”—a necessary anchor for morality—seems unknowable, and
the stories of traveling through this wilderness suggest that reason has only a
slight hold on the mind, that madness is always possible when you don’t know
for sure what anything means. Water that should get colder as it gets deeper
gets hotter instead, possibly the result from underground nuclear testing. Is
that noise a lethal rattlesnake or just a benign rustling paper? Nothing is certain.
In paragraphs 7 and 8, Didion addresses problems with the ethic of
conscience and provides many examples of people whose conscience told them
they were doing the “right” thing who nonetheless committed atrocities. She
contemplates the “sinister hysteria” and the “monstrous perversion” of doing
what you think is right—that is the path of “madmen.” And trying to inflict
your conscience on someone else is “intrinsically insidious.” She writes, “Except
on that most primitive level—our loyalties to those we love—what could be
more arrogant than to claim the primacy of personal conscience?”
Paragraph 9 is the heart of the argument: if people use morality as a
justification for what may be simply expedient, a good idea or a bad idea, a
grab for power or a push for public policy, then reason has lost its grip and the
“whine of hysteria” last associated with the desert spreads everywhere.

494 ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION: AP ® EDITION

 A very rough summary of the organization might appear as follows:
• Introduction and statement of purpose—paragraph 1
• What trusted morality is—paragraphs 2–4
• Why morality is so hard to pin down when “the good” in unknowable—
paragraphs 5–6
• Why the ethic of conscience is not morality—paragraphs 7–8
• What morality is not, and the current dangers of using it as
justification—paragraph 9
This kind of organization that follows the writer’s thoughts as they develop
and flow one into the next is sometimes called developmental order.
Language Most high school students would find the language of Didion’s
essay difficult, at least on the first reading. The audience she had in mind when
she wrote it was made up of high-achieving college students or graduates. At
the same time, some of her language is straight and simple. The language in
paragraphs 2 and 3, for example, in which she discusses the morality she trusts,
is plain and ordinary. In paragraph 4, however, the language changes as she tries
to untangle people’s conflicting views of morality: “. . . my own childhood was
illuminated by graphic litanies of the grief awaiting those who failed in their
loyalties to each other. The Donner-Reed Party, starving in the Sierra snows,
all the ephemera of civilization gone save that one vestigial taboo, the provision
that no one should eat his own blood kin.” Her alternating diction reflects her
attitudes toward the concepts of morality. When she writes about particulars,
her language is simple and clear; when she writes about explanations of
morality, her language becomes academic.

Remember: Because audiences are unique and dynamic, writers

must consider the perspectives, contexts, and needs of the intended
audience when making choices of evidence, organization, and
language in an argument. (RHS-1.N)

1.3 Checkpoint

Close Reading: Professional Text

Review Didion’s “On Morality” and then complete the open response
activities and answer the multiple-choice questions.
1. Choose five of the anecdotes or examples of evidence on the next page.
For each one, write a sentence explaining why you think Didion chose
it to advance her argument—in other words, what it conveys about
morality. (If necessary, do research to learn more about it.) Write a
second sentence evaluating its suitability for Didion’s audience and
purpose.

CONSIDERING AUDIENCE THROUGH STRATEGIC CHOICES 495

 • the car accident
• Donner-Reed party
• Jayhawkers
• underwater rescue attempts
• Mountain Meadows Massacre
• Alfred Rosenberg

2. Explain how the organization of Didion’s essay could be described as

a conversation with the reader. Point to at least four specific places to
clarify your explanation. Write a few sentences explaining the effect of
that pattern on Didion’s argument.
3. The rhetorical purpose of paragraph 1
(A) suggests the author writes from her own perspective and a
personal, journalistic lens
(B) encourages readers to compare their own assumptions about
morality to the author’s
(C) establishes excuses for possible lapses that may occur later in the
author’s arguments
(D) allows readers to connect with the author when she classifies
herself as morally delinquent
(E) clearly articulates the author’s thesis and establishes an
organizational pattern for the essay
4. The author’s use of an extended quotation at the end of paragraph 7
supports her perspective that
(A) a world void of the sense of a “higher good’ is doomed to suffer a
tragic end
(B) moral conscience may be used to justify atrocities
(C) whether people are moral or not, they will in the end destroy
themselves
(D) some forms of morality do not allow for violence in the name of
a higher good
(E) moral codes require too much education

Evaluating Writing: Student Draft

Reread the student draft on page 468. Then complete the following open
response activities and answer the multiple-choice question.
1. Evaluate the quality of evidence the writer used in light of the purpose
and audience.

496 ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION: AP ® EDITION

2. Describe the author’s diction and note any places where word choice
surprised you.
3. The student writer wants to alter the passage for an audience that is
unfamiliar with the historical details of the examples chosen. Which of
the following changes best accomplishes this goal?
(A) In sentence 2, changing “Age of Exploration” to “Age of
Discovery”
(B) After sentence 2, adding “(as Columbus called those he
encountered)”
(C) In sentence 11, changing “emperor” to “king”
(D) In sentence 11, adding “who was searching for gold to enrich
Spain,” after Conquistador
(E) In sentence 13, adding “(the Aztecs)” after the word “empire”

Source: The Museum of the Netherlands

This print by a Dutch artist shows the meeting of Cortés and Montezuma outside Tenochtitlan.
Look closely at this print and try to identify the people and their actions. How would you
describe the dynamic between Cortés and Montezuma in this depiction? What details would you
use as evidence to support your interpretation?

Composing on Your Own

Didion referenced an array of disciplines as she chose evidence: an
artist’s hellish paintings, a novel by Normal Mailer, Klaus Fuchs (science/
technology), Mountain Meadows Massacre (history), and Alfred Rosenberg
(politics). Didion’s span of evidence across a range of disciplines allows her

CONSIDERING AUDIENCE THROUGH STRATEGIC CHOICES 497

message to resonate with audiences of different backgrounds and interests.
You have already considered possible analogies, anecdotes, metaphors, and
similes that could advance your argument with your audience. You have
also thought about the denotative and connotative meaning of your words
and have put diction and syntax to work to deliver your message.
Now stand back and expand your evidence to accommodate a unique and
dynamic audience by looking for examples from different areas and perspectives.
Use the graphic below to help you think of evidence from different perspectives
to help you clarify your abstract concept and explain its relevance to today.
Try to think of at least three additional pieces of evidence from these broader
categories, and synthesize them into your draft. Save your work for future use.

Pop Culture

Government History
& Politics

Philosophy Abstract Science

or Religion concept

Current Literature
Events and the Arts

Sports

Figure 8-1

498 ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION: AP ® EDITION

Part 1 Apply What You Have Learned
Following are the beginning paragraphs of a 2008 article in The New York Times
Magazine titled “The Moral Instinct” by psychologist Stephen Pinker. Read
them and then complete the task that follows.
Which of the following people would you say is the most admirable:
Mother Teresa, Bill Gates or Norman Borlaug? And which do you think is the
least admirable? For most people, it’s an easy question. Mother Teresa,
famous for ministering to the poor in Calcutta, has been beatified1 by the
Vatican, awarded the Nobel Peace Prize and ranked in an American poll as
the most admired person of the 20th century. Bill Gates, infamous for giving
us the Microsoft dancing paper clip and the blue screen of death,2 has been
decapitated in effigy3 in “I Hate Gates” Web sites and hit with a pie in the
face. As for Norman Borlaug . . . who the heck is Norman Borlaug?

Yet a deeper look might lead you to rethink your answers. Borlaug, father
of the “Green Revolution” that used agricultural science to reduce world
hunger, has been credited with saving a billion lives, more than anyone else in
history. Gates, in deciding what to do with his fortune, crunched the numbers
and determined that he could alleviate the most misery by fighting everyday
scourges in the developing world like malaria, diarrhea and parasites. Mother
Teresa, for her part, extolled the virtue of suffering and ran her well-financed
missions accordingly: their sick patrons were offered plenty of prayer but
harsh conditions, few analgesics4 and dangerously primitive medical care.

1 beatified: made a saint

2 blue screen of death: blue screen that indicates the computer has reached a point where it
can no longer function
3 effigy: sculpture or model of a person
4 analgesics: pain relievers, such as aspirin

CONSIDERING AUDIENCE THROUGH STRATEGIC CHOICES 499

 It’s not hard to see why the moral reputations of this trio should be so out
of line with the good they have done. Mother Teresa was the very embodiment
of saintliness: white-clad, sad-eyed, ascetic and often photographed with the
wretched of the earth. Gates is a nerd’s nerd and the world’s richest man, as
likely to enter heaven as the proverbial camel squeezing through the needle’s
eye. And Borlaug, now 93, is an agronomist who has spent his life in labs
and nonprofits, seldom walking onto the media stage, and hence into our
consciousness, at all.
I doubt these examples will persuade anyone to favor Bill Gates over
Mother Teresa for sainthood. But they show that our heads can be turned
by an aura of sanctity, distracting us from a more objective reckoning of the
actions that make people suffer or flourish. It seems we may all be vulnerable
to moral illusions the ethical equivalent of the bending lines that trick the
eye on cereal boxes and in psychology textbooks. Illusions are a favorite tool
of perception scientists for exposing the workings of the five senses, and of
philosophers for shaking people out of the naïve belief that our minds give us
a transparent window onto the world (since if our eyes can be fooled by an
illusion, why should we trust them at other times?). Today, a new field is using
illusions to unmask a sixth sense, the moral sense. Moral intuitions are being
drawn out of people in the lab, on Web sites and in brain scanners, and are
being explained with tools from game theory, neuroscience and evolutionary
biology.

Write a rhetorical analysis of the introduction to Pinker’s essay to describe

how the author uses rhetorical strategies to address context, purpose, and
audience. Your analysis should focus on two of the following rhetorical
strategies discussed in Part 1:
• comparisons (similes, metaphors, analogies, anecdotes)
• diction
• bias (connotation)
• syntax
• punctuation
• awareness of unique and dynamic audience
• evidence
• organization
• language

Reflect on the Essential Question: Write a brief response that

answers this essential question: How do the audience’s needs, beliefs,
and values inform stylistic choices regarding comparisons, syntax, and
diction? In your answer, correctly use the key terms listed on page 471.

500 ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION: AP ® EDITION

 Part
2

Writer’s Style and

Perspective
Enduring Understanding and Skills

Part 2
Understand
The rhetorical situation informs the strategic stylistic choices that writers
make. (STL-1)
Demonstrate
Explain how word choice, comparisons, and syntax contribute to the specific
tone or style of a text. (Reading 7.A)
Strategically use words, comparisons, and syntax to convey a specific tone or
style in an argument. (Writing 8.A)
Source: AP® English Language and Composition Course and Exam Description

Essential Question: How do word choice, syntax, and conventions

define a writer’s style and help to clarify the message and create
perspective?

The way you interpret an argument depends to a large extent upon its style,
the manner in which the writer portrays the subject and expresses a unique
perspective or vision. Style varies widely depending upon the discipline and
the genre, but it is an important aspect of every creative endeavor—from music
to dance to the visual arts and writing.
For example, although all of the paintings on the next page have the same
subject, a woman’s face, each has a distinct style—the artists use widely different
shadings, brushstrokes, and approaches to depicting the human face. Their
perspectives, or viewpoints, on the subject are also different. The painting in
the upper left from 1911 shows a woman’s face from the perspective of a slight
side view; the intense shadings of the face contrast sharply with the outline of
the woman’s large black eyes, which seem to stare at the viewer. The top right
picture, painted around 1941, shows the perspective of someone looking at a
woman straight on, while the muted tones create a style that is calming and
restful. The bottom left picture, following an impressionistic style developed
in the late 19th century, uses muted tones to show a woman in profile. This

WRITER’S STYLE AND PERSPECTIVE 501

picture doesn’t attempt to carefully reproduce each feature of the woman but
gives a general impression of form and tone; it seems more of a sketch, with
the clearly seen brush strokes calling attention to the act of painting while the
exact expression on the woman’s face is hard to determine. The bottom right
illustration, created in 1892, uses a perspective from behind a woman who is
looking in a mirror, so the viewer can see both the back of her head and a
frontal reflection of her face. Further, the artist has designed the painting so
that from a farther perspective the viewer sees the outline of a skull; the artist
uses this image to comment on the transitory nature of beauty—life quickly
succumbs to death. Notice that all these artists make careful decisions about
style. Like the precise words and perspectives that writers use, each artist makes
particular stylistic choices to elicit certain reactions in the audience.

Source: Wikimedia Commons

Top left: Alexej von Jawlensky, c. 1911, Woman’s Face
Top right: Rabindranath Tagore, before 1941, Woman’s Face
Bottom left: János Tornyai, before 1935, Woman’s Face
Bottom right: Charles Allen Gilbert, 1892, All is Vanity

502 ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION: AP ® EDITION

 Though it does not depend on visual images, writing works in a similar
way. The words, conventions, and the organization of sentences and paragraphs
embody an overall perspective and work together to define a writer’s style.

KEY TERMS

conventions irony
ironic perspective style

2.1 Writer’s Style | STL-1.Q

Style is the mix of word choice, syntax, and conventions writers use to express
their message. Readers analyze these elements to learn from and define a writer’s
style, a practice that can be inspirational for young writers. However, writers
try to find their own sense of style that reflects their perspectives, personality,
and craft.
Every writer’s style is created as a result of choices. In her essay “On
Morality,” Joan Didion chose to use the word mendacious instead of dishonest
for a reason; out of all of the other synonyms that she could have inserted in
that sentence, she chose mendacious. Only she knows for sure why she chose
that word. Maybe she liked the rhythm of the word in the sentence; maybe she
liked having two words beginning with “m” together at the end of the sentence;
maybe she understood a nuanced connotation of the word compared to other
synonyms; maybe she chose a word of Latin origin—more typical of her diction
in the parts of her essay where she is not discussing down-to-earth particulars.
All a reader can do is speculate and assess the effect of that word on the reader.
Style is not prescriptive. Though there is plenty to admire in Joan Didion’s
writing, a student learning the craft cannot imitate Didion’s (or any other
writer’s) style and trick readers into thinking the message is authentic. Why?
Because style comes from experience, from understanding the different ways
that language can be manipulated, and from communicating—both successfully
and unsuccessfully—within a variety of situations. Many people learning to
write look for a checklist that will tell them they have achieved a style—or they
seek to imitate other writers who have their own identifiable style. But style is
subjective. That is the essential problem when analyzing another writer’s style
to try to create your own. Different readers may have very different ideas about
why certain rhetorical choices were made and the effect of those choices on a
reader’s response to the writer’s message.
Elements of Style
Review the list of style-defining elements in the chart on the next page.
How these elements are used can make the difference between a clean or
embellished style, a conversational or formal style. Styles may be as varied as

WRITER’S STYLE AND PERSPECTIVE 503

adjectives to describe them: declamatory, discursive, eloquent, lyrical, formal,
sarcastic, informal, angry, succinct, turgid, and many others.
Word Choice Syntax Conventions
The strategic use of words The way that words, Language that follows the
based on their denotative phrases, clauses, and customs of a community
meanings (those with grammar are arranged for (such as business, legal,
specific definitional effect. Syntax reflects the academic). Conventions
meanings) and connotative writer’s choices about should be appropriate to
meanings (those with using long versus short the medium, the writer’s
strong associations or sentences, rhetorical purpose, and the rhetorical
emotional underpinnings) questions, interruptions situation. Conventions likely
to enhance or reinforce within sentences for effect, follow rules of punctuation,
meaning in the given parallel sentence patterns, capitalization, and
context varied sentence patterns, grammar, though they can
and other arrangements. be broken for effect.
Table 8-1

Consider how you might identify and analyze the word choice, syntax, and
conventions of Didion’s essay to articulate her style. Reread the third paragraph,
reproduced below, and note the words that are strategically in line with Didion’s
purpose; a sentence structure that reflects syntactic purpose; the conventions
that reflect both her rhetorical situation and basic writing rules; and, finally, the
way these elements work together to reflect her style.
It was one instance in which I did not distrust the word, because she
meant something quite specific. She meant that if a body is left alone for
even a few minutes on the desert, the coyotes close in and eat the flesh.
Whether or not a corpse is torn apart by coyotes may seem only a sentimental
consideration, but of course it is more: one of the promises we make to one
another is that we will try to retrieve our casualties, try not to abandon our
dead to the coyotes. If we have been taught to keep our promises—if, in the
simplest terms, our upbringing is good enough—we stay with the body, or
have bad dreams.

Word Choice This is a paragraph in which Didion’s diction is down to

earth. A number of the words in this category have origins in Old English or
other northern European languages: word, body, close in, eat, flesh, torn, dead,
taught, keep, upbringing, good, enough, stay, bad dreams. She seems to prefer
that diction when discussing the kind of morality she trusts. At the same time,
the language is powerful. She does not write, “the coyotes close in and eat the
remains,” which somewhat sanitizes the idea of a dead body. Instead she uses a
much stronger life-or-death word, flesh, with its connotation of soft, vulnerable
tissue or its association with “flesh and blood.”
Syntax By far the longest and most complex sentence in this passage is the
following.
Whether or not a corpse is torn apart by coyotes may seem only a
sentimental consideration, but of course it is more: one of the promises we

504 ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION: AP ® EDITION

 make to one another is that we will try to retrieve our casualties, try not to
abandon our dead to the coyotes.

The sentence begins with an independent clause in which the subject is

itself a clause (Whether or not a corpse is torn apart by coyotes may seem only
a sentimental consideration) that has a feel of uncertainty to it because of the
words “may seem,” which suggest that it really is something else. Didion then
adds an independent clause—but of course it is more—to signal that there is
more at stake than first impressions. The thought does not end there, though,
since the sentence continues after the colon, providing through another
independent clause an example of the kind of promise people make to one
another that, when kept, can be considered a truly moral act. The repetition
of the word try—first in try to and then in try not to—places an emphasis on
the effort to fulfill that promise rather than the absolute achievement of it.
The complexity of the syntax reflects the complexity of the thought.
Conventions In the sentence analyzed above, Didion also made the choice
to use a colon where she could have used a period or semicolon instead. Why?
One use of the colon is to separate two independent clauses when the second
reflects, illustrates, or expands on the first, which would explain her choice
here. After the colon, readers may well ask, “What more is it?” Her answer then
follows the colon.
Didion also uses the dash effectively. A dash separates words into
parenthetical statements; here, what she includes between the two dashes is
grammatically nonessential, meaning that the sentence is a complete thought
without the phrase inserted in the middle. Why would she make this choice?
Although the phrase is grammatically nonessential, it still contains a key idea
that helps clarify the writer’s point. As a result, Didion uses the dashes to
amplify this “nonessential” information. She uses the convention of the dashes
to restate and correlate a good upbringing with being taught to keep promises.
Without a good upbringing, people will likely not make the moral decision in
this situation.
Reread paragraph 3, reproduced below. Then on the next page see how
you might pull all of the above observations together in a rhetorical analysis of
paragraph 3.
[3] It was one instance in which I did not distrust the word, because
she meant something quite specific. She meant that if a body is left alone
for even a few minutes on the desert, the coyotes close in and eat the
flesh. Whether or not a corpse is torn apart by coyotes may seem only a
sentimental consideration, but of course it is more: one of the promises
we make to one another is that we will try to retrieve our casualties, try not
to abandon our dead to the coyotes. If we have been taught to keep our
promises—if, in the simplest terms, our upbringing is good enough—we
stay with the body, or have bad dreams.

WRITER’S STYLE AND PERSPECTIVE 505

 In paragraph 3, Joan Didion provides an example of what she would
consider honest morality—keeping our promises to others. Since
this is a relatively simple and fundamental concept, she conveys
the message appropriately through down-to-earth but powerful
language with vivid connotations, such as her statement: “we will
try to retrieve our casualties, try not to abandon our dead to the
coyotes.” Didion suggests that none of us wants to be abandoned,
either in life or death, and we depend on our loved ones to keep
a basic social contract ensuring that we respect and look out for
each other. In sentence 3, Didion’s syntax appropriately focuses
the reader’s attention on the points that matter the most, with an
independent clause introducing the idea that not leaving a body
behind may seem like only a "sentimental" consideration, followed
by a second independent clause that clarifies what it actually is.
Didion enhances her syntax in this sentence with conventions that
clarify the message, including a colon that signals “here’s what
I really mean,” which is followed by her insights about specific
“promises we make to one another.” In the final sentence, she uses
a pair of dashes that emphasize the correlation between “keeping
promises” and a “[good upbringing],” emphasizing the relative
simplicity of her vision of morality.
As a writer, the more you focus on why you make specific choices within
your own writing, the more likely you are to have control over how the
audience will receive your message. As you work on developing a style of your
own, remember writing’s most organic purpose: to communicate a message
to an audience. Everything about your style should support that purpose.
For example, using large “impressive” words that don’t fit the context of your
argument will work against that purpose. Using clichés, overused phrases or
expressions, works against the originality and clarity of your message.
So what is the best advice for developing your writing style? Read and
study writers who came before you. Carefully consider the message you are
trying to convey. Question every choice you make—choose your specific
words, sentence structures, and conventions thoughtfully and strategically.
And write often.

Remember: Writers’ style is made up of the mix of word choice, syntax,

and conventions employed by the writer. (STL-1.Q)

2.1 Checkpoint

Close Reading: Professional Text

Review Didion’s essay. Then complete the open response task and answer
the multiple-choice questions on the next page.

506 ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION: AP ® EDITION

1. Review the rhetorical analysis of the word choice, syntax, and
conventions in paragraph 3 of “On Morality.” Then complete a similar
analysis of paragraph 8, reproduced below. Begin by answering the
questions below.
Of course you will say that I do not have the right, even if I had the
power, to inflict that unreasonable conscience upon you; nor do I want
you to inflict your conscience, however reasonable, however enlightened,
upon me. (“We must be aware of the dangers which lie in our most
generous wishes,” Lionel Trilling once wrote. “Some paradox of our nature
leads us, when once we have made our fellow men the objects of our
enlightened interest, to go on to make them the objects of our pity, then
of our wisdom, ultimately of our coercion.”) That the ethic of conscience is
intrinsically insidious seems scarcely a revelatory point, but it is one raised
with increasing infrequency; even those who do raise it tend to segue with
troubling readiness into the quite contradictory position that the ethic of
conscience is dangerous when it is “wrong,” and admirable when it is “right.”

(a) How would you describe Didion’s choice of words? How do

her choices affect her message? Provide and analyze specific
examples.
(b) How would you describe Didion’s syntax? How does her syntax
affect her message? Provide and analyze specific examples.
(c) Give examples of how Didion effectively uses conventions. How
does her use of conventions affect her message? Provide and
analyze specific examples.
2. Write a rhetorical analysis of the word choice, syntax, and conventions
in paragraph 8 of “On Morality” using your answers from the previous
question. Review the commentary on page 506 for a model.
3. In paragraph 9, the author uses the words “factitious,” “facile,” and
“assuage” to develop her belief that the act of asserting one’s moral
supremacy is
(A) necessary for social order
(B) a form of cultural identity
(C) conveniently self-serving
(D) ironically immoral
(E) complex and requires education

WRITER’S STYLE AND PERSPECTIVE 507

4. The author’s decision to use the word “Exactly” as a single-word sentence
suggests that she
(A) must compensate for her lack of certainty
(B) realizes that all her arguments so far have been vague
or confusing
(C) regrets trying to discuss a difficult concept like morality
(D) must speak forcefully to hold the reader’s attention
(E) desires to reinforce a key idea about morality

Evaluating Writing: Student Draft

Reread the student draft on page 468. Then complete the following open
response activity and answer the multiple-choice question.
1. Describe the author’s style by identifying specific words, phrases, or
organizational patterns. Be sure to explain how her word choice, syntax,
and adherence to conventions creates her style.
2. The writer wants to revise the underlined portion of sentence 10 (below)
to be stylistically consistent with the passage overall.
It is this characterization that is published in history books but not where
we get the real low down.
Which revision of the underlined text best achieves this goal?
(A) (as it is now)
(B) remove the underlined portion and adjust the punctuation
adding a period.
(C) but it does not address the moral infractions that came with the
success.
(D) which is a good reason not to trust most books about history.
(E) and why we must keep Cortes’s name alive for future
generations.

Composing on Your Own

Review the latest draft of your essay on an abstract concept. Analyze each
paragraph as you have analyzed the paragraphs from “On Morality” in the
activities above. Ask yourself:
• How might I describe my word choice? Does my word choice support
my message? How might I improve it?
• How might I describe my syntax? Does my syntax support my message?
How might I improve it?
• How might I describe my us of conventions? Does my use of
conventions support my message? How might I improve it?

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 Based on the answers to your analytic questions, make revisions to improve
your word choice, syntax, and use of conventions so they integrate smoothly
with your message. Save your work for future use.
Extension: While style is personal and organic, one of the ways writers
develop style is through exposure to other writers and experimentation with
stylistic paths. Choose a sentence from Didion’s essay that you think represents
an aspect of her style. Using that sentence as a model, write a sentence or two of
your own that reflect Didion’s word choice, syntax, and conventions but relate
to your own abstract idea and evidence. Does that style feel like a fit for your
topic? Do you see any other places in your essay you might want to incorporate
elements of Didion’s (or another writer’s) style? If so, make those changes.

2.2 Complex and Ironic Perspectives | STL-1.R

Style helps support and convey more than just the literal message of the writer.
Through stylistic choices, writers may also signal their perspective or the
stance they take toward their subject. One of those perspectives is irony, the
expression of meaning through language that usually means the opposite of
the writer’s true meaning. Irony often results from the differences between an
argument and the readers’ expectations or values.
Complex Perspective
Like fiction writers, nonfiction authors speak through the voice of a
persona—a created personality. Just as comedians or musicians design an
onstage persona, nonfiction writers develop a persona through whom to voice
their thoughts, ideas, and attitudes. Just as there is a real-life Ariana Grande
and a stage version (“The girl you see in photographs is only a part of the
one I am,” she sings), so is there a real-life writer and a published persona.
The persona a writer adopts cues the readers to the writer’s perspective—at
how much distance does the writer stand from the subject, audience, and
themselves?
In some cases, there may be very little difference between the writer and
the writer’s persona. Eric Schlosser, for example, speaks with a straightforward
perspective on his subject and his readers in Fast Food Nation (see Unit 3), as
if to say, “Here’s what I learned about fast food; I can make it pretty interesting
for you if you want to learn about it too; and I’m trying to get my message to
you as directly as possible.”
In contrast, Didion adopts a persona with more distance. In a review in
The New York Times of a 2017 documentary about Joan Didion (“The Center
Will Not Hold”), Glenn Kenny describes the persona Didion has developed
through her career and the tools she used to create it. He writes, “Joan Didion’s
meticulously calibrated prose has the effect of placing her at a particular
remove from the reader. The persona she creates on the page is always frank but
never ingratiating.” In “On Morality,” Didion has a more complex perspective
than Schlosser did in Fast Food Nation. It’s as if she’s saying, “I have interesting

WRITER’S STYLE AND PERSPECTIVE 509

and powerful thoughts about morality; I’m going to pretend I’m thinking them
through in a conversation with you, preempting your questions and concerns
(‘You are quite possibly impatient with me by now; I am talking, you want to say,
about a ‘morality’ so primitive that it scarcely deserves the name”), assuming
I know how you are reacting, and by so doing, I am placing some distance
between us, because now it’s not just my ideas that I am communicating but
also my ‘meticulously calibrated prose.’ ”
Ironic Perspective
One way to define irony is “the difference between an author’s argument
and the reader’s expectations and values.” In 1729, Jonathan Swift (author of
Gulliver’s Travels) published an anonymous essay that many consider the best
example of sustained irony in the English language. Its full original title is “A
Modest Proposal For preventing the Children of Poor People in Ireland From
being a Burden to Their Parents or Country, and For making them Beneficial
to the Public,” but it is more commonly known as “A Modest Proposal.” A
reader picking up this pamphlet may be hoping to find a workable solution to
a difficult problem. Note: the spelling has been modernized.
It is a melancholy object to those, who walk through this great town,
or travel in the country, when they see the streets, the roads and cabin-
doors crowded with beggars of the female sex, followed by three, four, or
six children, all in rags, and importuning every passenger for an alms. These
mothers instead of being able to work for their honest livelihood, are forced
to employ all their time in strolling to beg sustenance for their helpless infants
who, as they grow up, either turn thieves for want of work, or leave their dear
native country . . .
I think it is agreed by all parties, that this prodigious number of children
in the arms, or on the backs, or at the heels of their mothers, and frequently
of their fathers, is in the present deplorable state of the kingdom, a very great
additional grievance; and therefore whoever could find out a fair, cheap and
easy method of making these children sound and useful members of the
common-wealth, would deserve so well of the public, as to have his statue
set up for a preserver of the nation.
But my intention is very far from being confined to provide only for the
children of professed beggars: it is of a much greater extent, and shall take
in the whole number of infants at a certain age, who are born of parents in
effect as little able to support them, as those who demand our charity in the
streets.
As to my own part, having turned my thoughts for many years, upon
this important subject, and maturely weighed the several schemes of our
projectors, I have always found them grossly mistaken in their computation.
It is true, a child just dropped from its dam [mother], may be supported by
her milk, for a solar year, with little other nourishment: at most not above the
value of two shillings, which the mother may certainly get, or the value in
scraps, by her lawful occupation of begging; and it is exactly at one year old

510 ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION: AP ® EDITION

 that I propose to provide for them in such a manner, as, instead of being a
charge upon their parents, or the parish, or wanting food and raiment for the
rest of their lives, they shall, on the contrary, contribute to the feeding, and
partly to the clothing of many thousands. . . .
There is likewise another great advantage in my scheme, that it will prevent
those voluntary abortions, and that horrid practice of women murdering their
bastard children, alas! too frequent among us, sacrificing the poor innocent
babes, I doubt, more to avoid the expense than the shame, which would
move tears and pity in the most savage and inhuman breast.
[Here Swift continues, straight-faced, to make an accounting for the
number of children in the kingdom and to point out that they cannot be
gainfully employed.]
I shall now therefore humbly propose my own thoughts, which I hope
will not be liable to the least objection.
I have been assured by a very knowing American of my acquaintance
in London, that a young healthy child well nursed, is, at a year old, a most
delicious nourishing and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked,
or boiled; and I make no doubt that it will equally serve in a fricassee, or a
ragout.
I do therefore humbly offer it to public consideration, that of the hundred
and twenty thousand children, already computed, twenty thousand may be
reserved for breed, whereof only one fourth part to be males; which is more
than we allow to sheep, black cattle, or swine, and my reason is, that these
children are seldom the fruits of marriage, a circumstance not much regarded
by our savages, therefore, one male will be sufficient to serve four females.
That the remaining hundred thousand may, at a year old, be offered in sale
to the persons of quality and fortune, through the kingdom, always advising
the mother to let them suck plentifully in the last month, so as to render
them plump, and fat for a good table. A child will make two dishes at an
entertainment for friends, and when the family dines alone, the fore or hind
quarter will make a reasonable dish, and seasoned with a little pepper or salt,
will be very good boiled on the fourth day, especially in winter.

When you have read far enough to know Swift’s idea, you realize that the
first instance of irony is in the title itself: Nothing in this proposal is “modest.”
The persona’s sympathy for the poor at the beginning of the essay does, no
doubt, align with Swift’s own views, and an ironic perspective is not immediately
obvious. By the time he proposes his idea, which he hopes “will not be liable to
the least objection,” the distance between the writer’s persona and the real-life
writer becomes a gaping chasm. Swift’s ridiculous, extreme proposal helps him
deliver his true message: that the poor, especially the Irish, suffer greatly; that
they are humans entitled to human comforts; and that the rich and privileged
cannot commoditize poor people or treat them as economic resources. Notice
how Swift heightens the irony by presenting his horrifying proposals as being
entirely rational and logical; his perspective seems to be that of a rational man

WRITER’S STYLE AND PERSPECTIVE 511

who is coolly assessing cost-benefits based on basic mathematical calculations.
This strategy heightens Swift’s point: he shows that the English government
doesn’t respect the Irish as human individuals but instead treats them as if
they were livestock. In addition, Swift uses exaggeration when he suggests
different recipes for preparing children and also advises on breeding strategies
to maximize the output of children. Although Swift’s words may be humorous
today, his suggestion shocked his original audience; Swift knew his audience
expected a standard speech about the conditions in Ireland, and instead they
received biting satire. Writers typically use satire by employing irony, humor,
and exaggeration to criticize foolishness and corruption.
Didion also uses irony in a few places in “On Morality.” “Of course we
would all like to ‘believe’ in something,” she writes, enclosing the word believe in
quotation marks to subtly question the integrity of such beliefs. The quotation
marks signal a split between what she says and what she means. She also refers
to New York Times signatures, calling them brave but conveying the obvious
opposite—that there is little bravery in signing a letter to the New York Times.

Remember: Writers may signal a complex or ironic perspective through

stylistic choices. Irony may emerge from the differences between an
argument and the readers’ expectations or values. (STL-1.R)

2.2 Checkpoint

Close Reading: Professional Text

Review “On Morality” and complete the open response activity and answer
the multiple-choice questions.
1. Explain why Didion may use such conventions as quotation marks and
italic type for the following words and phrases.
• “wagon-train morality” (paragraph 4)
• failed (paragraph 4)
• “morality” (paragraphs 4, 5, 9)
• “the good” (paragraph 5)
• “wrong” versus “right” (paragraphs 8, 9)
• “believe” (paragraph 9)
• moral imperative (paragraph 9)

512 ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION: AP ® EDITION

2. In the context of her argument about morality, the story Didion tells in
paragraphs 2 and 3 offers a perspective that is
(A) ironic
(B) straightforward
(C) complex
(D) satirical
(E) distant
3. In paragraph 5, the author’s primary rhetorical strategy is to
(A) use the perspective of one individual’s life to generalize about
other groups throughout the desert
(B) progressively expand the focus of her narrative from the
description of Death Valley to American society
(C) acknowledge the likely reactions of her readers before illustrating
her claim with an example
(D) chronicle stories from all over the world that question the
authenticity of moral ideals
(E) appear uncertain about matters of morality only to shift to a firm
stand on morality in modern society
4. In paragraph 8, which of the following statements best describes the
author’s perspective on ethic of conscience?
(A) Individuals can change their own sense of morality, which will
affect the morals of society as a whole.
(B) Despite the different ways people view good and bad, the cultural
understanding of morality comes from childhood stories.
(C) Whereas many people choose to keep their ethic of conscience
hidden, this concealment is part of our innate moral code.
(D) Because of the nature of morality, neither writer nor reader has
the right to assume their own moral code is superior.
(E) Although discussing the ethics of conscience can be dangerous,
it is necessary when we believe deeply in something.

Evaluating Writing: Student Draft

Reread the student draft on page 468. Then complete the open response
activity and answer the multiple-choice question.
1. The writer seems to allude to additional complex ideas at the end of the
last paragraph. Add two sentences (or more) to the final paragraph: one
that includes an ironic tone, and one that includes a new or different
perspective.

WRITER’S STYLE AND PERSPECTIVE 513

2. When evaluating whether or not the writer has addressed the complexity
of the issue, which of the following is most important for the writer to
consider?
(A) the reader’s familiarity with this period and additional historical
facts the writer needs to provide
(B) which other Native American leaders the writer should include
to show a pattern throughout history
(C) whether the audience is likely to acknowledge their own moral
shortcomings after the moral dilemma posed in sentence 15
(D) whether the writer has offered equal amounts of research about
the biographies of Montezuma and Cortés
(E) why some history books choose to show only one side of the
story, resulting in biased presentations of ideas and facts

Composing on Your Own

1. Evaluate your perspective in your composition. Does your style help make
your perspective clear? Is your perspective appropriately complex for your
topic? Revise your work if your style is inconsistent or your perspective
lacks complexity.
2. Experiment with irony on the concept that is at the center of your essay.
Try rewriting a key sentence from an ironic perspective. For example, if
you were writing on morality, you might start your ironic essay as follows:
“Nothing could be easier to define than morality,” or “It’s a good thing
everyone can agree on what morality means,” or “I would write an essay on
morality but it’s such an unimportant concept.”
You might also consider adopting a persona, as Swift did in "A Modest
Proposal," through whom to express the opposite of what you actually believe.
For example, you might adopt the character of a politician trying to justify a
policy that most feel is immoral.
Decide whether irony would be appropriate to introduce in your
composition. If so, make further revisions to integrate irony into your work.
Save your work for future use.

514 ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION: AP ® EDITION