Becoming the Rhetor

As part of the final project for WR39B, my group worked to produce a quality podcast that exhibited our ability to use and understand rhetorical devices. Since it was a group project and the partners were pre-chosen, it was rather difficult to work together. However, we created many drafts and sample podcasts to best exemplify our skills as rhetors for the purposes of this course.  

(Note: The following YouTube video is a link to the final podcast. It is meant to be listened to and any visual are unintentional results of editing.)

 My group decided to create a theoretical podcast station called “Society’s YA,” in which a single host is joined by rotating guests who help create awareness/interest in a book they believe is particularly appealing or different. The host is the only fixed member of every episode and was played by myself, Ashley. Since we were trying to build the illusion of an established podcast station, I did not introduce myself beyond name as listeners are assumed to be familiar with me as a credible source who reads extensive novels and regularly produces podcasts. To further establish the appeal of credibility, a short intro was inserted to the beginning of the podcast which plays before every episode and creates a branding for “Society’s YA.” The name of the podcast comes from a shortened version of the draft title and has the edge meaning of a podcast that will discuss Young Adult Fiction and has the theme of a roundtable discussion with a diverse group of people. In the episode we created, it was important to note that the three guests were all students from UC Irvine but make up the youth of society and have had different upbringings and intellectual interests as reflected in their intended majors.

As a private podcast station as opposed to a public corporation “Society’s YA” is able to appeal to high school students, our target audience, because it has more freedom in style and the ability to use colloquial speech, which is popular amongst high school students. Professor Thomas W. Fish of Gonzaga University presented a thesis titled “INTERNET SLANG AND HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS: A TEACHER’S PERSPECTIVE” in which he referenced a series of studies (2008) on students aged 12-17 where, “teens 50% of the time used informal writing styles on their class assignments, and 38% stated they used shortcuts such as LOL (Laugh Out Loud) on class assignments (Lenhart, et al., 2008, p. 3) (Fish, p.14),” suggesting young students are most comfortable with colloquial language usage. Social media website Buzzfeed has also enjoyed a sudden windfall in popularity amongst young adults in the past three years. The Guardian published a list titled “21 things you need to know about BuzzFeed's success” implying Buzzfeed’s success stems from the company not framing themselves too professionally and as #5 bluntly states, the tone of the website is unique and appealing to social media users. Seeking to appeal to IUSD high school sophomores, “Society’s YA” decided to present ourselves as college students who perhaps hold a higher status than the students but are not advertently experts or intimidating. We chose sophomores specifically because they should already be familiar with dystopian texts and be able to correlate the major themes of the genre as well as the novel’s significance.

We chose to focus on Lord of the Flies (1954) by William Golding for this episode because it’s a very popular novel despite having been written over 60 years ago and continues influencing modern YA dystopias. The podcast was broken into sections covering what dystopian texts are typically composed of, how well Lord of the Flies aligns with those conventions, the context and possible meaning of Lord of the Flies, and finally whether or not the novel may be considered a predecessor to modern YA dystopian novels. We thought this might be an interesting take since Lord of the Flies was technically written before “YA” became a coined term (Strickland, CNN) in the 1960s. By comparing the model we know as “YA Dystopia” in the modern day and the format Lord of the Flies falls into, we hoped to find the novel stray from the typical example of  YA Dystopia. In order to make the podcast sound more natural, I ask one of my guests to give a brief overview of the dystopian genre conventions. Raul talks about the typical format of dystopian novels and Lord of the Flies falls into most of the bullet points; except the setting is not meant to be the future but rather the present. We mentioned popular modern dystopias such as The Giver, The Hunger Games, and the Divergent Series in order to spark interest in students who are likely familiar with one or more of these books and/or their on-screen adaptations.

Chris gives a very brief summary of the book in order for the listeners to get a gist about the novel’s content and I inserted the sounds of a crashing airplane followed by children electing a leader as Chris mentions these significant events. This is done with the intention to capture the attention of listeners and draw them into the novel with auditory cues. In order to best discuss the theme of the novel, Chris cites Alaa Lateef Alnajm’s article "The Main Themes in Lord of the Flies,” (Alnajm) which argues LOTF is an allegorical text but contains the strong overarching theme of savagery versus civilization. It is important we used an outside source because it helps build our logos if our ideas are matching with another scholarly rhetor. A quote is read from the novel in which the darkness of humanity is manifested and dramatic music is used to connote pessimism about humankind and savagery. This quote serves as a gateway for what the text is attempting to convey to its readers. By examining the historical context in which the novel was created, we were able to suggest the Golding was critiquing the many fragile nation-states around the world and predicting their collapse. This would justify why the novel was not written in a futuristic setting, although it is mere speculation.  

Lastly, we answered whether or not Lord of the Flies may be considered a predecessor for dystopian novels. Ultimately, we did not want to take a solid stance so that the listeners may decide on their own. It was definitely not the first dystopian novel to be produced, but it has a distinct mood from novels such as George Orwell’s 1984, published only 6 years prior (1949) and classified as Dystopia but not YA. I wish the podcast would have expanded on this idea because YA was not a genre when either of these texts were published and although similar, they have distinct classifications. In the podcast, I argue Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury was published a mere year before Lord of the Flies and is also considered a YA Dystopian novel. This complicates the argument for Lord of the Flies as a predecessor of the modern genre because it would suggest there is already a pattern being followed. However, there is essentially no final answer because we lack universal understanding of “predecessor” cut-off. Although we could not agree on this final answer, we can all acknowledge Lord of the Flies as a powerful text that still influences society and deserves to be read by mass audiences.

CITATIONS 

Alnajm, Alaa Lateef. "The Main Themes in Lord of the Flies." International Journal of English and Literature. N.p., 39 June 2015. Web. 18 Nov. 2017.

Cresci, Elena. “21 Things You Need to Know about BuzzFeed's Success.” The Guardian, Guardian News and Media, 11 Aug. 2014. Web. 8 Dec. 2017. www.theguardian.com/media/2014/aug/11/21-things-you-need-to-know-about-buzzfeeds-successLinks to an external site.

Fish, Thomas W. “INTERNET SLANG AND HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS: A TEACHER’S PERSPECTIVE.” Gonzaga University, Dec. 2015. Web. 8 Dec. 2017. web02.gonzaga.edu/comltheses/proquestftp/Fish_gonzaga_0736M_10509.pdf.  

Scholes, Justin, and Jon Ostenson. "Understanding the Appeal of Dystopian Young Adult

Fiction." Scholarly Communication Department, Research & Informatics, Virginia Tech Libraries. Scholarly Communication, Virginia Tech University Libraries, 12 Dec. 2013. Web. 01 Dec. 2017.

Strickland, Ashley. “A Brief History of Young Adult Literature.” CNN, Originally published 2013. Web. 8 Dec. 2017.

www.cnn.com/2013/10/15/living/young-adult-fiction-evolution/index.htmlLinks to an external site.