Tuesday, February 2, 2016

Project 1: Rhetorical Analysis of a Blog Post

An in-depth rhetorical review of Jeff Guo's WonkBlog Post
by Sasha Afanasyeva





Jeff Guo, a reporter for the Washington Post who typically covers economics, boldly explores new territory in his latest WonkBlog post about what’s wrong with Disney princess movies. With the goal of highlighting the controversial results of the latest groundbreaking and paradigm-shifting Disney princess research, Guo successfully approaches the subject through evidence-backed discussion on how women’s speaking roles have declined in these movies for the past 30 years. Guo uses a neutral tone much like a reporter to demonstrate to his audience that despite the subject matter, he is still serious in his discussion.


Guo starts of with examples of the “backwardness” of how women were portrayed in Disney movies in the 1930’s and 1950’s in order to demonstrate how 1989’s “Little Mermaid” appeared to be a step forward, only to tear down the “Little Mermaid” from the pedestal he put it on. According to Guo, the “Little Mermaid” started a disturbing trend in which speaking roles for women were suddenly decreased to less than half of words spoken, unlike the “backwards” predecessors where women still had the majority speaking roles. “For a film centered on a young woman, there’s an awful lot of talking by men. In fact, this was the first Disney princess movie in which the men significantly outspoke the women...in the five Disney princess movies that followed, the women speak even less. On average in those films, men have three times as many lines as women.” Guo wrote. This is a good example of the pathos appeal, as it shocks the audience into realizing that the newer films are not as progressive as originally thought.


For the majority of his post, Guo uses the ethos approach by using interviews as sources from various university researchers who studied the very topic, including professors of linguistics and the very people behind this Disney movie research. In addition to using these experts as sources, Guo also provides graphs that showed the percentage of words spoken per movie, and number of speaking roles women have compared to men. As the data is provided by sources that the audience can trust as being credible, they serve as a powerful tool in demonstrating how few speaking roles women have compared to men. Guo, successfully using these sources in his ethos appeal, explained that part of the reason women have fewer speaking roles, as well as as fewer words spoken, is that the chatty sidekick role in all these movies goes to men. Guo noted one exception to that being of Mr. Potts, a teakettle from “Beauty and the Beast.” Even in Frozen, which has the two sisters as protagonists, fewer words were spoken by women compared to men, and women had about 16 speaking roles as opposed to more than 30 that men had, demonstrating that this trend continues today. “Despite being a story about two sister princesses, men claim 59 percent of the lines in that film,” Guo said. To tie in the data from the researchers, Guo is successful in using the logos appeal when connecting the similarities between the movies and the point he is trying to make.


However, words spoken per movie is not the only concern Guo noted. Women in the more recent movies were more likely to be commented on their appearance than skill, reinforcing that body image is important, a point that Guo used both ethos and logos to make. After all, if girls are taught that being complimented on looks is something to aspire for, Guo logically connects that it can send a message to young girls that focusing on their body image is important for them. Guo’s use of both credible sources and logical connections shows that the way Disney portrays women is something to be possibly concerned about because of the sort of values the movies teach young girls. Guo did note though, that this focus on appearance shifted some in the last four princess movies made, starting with “The Princess and the Frog” with only 22 percent of compliments directed at women involving physical appears on average, and about 40 percent of those compliments involving skills or accomplishment. Guo attributed this recent trend reversal to the most recent movies, especially “Frozen” and “Brave”, due to these movies being directed and written by women or by a team that included women, once again making a strong logos appeal in the process. Guo furthers this point by mentioning how Brenda Chapman, creator of “Brave,” had said that she wanted to “smash the stereotype of the Disney princess movie.”


Throughout his discussion, Guo maintains a neutral third-person tone, using carefully picked quotes from his sources to make any “bold” claims, conveying to his audience that despite this post straying from his usual subject of economics, he is still professional in his approach. Had Guo used a first-person approach, the blog post would likely appear too opinionated, causing readers who expect the same quality writing as in his economics posts to lose interest. Guo’s writing style relies heavily on using data to truly drive in a point, making the logos appeal perhaps his strongest. He doesn’t just use a strong quote from a credible source to drive in a point--he uses data as evidence to support his claim. This is seen through the use of graphs and numbers throughout the post, not something one may expect when reading about Disney princesses. This could also be in part due to Guo’s true focus being economics. It is not uncommon for economists to tackle social issues as economics is the study of choices people make. Economics writing heavily uses data and logos appeals to draw conclusions. Guo’s day job as a journalist is also likely why he so heavily relied on the ethos appeal through the heavy use of interviews with credible sources, as opposed to just finding articles online to reference to. Guo did not use pathos very much in his post, with the exception of the beginning, where he “shocked” the audience into realizing that the rather sexist 1950’s Disney films were more progressive in some areas than modern movies. Guo likely used the pathos appeal that way to draw in the audience as a hook by showing there is a problem, which in turn keeps them reading the whole blog post.

Guo maintains the intellectual standards of critical and creative thinking of logic, precision, clarity, relevance, breadth, and depth throughout his post. Guo's use of credible sources and data to draw conclusions in a logical manner upholds the intellectual standards of logic and precision. The post is easy to read and stays on topic with no confusing or irrelevant information, thus meeting the intellectual standard of clarity and relevance. In addition to noting the main issue at hand, which is the reduction of women's speaking roles, Guo also looks at the social environment in which the films were made, as well as exploring Disney's perspectives and attempts to improve, thus upholding the intellectual standards of depth and breadth.

Overall, Guo successfully demonstrates that there is a problem in modern Disney princess movies that are meant to have female protagonists. Guo accomplishes this by showing that women have fewer speaking roles compared to men, as well as fewer words spoken. Guo strategically uses the pathos appeal to draw in the audience, and then uses ethos and logos appeals to carefully present his case, while maintaining a neutral tone throughout.

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