What's the Purpose?

August 20, 2012, 11:13 pm

Scared Straight — Into the Voting Booth

By ANN BEESON

It strikes me as funny that we call our political organizations “parties.” For most of us, elections and political parties are the antithesis of fun. It’s no wonder that many young people avoid them. As colleges around the country welcome hordes of students, and politicians feebly attempt to spark interest in the fall election, we should ask why.

I live in a college town, Austin, now the fastest growing city in the country. Young people are moving here in droves, drawn by the city’s creative energy and laid back lifestyle. And they are some of the most active and committed people I know.

I’ve been lucky to get to know many of them since I moved back to town last summer, after many years in New York City. Tanene Allison is developing a new media platform to give a voice to women, people of color and gay and lesbian youth. Cristina Tzintzun organizes low-income construction workers. Michelle Dahlenburg helps incarcerated women through theater and creative writing. John Fiege is making a film about people taking direct action to address climate change. Patrick Slevin launched a youth orchestra for Latinos. I could go on.

So why do so few young people vote?

In the recent run-off elections to select Senate candidates for the race this fall in Texas (there was one for Democrats and one for Republicans) only 8.5% of eligible voters showed up. These determined citizens essentially decided the outcome in November, given the extreme odds against a Democrat defeating the Republican run-off winner, Ted Cruz. Though Texas is certainly ground zero for weak voter participation, even national averages for young people (18-35) have teetered just around 50% for most presidential elections, and they’re half that in non-presidential election years – 24% in the 2010 midterm elections.

 

While the percentage of young people who vote has actually grown incrementally during the last few presidential elections, we have yet to return to the voting levels of the early 1970s. Turnout was 55% in 1972 — just after the 26th Amendment to the Constitution added millions of young voters to the rolls by dropping the voting age from 21 to 18. To offer a more stark comparison, voter turnout rates have topped 70% in Canada, 79% in France, and 96% in Australia (where voting is compulsory).

Quoting these sobering statistics, older generations love to bemoan the antipathy of youth, the lack of a culture of civic participation in America. At a dinner party I hosted recently, dour comments flowed. While it was hardly a representative group — the guests included journalists, advocates, a documentary filmmaker and a government official — their remarks were typical: “When I was young everybody got involved in politics, but my kids just don’t care;” “Young people have given up on government, and it’s our fault because government sucks;” “Occupy was so inspiring at first, but I guess they all just wanted to camp.”

These comments ignore other forms of youth engagement that may tell us something about why young people can be enthusiastic volunteers and organizers but tepid voters. Three causes are worth exploring. First of all, many young people just don’t see the connection between voting and their commitment to improve their communities, advocate for a cause, or change the world. Secondly, there are very real grounds for political cynicism. And finally, let’s face it, civic engagement can be a snore.

The missing link between issue advocacy and voting struck me forcefully when I discovered that many of the young women who rallied recently at the state capitol to protest Gov. Rick Perry’s attack on Planned Parenthood hadn’t voted in the 2010 gubernatorial election. They had skipped a step in the policymaking process that might’ve kept them out of the heat – voting out a leader willing to risk women’s lives to score political points. I’ve also met plenty of bike-riding young people who are passionate about saving the environment, fanatic about composting, obsessed with their carbon footprint — but they don’t vote either.

Other citizens get how government is supposed to work but are deeply cynical about the political process. This isn’t just youthful ennui. Big money has an outsize influence on both political parties, gerrymandering dilutes votes, and partisan gridlock stalls action on even the most pressing problems. Young people are courted during election season and then ignored or chastised when they demand accountability and solutions. There are still too few candidates who represent the diversity of the younger generation, which is comprised mostly of people of color and immigrants. Recognizing all this, we need to make a better case that voting still matters.

Then there’s the fun factor. The fact is, for many young people – all right, most people – civic engagement is a bore. The phrase “civic engagement” conjures images of neighborhood meetings that plod along in rooms with stained carpets, cheap paneling and fluorescent lighting. Slick, overproduced political rallies and overly earnest sharefests. I know, I’ve been there. I’ve even sponsored a few.

How to remedy these ills? We need to put young people in charge, because they will engage their peers where they’re already active – in community gardens, volunteer networks, sports clubs and cultural hubs. Voting should be tied directly to issues that young people care about, as a natural extension of other forms of involvement, creative expression and collective action. And the best way to counter youth cynicism may be to rub their noses in the stale fruit of inaction – do you really want to have no say in policies that determine whether or not you have a job, what you pay for college, whether climate change ever gets addressed or even acknowledged? Scared straight into voting.

Most importantly, it should be terrific fun to vote and to stay involved after election day. What if the average civic gathering – whether it’s a political rally, grassroots group, school task force, or city council – involved cook-offs, improv or gaming? What if we devised clever ways to scale up what’s working, instead of whining for a living? What if we banned Robert’s Rules of Order and actually got to know one another? It’s no surprise that two of the most effective movements in the last few years have been the Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street. They threw out tired old forms of engagement and communication, and inspired people to make noise, create political theater, to engage people’s emotions and not just their rational brains.

Some groups are doing things differently now, and we need more like them. The Bus Project in Oregon recruits young people to get on a bus — yes, an actual bus — to engage voters on issues or candidates they believe in. They’ve made even tried and true methods of political organizing more fun, like their Phone Phests: “Vivacious volunteers + tasty treats + delicious drinks + magnificent music + dialing for democracy = the greatest phone calling experience of your sweet young life.”

The League of Young Voters, despite its stodgy name, is masterful at cultural organizing and social media outreach. Check out “Total Recall Live,” the league’s weekly online talk show where an R&B songstress and a D.J. remix news regarding hip-hop and politics.

Yana Paskova for The New York Times Volunteers in Athen, Ohis, 2008.

Conservatives have wisely invested in youth leadership programs for decades, through groups like the Leadership Institute. Their graduates helped Cruz, a Tea Party favorite, win the primary against the candidate of the Republican establishment and Gov. Perry, Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst.

In 2008, as a candidate, Obama dazzled the nation with his ability to inspire millions, including loads of young people, to get involved in political organizing for the first time. And they reached their goal – they elected Obama. Problem was, it was the wrong goal. The party ended, and many were disillusioned when change didn’t happen overnight. Voting is critical, but it is just one step in the broad spectrum of engagement required to advance real change, whatever your goals and ideology. For democracy to flourish, we need people to do it all — vote, volunteer and raise some righteous hell.

Ann Beeson is a senior fellow and lecturer at the Annette Strauss Institute for Civic Life at the University of Texas. She was previously the national associate legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union.

http://campaignstops.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/08/20/scared-straight-%E2%80%94-into-the-voting-booth/?_r=0

After reading the article above, answer the following questions:

1.) What was the author's purpose? 

To Inform

To Entertain

To Question

To Argue

To Elicit an Emotional Response

2.) Once you identify the author's purpose, next explain "for what and/or for whom."  In other words, if you stated the author's purpose was to entertain, then explain for what reasons and/or to whom.

3.) Next explain "why?"

Please note that questions 1-3 could be completed in as little as one sentence.

4.) Now list some evidence that supports your assertion on her purpose.  You may write this in sentence format, or you may simply bullet the information.

5.) Now discuss what strategy she used to achieve her purpose.   You may need to review all the rhetorical devices and strategies we have discussed so far.  Sorry, but I am not giving any hints here. Or you can google rhetorical strategies and learn something we have not discussed.

6.)  Next, open up one of the ten hyperlinks within the article and read where it takes you.  Comment upon the relevancy of the link as it pertains to the article.  Does it support the article, if so, in what manner?  Does it seem off-topic from the article?  If so, then why?  If the link no longer exist, then find one that opens.

Please try to read a different link than what others have already reviewed.

7.)  Finally, respond to one student's commentary.  Just one person this time:>) unless you would like to respond to more than one person, then please feel free to do so.

Due Dates:

Your posting is due by Wednesday, September 4th = 40 points

A thoughtful response to one classmate by Friday, September 6th = 10 points

Yes, this is an extended blog, therefore it will be worth more points.   Vague responses will be discussed next week during class and will not be tolerated anymore.

In Cold Blood

Announcement: 

Finish the novel In Cold Blood by September 3rd.  If you complete the novel sooner, please request the next novel The Things They Carried.  You will have a formal writing assignment by September 23rd so both novels need to be read by then.

(A Kansas Fall)

 

  Step 1.) While reading In Cold Blood, find a passage that you feel particularly drawn to in terms of Capote's use of language. 

Think of Capote as an artist who uses words.  If you find this difficult to do, take a passage and then cut it down to its bare bones in terms of what he is saying.  Your version should be boring, while Capote takes great effort creating what some claim to be the most influential literary work from the 20th Century.  So look at his writing as if you are viewing a piece of art. 

Step 2.) Read the two sample student blog responses below:

First Sample Response: 

Idyllic descriptions aside, my favorite passage is found on p. 79. Several close friends of the murdered family have cleaned the Clutter household, deeming it their “Christian duty” to purge the home of the family’s blood stained belongings. After accumulating all reminders of the Clutter’s gruesome fate, the troupe transports the relics to an open field on the property of River Valley Farm. Dousing the assortment in kerosene, preparing to ignite the remnants of the victims’ pasts, Andy Erhart, Mr. Clutter’s closest confidante, reflects on the merits of the family and speculates about the repercussions of the atrocity that has befallen the Clutters- “But that life, and what [Mr. Clutter] had made of it- how could this happen, Erhart wondered as he watched the bonfire catch. How was it possible that such effort, such plain virtue, could overnight be reduced to this- smoke, thinning as it rose and was received by the big, annihilating sky?”

The beauty of this passage and the simplistic metaphor it contains is found in its succinct and accurate reflection of the human attitude toward death. The Clutters were prominent citizens in Holcomb: Mr. Clutter was a successful and philanthropic farmer. Nancy Clutter was class president and future prom queen. With such esteem, it seems unnatural, even preposterous, that something as commonplace as death should have the power to desecrate the upstanding reputation that the family has built for itself. This ideal is neatly summarized in Andy’s thoughts. Furthermore, the symbolism of smoke as the Clutter family’s legacy is a clever rhetorical device employed by the author. Even the largest, most impactful fire is eventually reduced to smoke, much like the influential lives of the family. Lastly, the use of the word “annihilating” to describe the expansive sky adds an unexpectedly foreboding aspect to the passage, implying that the Clutters’ memory will dissipate just as surely as the smoke is obliterated by the sky.

Second Sample Response:

“After rain, or when snowfalls thaw, the streets, unnamed, unshaded, unpaved, turn from the thickest dust into the direst mud. At one end of the town stands a stark old stucco structure, the roof of which supports an electric sign – Dance – but the dancing has ceased and the advertisement has been dark for several years. Nearby is another building with an irrelevant sign, this one is flaking fold on a dirty window – Holcomb Bank. The bank closed in 1933 and its former counting rooms have been converted into apartments” (1-2).

There are many reasons that this passage struck me as I was choosing among my favorite passages in the book. Capote employs a complex style and uses many subordinate clauses in his prose. This technique creates a unique cadence, but the cadence of this passage stood out among the rest. He uses three past participles, “unnamed, unshaded, unpaved, to describe the streets of Holcomb. This clever device shows us that Holcomb is a small town that has not caught up with some modern conveniences such as paved roads without coming out and saying it blatantly. Capote subtly gives up some other interesting details about Holcomb, Kansas in this passage. He tells us that the Holcomb Bank closed in 1933, the peak of the Great Depression. He also tells us that there is a vacant dance hall in Holcomb. Presumably, the dance hall was a popular establishment in the 1920’s that went out of business during the Depression. These two details show the reader that Holcomb was hit hard by the Depression and is still recovering from its implications. The way that Capote delicately gives us detail makes this passage one of my favorites in the book. Another aspect of this passage that I thought was interesting was the foreshadowing at the beginning of the passage. He tells us that the streets of Holcomb turned from “the thickest dust into the direst mud” after it rains. The roads can be interpreted as a symbol for the Holcomb community, while the rain symbolizes tragedy for the community, such as the Clutter murders. The rain turns the roads into the “direst mud,” just like the Clutter murders turned the community into a disarray of fear and confusion. He uses the word “direst” to describe the mud, which is interesting because usually that word is used to describe a dire situation. By describing the situation of the roads after rain, he foreshadows the “dire” atmosphere of Holcomb after the Clutter tragedy.

  Step 3.) Now choose a passage from the novel and comment according to the sample responses above.  Your first paragraph needs to include the passage you will discuss placed in quotes.  Make sure to include the page number at the end of the quoted passage. It is also a good idea to set-up your quoted passage just like Sample #1 did before they quoted the passage.

Your subsequent paragraph(s) must elaborate on Capote's use of language and discuss SPECIFICALLY how Capote manipulates and controls language.  Think of his use of Diction (word choice), Syntax (the way a sentence is structured such as a periodic sentence verses a loose sentence--google this), sensory details, dialogue, alliteration, or how he creates mood (atmosphere) or tone (attitude) and any other way you see him controlling language in an artistic manner.  

Please know that Plagiarism will not be tolerated.  You will lose all credit for this assignment if you plagiarize. 

This assignment is worth 40 Points.

Due Dates:
Blog Response by Monday, August 26, MIDNIGHT.

Complete the Novel by September 3rd.    

 

 

 

Announcement: Finish the novel In Cold Blood by September 3rd.  If you complete the novel sooner, please request the next novel: The Things They Carried. 



The Aesthetics of Language

Sarah Kay: "If I Should Have a Daughter"

Click on the link below.  Watch the 18 minute video then respond to the short writing prompt noted below. Make sure to use details and examples to support your assertions/claims.  In other words, state quoted evidence.

 

http://www.ted.com/talks/sarah_kay_if_i_should_have_a_daughter.html 

 

Writing Prompt: After viewing the video, choose one phrase/section that you really like and comment on how Sarah Kay manipulates language to make the content aesthetically pleasing.  In other words, what does she say that “moves” you and how does she say it?  Think in terms of every literary device you have every learned.

One thing you might want to focus on is how she uses allusions (A Reference to Something Historical, Cultural, Biblical, or Mythical).  An allusion is a literary device that also appears within essays and speeches.

 

Because many of you have essays to write, you do not need to comment on what your peers say unless you would like to send them a message.

Remember to use "net-etiquette", meaning your response to this prompt should begin with "Dear Ms. Carlson" or" Dear Ms. Sette".  Make sure to sign your name formally such as “Sincerely” or “Respectfully.”

 

Your response is due by Monday, August 19th by Midnight.

Late work cannot be accepted for this assignment.