Tow #12 - Ten Green Bottles Analysis

Ten Green Bottles is the story of Nini Karpel's struggles as she told it to her daughter Vivian so many years ago.  To Nini Karpel, growing up and getting raised in Vienna during the 1920s was a romantic confection. Whether schussing down ski slopes or speaking of politics in coffee houses, she cherished the city of her birth. But in the 1930s an undercurrent of conflict and hate began to seize the former imperial capital. This struggle came to a start when Adolf Hitler took possession of neighboring Germany. Anti-Semitism, which Nini and her friends believed was impossible in the socially advanced world of Vienna, became widespread and virulent. The Karpel's Jewish identity suddenly made them foreigners in their own homeland. Tormented, disenfranchised, and with a broken heart, Nini and her family sought refuge in a land seven thousand miles across the world. Shanghai, China, one of the few countries accepting Jewish immigrants, became their new home and refuge. Stepping off the boat, the Karpel family found themselves in a land they could never have imagined. Shanghai presented an incongruent world of immense wealth and privilege for some and poverty for the masses, with opium dens and decadent clubs as well as rampant disease and a raging war between nations Ten Green Bottles is the story of Nini Karpel's struggles as she told it to her daughter Vivian so many years ago. This true story depicts the fierce perseverance of one family, victims of the forces of evil, who overcame suffering of biblical proportion to survive. It was a time when ordinary people became heroes. The author of Ten Green Bottles uses the idea of family in the story to emotionally impact her readers, whom have all presumably have family they love. The story is about a close family sticking it out when times get tough. The author also argues an argument of value. the author’s argument (from reading the book) is that even when times get bad, and the world seems to fall apart around you, family is what is important and no matter what you are doing or where you are, if you have family everything will be ok.

Tow #11 - Brown Vs. The Board of Education

                In the first half of the 20th century, school segregation, either by law or custom, was practiced across the United States. Buildings and programs for African Americans were always inferior, especially in the South. They worried that African American children they considered intellectually inferior would drag down educational quality for the their own kids. Caucasians feared the specter of their children mixing socially with African Americans, and frequently warned of behavior such as interracial dating. Above all, Caucasians resisted the fundamental threat to their supremacy that school integration posed. In 1954, America was still a society divided along racial lines. Even schools were divided into those catering to either Caucasian or African American students. Oliver Brown of Topeka in Kansas believed it to be in violation of his 14^th Amendment right to Equal Protection. He brought a case against the Board of Education to the court. White segregationists argued that, while they may go to different schools, the fact that they have similar buildings, accessibility and subjects mean that African American students were getting an education equal to that received by Caucasian students; separate but equal, in other words. The plaintiffs argued, however, that the fact that it was separated meant that there was a difference and unless remedied, they would never be equal. The Supreme Court sided with Brown and declared school segregation as unconstitutional. Brown’s side argument of fact was that that segregation in education was against the constitution. This was a fact and could be argued with reason and evidence. Brown’s argument of value was that segregation is a terrible law, both of these arguments ultimetly led to Brown’s argument of policy, which was that the law of segregation should be dissolved, and a new policy should be put in place where all races of American can receive an equal education and have the same opportunities. In the end, Brown’s case was won in the civil court. This could be traced back to good arguments, evidence, and reasoning. These are all things that make a good persuasion.

Tow #10 - Geico Advertisement

Geico utilizes more characters at one time than probably any other commercial company in the history of business marketing. If one turns on the Television tonight one could see an ad starring their Gecko, Cavemen, or the pile of cash. Or maybe all three, to effectively captivate the audience into hearing them talk about their product.

The gecko first appeared in 1999 during a Screen Actors Guild strike that made the use of live actors impossible. In the gecko’s first TV add, he pleads for people confusing him, the gecko, with “GEICO” to stop phoning him. The gecko speaks with an English accent, because it would be unexpected, which draws the audience of the comercials in, and makes them interested in their product.

These modern cavemen have somehow escaped death, and avoided extinction while developing a fine taste for tennis, plasma TVs, and other modern things foods and activities. They are insulted by GEICO’s ad tagline, “So easy, a caveman can do it.” This technique adds satire to the advertisement. Reversal is used, and Geico shows a scene of cavemen doing normal things to draw attention to their adds.

Starting in 2008, GEICO has aired a series of TV ads featuring two paper-banded stacks of U.S. bills with a pair of big, buggy eyes on top. The pile of Cash, who never says anything, just sits and stares at people set to an obnoxious remix of a Rockwell/Michael Jackson song, “Somebody’s Watching Me.” This is a joke, that involves a literal stack of money watching a customer of another insurance agency. This, just like the gecko joke, is unexpected, and draws in the audience attention.

An actor asks the familiar question, “Could switching to Geico save you 15% or more on car insurance?” He then follows up with a rhetorical question: “Does Charlie Daniels play a mean fiddle?” or “Did The Waltons take way too long to say goodnight?” The use of rhetorical questions draws the audience in, while other boring ads makes their audience tune out.

IRB intro post #2 - Ten Green Bottles

Ten Green Bottles was written in 2004 by Vivian Jeanette Kaplan. The book was published in English, and translated into several different languages such as German, Hungarian, and Italian. It is the true story of a Jewish family that escaped from Nazi-occupied Vienna to Shanghai under Japanese rule. The book is told from the viewpoint of the author's mother and starts in 1921. Gerda Karpel is a 5-year-old Jewish girl living in Vienna in 1921. She comes from an upper middle-class family. The book starts with the birth of Nini's brother, Willi, to the death of Gerda's father shortly after the birth. The book then discusses day to day life from the viewpoint of a Jewish girl growing up in Vienna. It talks about the political instability caused after the assassination of Engelbert Dollfuss and the suppression of democracy after it. This book seems especially interesting to me because I am from a Jewish Heritage, and many of my relative that lived in the 20th century have similar stories to this one. I hope to learn more about the European Jewish Culture that my family shares in my duration of reading this book. 

TOW #9 - Ernest Hemingway's "Camping Out"

Ernest Hemingway’s essay Camping Out starts with Hemingway describing with how going camping can be either a relaxing vacation or a terrible experience based on your knowledge on the subject.  He outlines points that can make a camping trip horrible to a novice, leading the reader to believe that he has done this many times himself and he truly is an expert. Hemingway’s protagonist in this story seems to be Wilson, the hunter who lives and breathes the great outdoors. The story to juxtaposes another character Macomber to Wilson, and obviously, Wilson is the favored in that comparison due to his outdoorsiness. However, at the end of the story Wilson breaks the code to which he lives by as he hunts down buffalo in a car, a cowardly, and indisputably illegal act. Wilson is by no means perfect.

Two literary techniques are in play throughout the story that enliven the action and embellish Hemingway’s otherwise minimal descriptive passages. The first is onomatopoeia, and is best exemplified by “whunk,” the noise Macomber’s bullet makes as it hits the lion (p. 22, 33), and “carawong,” the noise Wilson’s high-velocity “big gun” makes as it fires at game (p. 26, 34). Hemingway’s usage of these terms helps the reader imagine the noises and brutality of the hunt. The second technique Hemingway employs is simile and metaphor. The most notable example occurs in Wilson’s thoughts when Macomber asks if they should leave the wounded lion, “Robert Wilson, whose entire occupation had been with the lion and the problem he presented, and who had not been thinking about Macomber except to note that he was rather windy, suddenly felt as though he had opened the wrong door in a hotel and seen something shameful” (p. 24). This simile demonstrates Wilson’s shock at hearing Macomber voice such cowardly ideas. Macomber would rather leave the lion to suffer or risk someone else running into the lion and possibly being killed than face up to hunting it down and finishing what he started.