Ji, Mary

8East, Humanities

April 26, 2003

Debatable with Modification

My argumentative writing and I as a writer have definitely improved since September. I am now able to use visuals to position readers to believe certain things throughout history. I can make tree visuals more persuasive without taking an hour on it, I can craft persuasive essays that have mini-arguments that back up my thesis and I can certainly get my reader to act and think differently in my resolution.

My new tree visual is more convincing than my first one because it now has a clear argument. My old tree visual wasn’t persuasive enough because it lacked arguments. In my new tree visual, I have something to argue that relates to my thesis statement and thesis.

My thesis statement and thesis is more swaying and have a clear direct statement that I can argue throughout my mini-arguments. My old thesis statement doesn’t state any argument; I was just mentioning facts that the audience knows when I stated, “Advertising functions in society by influencing your self-image and your self-esteem.” This thesis statement clearly shows you that I didn’t have anything to argue so my whole essay would just be a bunch of facts and numbers. This statement didn’t have my opinion, which my new revised Advertising Final Essay have, which is “Using advertisements that target how men, women and adolescents must look and behave in society shouldn’t be promoting gender stereotypes.” This new revised statement is much clearer and isn’t as broad, also this statement have what my opinion and that is how advertisements that target men, women and adolescent shouldn’t follow the gender stereotypes. My first essay written in the eighth grade also has loss thoughts and ideas all stuck onto the thesis, such as when I stated, “Advertisements use different mediums and media forms to get you hooked.” This has nothing to do with what I’m trying to argue, which brings me to my point on how I just include random thoughts that I thought was important to include and that would make me look more intelligent. This line clearly doesn’t work with my thesis and with my mini-arguments. In my new revised Advertising Final Essay, I related points that I’m going to be discussing and pointing out such as the second sentence of my thesis, “The nutrition, fashion, tobacco, and alcohol ads all show how men, women and adolescents should act and behave in society.” This sentence shows how I’m relating to the requirements, and my thesis statement which will be talking about how different groups of people are being portrayed in society.

My new revised Advertising Final Essay’s mini-arguments do a better job than my original argument in supporting the thesis. My old mini-arguments didn’t relate to the thesis statement, and since the first sentences didn’t work, the whole arguments must not have been related to my thesis statement. My first mini-arguments beginning sentence, “Mass media informs you that advertisements exaggerate the present,” definitely didn’t relate because it’s telling you that the mass media exaggerates the present. I didn’t bother to change anything; instead I cut the whole paragraph out because it wasn’t related to my main argument stated in my thesis and thesis statement. For my second min-argument in my old tree visual before it was revised, It have nothing to do with what the paragraph is going to be talking about when I stated, “Influencing weight loss is effective.” This sentence is a stated fact, not opinionated about how weight loss is effective when influenced by the mass media. But when I revised this sentence, it came out to be, “Advertisements shouldn’t be influencing that weight lost is not effective and that it doesn’t hurt to diet.” When I revised the old sentence, it came out to be opinionated where people can disagree with why advertisements shouldn’t be influencing weight lost. My third mini-argument from my first essay certainly did not have any argument, just a full unarguable statement which stated, “Looking slim, buffing up, changing appearances are how women and men stereotype themselves.” This sentence is a fact like all sentences that tell you how women and men stereotype themselves. Then I changed it so that it can be debatable which is, “A person’s body shouldn’t be judged by what they have on it but by how it looks.” This sentence is disagreeable because you can have a positive approach and a negative approach on why a person’s body should or shouldn’t be judged by how it looks. My fourth min-argument from my first essay is confusing and isn’t pointing out what’s about to be talked about, when I stated, ‘Smoking causes addiction, no matter if you don’t always smoke.” This is a known fact, not an argument where someone could easily disagree with. When I went over and revised it, I figured that the sentence doesn’t work with the rest of my paragraph so I reconstructed it to, ‘Smoking advertisements shouldn’t be targeting young adolescents.” This sentence is much clearer with a better opinion whereas people can disagree and say no to. In my fifth mini-argument about alcohol, I didn’t give a statement that people can differ with when I stated, “Alcohol makes you drunk, not knowing how you will end up, in jail, or even dead.” This sentence is fact and you can disagree with fact, so it doesn’t work. When I changed this fact into a differing statement it came out to be, “Alcohol advertisements shouldn’t use sexuality to promote their product.” This targets a clear and apparent question regarding sexuality and promoting products. My mini-arguments from the first essay all were statements and facts, which really didn’t help the reader choose a side to be on, whereas when I revised it, I strengthened the arguments and changed it into statements that the reader can easily disagree or agree with.

My resolution is more persuasive and not just an “add on” that does not really get my reader to act or think differently. In my first essay, my resolution wasn’t an “add on,” it just wasn’t clear enough about what I was asking the reader to do, think about when I urged them to, “Find any kind and compare how they are leaving certain type of information out. Act differently; don’t listen to the media and how they are spreading propaganda around.” This resolution isn’t clear about what I’m telling the reader to do when I tell them to stop the media from spreading propaganda around when in my essay, I didn’t talk much about propaganda. In my new revised resolution, it has a clear argument that asks the reader to think and act differently when I say, “You should speak out against the gender stereotypes in society and the propaganda spreading advertisements that target towards youths and adults which will change how people are being judged.” This sentence summarizes my essay and relates back to my main argument about gender stereotypes.

Clearly, I have definitely improved at argumentative writing and as a writer because I can learn from my mistakes and I know how to correct a sentence to make it questionable to my readers. I know that a good essay need a good opinionated sentence that people can easily agree or disagree with which makes you interact with your reader.

Being in the eighth grade helped me as a writer in improving how I write argumentative essays and being in the eighth grade gave me all the techniques in crafting a well thought out persuasive argumentative essay. I have clearly learned a lot about how visuals craft the positioning of my readers into believe something that I’m trying to argue. You should not question if I have improved as an argumentative writer but as an eighth grader who faced many difficulties to write an arguable essay where my reader can say no to.