Your name: 

Guelimanuel Grullon

Completing this worksheet may take more time than you think. It’s worth the time. The information you gather will help you later when writing up assignments. But more importantly, the process of addressing each of the questions below will slowly work to change how you read texts. Keep in mind that some answers will not be obvious or even observable in the text, and so you may have to do some critical thinking and, at times, even some online research. Use full sentences. Take as much space as you need.

Context & Exigence: What topic/conversation is this text responding to? What year is the text published? What is the exigence–that is, what motivating occasion/issue/concern prompted the writing? The motivating occasion could be a current or historical event, a crisis, pending legislation, a recently published alternative view, or another ongoing problem. 

The topic that the video is responding to is the people that de-value minorities and people with accents. The video was published in February 2016, and the motivating issue that made this even happen was a video that he did with TEDEd about the history of video games.

Author: Who is the author of this text?  What are the author’s credentials and what is their investment in the issue? 

The video narrator is Safwat Saleem. The only investment that I found he’s doing is to not let the people deter him because of his accent.

Text: What can you find out about the publication?  What is the genre of the text (e.g., poem, personal essay, essay, news/academic article, blog, textbook chapter, etc.)? How do the conventions of that genre help determine the depth, complexity, and even appearance of the argument? What information about the publication or source (magazine, newspaper, advocacy Web site) helps explain the writer’s perspective or the structure and style of the argument?

This is an informative video with slight entertainment in the script as well. It conveys the arguments really well because it shows his personality well. He explains a Youtube video that he made and shows the positive and negative comments that he had.

Audience: Who is the author’s intended audience? What can you infer about the audience (think about beliefs and political association but also age, class, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, profession, education, geographic location, religion, etc.)? Look for clues from the text (especially the original publication) to support your inference.

The intended audience is for everyone but is directed at people that deter others that are the minority or women or has an accent.

Purpose: What is the author trying to accomplish? To persuade, entertain, inform, educate, call to action, shock? How do you know?

The purpose of the video is to not offend people that have accents or that are the minority. He didn’t let that go into his life in the long term.

Argument: What do you believe is the main claim/idea/argument that the author is trying to communicate? What stance does s/he take? 

The claim that the author is trying to make is that people shouldn’t stop or change whatever they’re doing just because of a hater says that something that you’re born with is bad and you should change it.

Evidence: How is the argument supported? Types of support include reasons and logical explanations as well as evidence. Types of evidence include anecdotes, examples, hypothetical situations, (expert) testimony, quotes, citing sources, statistics, charts/graphs, research the author or another source conducts, scientific or other facts, general knowledge, historical references, metaphors/analogies, etc. 

“I recorded my audio, but every time I sat down to edit, I just could not do it.” “I’m now slowly starting to use my voice in my work again. And it feels good. It does not mean I won’t have a breakdown the next time a couple of dozen people say that I talk (Mumbling) like I have peanut butter in my mouth. “

Rhetorical Strategies: What aspects of this text stand out for you as a rhetorical reader? In other words, what do you observe about what the author strategically does (consciously or not) in hopes of appealing to their audience? List here as many observations as you can make about what the text does. 

Insert a couple of jokes in there to entertain the audience.Uses actual Youtube comments Video is still online, so he still has the courage to leave it up.

Citation: Add the correct MLA or APA bibliographic entry for this text. Use easybib.com if you prefer.

Saleem, Safwat. A Brief History of Video Games (Part I) – Safwat Saleem. Youtube, Ted-Ed, 13 Aug. 2013, www.youtube.com/watch?v=x24KoVNliMk.Saleem, Safwat, director. A Brief History of Video Games (Part I) – Safwat Saleem. Youtube, Ted-Ed, 13 Aug. 2013, www.youtube.com/watch?v=x24KoVNliMk&t=112s.

Notes: What do you want to remember about this text?

Found the comment about the peanut butter.