hi I'm Don Knight I'm an English teacher from Westfield Indiana um today we're going to talk about the rhetorical analysis essay specifically the focus of this video will be thesis statements and just so you know you do have access to the prompt and passage you're welcome to download that follow along or print it if you want I'll also talk through everything so if you can't that's no problem so um a couple of reminders about thesis statements they should always AP answer the prompt um they should be original not a direct quote or paraphrase they should also take a clear position or stance that can be defended or supported um and that should be in a statement not a question and finally they should be the focus of your essay so you'll notice on my screen I have a diagram just to kind of show you the line of reasoning and why thesis statements are so important they really are the building block um of the essay so typically you'll find it near the end of an introduction um and again it'll be the answer to your prompt and then you'll have body paragraphs I put two on the screen just because of space you might have three you might have four it depends on the prompt and your answer to it um I will say for a timed essay two very well- written body paragraphs would be better than three or four just okay ones um each body paragraph will have a CL claim that supports the thesis and then you'll select evidence that supports the claim and the commentary will explain how the evidence supports the claim and connects back to the thesis so everything goes back to that thesis as the building block all right so you have an example of a prompt um on the screen you're always going to have the same basic prompt um it'll be the passage or the topic that changes depending on the essay so for this one we're looking at um a passage from Mary Oliver the following is an excerpt from the essay owls by Mary Oliver a poet and essayist who won the national book award and the Pulitzer Prize for poetry Oliver's writing focuses on The Wonder of the natural world read the passage carefully write an essay that analyzes the rhetorical choices Oliver makes to convey her message about nature so I want you to notice the things that I've highlighted on the screen here um we always want to look at write an essay what is it telling us to do because remember we need to answer the prompt so we're looking for rhetorical choices Oliver makes and not just any but the ones that stand out to convey her message about nature we're looking for those two things and today we're focusing on um this element of the prompt responding to the prompt with a thesis that analyzes The Writer's rhetorical choices on the screen you see that I have a sample of what it might look like when you're annotating your prompt and passage um so because I'm looking for those two elements the specific rhetorical choices a writer makes and the specific message I'm looking for those elements as I read so you'll notice I have things like imagery and parallelism and I've circled I um and contrast and Paradox so I'm looking for these things um and then I'm looking for the ones that I think which of those rhetorical choices are conveying the message and what is the message so let's look more specifically at each paragraph So in the first paragraph I noticed that the rhetorical choices of word choice say that three times fast uh stood out imagery and the use of first person and I also included some initial thoughts on that um the word choice of delicate sawet luminous Wanderer uh Swift and merciless like a big soft moth um I noticed that the imagery is showing nature um as beautiful but also um that it can be scary and that there's some juxtoposition or contrast between those two parts of nature the imagery um in this paragraph um portrays nature as pretty frightening we see the Headless bodies of the um animals that the owls have eaten and that the owls have this insati craving for the taste of brains they're like zombies um and then the use of first person um Mary Oliver writes I look up at it and listen it's the center of my life I can't imagine being in such proximity to these creatures I Must Fall I have found headless bodies so there definitely seems to be a focus on her interaction with um nature similarly in the second paragraph we see word choice again with more contrast and jux toos like deathbringer and ricking Glory imagery um talking about uh the owl being endlessly hungry and endlessly on the hunt that reinforces the frightening images from the first paragraph the contrast and Paradox of um the sunny but also the terror um and so we definitely keep seeing Beauty and Power in nature and then more firsters with Oliver writing I hear I know I'm standing at the edge of mystery and talks about her own life as part of that she also mentions that her world is the owl's World um which might give us um some idea about her relationship with nature in the next paragraph more imagery with um uh images of winter it being 10 degrees above nothing and then the contrast again with summer fields full of flowers and a sweetness so palp so we keep seeing more juxtoposition of these two different um elements of nature first person I have stood listening I have found myself thinking I'm struck I'm taken I'm conquered I'm washed into it so the narrator who previously was focused on their relationship with nature is taking it to an even deeper level in this paragraph and talking about the extent to which her own life seems to intertwine with and be a part of nature and then there are some rhetorical questions that are new in this paragraph and is this not all terrible and is this not also frightening so this definitely hits on that Paradox the beauty of flowers is frightening nature is both beautiful and terrifying so we see some paradoxical elements here all right finally in the last paragraph imagery of the small and loveliness of the flowers and how they're an immutable Force um um the rhetorical question are the Roses not also even as the owl is excessive so here's there's definitely Paradox with this idea of small and lovely roses being a force and then first person now I'm cringing at the very sound of the owl's Dark Wings opening over my head not long ago I could do nothing but Lounge on the sand and stare into the cities of roses so again the narrator pondering their relationship with nature here okay so now we've analyzed the passage for those things that we need to AP answer the prompt which means we can think about what our thesis statement is going to be remembering that it's going to be the focus of the essay that it needs to take a clear position that it needs to be original um that specifically it needs to include rhetorical choices Oliver makes to convey her complex relationship with nature all right so we're responding to the prompt looking for rhetorical choices with that message about nature so that's your turn we're going to look at some options um you are going to select and there's more than one right answer and I did that on purpose and that's because there isn't one right answer to these essays we just need to make sure that we are answering the prompt and that we're able to support what our thesis is so I want you to take a look at the options I'm going to read them out loud to you and you'll decide which ones would make a good thesis statement for this essay so a Mary Oliver uses imagery and Paradox to convey her complex relationship with nature B Mary Oliver uses imagery and Paradox to convey her message about nature C Mary Oliver uses kenning and simil to convey the message that she finds nature both beautiful and terrifying d Mary Oliver expresses her connection to Nature and her complex relationship with it through imagery and Paradox and E Mary Oliver uses imagery and ju deposition to convey her message that her relationship with nature is complex she both rever and fears it so you can pause here if you want to take a minute and decide which ones and hit play when you're ready and then I'll talk through them so if you decided a that is one of the options that would make a good thesis it does give a specific rhetorical choices and it talks about the message that it reveals a complex relationship with nature it could be a little more specific about what that relationship is but this one's good if you chose D that's another good one Mary Oliver expresses her connection to Nature and her complex relationship with it through imagery and Paradox so here we have connection and relationship and that it's complex and then we also have specific rhetorical choices and E is another good one Mary Oliver uses imagery and ju deposition to convey her message that her relationship with nature is complex she both reveres and fears it so again specific message specific choices now B um isn't a best answer because um we don't see a specific message it just says a message about nature but it doesn't tell us what that message is and C isn't a good one because because although there is a kenning and there's some simile in the passage they don't stand out in conveying the message we don't want to just treasure hunt for devices we want to find the devices that stand out in conveying the message all right so some reminders when you are looking at thesis statements for the rhetorical analysis first read The Prompt in passage looking for the argument the message and the strategies that stand out don't treasure hun for literary devices look at the ones that stand out to convey the specific message and write a thesis that fully answers the prompt specific rhetorical choices to convey a specific message thank you so much for joining me I hope you'll come back and watch some more of our videos um in the meantime please remember to be kind to yourself and to others thanks so much