This is a weird one. This essay by Sharon Mazer called "The Power Team" is a really nice example of a research paper. She uses a bunch of different types of sources, like Times interviews, videos, live witnessing of the acts themselves and interviews from pastors. The topic itself was strange.
I was raised Catholic and always thought of the Evangelists on TV as crazy people, and I could only imagine actually seeing these guys ripping apart phone books "in the name of God." What I did notice was the repeat reference to the formulaic design of their program. I just watched a documentary in sociology class about the marketing of "cool" to adolescence. It focused on MTV and Sprite and how they market to youth. It also mentioned WWF and how it attracts guys. The Power Team openly admits to this same marketing ploys.
Another point was the "feminisation" of Christianity. Basically, Christianity is "uncool" to young males. The goal of the Power team is to make Christianity cool again. But some of the strongest examples of faith in the Bible are of females, like Mary.
Sunday, April 3, 2011
tic tic tic....
We were asked to read "A Plague of Tics" by David Sedaris and respond. I really don't have anything to say, which is shocking I know. The story is an account of a child's struggle with OCD. It is interesting and easy to read, but I don't know if I would consider it humor. It's sort of tragic, in that he is dealing with a serious problem and his teachers assume he is just a problem child and his mother uses his problem as a way of getting attention.
What I wasn't expecting was the author's voice, which we listened to in class. I read the article first and my interpretation of the voice was sort of sarcastic and comedic, but in class he had this mousy miserable monotone (holy M's Batman!) voice that made the story just sad!
The end of the story shows his resolution, smoking cigarettes. It's not so much a cure as a refocusing of his tics elsewhere.
I did notice at one point in the story his mother mentions that his father saves everything. Hoarding is a more complex form of OCD and this may show some heredity to the disorder that no one in the family is noticing.
What I wasn't expecting was the author's voice, which we listened to in class. I read the article first and my interpretation of the voice was sort of sarcastic and comedic, but in class he had this mousy miserable monotone (holy M's Batman!) voice that made the story just sad!
The end of the story shows his resolution, smoking cigarettes. It's not so much a cure as a refocusing of his tics elsewhere.
I did notice at one point in the story his mother mentions that his father saves everything. Hoarding is a more complex form of OCD and this may show some heredity to the disorder that no one in the family is noticing.
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