Hook: Mention how nearly all members of America’s millennial generation have smartphones, contrasting views of how they play into social interactions – good or bad?
-Provide overview of relevance of the debate to Penn State students and young adults generally
Introduce Nina Jablonski speech and her proposal for students to put aside their cell phones for the next four years, get to know opportunities and people on campus
– Rhetorical strategies she uses to convince students of the importance of putting away devices
- Presents herself as not just anti-technology, concerned for welfare of students (ethos)
- People can do amazing things – taps into optimism and potential of college freshmen (pathos)
- Lists the diversity and volume of new experiences available at Penn State (logos)
- Social media and electronics are familiar but stunt social growth
- Commonplaces: college is a place where students experience the formative years of their lives, but it’s upt to them to seize the chance
Summarize content of Verizon ad, represents a counterpoint to Jablonski’s speech
-Rhetorical strategies employed in the advertisement
- Appeals to human desire for connections (pathos)
- Depicts millennial actors doing hip millennial stuff-eating at food trucks, checking phones (ethos)
- With Verizon, people can stay connected to their friends all the time with 4G LTE data (logos)
- Commonplaces: millennials expect to stay connected to the world via their mobile devices while they are on the go, society is moving too fast to even miss a minute of news or social media post
-Mention similarities between the two pieces of rhetoric:
- Both target millennial audiences
- Incorporate culture, values and expectations of millennials
- Do cell phones hinder development of young people or help it? (reiterate question)