Tag Archives: RCL

Why We Dance: The Story of THON

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With this weekend being the first of the three canning weekends for THON, the overall excitement for THON is growing around campus. In less than 142 days, we will dance for a cure, in hope that one day we will dance in celebration. This Thursday, WPSU, and many other affiliates of PBS in Pennsylvania will be showing the THON Documentary: Why We Dance. This week, I want to evaluate the civic artifact that is the documentary’s trailer.

I strongly encourage anyone reading this to go watch the trailer at http://wpsu.org/thondocumentary. Not only will it help you follow along with my blog, but it should make a profound impact on your view of THON and what we are doing here. That being said, you could also just watch the whole documentary on Thursday night at 8. Aside from being emotionally moving, the trailer is both rhetorically effective and civically engaging.

The main rhetorical strategy utilized by the trailer is the use of Pathos. Quite simply, if you don’t find the documentary emotionally moving, nothing will. The makers of the THON documentary appeal to our emotions in order to captivate us. Whether it is the parent’s stories, the children’s smiles, or the incredible positive attitudes of everyone involved, the THON documentary creates an effective appeal to our emotions in a call to introduce us to the amazing process of THON.

That brings us to the civic engagement part of the documentary. In our speeches, many of us defined civic engagement as being a part of a larger group than yourself, or something along those lines. This documentary shows the amazing works of the entirely student-run program not only to inform the public, but to engage the public. A cause with the magnitude of THON doesn’t happen overnight, and it takes more than a few people to happen. This documentary shows us how we are surrounded by an amazing opportunity to be a part of something that makes a real difference in many lives, and calls for every Penn State student to use our time here to make a lasting positive impact.

Atlas Dinner at Five Guys

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Last night, most of the THON group Atlas went to a fundraising dinner at Five Guys. A portion of all of the profits that the restaurant made that night went to Atlas, making it one of our first fundraisers. On the surface, it was a fun night. Recently, all of the members of the club were sorted into “houses,” and we went with those houses for an evening of dinner and meeting new people.

However, this night went much deeper than the experiences we shared while eating some good burgers and far too many fries. This event was the first of many civic engagement events through Atlas. Just yesterday, I spent three minutes of our morning together arguing that civic engagement is as simple as understanding you are a part of something larger than yourself, and working toward building that larger entity. This evening was the first of many civic engagement opportunities through Atlas. In two weeks is the first canning weekend for THON, and not long after that comes Homecoming.

See, clubs like Atlas are unique because they are founded for the sole purpose of bringing people together for a common cause. It’s not just Atlas; other THON groups such as Springfield, Apollo, A7, and many others all give a unique way to get involved. The social atmosphere that comes with clubs like these is almost simply a byproduct of the community produced by people working together for a common goal.

As for the civic engagement of our dinner last night? It was great to see a line out the door of all people from Atlas, working together, sacrificing their time and their LionCash to help a great cause hit the ground running here in 2012. Everyone there last night understood, whether consciously or not, that they were a part of something larger than themselves; and some point down the road their actions would pay dividends For The Kids.

Fight the Power

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In the 1980s, the radio waves of Hip-Hop stations everywhere were dominated by a few prominent rap groups. One of these groups was Public Enemy; a collection of young rappers and a MC from New York. The beats and lyrics of Public Enemy ran in the minds of young African Americans all across America, and became the voice of a generation. Undoubtedly, Public Enemy’s most popular and influential song was Fight the Power (1989). A song carrying the undertones of Malcom X’s revolution by any means possible, Fight the Power is full of “revolutionary rhetoric” that calls to “fight the powers that be.” (Watrous 1990)

It is this call to revolution that inspired writer/director/producer Spike Lee to use Fight the Power as the soundtrack and backbone of his film Do the Right Thing (1989). In Do the Right Thing, main character Radio Raheem is characterized by his ever-present boombox radio, blasting Fight the Power like a broken record. In the film, Raheem’s stubborn playing of his boombox leads to his tragic death at the hands of the police. It can be argued that Lee is trying to depict a society trying to kill the revolution broadcasted by Fight the Power and embodied by Radio Raheem.

In Do the Right Thing, Lee displays a stereotypical ghetto in Brooklyn, New York, complete with racial tensions so prominent that they are, at one theatrical milestone, shouted at the audience in a string of extreme close-up, one-shot scenes. These not-so-secret tensions boil over, leading to an inauspicious conflict-to-end-all-conflicts. Lee uses this destructive riot, which includes the death of Radio Raheem, to display the consequences of the uncontrolled spite that racism can build.

It is difficult for the casual observer to find the actual rhetoric below the surface of revolution in Do the Right Thing. Rhetoric as we know it is best embodied in the character of Mayor. Mayor is a pillar of the community, despite the lack of respect he receives. His best quote is simple advice to a young black man: always do the right thing. Among the madness of the climactic riot of the movie, Mayor is a voice of reason; he calls for everyone to step back and think before they fight fire with fire. Nobody listens. The community’s ignorance results in death and destruction; exactly what the world sees when rhetoric fails and violence takes over.

Work Cited:

Watrous, Peter. “Recordings; Public Enemy Makes Waves – and Compelling Music.” The New York Times. April 22, 1990.