Day 5: How do I plan and tell my story?
Issues
- How is the framing of a piece communicated?
- How does framing relate to the genre of a piece?
- How does framing relate to an author's predispositions?
- What's the right balance between the voices in a story, including the author's own?
- Who is a story supposed to please? Who will it antagonize?
Background
Source
Issue
Text
George Lakoff and Mark Johnson, from Metaphors We Live By
[JB: Paraphrased]
Rational argument: a characteristic of “good” journalism or a figment?
Part of being a rational animal involves getting what you want without subjecting yourself to the dangers of actual physical conflict. [However, our understanding of rational argument relies on the metaphors of war,] you attack, defend, counterattack, often with tactics involving intimidation, threat, insult, belittling, evasion, flattering, and so on.
There are segments of our culture where such tactics are frowned upon, including journalism, which aspires to a higher ideal of rational argument, but the war metaphor still applies. Positions are defended and you win; positions crumble and you lose.
George Lakoff and Mark Johnson, from Metaphors We Live By
[JB: Paraphrased]
Negotiating meaning
To negotiate meaning with someone, you have to become aware of and respect the significant differences in your backgrounds. You also need patience, a certain flexibility in world view, and a generous tolerance for mistakes, as well as a talent for finding the right metaphor to communicate the relevant parts of your shared and unshared experiences. Metaphorical imagination is a crucial skill in creating rapport.
The Art of Opinion Writing, chapter on Ellen Goodman
Key components in opinion writing.
“You need a beginning, a middle, and an end. Every column is a story in that you need to give people the facts, as you understand them, and an understanding of the issue. Sometimes it’s a personal story, and you hope it has a through-line that leads to a conclusion with a kicker of some kind, an ending that satisfies as you’re leaving it.”
The Art of Opinion Writing, chapter on Jeffrey Seglin
Ask yourself three questions about your opinion piece.
“Do I have a point?
What is it?
Who cares?”
The Art of Opinion Writing, chapter on Robert Koehler
Voice and mind of the author
“You cannot take a writer’s voice out of the writing and still have deep validity.
There is no such think as objective reporting. How you approach a story or organize it is still subjective.
When you take your own voice out of your writing, you become a stenographer for the powerful.
Hannah Geffert, Keep guns out of campus classrooms, LtE to SOJ, 2/8/23
(Excerpted)
Arguing against the Campus Carry bill passed by the WV legislature. The bill was later passed and sent to the governor for signing into law.
Geffert was a Shepherd University professor and a WV Democratic Senator
Free exchange of ideas cannot take place when one or more of the people in the classroom are armed. This is because guns are often perceived as making an implied threat. That is, after all, a purpose of carrying a deadly weapon. That kind of implied threat has no place in a classroom. Allowing guns on campus will lead to violence.
The bill forbids the state or any state school from being held liable for any injury caused by a shooting on campus. There is no need for protection from lawsuits if the authors of the bill really think that their bill will cause no harm. Thus, SB 10 says, in effect, we know people will be hurt by the bill, but you can’t blame us. When the inevitable shooting occurs, those who vote for SB 10 should remember the words of the religious philosopher Abraham Heschel: “Few are guilty, but all are responsible.”
Gary Dungan, A case for campus gun carry, LtE to SOJ, 2/22/23
(Excerpted)
Arguing for campus carry in response to Geffert’s LtE
Dungan was in the military.
Hannah Geffert says anecdotally that based on her 20 years as a Shepherd University professor, guns have no place at a place of learning. Leaving aside the question of how much “learning” occurred in her classes, I would like to point out that a gun has appeared on the campus of Shepherd in the past. [He refers to a shooting incident in 2006 in which two students were killed by their father. He doesn’t detail the incident.]
Geffert says that the purpose of carrying a deadly weapon is to make an implied threat for intimidation. In my anecdotal experience, the purpose of legally carrying a deadly weapon on a college campus is for protection of yourself, your fellow students and your professors. Kudos to the Legislature for allowing for a few well-qualified and well-armed shepherds to be present among the now defenseless sheep at Shepherd.
Anna Mary Walsh, Promote responsible gun ownership, LoE to SOJ, 3/1/23
(Excerpted)
Responding to Dungan’s LtE
Walsh was in administration at Shepherd University for 30 years.
The 2006 killing of two students on Shepherd’s campus [was committed] by their father who shot them on Labor Day weekend. Had the 26 and 24 year old brothers had guns, do you think they would have shot their 46-year-old father? [The father then killed himself.] Another sad note is that he’d purchased the gun just two day prior to the murders.
It’s very sad that there will be no legislation dealing with red flag laws in West Virginia….Gun ownership needs to gain back the respect it had decades ago by making it extremely difficult for those who don’t follow rules of gun ownership to have access to one. Those who abuse the right to have a gun have no idea what the gun represents. And it isn’t to play cops and robbers.
Discussion Questions
- What genres do you have a preference for?
- What standards do you set for yourself to determine the quality of a piece?
- What are the metaphors you rely on to present your message?
- How open to "rational argument" are you?
Application
Do a back and forth on the issue of abortion. What are the dominant metaphors in the pro and con arguments? Why aren’t the arguments of one side looked on as reasonable by the other? Is there any prospect or hope of “meeting in the middle” somehow?
Another example. In a recent column in the Washington Post, Phillip Bump presented poll data that showed an uptick in the number of Democrats between 2022 and 2023 on how “worried you are about crime.” Let’s think about this.