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[edit] Hunger as Ideology first draft

In “Hunger as Ideology” by Susan Bordo, the speaker makes a number of claims that support her argument of food in relation to gender dualities. (Try including WHAT her argument is in this first sentence.) She tries to expose the deeper origin of distorted body image eating disorder and: a permanent, baneful ideology that has held women captives of their own desires. (Colon is not necessary. Instead you need commas like this: distorted body image, eating disorders, and a permanent...) Rhetorical strategies: ethos, pathos and logos, are being used throughout the article to improve her effectiveness, clarity and enjoyment. (Commas should come before 'and' (pathos, and logos) and find a way to remove colon agian.) She discusses five major topics which include “The Woman Who Doesn’t Eat Much”, “Gender, Hunger, and Desire”, “Food and Love”, “Food as Transgression” and “Destabilizing Images”. In each topic, she gives interesting and effective examples to support her position, argument and identity. (You don't need to name the sections :)

Bordo claims that “While masculinity demands a celebratory, even voracious appetite, women are encouraged to indulge only in small amounts to demonstrate a lack of all desires even about the basic need to eat.” She says “Men, of course, are supposed to have hearty, even voracious, appetites.” because it resembles masculinity and sexual aggressiveness. (I don't think you need this quote! It repeats previous sentence...just write your own words here) In contrast, women should feel shameful and guilty when they are eating “too” much or even just desiring to eat. Giving the example of fashionable model Kate Moss, the speaker says, “We all knew that they had to be skinny ‘to photograph well.’” She points out that it is cool when women are emotionally and mentally opaque and vacant about food. She also gives historical evidence saying that “Victorian’s young girls (Young Victorian girls) were admonished (word choice) to “be frugal and plain in your tastes.” This claim is the logos of the article because the speaker states society’s philosophy and reasoning of men's and women’s different “relationships” with food. (Note that it's more like the origin of these philosophies)

The speaker addresses the audience through emotional and characteristic appeal (Pathos and ethos). (Period comes after parenthesis) Her target audiences are women. (Plural disagreement: Should be "audience is woman(kind)" or "readers are women") She talked about food equated with maternal and wifely love and women find love in food. (I'm confused here. Maybe it could say women finding love?) “A woman admits to spending a lot of time alone with her “latest obsession”, chocolate drink, because it gives her “the same feeling as being love.” (Don't just throw the quote out there - talk about it! What does it mean?) Other audiences (another audience) would be film and advertisement producers. She gives many dialogs of advertisement of movies to relate eating and food to products and film lines. (She gives advertisement dialogues...) She uses product ads that are well known and popular among her audiences such as Nestle’s Toll House Cookies, Jell-O and Hershey’s kisses. Different culture represent different attitudes for food. (cultures) For French women, “Eating has become, for her, no big deal.” Contrastingly, a commercial by an African American woman who promotes Virginia Slim Menthol, she says “Decisions are easy. When I get a fork in the road, I eat.” “Undominated by unsatisfied, internal need, she eats not only freely but without deep desire and without apparent consequence.” (These commercials are actually American! Talk about what attitudes these commercials show)

Bordo is the speaker of the article. (To flow better this could say something like "As the speaker, Bordo takes the role of a teacher." and then go on to quotation) She is a teacher as she mentions, “women students of mine complain (about the) tortures of the cafeteria- the embarrassment of eating ice cream in front of male students, the pressure to take just a salad, or better yet, refuse food altogether. (quotation mark) Her position is that she thinks it is unfair to have society’s bias and unequal expectations on the amount of food men and women consume. (argument, add to beginning?) She writes, “And yet, (remove this) intruding into this world of gender equality and eating realism that is designed to appeal to the sensibilities of “progressive” young men and women is the inescapable disparity in how much and how the man and woman are eating.” She used the word “rather” many times to rectify the audiences misconceptions or further explain the idea. “ Eating is not really a metaphor for the sexual act; rather, the sexual act, when initiated and desired by a woman, is imagined as itself an act of eating, of incorporation and destruction of the object of desire.” (Hmm...is use of the word 'rather' really important? Discuss it! And, the second to last quote about progressive men and women is not explained!)

[edit] Peer Review - Hunger as Ideology draft 1

Although there were many grammatical and punctuational errors, I think you should focus on elaboration. You make a lot of different points throughout the essay. Now what would be helpful is to organize them - figure out which ones are really strong and whether or not you want to remove any. Then, try to have one point per paragraph. In the first paragraph, after the introduction, are you stating Bordo's argument? If so, summarize it at the end of the paragraph like you did at the end of the essay (you said "her position is that she thinks it is unfair to have society's bias...etc"). In the second paragraph its clear what the audiences are but the strategies aren't explained. How do pathos and ethos apply to the audiences of women and advertisers?

I think my main criticizm is just that there's too much information squished together. Try to elaborate on each point - if you say that Bordo is a teacher or that she uses the logos strategy in one quote, ask yourself how and why. Try to answer these questions in the essay. Really draw out the points so that you can organize them into their own paragraphs...right now there are rhetorical strategies and separate arguments mixed in together, which can confuse the reader.

Overall I think you understand the article and rhetorical strategies, you just need to explain yourself better. You could form your own personal argument in whatever direction you like. Do you agree or disagree? Do you think Bordo's strategies were effective? Find something that interests you!

-Magicsofa 12:49, 1 November 2006 (EST)