Mastering the SAT Reading Section

Use topic sentences to build an outline and â€Å"road map† of the passage. For many, the reading section of the SAT is daunting—sure, you’ve read plenty of books over the years and your vocabulary isn’t half bad, but the prospect of analyzing four long and two shorter passages over the course of only 65 minutes can feel like an impossible task. Luckily, as with most of the SAT, solid strategies can make the process feel a much more manageable—and maybe even a little bit enjoyable! Here are a few strategies to help you get started. Use topic sentences to build an outline and â€Å"road map† of the passage. When you’re first working with a passage, especially a non-fiction passage with more than one or two paragraphs, use the topic sentences (the first sentence of each paragraph) to determine the main idea and trajectory of the passage. If you don’t consider yourself a â€Å"fast reader,† this can be a great first approach to a passage in place of a skim. A topic sentence gives a fairly clear statement of the main purpose of its paragraph, and when you weave all topic sentences together, you’ve got an outline—pretty helpful when you’re trying to figure out main purpose or trying to determine how an author’s argument changes over the course of a passage. Read the blurbs. The SAT includes a brief blurb—sometimes of only a few words—above each passage, detailing the author, title, and sometimes background info for each piece. The blurb can be incredibly helpful, so it’s a great idea to glance at it before diving in. For example, you might learn that a passage discussing the nature of freedom is written by Martin Luther King, Jr., so even if the text is dense, you can make a pretty good guess regarding the author’s main idea. Try â€Å"translating† tricky text. You’ve read dense books in English class, so why do some of the passages on the reading section seem so impossible to understand? Short answer: that’s the point. The SAT folks are selecting excerpts designed to challenge you, so of course they’re going to include writing from 1872 packed with flowery language or legal jargon. When you’re confronted with a passage that flies over your head, don’t despair! Try translating the passage, sentence by sentence, into your own words. For example: â€Å"But on another level of ideas, the question changes and may be easily resolved.† âž ¡Ã¯ ¸  When you think about it differently, the question is different and easy to answer. Once you’ve figured out the author’s main point in a paragraph, feel free to jump ahead—old-timey authors love a high word count, so don’t be surprised if an entire passage only contains one or two distinct ideas. Understanding main idea is key. If you’ve tried translating the passage, and you still can’t figure out the details of what’s going on, stick to determining the overall main idea of the passage. Once you figure out, for example, that the author is in support of women’s suffrage, it makes it easier to determine the steps the author takes along the way. By translating the details of the passage while keeping the main idea in mind, you can make the process a lot less frustrating. Once you’ve figured out what strategies work best for you, it’s important to practice with them! The more reading passages you make it through, the more confident you’ll feel, and the higher your score will be on test day. Standardized test preparation doesn’t have to be painful. Our SAT test prep tutors, like Elizabeth, can help you keep your cool. We offer tailored tutoring plans, strategic preparation, and a data-driven approach. Work with us in-person in Boston and New York, or online anywhere around the world. ; Want to learn more about preparing for the SAT? Check out some of our previous blog posts below: SAT Reading: Which comes first? The passage or the question? 7 Test Day Tips for the SAT How to Ace the SAT Math Section

Writing an Essay for American Issues

<h1>Writing an Essay for American Issues</h1><p>To compose an exposition for American Issues, you have a decision of perusing the points and looking into data on the web. You may likewise require a program to make your own themes or consider utilizing points discovered on the web. There are an assortment of sites out there where you can discover a rundown of subjects or go to your preferred web crawler and quest for points. For this technique to work, you'll have to realize what you are looking for.</p><p></p><p>Since the point is American Issues, you may require a degree in topography or history. This might be the situation in the event that you have invested energy going around the United States or even abroad. This is significant on the grounds that geology is one of the fundamental zones secured by the theme. On the off chance that you are composing as an understudy, topography is basic to the subject. The points you should incorporate mu st have some connect to topography or ought to be pertinent to the theme at hand.</p><p></p><p>The principle things to remember for the subjects is your feeling about the theme. A decent method to keep your conclusions straight is to compose an article titled 'The Truth About My Opinion on _____'. Here you will incorporate any assessments you have in regards to specific parts of the subject, how it influences you and others and any foundation data you can provide.</p><p></p><p>Another interesting point when expounding on American Issues is the world perspective on the peruser. While having a conclusion is consistently significant, you would prefer not to lose the capacity to represent yourself. The subject should cover things like the United States and the world, different countries and issues of significance to you by and by and this can be remembered for the topic.</p><p></p><p>If you pick a rundown of points that are known by most, there are choices you have. It might be to incorporate subjects you have never known about or to discover a rundown of themes that relate to you and your inclinations. Another alternative is to concocted subjects dependent on points you have known about or researched.</p><p></p><p>One of the more significant viewpoints to recall when expounding on American Issues is the length of the paper. The papers you will compose should be lengthier than a two page report on any subject you know. The explanation behind this is on the grounds that you need to think of points that will address the whole subject and the articles ought not run too long.</p><p></p><p>When composing for American Issues, you have a few choices accessible. You can utilize a theme you have examined yourself or you can search for subjects in the web indexes and read articles to help you along.</p>

Film JFK Narrative

Sample details Pages: 18 Words: 5541 Downloads: 9 Date added: 2017/06/26 Category Cinematographic Art Essay Type Narrative essay Topics: John F Kennedy Essay Did you like this example? Both films, for example, pore over minutae that may or may not be significant (umbrellas opening in JFK, a dropped thickshake in The Thin Blue Line) to draw the viewer ever more deeply into the world of the crime scene. Yet neither film stops at a simple recitation of facts: both look at the States role in events and suggest an explanation for the alleged cover up. In JFK, this is Stones highly controversial suggestion that the CIA and the military-industrial complex had a vested interest in seeing President Kennedy dead because he was shortly to scale down Americas involvement in Vietnam. Don’t waste time! Our writers will create an original "Film JFK Narrative | Film Studies Dissertations" essay for you Create order In The Thin Blue Line, two related theories are suggested for the official insistence on trying Randall Adams: firstly, that David Harris account had the advantage of providing the police with an eye-witness, while if Harris was himself the murderer, no reliable witness existed; and secondly, that Harris could not be tried as an adult, thus robbing the District Attorney of the much-sought death sentence for the murder of a policeman. These theories are communicated through devices commonly associated with fictional narratives, such as a highly evocative musical score (Phillip Glass music for The Thin Blue Line invokes a melancholy sense of helplessness, while John Williams score for JFK has a more urgent tone, suggestive of furtive conspiracies and forces careening out of control). And both counterpoint different modes of filmmaking as they do so, contrasting invented material filmed in a classical Hollywood style with documentary or faux-documentary footage. The similarity in effect of the two films fast-paced juxtaposition of styles is striking, and suggests Stones approach may have been influenced by Morris work. Yet while both films have an over-riding concern with the filmmaker uncovering facts, that might be called the outer narrative, each constructs a contrasting relationship between the narrative and documentary elements within the text. In JFK, Stone uses an interior narrative of Jim Garrison (Kevin Costner) investigating the case. While Garrison is essentially a surrogate for the filmmaker, so that the film cannot be considered as the story of Jim Garrison,3 this narrative is provided moments that function simply as character drama with little or no relationship to the larger argument (such as Garrisons arguments and reconciliation with his wife, or a Norman Rockwell moment4 with his children). This, then, is an example of classical Hollywood-style fictional filmmaking. This is then ruptured by the moments of documentary and faux-documentary that expand on Stones argument as it is being expressed by Garrison. This includes what we might call genuine documentary material: the Zapruder film of the assassination and archival photographs (such as of Kennedys autopsy, or the photograph of Lee Harvey Oswald holding the rifle). It also includes a large number of re-enactments, which are very often presented in a simulated documentary style (grainy or black and white film stock, hand-held cameras). This faux-documentary material is often juxtaposed with the genuine documentary material in a manner that blends the two together (the Zapruder footage is matched by staged footage using similar film stock, and the autopsy photographs are intercut with shots of a wax dummy of Kennedy). The Thin Blue Line shares the same outer narrative (filmmaker investigating), but the inner narrative (the story of Randall Adams) is not constructed in a classical Hollywood style. Instead, it is told through one of the standard modes of documentary filmmaking identified by Bill Nichols5: direct address by participants in an interview format (with the interviewer removed through editing). As with Stones film, this inner narrative is supported by evidence, but again the mode of presentation is reversed: the principal method used to support the witnesses testimony is through reconstructions of the crime scene that, while stylized and fragmented, are constructed as a miniature classically constructed narrative. This nesting of different modes might be tabulated as follows: My point, however, is that the films differ in mode, but use mirror-image forms of the same structure. JFK is primarily a fictional film, which employs a documentary style when re-enacting speculated events. The Thin Blue Line is primarily a documentary, but employs a style borrowed from fictional films in its re-enactments. If the two films share so much in common, and slide so fluidly from documentary to fictional modes so quickly, does this suggest the difference in the two forms might be largely cosmetic? Fiction can be used to express truths about the real world, and the documentary is can be used in ways that obscure the truth or construct falsehoods. If the fundamental difference between fiction and non-fiction is taken as the link to the real, and it is shown that documentaries and fictions share similar relationships to the real, then the two forms start to look more alike: not the same, exactly, but similar. JFK and The Thin Blue Line, by this way of thinking, are then only superficially different types of movies. They share the same structure and the fiction versus documentary dichotomy is more like a difference in genre than a fundamental distinction. This is not to invest the superficial crossover of techniques between the two forms with a significance it does not posses. Documentaries are not fictions just because The Blair Witch Project (1999) does such a good job of pretending to be a real document, or even because Rats in the Ranks (1996) works so well as a narrative. Rather, the downplaying of the documentary / fiction division is based upon a deep-seated cynicism about claims to truth in documentary. That there is such reluctance to accept truth at face value in documentary should not be surprising. Early or classic film studies was based largely on arguments about the relationships between film and reality. While this debate is too detailed to fully explore, it is important to touch upon briefly because much writing upon documentary echoes the arguments of these early writers. The direct link to reality might be seen as a defining feature of the documentary, but it was also seen in the first half of the century as one of the defining features of the film medium itself. The cinema appeared to be an even more perfect method for mechanically reproducing reality than the still photographs that preceded it. This added urgency to arguments of aesthetics that centred on whether the role of the artist was to attempt to recreate the real world, or rather to interpret or even transcend the real.6 These arguments were therefore central to classic film theory and resolved into two broad strands of argument that echo the aesthetic positions described. Thus writers such as Siegfried Kraceur and Andre Bazin had approaches that emphasised films role as a mirror to the real. Of more interest to the current discussion, however, are early anti-realists such as Rudolf Arnheim. In his Film as Art, his defence for cinemas status as serious artistic medium (rather than a mechanical process) is built a round a series of explanations of the way in which film differs from the real.7 Three dimensional surfaces are projected on a plane surface. Perception of depth is lost. In the black and white cinema with reference to which Arnheim formulated his thesis, colour is eliminated. Lighting distorts. Editing interrupts the flow of time and creates artistic possibilities through the use of montage. Non-visual stimulus is absent (or, after the coming of sound, limited), and even the visual world is limited by the edge of the screen. This catalogue of distortions is, for Arnheim, the very basis for the creation of aesthetic systems by which films can signify meanings. After establishing the above points, he sets about demonstrating how each of these limitations in depicting the real is used as a method of artistic expression8. Subsequent film theory moved beyond Arnheims formulations, but has tended to take them as a given in the sense that few would still argue that the central project of film is limited to the reproduction or reflection of reality. Given that such formulations are at the foundation of later film theory, it should not be surprising that they were echoed when subsequent theorists turned their minds to issues regarding documentary, and particularly its relation to the real. Nol Carroll attributes much of this writing to a backlash against premature claims by proponents of direct cinema that their method of cinema provided unmitigated access to the real.9 These documentarists attempted to avoid the filmmakers intervention and interpretation, reacting to the overt imposition of a viewpoint present in traditional Griersonian forms of documentary. However, as Carroll puts it, [d]irect cinema opened a can of worms and then got eaten by them.10 It was quickly argued that direct cinema was every bit as interpretive as Griersonian documentaries. For the distortions of reality that were identified by Arnheim are equally present in documentary cinema, but with different implications. Instead of being the unambiguously positive means to artistic expression, every limitation of the medium is instead a problematic point of mediation by the filmmaker. The limitations of the film frame, for example, force choices upon even the most non-interventionist direct cinema filmmaker. And with every choice the filmmaker is placing the film at a greater distance from reality. Carroll quotes Eric Barnouw making this point: To be sure, some documentarists claim to be objective a term that seems to renounce an interpretive role. The claim may be strategic, but it is surely meaningless. The documentarist, like any communicator in any medium, makes endless choices. He [sic] selects topics, people, vistas, angles, lens, juxtapositions, sounds, words. Each selection is an expression of his point of view, whether he is aware of it or not, whether he acknowledges it or not. Even behind the first step, selection of a topic, there is a motive It is in selecting and arranging his findings that he expresses himself; these choices are, in effect, comments. And whether he adopts the stance of observer, or chronicler or whatever, he cannot escape his subjectivity. He presents his version of the world.11 Such an argument certainly seems to cast doubt over the potential for objectivity in documentary cinema. Carried to an extreme, it is the presentation of a version of the world rather than the world itself that can be seen as rendering documentary a form of fiction. Either way, the prospects for documentary truth in such a model seem grim indeed. It should be noted that Carroll puts little faith in such an approach to documentary, and his counter-argument will be returned to. Before doing so, however, it is worth noting that more recently, Carroll has drawn the distinction between what he calls the selectivity argument (recited above) and more global postmodern scepticism of claims to truth.12 The latter is based not in the assumptions of classical film studies, but rather the wider discussions about the way any human discourse imposes meaning and structure on real events. For example, historical accounts impose a narrative structure onto events to make them intelligible, and a distinction must be drawn between the real events (which actually occurred) and the account (which lacks an independent historical existence): The states of affairs and events the historian alludes to do have a basis in historical reality, and the historians claims about those states of affairs and events can be literally true or false. But the narratives in which those states of affairs and events figure are inventions, constructions, indeed, fictions. The narrative structure in the historical recounting is not true or false; it is fictional.13 This point of such an observation may seem a little obscure. If the narrative structure imposed in a historical account is considered independently of the statements of historical fact that it is used to explain, then of course it must be considered fictional. If, however, a documentary text is considered in its entirety, then it is open to questioning about the validity of the historians factual claims (including analysis as to whether the narrative structure is an accurate or fair way of interpreting the real events) in a way that fiction is not. Certainly the argument is here being posed by Carroll (albeit following Michael Renov and Hayden White) as a prelude to arguing that it is unsupportable14. However, Carroll also refers to an alternative model for looking at the link between non-fiction and fiction, mounted by Bill Nichols in his book Representing Reality, which is more subtle and worth dealing with directly. Nichols, unlike the other theorists alluded to by Carroll, does not argue that documentaries must be considered fiction. He recognises that the existence of an external, real-world referent is an important distinction that cannot be dismissed as irrelevant. The world of a fiction film is a unique, imaginary domain, but the world of documentary is different: Instead of a world, we are offered access to the world.15 This claim to representation of the real means that documentaries are not simply narratives: they are also argumentative, if only in the sense that they make claims (even if only implicitly) about what is true. They are therefore a fiction (un)like any other.16 However, Nichols remains troubled by these claims to truth. While the documentary is distinguished from fiction by its links to the real, this representation is rendered problematic by the apparent impossibility of rendering truth objectively. Documentaries, while not fiction, share with fiction those very qualities that thoroughly compromise any rigorous objectivity, if they dont make it impossible Objectivity has been under no less siege than realism, and for many of the same reasons. It, too, is a way of representing the world that denies its own processes of construction and their formative effect. Any given standard for objectivity will have embedded political assumptions In documentary, these assumptions might include belief in the self-evident nature of facts, in rhetorical persuasion as a necessary and appropriate part of representation, and in the capacity of the documentary text to affect its audience through its implicit or explicit claim of This is so, isnt it?17 Nichols argument is reminiscent of those strands of theoretical thought that view ideology as an inescapable and all pervasive force. Documentaries do make claims about the truth that are open to evaluation, but unfortunately, according to Nichols, our institutional mechanisms for assessing such claims are themselves suspect. If such an approach is accepted, evaluation of the arguments made by Oliver Stone and Errol Morris might be highly problematic. Carroll, however, is not willing to concede that any of these arguments establish either that non-fiction is a form of fiction, or that objectivity is impossible. Firstly, he argues that the cinema does not posses any unique tendency towards bias compared to other media. The same arguments about selectivity that Barnouw raises with respect to film are equally applicable to other media and fields of enquiry.18 The particular causes of distortion may be different, but any historian for example may select, manipulate, interpret or emphasise aspects of their material just as a documentary maker can. Thus if non-fiction film is said to be subjective due to its selectivity, so must any field of human enquiry, such as history and science. In the earlier of the two articles I have discussed (written in 1983), Carroll is confident that such a wide-ranging scepticism would not be seriously proposed.19 As we have seen, by 1996 that was exactly the argument Carroll was responding to. Nevertheless, in 1983 his defence against the selectivity argument is based upon the notion of objectivity. In any given field of argument, at any given time, there are patterns of reasoning, standards for observation, and methods for assessing evidence which are used for getting to the truth.20 A piece of research is considered objective insofar as it abides by these norms. Likewise, non-fiction films may be assessed against similar codes, and will be considered biased or subjective if they fail to meet them. That selectivity may make bias possible, or even likely, does not preclude the possibility of a film according with established standards of objectivity. The obvious differences between the real world and the filmed presentation prevent film from substituting for lived experience, but they do not prevent documentaries from being objective. This central assumption of this argument that there are standards of objectivity that can be used to judge the truth is exactly the assumption that we have seen Bill Nichols question. Carroll, however, disputes all of Nichols contentions that are cited above. Firstly, he does not accept that objectivity demands that a film call attention to its processes of construction. After all, the fact that a non-fiction film is constructed is understood by any audience and does not need to be spelt out. Self-reflexive analyses of the filmmaking process or the authors own subjectivity might be a feature of many recent documentaries, but for Carrol this is an artistic device, rather than a necessary benchmark for objectivity. Nor does he accept that any standard for objectivity has embedded political assumptions, even accepting Nichols very broad definitions (outlined above) of what constitutes a political assumption. A belief in the self-evident nature of facts, for example, might be a political assumption when the facts being presented are politically charged falsehoods. Yet the acceptance that some claims of self-evident truth are suspect does not mean that there can be no self-evident facts. With regards to rhetorical persuasion, he argues that films can either eschew such devices altogether (he cites nature documentaries as an example),21 or employ rhetorical structures in the service of objective discourse. Similarly, he regards the implicit claim that this is so, isnt it as present in virtually any assertion and hence neither a political assumption nor a barrier to objectivity. Carrolls approach to these arguments about the prospects for truth or objectivity in documentary is often to return to examples where the truth claimed by the documentary seems clear and uncontentious (as with his common use of nature documentaries as discussion points). The linking thread of the arguments he presents is that the theorists he criticises have mistaken the difficulty in presenting objective truth for an impossibility, often by focussing on exactly the texts where the truth is most problematic.22 It is worth returning to The Thin Blue Line and JFK at this point, since these films both explore events that are subject to considerable conjecture. Neither could be accused of assuming the truth about these events is self-evident (quite the opposite), yet both nevertheless ultimately make vital factual claims. As noted already, these claims question state-sanctioned verdicts, and both films led to a public discussion that forced official re-examination of the cases: The Thin Blue Line forced the retrial of Randall Adams, while JFK contributed to the passing of the President John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Collection Act of 1992, which appointed an Assassination Records Review Board (AARB) to re-examine unreleased information about the assassination.23 More than a decade later, with Randall Adams freed from jail, it seems fair to say that Morris case has been widely accepted as true. Oliver Stone, too, has been partially vindicated by subsequent re-examination of the case, with records released by the AARB that support some of his allegations (such as tampering with records of Kennedys autopsy).24 Yet, despite such small victories, and acceptance by many filmgoers of Stones theory of the assassination, JFK remains subject to fierce scholarly criticism of both its methods and conclusions that stands in contrast to the reception of The Thin Blue Line. Linda Williams, in her discussion of the two films, dismisses JFK as paranoid fiction,25 and the widespread condemnation of Stones film by both popular and academic press is well documented.26 Clearly this has much to do with the nature of the case Stone discusses. The Kennedy assassination, for obvious reasons, is a much more familiar event and one that had been the subject of considerably more public discussion than the Randall Adams prosecution. Furthermore, while The Thin Blue Line avoids underlining the political implications of its own conclusions, JFK is explicitly critical of the government and media, calling the assassination a coup detat and coming very close to suggesting former president Lyndon Johnson was involved.27 However, the difference in the reception of the two films cannot be explained simply through reference to the argument each presents. Within the very similar structures outlined at the start of this essay, there are also crucial differences that also explain much of the negative response to Stones film compared to Morris. In his consideration of JFK, Robert Rosenstone notes that there are considerable constraints over the depiction of historical events on the screen.28 In particular, he sees the need to invent detail and compress events to shape a narrative as a limitation that must be negotiated by any historical film. While he is referring to narrative features such as JFK, his argument is equally applicable to the summaries of and suppositions regarding events in The Thin Blue Line. This argument has clear overtones of the discussions of documentaries distortions of truth through selectivity that have already been cited. Like Carroll, Rosenstone argues that when a historical filmmaker such as Stone invents or compresses events, he or she is exercising the same type of discretion that the author of any written history must.29 Such inventions can be considered true (at least to a point) in the sense that they can be verified, documented, or reasonably argued. The problem, notes Rosenstone, is that the verification must occur outside the world of the film. When Stone argues in JFK that President Kennedy was about to withdraw troops from Vietnam, the information is justified by reference to a real memorandum (National Security Action Memo 263), but a fictitious character makes the reference. Assuming no foreknowledge of the case, the audience has no way while watching the film of even knowing that the memorandum really existed, let alone being sure that it supports the conclusion Stone draws. If Stones conclusion is to be examined, the audience must go beyond viewing and read the relevant documents (or scholarly discussion of them) for themselves. If they do so, they will, as Rosenstone states, be undertaking the same kind of critique and review that a work of written history is subjected to. This process of measuring a film against standards of objectivity is exactly that which Carroll highlights as the means of linking non-fiction films to the truth. Stone has actively sought to enter into such debates, mounting extensive defences of the historical accuracy of JFK and his other works.30 That JFK was so controversial was perhaps partly due to the fact that audiences do not necessarily judge films within such evaluative frameworks: unlike the target audience for written history, they may assume that what they see is true and not enter into the debates as to the films veracity. Even assuming an engaged, sceptical audience, however, it is also the case that Stones film does not make the separation of truth from fiction a straightforward task. I have already suggested that the film possesses three layers of exposition: an outer narrative (Stones case), an inner narrative (Garrisons story), and evidence (presented as documentary material and re-enactments). The inner narrative story of Jim Garrison (which is likely to be understood by most audiences as at least partially fictional and not taken as literally true) is often weaved seamlessly in with the evidence (more likely to be seen as Stones presentation of true material). Garrison, for example, meets the mysterious Mr X (Donald Sutherland) in Washington, who outlines a hypothesis about who killed Kennedy and why. This calls forth a series of re-enactments of high level discussions between officials that are weaved into Mr Xs account. The narrative is calling forth evidence, but the difficulty with this sequence is in separating what material is a fictional narrative device, what is speculated, and what is documented truth. For example, are we to accept that Garrison really did meet an anonymous official who told him this information, and take that as evidence that Stones case is true? Or are we to take this as simply part of the inner narrative, a method of presenting evidence? As mentioned, Mr X talks in detail of a real memorandum in order to put Stones case that Kennedy wished to withdraw from Vietnam. An audience might correctly surmise that the existence of such a memo (putting aside its meaning) is a documented fact. However, this quickly leads into discussions of the reaction to this memo within high levels of the government, and the point at which history slides into speculation in this sequence is by no means readily apparent. The re-enactment portions of the sequence are presented in a stylised style using black and white photography, but this does not flag them as conjectural, since Stone switches between film stocks throughout the film without drawing such distinctions. (Elsewhere in the film, for example, the Zapruder film of the assassination, is alternated with simulated footage shot in the same style.) The effect of these aesthetic decisions by Stone is to confuse the boundaries between non-fiction and fiction in a way that makes application of objective standards for assessing truth difficult. The audience can only infer which sections of the film are intended to be read as non-fiction and subject to such examination. Written in October 2001 for the Melbourne University subject Ethnographic and Documentary Cinema. Notes 1. This is the concluding sentence of Eric Barnouw, Documentary: A History of the Non-Fiction Film, (Oxford University Press, New York Oxford, 1993, 2nd Revised Edition), p. 349. 2. The list of similarities between the two films that follows draws partly on Linda Williams, Mirrors without Memories: Truth, History and The Thin Blue Line in Barry Keith Grant Jeanette Sloniowski (eds), Documenting the Documentary: Close Readings of Documentary Film and Video (Wayne State UP, Detroit, 1998), p 381. 3. The films Garrison, for example, has access to information the real Garrison did not, in order to allow Stone to communicate it to audiences. For example, In the movie we attributed to Garrison the information about Shaws background but in real life Jim did not have access to that information at that time. (Oliver Stone audio commentary, JFK DVD, Region 4 Special Edition Directors Cut release, Warner Brothers, 1 hour 28 mins approx.) 4. This phrase is Stones own: JFK audio commentary, op. cit., 2 hours 10 mins approx. While these scenes are also used to communicate information about the larger case, this is an example of narrative efficiency, and does not contradict my point that they do contain aspects (such as the melodromatic touch of Garrisons children asking Dont you love us any more?) which function simply as domestic drama, with no relation to the case against Clay Shaw. 5. Nichols has revisited and slightly reformulated these modes over time, but they can be summarised as expository (ie voice-of-God documentaries that use direct address to tell the audience a truth), observational (cinema verite style films that aim to observe events without participating), interactive (interview based films that allows for direct address by participants, while allowing for filmmakers interaction through questioning), reflexive (films that draw attention to the documentarys own methods), and performative (stressing an individual, subjective position, while downplaying objective or referential aspects). See Bill Nichols: The Voice of Documentary, Film Quarterly 36, no 3 (Spring 1983); Representing Reality: Issues and Concepts in Documentary (1991, Indiana University Press, Bloomington and Indianapolis), Chapter 2; and (for the perfomative mode) Performing Documentary, Blurred Boundaries: Questions of Meaning in Contemporary Culture (c. 1994, Indiana UP, Bloomington), pp 92-106. 6. This point and the subsequent discussion of classical film theory draw on the discussions in the anthologies Gerald Mast et al. (eds.), Film Theory and Criticism: Introductory Readings, (Oxford University Press, New York and Oxford, 1992), pp. 3-7, and Antony Easthorpe, Contemporary Film Theory (Longman, London New York, 1993), pp. 2-5. 7. Rudolf Arnheim, Film as Art (Faber Faber, London, 1958), esp. pp. 17-37. 8. Ibid., p. 37-114. 9. Nol Carroll, From Real to Reel: Entangled in Nonfiction film, in Nol Carroll, Theorizing the Moving Image (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1996), p. 224-252. (Originally published in Philosophic Exchange in 1983, and will be cited in future as Carroll (1996/1983) to distinguish it from his piece in Post-Theory cited below). Reference to direct cinema is p. 225. 10. Ibid. 11. Ibid., p. 226. Carroll is quoting from the first edition of Barnouws Documentary, citing p. 287-288 of that edition (Oxford University Press, New York, 1974). The nearest equivalent to this quote I can find in the third edition (op. cit.) is at p. 344. 12. Nol Carroll, Nonfiction films and Postmodernist Skepticism in Nol Carrol David Bordwell (eds.), Post-Theory: Reconstructing Film Studies, (University of Wisconsin Press, Madison, 1996), pp. 283-306. 13. Ibid., p. 288. Emphasis is Carrolls. 14. Carroll is frequently belligerent about the texts he discusses but is particularly so about Renovs Theorizing Documentary, describing it as a state of the art compendium of received thinking about the documentary film, and dismissing Renovs argument as a red herring. Ibid., p. 285 291. 15. Both quotes Nichols, 1991, op. cit., p. 109. Emphasis is Nichols. 16. This is the title of the second part of Nichols book. How helpful this argumentative nature is as a distinction between fiction and documentary (and how unlike any other form of fiction documentary can be said to be) is debatable given that fiction can be every bit as argumentative as documentary (as JFK demonstrates). 17. Ibid., p. 195. 18. Carroll (1996/1983), op. cit., p. 226. 19. Carroll: I mention this because I do not think that commentators who conclude that the nonfiction film is subjective intend their remarks as a mere gloss on the notion that everything is subjective. But that, I fear, is the untoward implication of their attack. Ibid., p. 226. 20. Ibid., p. 230. See also Carroll, 1996, op. cit. pp. 283-285. 21. Carroll, 1996, p. 294. 22. See, for example, Ibid., p. 293, regarding film scholars focus on art-documentary. 23. Michael L. Kurtz, Oliver Stone, JFK, and History, in Robert Brent Toplin (ed), Oliver Stones USA: Film, History, and Controversy, (University Press of Kansas, Lawrence, 2000), p. 166-177. Reference to AARB is p. 174. 24. Ibid., pp. 175-176. 25. Williams (1998), op. cit., p.381. 26. See Susan Mackey-Kallis,Oliver Stones America: Dreaming the Myth Outward (Westview Press, Colorado and Oxford, 1996), pp. 39-44. Also Kurtz (2000), op. cit., pp169-170. 27. Stone tends to downplay this highly charged suggestion, denying he implies it in his audio commentary for the movie (op. cit., 2 hours 18 mins). However, the exchange between Garrison and his deputy Broussard at the same point of the film is as follows Garrison: This was a coup detat with Lyndon Johnson waiting in the wings. Broussard (shortly after): Boss, are you calling the president a murderer? Garrison: If Im so far from the truth why is the FBI bugging our offices? 28. Robert A. Rosenstone, JFK: Historical Fact / Historical Film, in Don Kunz (ed.) The Films of Oliver Stone, (Scarecrow Press, Lanham London, 1997), pp. 199-205. 29. Ibid., pp. 203-204. 30. See, for example Oliver Stone, Stone Responds, Part III of Toplin (ed., 2000), op. cit., pp. 217-298. 31. Williams (1998) op. cit., p. 386. 32. Ibid., p. 381. Bibliography Rudolf Arnheim, Film as Art (Faber Faber, London, 1958) Eric Barnouw, Documentary: A History of the Non-Fiction Film, (Oxford University Press, New York Oxford, 1993, 2nd Revised Edition) Nol Carroll, From Real to Reel: Entangled in Nonfiction film, in Nol Carroll, Theorizing the Moving Image (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1996), p. 224-252. Nol Carroll, Nonfiction films and Postmodernist Skepticism in Nol Carrol David Bordwell (eds.), Post-Theory: Reconstructing Film Studies, (University of Wisconsin Press, Madison, 1996), pp. 283-306. Antony Easthorpe, Contemporary Film Theory (Longman, London New York, 1993 Gerald Mast et al. (eds.), Film Theory and Criticism: Introductory Readings, (Oxford University Press, New York and Oxford, 1992) Susan Mackey-Kallis, Oliver Stones America (Westview Press, Colorado and Oxford, 1996) Bill Nichols: The Voice of Documentary, Film Quarterly 36, no 3 (Spring 1983) Bill Nichols, Representing Reality: Issues and Concepts in Documentary (1991, Indiana University Press, Bloomington and Indianapolis) Bill Nichols, Performing Documentary, in Blurred Boundaries: Questions of Meaning in Contemporary Culture (c. 1994, Indiana UP, Bloomington), pp 92-106 Robert A. Rosenstone, JFK: Historical Fact / Historical Film, in Don Kunz (ed.) The Films of Oliver Stone, (Scarecrow Press, Lanham London, 1997) Robert Brent Toplin (ed), Oliver Stones USA: Film, History, and Controversy, (University Press of Kansas, Lawrence, 2000) Contains the following referenced material: Michael L. Kurtz, Oliver Stone, JFK, and History, pp. 166-177. Oliver Stone, Stone Responds, pp. 217-298 Linda Williams, Mirrors without Memories: Truth, History and The Thin Blue Line in Barry Keith Grant Jeanette Sloniowski (eds), Documenting the Documentary: Close Readings of Documentary Film and Video (Wayne State UP, Detroit, 1998) Filmography The Thin Blue Line (Errol Morris, 1988) JFK (Oliver Stone, 1990) Related Items For more on documentaries, see my reviews of Mondovino and Fahrenheit 9/11.

How To Write An Essay Sample

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Strong College Essay Samples

Strong College Essay SamplesAre you trying to figure out what strong college essay samples are? Well, take a deep breath and relax because this article will be the perfect one to help you get started.Different writers write for different reasons. Some write to impress a certain audience while others do it because they want to show that they know how to write.For those who write for different audiences, there are many different ways to go about getting essay samples from different writers. One way to do this is to get an essay from someone who is able to deliver a great amount of content and do it at the same time.For example, if you were to get an essay from a book reviewer, the book review would be a great sample. If you were to get the book reviewer's writing samples, you would not only get the writer's idea of what writing should look like but you would also get their take on what the book was like. This is one of the main reasons why it is important to get sample essays written b y someone you can trust to write something good.Another example of getting a sample essay is to get an essay from someone who has already written several good ones. If you have found a quality writer, then that writer should have a huge body of work to draw from as a way to prove their abilities.Once you find a source for writing samples, all you need to do is look through the material that they provide and look for what interests you. That will give you the basis of what you need to build on to make a great essay.Keep in mind that the writer that you are using should have some kind of sample essay that you can use. You don't want to overdo it so just get something good and start working from there. Now that you know what strong college essay samples are, you should be able to decide how to go about getting the best ones. This will give you a leg up on the competition and help to ensure that you get good grades at the end of the day.

Video Games The Real Cause of Mass School Shootings Essay

Whether violent media content leads to real-life violence is always debatable. And in recent years, school shootings have made video games a new focus of public concern and scientific research. In public opinion, video games cause more aggression in comparison to traditional violent media contents because video games have more features of interactivity, due to the active engagement and participation of players (Hummer and Wang et al. 137). But more and more reports tell us that video games are not the main cause of school shooting issues; rather it is the negligence of parents, schools, and communities. Since children are good at imitating and are in their developmental period, are they affected by violent video games? This†¦show more content†¦Hundreds of studies have been done to determine whether violent video games will really make juveniles more violent. Randomized experiments were used in several studies to examine the short-term effect of violent video games (Anders on and Berkowitz et al. 90). In these studies, children were randomly assigned to play violent or nonviolent video games and then were observed when given an opportunity to be aggressive. The result was that children who played violent video games usually behaved aggressively. Another set of randomized experiments also examined the effects of violent video games on psychology. In these experiments, after two groups of participants played violent or nonviolent video games, they were required to list their thoughts on paper to assess their aggressive cognition. Unfortunately, the results tell us that violent video games appear to make people generate more aggressive thoughts than those who played nonviolent video games (Anderson and Berkowitz et al. 91). And by careful meta-analysis, the conclusion came out that repeated exposure to violence not only decreases individuals’ normal negative emotional responses to violence, but also [makes people] easier to think about engaging in violence and decreasing sympathetic and helping reactions to victims of violence (Anderson and Berkowitz et al. 104). This means they showed a decrease in pro-social behavior, which is a voluntary behaviorShow MoreRelatedExploring the Issue in Gun Control760 Words   |  3 PagesExploring the issues in gun control is the name of the article and it sounds obvious that the article is going to be about the issue behind mass shootings. The article is written by Dan OBrien and Betty Stanton, who are both professional writers with great amount of knowledge about the issues in gun control. Dan OBrien is a currently a Director of Safety and Environmental Health for San Antonio Water System, Certified Safety Professional, a nd Certified in Homeland Security. 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Cloning Essay Research Paper In today s free essay sample

Cloning Essay, Research Paper In today s society it seems as if anything can be accomplished through engineering. Though most promotions are being made to assist remedy and attention for ill and handicapped people, many believe that scientist have gone to far and are playing the function of God. One of the most asked inquiries today is the theory of cloning a human being. Technology and scientific discipline have practically made this thought a world ; nevertheless, many disagree about the moralss of cloning. Is cloning merely another agencies of reproduction or is science ignoring the natural order of Gods creative activity. In the concluding analysis, human cloning is incorrect because of the negative effects it will hold in today s society and the danger it will bring down on worlds. When inquiries about human cloning arise, people are over flowed with thoughts of how it could lend or profit themselves and their hereafter. Would it let them to populate longer? Could it give hope to those unable to bare offspring of course? Could it open window to human viruses, which would let for medical specialties to handle incurable diseases, such as Aidss and the Ebola Virus? What could cloning really make? Scientist program to utilize cloning for medical intents along for a simple agencies of reproduction. Researchers besides intend to clone grownup human cells that will do it possible to turn new Black Marias and livers and nervus cells ( Gibbs 49 ) . If this were so, so it would most probably be possible to change the genetic sciences of a individual all together. Jeanna DuPrau provinces, Most of us would be happy if our parents had created us by a familial heritage free of malignant neoplastic disease, bosom disease, and progressive neurological disease ( 68-69 ) . Cloning could reply the inquiries to so many enigmas that plague scientist today. And with replies, cloning brings hope to those enduring from las ting unwellnesss, and would give rise to bigger and better communities. Over the past decennary, more and more twosomes have found themselves impotent and unable to bear kids of course. Cloning could, for illustration ; give hope to person who is sterile because of malignant neoplastic disease therapy [ and ] wants to hold a babe through cloning ( Gibbs 48 ) . This option would enable households to hold kids without holding to travel through the really delivering procedure. Yet these are still theories, cloning can still be used as a possible and major option for consideration. Though cloning new wave be fundamentally created around the medical universe ; its intent doesn T halt at that place. Society takes this thought in and creates a whole new genre of subjects that they could profit from. Cloning is thought to give rise to human improvement and in bettering. Humanity should be in control of its ain fate, says DuPrau ( 74 ) . See being able to clone the most first-class specimens of humanity. . .then the figure of first-class people would increase, and in the long tally, the human race would be improved ( DuPrau 61 ) . With this being true, people feel that their hereafter of being successful is inevitable. They will be able to find precisely what they want in their kids and have them created to their every desire and liking. With the coming familial revolution, we will be directing our ain development instead than trusting on a natural ( and sometimes black ) lottery to make it for us, states Jonathan Colvin ( 2 ) . With all the possibilities available, cloning is about a foreordained impression that is on the brink of going world ; nevertheless, there is much contention on the topic of human cloning. DePrau feels that some via media has to be reached between those who say human cloning must neer go on, because it is immoral, and those who say human cloning must go on because its benefits out weigh its dangers ( 75 ) . Though there are many possible benefits, there are far more who disagree with the idea of human cloning and holding engineering produce future man-kind. If human cloning became possible, the societal and economic criterions pressed upon the people of our universe would go unapproachable. To make a ringer it will be fewer than 1 million dollars ( DuPrau 62 ) This hideous figure would be excessively amazing for anyone of normal income to afford. Due to this fact, differences between rich and hapless could become so great that worlds will literally be transformed into more than one species ( DePrau 63 ) . Therefore this capableness will be limited to affluent people and in this state affluent people are likely to be white ( 62 ) . With this being true, our universe will once once more be put into a type of segregation epoch were people are forced to be separated over something that they have no control over. Population as a whole will go a game for engineering and scientific discipline to play with and it will finally convey us down alternatively more advanced. We will go merchandises of the same types and individualism will barely be. Colvin states that. . .by extinguishing the commixture of cistrons that occur during conventional reproduction, human biodiversity will be diminished and human development will discontinue ( 2 ) . We would be decreasing the natural procedure of reproduction and by that diminishing our features as different people. With a population such as this there comes certain outlooks that are to be met. Lifes will get down being created, as merchandises alternatively of a construct of love between two people. Human existences should be created for their ain interest, neer for person else # 8217 ; s aim ( DuPrau 70 ) . Many times these kids may be created merely to fulfill the desire to live over a past clip or to take the topographic point of a lost loved one. What a load for those kids, to cognize that their parents were endeavoring to re-create themselves or person deceased ( Arnst 1 ) . That kid will experience obligated to be a individual he or she is non prepared to be or may non even want to be ; nevertheless, he or she will be born with certain outlooks. The kid may experience these outlooks as force per unit area. He dark feel that he doesn Ts have the freedom to be what he wants to be ( DuPrau 65 ) . To make a kid and imperativeness such outlooks on him or her is all together unethical. A kid should be brought into the universe out of love and marriage, non for 1s ain personal intent or desire. If a the kid is brought into the universe for this intent, imperfectnesss and all, so the kid is hence ever a gift-one like them who springs from their embracing, non being whom they have made and whose fate they should find ( OConner 24 ) .