Summer Nonsense

Monty Python & the Ad hoc, non-sequitor logical fallacy
There's something very summery about Monty Python--before TiVo and On-Demand TV, you had to fill summer TV watching with either strange movie recommendations from friends or settle with Golden Girls, Cheers and other re-runs. So it also happened to coincide that the summer between freshmen and sophomore year when I was exposed to the learned, and/or acquired taste of Monty Python.

I was thinking that I some how wanted to work Monty Python in as an example of ad hoc that which does not follow logically after one another. The Deus ex machina of the foot coming out of the sky provides its own kind of non-sequencial logic; yet, the ending of Holy Grail came to mind because of the anachronistic, meta conscious recognition of the film at the end of the film.

Latina/o Caucus Newsletter Article

Cross-Promotion Sin Verguenza
I was speaking with a colleague and friend of mine the other day and she mentioned that she'd seen the article I wrote in the most recent NCTE Latina/o Caucus Newsletter. It occurred to me that I had yet to post a link from my very own blog.
It's a really great issue, and I'm not just saying that because I'm in it. The editors Janie Jaramillo Santoy and Alexandra Hidalgo did an amazing job of working with the contributors and putting out a professionally crafted product.

A Student Favorite

Over the summer, the topic of SB 1070 arose in my rhetorical analysis course because of our geographic context, the student population and the numerous discourses that frame both sides of the issue.
When it came to the issue of 'how do you tell who's illegal' without racial profiling, this Daily Show clip seemed to be an effective point of departure. Many of the white collar New Yorkers in the clip demonstrate the logistical issues related to proving citizenship. The humor of course derives from the fact that none of these people of privilege would ever really experience the legitimacy of their citizenship.
The Anthropologist DeGenova at Columbia makes an important point about the issue of immigration when he says that we need to pay attention to how legality is addressed because it shows us the uncertain state of our own citizenship and rights.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Suspicious Behavior on Cinco de Mayo
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Tea Party

What Part of Rhetorical Question Don't You Understand?

The Unvoiced Assumption in Enthymemes Meant to Maintain Privilege

A favorite refrain on the right as a part of the immigration debate is: 'What part of illegal don't you understand?'
As a rhetorical question, it gets at the issue of language, but uses the law as its primary ethical appeal. The unvoiced assumption in the syllogism is that we all conduct ourselves in a manner in accordance with the "law."

In Chapter 10 of Book I in Rhetoric, Aristotle makes the point that there are two kinds of law: the specific to a community, and the understanding that exists within the social contract of treating one another civil.

“We may describe "wrong-doing" as injury voluntarily inflicted contrary to law. "Law" is either special or general. By special law I mean that written law which regulates the life of a particular community; by general law, all those unwritten principles which are supposed to be acknowledged everywhere” (Book I, Chapter 10 1369a)

While the "law" is often deployed as an end all to public discussions about right and wrong, the presupposed acknowledged understanding between humans goes ignored, and unacknowledged.

Some Great Student Work

Public Argument Assignment

It's hard to really say anything except I feel a bit the role of the proud teacher with these student videos that were done as a part of a public argument assignment based on their research and analysis of a controversy.

Alan



Renee




Savanna

"El Machete" as Talking Point

Lining Up to Buy Tickets

It's hard to believe that this trailer has been out since Cinco de Mayo and I've only just now seen it. What I hope is that El/The Machete takes on a Zoot Suit Pechuco-like status, a cultural symbol to rally around, if you will; hopefully the kitsch factor will outweigh representations in the film that inspire criticism. The representation of El Machete as an exoticized 'other' should be pointed out, with all of the over-sexualized "he gets the ladies" trappings of the person of color should be noted; yet, the Jessica Alba character seems to have a character arch that reflects the enlightening of a close-minded, self-hating Latina who becomes empowered all the while Machete goes after Brewer/Arpaio types.

Scabs Crossing the Picket Lines

Barbados-born, English and Canadian Musicians Ignore AZ Boycott

(Image from Arizona Daily Star)

Apparently Rihanna's umbrella isn't connected to a picket sign; after low sales in Joe Arpaio's neck of Maricopa county, Rihanna moves her concert to Tucson, ignoring the boycott of musicians like Kanye and Zach De La Rocha of AZ due to SB 1070.

After Elton John sang at Rush Limbaugh's wedding (People.com), personal politics don't seem to sway the Rocket Man as much as capital. As Meth and the Wu put it, John's motto might very well be: Cash Rules Everything Around Me, CREAM, get the money, dollar, dollar bills y'all.

I'm not hip enough to know the New Pornographers, but I imagine they could fall into this category on Stuff White People Like.com. And everyone seems to know that Robert Plant can't hit any high notes anymore, but that shouldn't cloud his judgment. In the rhetoric of the right: What part of Boycott don't they understand?

Something tells me that these foreign born (un)documented migrant laborers won't have to show their documents before taking their respective stages. Tucson is a small market town that doesn't get very many Top 40 headline acts, but this is hardly a reason to condone SB 1070 by ignoring the boycott. Concertgoers, what's your price?

Shared Assumptions about Mexicans Pt. 2

Illegal Alien Problems

Unlike the "Bionic Mexican" clip, this one actually brings up the issue of immigration with regard to non-Latinos/as even though in the clip, as in reality, the majority who are targeted are Latinos/as. Wanting to practice hermeneutic generosity, I find myself contemplating humor as art, although art tends to be defined as something un-cliche, unless its pop-art drawing attention to itself; so, I recognize the blurry territory of humor used to criticize and humor used to reproduce negative discourse that can be seen in this play on the immigration issue in California.

Shared Assumptions about Mexicans

The Bionic Mexican

There are a couple of these clips on the adult swim website from the Robot Chicken show. In each, we see a cliche image of a "Mexican" in a sombrero that plays to all of the hackneyed representations of Mexicans, reviving the image and thus keeping the dominant accusation of deficiency alive in the public discourse.

Helpful Hyperviolent Analogy or Politically Naive

M.I.A.'s "Born Free": A Controversial Talking Point

From what I've heard of the debate, M.I.A's "Born Free" has been criticized for the graphic depiction of the genocide of redhead males; the Huffington Post noted that the video could serve as an analogy:
The video shows U.S. soldiers rounding up redheaded men and boys and bussing them to the desert where they are brutally beaten and killed. Whether it's a comment on the absurdity of genocide (of which MIA saw plenty during her early childhood in Sri Lanka) or a challenge to the idea of "other" in Arizona's immigration law, it is startling even in the context of recent genre-bending music art-films.(Huffington Post.com)

While I'm reminded of the symbiotic relationship between artists and critics because of the mixed-reception the video has received, I'm of the opinion that creative endeavors are meant to inspire reactions and provoke thought. Parents might not want their young children watching this kind of video; however, adults sometimes need to be prodded out of their comfortable apathy to consider issues that they do not encounter in their daily lives.

In "Simulacra and Simulations,"(props to William Nericcio's book for turning me on to Jean Baudrillard) Baudrillard brings up the issue of simulating violence and the danger that it presents because of how simulation can be difficult to discern from reality:
"“it would be interesting to see whether the repressive apparatus would not react more violently to a simulated hold up than to a real one? For a real hold up only upsets the order of things, the right of property, whereas a simulated hold up interferes with the very principle of reality. Transgression and violence are less serious, for they only contest the distribution of the real...There is no "objective" difference: the same gestures and the same signs exist as for a real theft...you will unwittinglyfind yourself immediately in the real, one of whose functions is precisely to devour every attempt at simulation, to reduce everything to some reality”(175-176) 



Baudrillard's explanation accounts for why people who do not understand the root of what M.I.A. is representing feel as disturbed by the simulation in "Born Free" as though it were real violence enacted, even if only symbolic. The messages sent in representation serve to remind how us of ideas in the public discourse because the representation wouldn't be as persuasive were it not associated, or conflated, with a shared referential meaning. Can we forget Cartman's movement against redheads?Click on picture or link to Cartman's presentation on Gingervitus: 

It's Not Racial Profiling

Save the Earth, Ban NASCAR
Aristotle teaches us that there are only a certain number of themes/topics that come up and that the ways that these topics are debated can be identified when we're aware of the rhetorical strategy. It wasn't very long ago that immigration wasn't the issue in the Arizona spotlight, but the economy grew worse with the house-crash, so Republican politicians scurried to blame someone other than the deregulation loving 'libertarians' who targeted minorities with their toxic home loans.

So, Arizona got behind SB 1070 because Republicans know they can get re-elected when they come out against Mexicans, Mexican Americans and undocumented migrant laborers.

Entonces, I propose we change the topic. Instead of focusing on "illegal immigration," how about we focus on the pressing environmental of our nation's dependency on oil. While British Petrol has come up with very few solutions other than to put an American face on the publicity campaign, President Obama advised that we think about alternatives. What might happen if the state were to outlaw all recreational and entertainment forms of transportation?

Call the Bill: BP 10W-30
NASCAR, motor-cross, dune-buggying, ATVs, power boating, funny cars, Formula One--they could be taken off roads, tracks, trails and rivers to stem the excess burning of fossil fuel.(A cropped photo of my brother, one of the few Mexican Americans negatively impacted by banning NASCAR)

Take the gas guzzlers from the Indianapolis 500, turn Talladega into a scrapyard, drop bundles of Kawasaki motorcycles into the BP oil spill--Cap it up with a giant ball of metal forged from the carcass of Dale Jr. and Kurt Bush's chassis.

(apparently from fireball22.com website)

The a historical/cultural link to the Anglo-Saxon smugglers, whose tradition was carried on by Appalachian moonshiners informally racing for bragging rights, might be reexamined in a move to show how this law targets a particular group. "A Brief History of Nascar: From Moonshine to Dale Earnhardt Jr" Arguments about 'what part of illegal don't you understand' might be rethought for the bias for the privilege the refrain protects.

Or maybe more viable forms of energy will be released to the public? But that's like hoping that immigration reform might actually come about from arresting hard-working undocumented people.

Rhetoric of the Non-Essential Argument

The Chewbacca Defense

Speaking to my summer school class about the link between forensic rhetors in ancient Greece and their role as hired advocates before judges, I found myself referencing the Chewbacca Defense from South Park. In Book 1 of Rhetoric, Aristotle privileges rhetoric over narrative because it cuts out all unnecessary introductions and other elements that Aristotle found to be extraneous to persuasiveness before a judge and small jury. The term 'red herring' is what we often use to categorize this kind of rhetorical strategy that purposefully attempts to change the argument.

The context for the Chewbacca Defense was the distinction I made between the conciseness of Aristotle's definition of forensic as opposed to the long, drawn-out kinds of opening and closing statements seen during the O.J. Simpson trial. Given that the trial took place during 1994, 18 year students do not have the same experience with what seemed like weeks and months of courtroom coverage. But I referred to the South Park episode with a parody of Johnnie Cochran speaking of non-essential information during a court case as a strategy to show that the accused was so innocent that Cochran need not discuss the actual case. Instead, he focused on a tangential argument as an appeal to logos.



In the indie film Rocket Science about a young stutter who wants to join the debate team at his high school, the opening scene shows a debater deploying a similar strategy to the Chewbacca Defense. At about Minute One, the young man stops and says something to the effect of, "Other than repeat something you already know, I will give a moment of silence..." Because debaters are timed, this rhetorical strategy can be effective in oratory because it appeals to a confidence, or ethos of the speaker. Modern debate also demonstrates the salience of copiousness to rhetoric.