Lecture Notes Week # 6

What a Certain Visionary Once Said (1992) by Tomson Highway

The first half of the class was the group work on the above mentioned article.

The following questioned were considered in group :
 Who is the audience of the article, specify the evidence?
 What is the thesis statement? And its purpose.
 How the first paragraph is organized?

In the second half of the lecture Prof. Derek Brown explains the article. The purpose of this exercise was critical reading. The critical reader not only understands the article, but also tries to portray the message which the author is trying to convey.

To read the article critically, reader should have to look for :
I. The article was written for whom --- Who is the Audience ?
II. What author is describing in his article ? --- writing style, emphases, tone, words and more.
III. Try to interpretate and understand what author means ? --- Author’s purpose.

We started with understanding who the audience on the basis of the evidence provided.
Look carefully in the article. Sometimes, need to read the additional information provided with the article. Autobiography of the author helps, because most of the time authors life reflects what he write.

In this article we found two strong evidence first one the article starts with sentence “ As you travel from Winnipeg ” the word “you” means reader and he travel from Winnipeg, which is the name of the city. So the reader lives in the city. When we read the additional information about the article we observed it says this essay first appeared as an insert in The Bank of Montreal Annual Report ( 1992). This statement gives a clear picture of our audience.
Demographics is :
• Age
• Gender / Sex
• Ethnicity / Culture
• Location
• Income
• Education

According to the evidence we found in the article, we can take a snap shot of the demographics and can define our audience are :
Age between 35-50, men, Caucasian, Urban / Sub-urban, with high income and high education.

After describing the audience, now when we read the article it easier for us to understand what author want to convey the message.

In the essay the write gives the list of items all the time. List means he is engaging the readers. In his list he add a new thing, telling to the reader that you know a lot but still you need to know more.

He often begin the sentence with word “and” to create continuation from one sentence to another. This way writer is trying not to give a break to the reader in his thought and they will continue from one sentence to another until author finally conveys his message.
In the first half of the paragraph, Tomson Highway talks about the journey from city to the north. In the second half use the method of shift in time, specifically seasonal changes. He used the method of invoking the senses so that reader can picture how beautiful the land is by using sight and imagination. In the end he emphasize this is your home.

In his essay Tomson Highway was talking about the environmental damage we are making to our land. He understand very well the psychology of the audience that if he is going to blame them directly then they will stop reading the essay, and he cannot convey his message. Therefore, in his fourth paragraph he used the word “such” so the reader will not be offended that he blaming them, But when reader will think after understanding writer’s message, they will realise that they are contributing to the environmental damage.

In the end Tomson Highway uses the rhetorical words, and particularly the last question “ Eh?” it is very specific to the Canadian Culture. With these words he is expressing that look what damage we have done to the place which is our home. This is the home of our future generation. We have no right to use it up, and we should have to leave it for our children.