Author: AKOSUA OMARI-DOTTOH

Connected to my residential hall, there is a deli. There are two entrances to the deli, one connected to the residence hall, and one outside. This choice was made for the convenience of students living in the dorms, while also saying that this place is not solely for them, but anyone in the area. When going to checkout, students are given a 10% discount on whatever they purchased in the store. Why was this made? It’s a great marketing tactic, drawing broke college kids in with much needed discounts. However, it’s also a financial decision because there is one thing you notice that you may not at first. Down the block we have a grocery store, and the majority of items that are in the deli, you can find there cheaper. 

The Deli’s prices are highly inflated, there you can get $6 lemonade, when you can get the same one 2 for $5 at the grocery store. Yet, most students will still get the one from the deli because it’s convenient, and hearing that there is also a discount makes you feel like it is the smarter choice. That was a strategic financial decision made by the owners, they were able to market their business in a way that sort of made us ignore the irrational prices they actually hold. One thing to also notice is that there are no price labels on most of the products in there, actually the majority have none. Most of the time, you only find out the price once you’re actually up there paying for it, which at that point, for most people, many will pay for it regardless. The lack of visual representation of their prices benefits them in that way. In most delis and grocery stores this is not the case, so why is it here? Because this deli’s main consumers are college students living in not so cheap dorms, that will take convenience over almost anything when it comes to quick things like snacks and drinks, like me.

“At 0:46, we are faced with this image of Beyoncé laying on the sand, looking to the side, into the sunset. It’s silent with only the vocals of birds chirping in the distance, her face is covered with a see through cloth and she doesn’t move an inch. This choice was made in order to represent how stuck, lost she felt in this situation. Not knowing which way to go, she starts an internal battle between what her mind is telling her she should do, and what her heart wants her to. This results in her physical body going, in a way, numb.”

1. Coates focuses on what was left out of the movie because doing so is simply more interesting. He could go on and on about how great First Class was but that would not work to create a great analysis. By pointing out what was left out of the movie it opens doors to answering new questions for analysis, like why certain things were left out, what you feel it means, etc. Knowing that it was a creative choice to leave some things out let you venture into the subject of why, and that can go a long way. It would be easy for Coates to just brag about a movie he enjoys and talk about what makes it so great.
2. Parkin shows repetition when saying “Everything you discover en route can be named and catalogued, a delight for anyone with a talent for descriptive, whimsical, or smutty neologisms, or for anyone who, like me, has simply longed to name a solar system after a departed pet gerbil.” This choice was made to point out his audience in this analysis, the ones he wants to attract to this video game. He uses contrast when saying, “…a vast, snow-globe-y sort of experiment that plays out according to the hard rules of physics and the loose rules of story.” Parkin does this to help analyze what reality as a game would look like, to have the reader understand that before introducing the video game. Parkin also uses a strand by saying, “While we benefit from the invention of penicillin, of air-planes, of the Internet, we also suffer antibiotic resistance, looming climate disaster, online comments.” This quote works to group together the good and the bad we face as humans on earth. Parkin identifies an anomaly in No Man’s Sky when saying, “  its most memorable trick is to make the player feel impossibly small, lonely, and lost.” This is not a common occurrence in video games, Parkin clues, it’s a detail that was extremely different and stuck him. This detail mattered because it gave us more interesting insight into the video game he is analyzing.

When walking into my dorm room, one of the first items you will notice is my desk. This desk is brown, with a wood-like print on it. The desk is smooth with no outstanding textural parts. Attached to it are 6 draws that only open and clothes, each draw has a metal handle attached. Coming with the desk is a wooden rocking chair, that unfortunately is not always trustworthy when rocking. There are two levels to the desk, one being the surface level, another that is placed at least 10 inches higher. Connecting these two shelves are wooden blocks placed on each end.

On the backside of the desk, facing you, is this thick rough feeling brown block. This is there to give the student an opportunity to hang up things that are usually hung up in a dorm or bedroom, like miniature white boars, calendars, etc. Adding this onto the desk was a very mindful and considerate choice. This was also added to maybe prevent students from using the wall too much, since many are only staying a year they rather not have the walls ruined. This board in the back is, in a way, indestructible, and can be used repeatedly without even being able to notice it was used once. There are 3 identical desks that go down the row next to where you sit. These desks are long and enable you to fit a bunch of things you need within them so you don’t have to use a lot of surface desk area. As sturdy as the surface of the desk is, it is always more visually pleasing to not have many things on there other than the essentials, like a desk lamp/mirror and your laptop or notebooks, arranged neatly.

 

The hardest part for me was trying to go in depth about what this item meant and creating a “deeper” analysis of it. What was easy was just saying what I saw, but in all it didn’t feel as easy to do as the other ones while also trying to follow Sullivan’s structure.

There’s a garden on the right side of my residential building. While taking the 6 train to school you always see it, it always grabs your attention. In this garden the floor is formatted out into a sort of maze. The designer logically makes this decision so that it will, without words, convince the enjoyer to walk around the garden. There are big plots of bushes assorted though the space, the garden is broken apart so you have the ability to walk through the different sections. There are an assortment of flowers that vary as you walk through the sections. On the very outside block, a long array of flowers and bushes are created, circling around you. 

There are benches all around the outer side of the circle, indicating that you are welcome in this space, to view, to appreciate the nature around you. Occasionally you will see a couple spotted rats running around and within the bushes, this is in fact New York after all. The creators wanted you to be able to walk through the garden with close proximity to the plants so that you yourself can analyze what you see up close and personal. Benches are spotted in the rear so that after you are down walking around and seeing everything, you have an opportunity to reflect, and view the space as a whole. At night, lights appear in the garden making it accessible for evening experiences that give off a whole new aura than daylight ones.

I added in the use of logos the designer used to attract consumers to do certain things. I did this because I believed it was relevant to add in the sort of function of the garden, to help the reader understand the vision of the artist. Also to show that the layout of the garden was no accident but an important detail the designer made for the consumer.

 “This effort towards unacceptance for half of what made me whole, allowed me to be just that, only part of me. I always felt like something was missing about myself, like I wasn’t who I truly was supposed to be. That lost feeling made me do to myself what I feared others would do to me. At a young age it was mainly just the worry of fitting in, but as I got older it turned into something deeper. It became self-hatred, it became an in-denial lifestyle, it became a battle between my inner self and the person that I had taught to myself I was. “

1. One detail that stood out to me in X’s narrative was his last line, when he said “In fact, up to then, I never had been so truly free in my life.” It felt a little weird to me for someone in the setting he was in to be able to say that, but that feeling of weirdness quickly changed into a thought of beauty. It was beautiful that X was able to be in prison and still have the determination and drive to make a routine out of reading and writing. It’s like witnessing someone finding their calling in life because you could imagine how hard it must be to be able to feel freedom while being incarcerated. That statement suggested that just because he was a part of this discourse community didn’t mean he couldn’t have the same, or at least very similar, experience as someone who wasn’t. It showed that apart from stereotypes made about this discourse community, there is opportunity for real growth and education. His relationship to writing and reading shifted from one that you could describe as limited and frustrating, to freeing. It’s inspirational.
2. I would love to imitate Manson’s structure of description.  This style grabbed my attention because when reading this essay it helped me as a reader understand what the writer was feeling. In my literacy narrative I believe that I am going to have a lot to say about how I feel about my experiences and things of that sort but fear telling without showing enough. Manson’s way of describing, I feel, would be very beneficial to me because in the middle of these thought processes there would be short examples and stories incorporated in to show the reader what Manson felt. I always learned in the past the skill of showing not telling in writing, but I believe Manson’s way of doing both is something that I would definitely want to adopt. When explaining my desires of fitting into the black community at a younger age, I can use Manson’s technique by showing times in my life where I felt like I had to do such.