Nishmitha Rodrigo Week 5 Reading Responses

1. ETHOS- “I have always deeply believed that people don’t learn through words, they learn through experience. That’s just human nature. People can tell me a hundred different things, but I’ll never truly believe any of it until I go out and find out for myself through experience.” This except from my literacy narrative represents ethos because it shows my values as a person and why it distinguishes me from my family and the rest of the Sri Lankan community. It also shows that I know how to balance passion and cautiousness because I want to learn what to look out for and be cautious about through the act of living and experiencing life.

PATHOS- “I was filled with extreme frustration and anger because my life had gotten to the point where I started losing people I love trying to make my parents happy. I felt as if I was living for someone else rather than for me.” This except from my literacy narrative represents pathos because it leads to the rise of certain emotions within the reader. After reading about how suffocated I felt through my entire childhood and teenage years with my ultra-cautious parents, the reader must already feel pity and sympathy towards me. Then, reading about how frustrating it was to live for someone else just might enrage them even further.

LOGOS- “how am I ever going to learn which people to trust and what kind of people are out there in the real world if my parents are the ones that are keeping me inside, making it pretty much impossible for me to go out and find out for myself.” This except from my literacy narrative represents logos because my arguments are both logical and reasonable. The rhetorical question relates to logos because my parents were saying I can’t do this and because of I don’t know how x,y,x works and then I pushed back with a logical arguments saying well how am i going to learn x,y,z if you’re not letting me go out and find out for myself.

2. A song that I know well is “Mirror” by Lil Wayne. This song is about struggling with internal and external factors while being in deep emotional pain. When he says “Mirror on the wall, here we are again Through my rise and fall You’ve been my only friend You told me that they can understand the man I am”, he is referring to a specific time where he was staring at himself in the mirror trying to come to an understanding about why everything is the way it is in his life. He realizes that no matter how much he tries to be accepted and loved by the people in his life, that’s never the case for him. Lil Wayne feels extremely misunderstood by everyone and feels as if no one understands the pain he is in. He feels as if he, himself, is the only person that he can ever count on to be there for him regardless of the situation. This is also a symbolic representation of the war going on inside the mind. The words he has chosen to sing in this song also tells you that he feels extremely lonely and desires to be loved and understood by those around him.

3. While writing this summary about this song, I realized that I can connect and relate to how he feels more than I would like to admit. I think many of us can relate to this song, whether we can admit it or not. Analysing the lyrics of this song word by word can help you read between the lines to actually hear the pain and loneliness within his tone. This made me realize that it’s really important to listen to other more thoroughly because the hints and clues are always there within their words and actions, you just have to be willing to see and hear it to pick up on them.