Toilet Paper Description

One thousand 4×3.75 inch sheets of white tissue paper are wrapped around a cylindrical cardboard center. There are ninety-six of those rolls tightly packed into a box, and the boxes are stacked six feet tall. Both the boxes and the floral toilet paper wrapping, are heavily adorned in symbols: a Tork Universal logo, a recycling pyramid, a septic safe stamp, a proud “Made-in-the-Grand-ol’-USA” flag, and a certified biodegradable crest— there were clearly great efforts made to communicate company policy.

What all those symbols really communicate is that Tork Universal is a company that cares. Both the actual product and the cardboard case it is stored in are made of 100% Recycled Fibers, and, the toilet paper is made to degrade in an environmentally friendly fashion. The US also has stricter factory emission regulations than the countries we outsource to, like China, so by keeping their factory in Philadelphia they are taking steps to make sure fewer pollutants are thrown into the atmosphere. Based solely on the Tork Universal toilet paper packing, it is evident they are environmentally conscience company that make several efforts to ensure that their product will create the least waste, build up, and damage to the environment as possible.

 

Guiding Questions

As you read your  magazine shorts, remember not only are you writing a description post on this short for tomorrow, you will also be using these shorts as models for your next post assignment (writing your own short).   You really want to think not so much about content, but about form.  How is this piece accomplishing what it wants to accomplish in the space it has to accomplish its task.  Some questions to think about:

What is the central topic of this piece?

What is this piece’s underlying aim?  (I.e.  What does the article want to do?  Does it have an argument it wants to make?  Do you have a sense of who its intended audience is and what it wants that audience to think about or do?)

Can you describe what the piece does in the beginning of the article in order to achieve its underlying aim?

“. . . .”  in the middle of the article?

“. . . ” at the end of the article?

Does the article make use of any noticeable rhetorical devices?  Some examples of common rhetorical devices include but are not limited to:

Anecdotes

Quotes

Snappy one liners

Comparisons

Carrying an example to the extreme

Fear tactics

Lists

Compelling and easy to chief data bites.

 

Your description shouldn’t just be answers to these questions, but answering these questions should help you assess the reading and write a strong description post.