Academic Stuff
What’s a Good Story Worth?
What’s a good story worth? I compare a good adaptation of Hamlet, which severe story problems, to a poor adaptation of Twelfth Night, which has an excellent story.
Justifying the Ways of God with Humor
This undergrad paper examined Jonathan Swift’s “An Argument Against Abolishing Christianity” and argues that Swift is being both disingenuous and hypocritical.
The History as Narratives and Exposition in Gould’s ”The Creation Myths of Cooperstown”
This rhetorical analysis of Stephen Jay Gould’s “The Creation Myths of Cooperstown” argues that Gould functions as a counter example to Hayden White’s idea that history functions as narrative.
The Absence of Art in The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
This is a paper I wrote as an undergrad about Anne Brontë's The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (affiliate link). Looking back, it's a thoroughly ridiculous paper. Although accepted in the academic genre, it's impossible to follow unless you're familiar with the book. It's...
Political Rhetoric Done Right
Matthew McConaughey gave a speech at the White House about the mass shooting in his hometown of Uvalde, Texas. While I’m not particularly passionate about the legal status of guns, I think his speech was a master class in political rhetoric.
The Great Nick Carraway
Who doesn’t have a Gatsby paper? My interpretation of The Great Gatsby is not the most conventional view, so you may find this paper to actually be a unique take. I wrote this for Dr. Davis’ class at Wittenberg for my undergrad degree. I probably put way more effort into this paper than I needed to for the grade, but I’m glad I did. Writing it helped me mature as a writer. It also provided me the opportunity to articulate how I feel about The Great Gatsby, a novel I always had strong opinions about.
Master’s Thesis: “The Hyperreal Nature of The Trump Administration’s Post-Truth Rhetoric”
This is my master’s thesis for the University of Dayton. The topic sounds like the cliché ramblings of a liberal professor but I promise it’s a serious examination of political rhetoric. If you’ve got time to read a 50+ page paper and you’re interested in rhetoric, Jean Baudrillard, or post-truth then this is just the paper for you.
How Theoretical Lenses Affect Interpretation: Using a Scene from Sergio Leone’s The Good, The Bad and the Ugly to Juxtapose Pentadic and Generic Criticism
This is a rather odd rhetorical analysis. It was an assignment for Dr. Strain's Rhetorical Theory class at The University of Dayton. The assignment was to look at the same artifact using two different rhetorical lenses and then contrast the two. I went overboard....
The Rhetorical Pronoun Shift in Malcolm Gladwell’s “Harlan, Kentucky”
A rhetorical analysis of Malcolm Gladwell’s essay, “Harlan, Kentucky.” This essay considers how Gladwell uses different pronouns for rhetorical effect.