Here is an excerpt from WS's paper. What are its strengths? How could he empower it?
" While 'Prisoner of the State' deals with a vastly different situation than 'No Stealing the Shrimp,' some of the actions and thought processes resurface. In this passage, Zhao Ziyang is being held under house arrest for a crime he is not even sure of. His detainment is unlike anything seen before in China, even in cases regarding more dangerous criminals than Zhao during more dangerous times. He is shown barely any attention from the government once he is put under house arrest and after two letters Zhao received a phone call stating they had received the letters and that nothing had changed in his confinement. This shows the trend that modern China is exhibiting. The General Committee to him Zhao is writing realize they can continue to hold Zhao under house arrest and they do not bother to examine his case or hold him fair trials because they have more important matters to attend to, and one individual 'fringe' criminal is far less important than taking down dangerous criminals, but the instinct of the Chinese tell them that the individual, Zhao, should be confined anyway."
I like the ideas used overall here. It is a little bit unclear, though, as to what certain things are referring to. I would have avoided using 'this' too much and attempt to be a little more direct especially in terms of which passage is being referenced. Either way, it is still pretty clear what he is attempting to say and those points are very unified and coherent.
ReplyDeleteThe ideas are strong but the delivery of them is shaky. The periods and commas could have been used more efficiently to better the argument and make it flow better. This paragraph is a confusing and i think that is the only major problem is the fact of the delivery. If Will could revise this and change punctuation and word placement it would be much stronger.
ReplyDeleteIt wasnt clear what passage Zhao Ziyang was in, "prisoner of the state" or "no stealing the shrimp. this passage had too much summary, and i didnt see enough analysis. However, i did like the closing. i thought the delivery of the conclusion was fluent and smooth.
ReplyDeleteThe lesser Will's ideas are really great, but I agree with Connor that the delivery wasn't very good. If he was able to tie together all of the thoughts he had about China's trend towards oppression and the message of the passage better, then I think his argument could be really strong.
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