Jornal 2

In his article “Shirt-Worthy,” David Giffels says that in order to really own a band t-shirt, such as a Ramones t-shirt, you need to “earn” it, which means going to the concert, “sweating and bleeding,” and then buying the t-shirt at the concert. He says that any kind of band clothing has to be hard worn and have personal experiences wearing it so there is some kind of meaning behind wearing it. He then tells us about how he simply bought a Ramones t-shirt at the mall for his son without having to “struggle” for it. When his son eventually rips the shirt, instead of ruining the shirt, David feels that it actually made the shirt “better.” The subject of his story is how some things have changed from when he was younger, such as how people view bands and band t-shirts. When David was younger band t-shirts had much more meaning behind them, but today people do not need to “earn” a band t-shirt and can easily go to the mall and buy a shirt by just about any band they want. This story is very relevant to today's society because it shows how much more available and easy things are to get. David says that “These days, things that should be rare are startlingly available” which is true not just for band t-shirts, but just about anything. With resources such as malls and the internet, people “never have to struggle” to get things that would be more difficult to get or would have to be “earned” when David was younger.

This article's intended audience is anyone who is around David's age and remembers when things like buying a band t-shirt had a much different meaning. I also think that this article is intended to be read by people around my age who are living in a time where things are much more accessible and is meant to show us someone like David's perspective. This story is relevant to me because just about anywhere I go, I see people around my age and younger wearing band t-shirts, and in many cases, for bands that they have probably never seen live, which shows that getting some things today require much less effort then they used to. There are a few examples of good rhetoric David used in this article. One that I found strong would like to include in my writing is how David was able to make what he was writing about relatable to the audience. By appealing to the audience's emotions and feelings (pathos) David is able to make his article much more enjoyable and easy to understand.