In Christine Rosen’s piece Our Cell Phones, Ourselves she writes about the cell phone and how it’s changed over the years as well as how it’s affected every day life. People have become so reliant on cell phones that when asked in a poll if you were stranded on a deserted island and could have one thing with you one of the answers was “wireless phone”.
Cell phones used to be associated with the wealthy, presidents and crime. She writes about how in the 1990’s, cell phones became cheaper and more available to more people. For instance, in the United States more than 158 million people by 2003 were using cell phones. Cell phones give a feeling of safety, for instance if you break down on the side of the road, you can call someone immediately for help. If you’re walking home late one night and are feeling on edge, you can call someone to ease your fear as you make your way to your destination. Christine notes that cell phones not only ease worry, they’re also a convenience. For instance, in Slovakia people can turn the heat on in their homes before arriving by using their cell phones. Today’s phones also have camera’s so construction workers can now take photos of the work site and send them to the contractors in a matter of minutes saving everyone a lot of time.
In addition to convenience, cell phones have been used “to advertise worth, status and desirability” amongst men and women. The thought being, if a member of the opposite sex sees how important and needed the phone talker is, the more desirable they become.
Christine also brings up the lack of phone etiquette. She writes about the dangers of talking while driving. In addition to talking, people text while driving making them even more dangerous behind the wheel. Another etiquette breaker is the lack of privacy. You can listen to someone’s entire conversation, private or not, while waiting for a bus or sitting on a train. The concept of “overhearing” a conversation has been replaced by hearing, in its entirety someone’s conversation, whether we want to or not. People seem to toss manners aside while on their phones and speak loudly or even yell, disturbing everyone around them.
Christine suggests one way to fix the cell phone issue is make designated talking zones, similar to smoking sections stating that “we might partially reclaim something higher even than healthy lungs: civility”.
Nicole,
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed reading your summary. Could you tell me is the author more for the cell phones or against. I think she is against it for the reasons in the last paragraphy but it is not clear since many good points about cell phones early on. I guess I am not sure what the author is trying to say. Go get a cell phone or band them.... I think maybe you could try to work that in somehow. Other than that I think you its great! Just a thought hope it is helpful.
Nicole--
ReplyDeleteYou are fairly complete here in picking up most of Rosen's points--great!!--, but a few thing to work on a little more. (Overall this is well done.)
First, as Rachel mentions, is the issue of focus. In her article Rosen (and call her Rosen, not Christine) gives some positives and some negatives, but what is her main point? Is this an argument? Can you find one sentence (the thesis statement) that seems to sum up the article? (A hint: in short essays, the thesis statement normally comes at the end of the first paragraph; in longer essays it is often at the end of the first several paragraphs or first section.)
The other main thing to pay attention to in revision is paragraph structure. Each paragraph should have one main idea, and in this sort of expository writing, normally the main idea is given in a general topic sentence that comes first in the paragraph. In para. 2 you talk about safety and convenience (not so much the history of cellphones, as your 1st sentence suggests). Can you write a topic sentence that includes both of those ideas? (seems to be about advantages of cell phones) but then para. 3 goes on to give another advantage maybe, or is it a negative? You want to be able to "outline" your own essays, so that you can see the progression of ideas from para. to para. and understand the rationale for breaking where you break.
In para. 4 ("Christine also brings up...") you seem to be making a major shift between positives and negatives. So first of all you might use a stronger transitional word than also, something that more emphasizes the shift. Then phone etiquette doesn't quite cover what you're talking about in the para. (The jump from etiquette in 1st sentence to safety in 2nd sentence is a big one...) A more general topic sentence would work better, or perhaps there are several different "kinds" of negatives with cell phones, so depending on how much material you have to cover, you may want to break the negative side into several paras, each with its own topic sentence to announce what it covers.