1. Close Reading: The Art and Craft of Analysis
Chapter 2

2. Close Reading An analysis of a text
Develop an understanding of the text that is first based on the words themselves and then on the larger ideas
Start with smaller details and then think about the larger meaning
When you write about close reading, start with the larger meaning and use details as support
Use it unconsciously and instantaneously
Close reading is used to analyze style

3. Style Components of style Body language Gestures Facial expressions
Tone of voice
Volume
Sentence structure
Colloquialisms
vocabulary

4. Analyzing Style
We can better understand a text by analyzing its tone, sentence structure, and vocabulary just like we can better understand a speaker by analyzing body language, gestures, facial expressions, and volume
Style contribute to meaning, purpose, and effect of a text

5. Diction and Syntax Diction- the choice of words
Syntx- arrangement of words
A troupe is artful diction
Metaphor
Simile
Personification
hyperbole
A scheme is artful syntax
Parallelisms
Juxtapositions
Antitheses

6. Questions to ask when you analyze diction:
Which of the important words in the passage (verbs, nouns, adjectives, and adverbs) are general and abstract? Which are specific and concrete?
Are the important word formal, informal, colloquial, or slang?
Are some words nonliteral or figurative, creating figures of speech such as metaphors?

7. Questions to ask when you analyze syntax:
What is the order of the parts of the sentence? Is it the usual (subject-verb-object), or is it inverted?
Which park of speech is more prominent – nouns or verbs?
What are the sentences like? Are they periodic (moving toward something important at the end) or cumulative (adding details that support an important ideas in the beginning of the sentence)?
How does the sentence connect its words, phrases, and clauses?

8. Talking with the Text
Helps us to generate questions to do a close reading
Techniques
Annotation – marking the text as you read
Dialectical Journal (double column notes) – use columns to represent visually the conversation between the text and the reader
Graphic Organizer – visually organized representation of information

9. Annotation Reading using a pen or pencil
Write on Post-it notes if you can’t write in you book
Identify main ideas
Identify words, phrases, or sentences you don’t understand
Look for figures of speech or tropes
Ask questions or comment on what you are reading
As you read, listen to the voice inside your head and write down what the voice is saying

10. Dialectical Journal
Also call double entry notebook or double column notes
Can be set up in a variety of ways
Right side main idea, left side supporting details
Rights side literary techniques identified, left side examples of literary techniques
Breaking the text into smaller sections can help you notice the details

11. Graphic Organizer Text can be divided for analysis
Use paragraph divisions as natural breaking points
Takes times to complete, but allows you to a lot of information to analyze
Can take many forms

12. Assignment P.48 – use handout provided
Complete the assignment using a close reading of your choice
As a group, select a method of close reading
Everyone needs to do a close reading using the technique selected by the group
When everyone has finished, compare how other groups members approached this assignment
Be sure to tell why you selected that close reading

13. Analyzing a Visual Text
Many of the same tools of rhetorical analysis and close reading that we have practiced on written texts are also useful for detecting the underlying messages in visual texts, such as advertisements

14. Advertisting Aggressive tone Less aggressive picture Comical element
Use of colloquialism “baby”
Connotation
Word choice
Less aggressive picture
Shows family values
Appeals to women
Tatseful
Power under the hood
Comical element
Big soft letters
Pleasure of unhealthy lifestyle

15. From Analysis to Essay First, read last paragraph on p.51
Listen to Kennedy’s inaugural address
Read it using one of the close reading techniques
Answer the questions on diction and syntax as a group. (p.55)
For the remaining time in class and homework, crate a thesis and write an essay analyzing the rhetorical strategies John F. Kennedy uses in his inaugural address to achieve his purpose. (p.57)
Hand in annotation, questions, and essay for a grade