Wednesday, October 28, 2009
Paper Problems
In my paper, I am having difficulty describing my focus. I know I want to portray the message that torture occurs in Dollhouse and that it constantly happening in the real world as well. However, the quotes I use and the other points I make don't clearly get my message across. I think that this is due to a lack of a thesis. The one I wrote down yesterday was: "Torture occurs not only in Dollhouse, but in every day life as well. Acknowledging the fact that torture happens everywhere is the first step in stopping its occurence. People overlook torture because they--people young and old--don't understand what torture is. The people who work in the Dollhouse disregard the fact that by creating "actives," they are disrespecting and torturing the humans who were transformed. In the real world, torture does not have to be just physically hurting someone, it can be as simple as just verbally putting someone down. In Joss Whedon's Science Fiction television show, Dollhouse, he brings to light that torture is happening all around us and just because it is not called "torture" does not mean it is not." I know that the common reader isn't going to understand what I am saying when I talk about the "actives" and how they are transformed, but I don't know how to incorporate that without making the paragraph not flow as well as becoming boring and tedious. Any ideas?
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I am having a similiar problem to you because I think I know what my focus is, but I don't know how to word it. As for your quotes, you could watch your episode over and focus on it more to pick out different quotes that you didn't think would fit what you are trying to say before. Use your sources to relate to the quotes and it may also help you with your thesis.
ReplyDeleteI think this thesis is awesome so far. I would just take some passive words like, "put down" and re-write it as, "verbally abuse."
ReplyDeleteI think your thesis is pretty good so far. I would say to may discribe what an "active" is a little bit more for those who haven't seen Dollhouse. But maybe you do go on and say what they are later in your paper.
ReplyDeleteI was having the same problem, mostly because I wanted to touch on so many points, and ended having to cut alot of it out and rewrite things to make it more or less appear more focused
ReplyDeleteI think it's not you do not have thesis. It's just you can not make the thesis clearly or strong enough!!
ReplyDeleteYou seem to be between a rock and a hard place. I really don't know how to relate those too. Maybe picking a close example from real life for the actives would serve the purpose well enough
ReplyDeleteI am sort of having the same issue, it is frustrating not being able to get your point across. Especially in an issue a serious as torture. I think if you make sure you clearly define "actives" even the common reader will understand.
ReplyDeleteWhat I would probably do is put in all of your information for right now. Get all of your ideas across, even if it means temporarily having a boring and tedious paper. Then, once you've said everything you need to, you can edit and revise to make it flow better and be more interesting.
ReplyDeleteI like the sentence, actually. It's intriguing. And I think that maybe you could use the very next paragraph to talk about the 'actives'.
ReplyDeleteI really like your topic idea so far. I think what you need to do to really get the reader involved in your paper is to explain a little more what the dollhouse is and how it works to someone who is unfamiliar with the show. Maybe from there, you will then find further connections between dollhouse torture and real life torture and begin to have a clearer focus on your topic.
ReplyDeleteI would say if you explain what the "actives" are later if you're paper then you should leave that sentence in. If not, I think it could be taken out and the paragraph would still make sense.
ReplyDeleteI think your thesis is pretty strong right now. It definitely informs the reader of the paper. I think you might want to change your first sentence and make it a little more general in topic. Not everyone knows what dollhouse is, so if it's in the first sentence some people might just not even read the rest of the paper. Try it out and see if it all still flows.
ReplyDeleteConfucious says; Thesis looks good. It seems to be centered around your main focus. Now just bring in supporting details around that idea.
ReplyDeleteI think you're on the right track; after reading that sentence, I feel like I have a pretty good idea of the general premise of 'Dollhouse' and I've never seen the show. The only advice I'd give you is to maybe break down a couple of the sentances at the end of that sequence. Like when you wrote,
ReplyDelete"In Joss Whedon's Science Fiction television show, Dollhouse, he brings to light that torture is happening all around us and just because it is not called "torture" does not mean it is not."
You could break up the ideas of torture being all around us, and that torture is still torture, despite what you call it. I think separating those ideas would clear up that paragraph a lot.
Well it sounds like you have a really strong grasp of your topic and understand it well. I think that when you incorporate your "actives," it may seem boring for you because you've read about it a lot, but for other people, it will seem interesting to them because it is a new idea.
ReplyDeleteMaybe you can relate torture to the real world, give real life examples like the holocaust and try to tie that in to the kind of torture in "Dollhouse."
ReplyDeleteMaybe describe a day in the life of an "active" and use that as an introduction so readers will understand what you're really referring to in the context of the series and your paper.
ReplyDelete