Research Essay Topic

Tentative Topic: Music

Tentative Research: Does anyone not like music?

Rationale: Music has such a huge impact on our culture. I was wondering why people like music so much and why it moves us. Most things in the world you either like or dislike, but music seems to be something that everyone can enjoy. Are there actually people in the world that don't listen to some form of music? If they exist, what kind of personalities do these people have?

Reading Response #2

The essays written by Amy Garrett-Brown and Jay Holmquist are definitely more about discovery than just being traditional research papers. They both set out to answer a question that they’ve had instead of trying to prove a point or argue their side on a certain topic. In Garrett-Brown’s essay, she seeks the reason why white people like to tan so much when there are numerous health issues involved in fake tanning. Holmquist wanted to find out if the drugs he liked to use at raves were actually harmful to the body when so many people thought they were safe. They both find the answers they need by doing extensive research on tanning and drug use. Amy found that “2/3 of teens say they look better with a tan and feel healthier” and that “50% say they looked more athletic” (460). Besides the fact that you get “prematurely leathered and wrinkled skin and a much higher risk of developing melanoma or other skin cancers,” people tend to care more about their look than their health (459). People would rather pay money to get a fake tan, possible cancer, and not spend time under the actual sun just because having a tan is very much in fashion. She also found that health industries suggested not being in the sun at all. With all this in mind, Amy finally comes to the conclusion that “there must be some middle ground” meaning that there has to be a way for people to get an actual tan from the sun without having to worry about cancer (460). Holmquist discovered a lot about the three drugs that were commonly used at raves: LSD, MDMA, and GHB. LSD can cause “flashbacks” and makes people think that “they can break the laws of physics,” MDMA “can involve severe depression, loss of appetite,” and “death” from being “overheated,” and GHB can inhibit “loss of bladder control, temporary amnesia.… sleepwalking… seizures, and cardiopulmonary depression” (B27-B28). Through these discoveries and his friend’s heart almost stop “pumping three times on the ride” to the hospital, he decides not to go to raves anymore because he now know the deadly effects of these drugs. Although both essays involve research, the authors still put their voice into the writings. Amy establishes her voice in the essay by showing her thought processes and how she wondered about things and then asked herself multiple questions which lead to other questions and more answers. She started off my asking herself about fake tanning which lead to “why [people] completely gyp themselves of the pleasures of the sun to be rewarded with a battle with cancer at worst and saggy skin at best” (460). This in turn lead to her wondering why people didn’t like being in the sun and that “the health industry sure doesn’t like or condone it” (460). Jay establishes his voice using his personal experience with the raves and party drugs and his reasons for not attending raves anymore. During his essay, Jay tells us that he like raves so much because “a rave is a place where [he[ can escape from reality” and “where [he] can get out [his] aggression through dance and music” (B25). This is helpful for me personally because I’ve never been to a rave and this helps me to understand his personality a little bit and the aspect of why other people might go to raves. At the end, he decides not to go to raves anymore because his friends “didn’t act like themselves” and “the temptation to do these drugs [was] way too high” (B29). Through this we again can see part of his personality in that he likes real friends and that he truly cares about his well being. These essays and Ballenger’s suggestions have helped me to realize that research essays don’t have to be boring and that it really is more about discovering something interesting, rather than just doing research with no reason in mind. Both Garret-Brown’s and Holmquist’s essays are very informative on their topics, but also very interesting to read. I guess instead of thinking about all the research that I might have to do in order to write the paper, I will ask a question to something I’ve always wondered about and find the answers through my research.

Charlotte Hogg and Catherine Black both demonstrate many of the forms of writing a personal essay that Ballenger talks about in his book. Both of them wrote their essays in first person. Using first person makes the essay “very intimate” and “invite[s] the reader to share in the writer’s often concealed world” (93). In Hogg’s essay, she brings you into her life and tells you about her personal love of Davy Jones from the Monkees. Talking about this in first person showed her true emotion about Davy Jones and was more meaningful than telling about someone else’s feelings. Black shows personal experience while working with the lo’i, describing it like “stepping into a vat of chocolate syrup, only cooler, and pungent with the fresh, damp smell of nutrient-rich soil” (B12). No one could have described this in the manner she did unless they could have experienced it for themselves like she did. Both of the essays also rely on memory and observation expressed in Ballenger’s form. Hogg tells that when she would listen to Davy speak on the Monkees Greatest Hits album, she “believed this was some kind of privileged access [she] had” to him (B1). Hogg showed her remembrance of how she felt when she was 15 years old and her love of hearing his voice. Black tells of how she disliked living and being a part of Hawaii and how much she learned and associated herself with foreign ideas and cultures. She is expressing her memory of the things she wanted to be so different when she was younger and growing up in Hawaii. I find a lot.
Black also has a very “commonplace” subject in her essay. She talks about working in the lo’i which is a very simple and easy topic she used to connect her readers to a part of her life. Something that I thought was different about the stories than in Ballenger’s form was that you knew exactly what Hogg was going to talk about at the very beginning her essay. She started talking about Davy Jones and that she wanted to meet him at a young age and you knew it was only going to progress from there. Her essay also, to me, was not very commonplace. She talked about her slight “obsession” that she had over Davy Jones which is not exactly something that I’ve ever experienced. I know that I haven’t ever been obsessed over anyone so much that I would want to listen to their voice all the time and watch every show that he or she was on. Black’s essay seemed to follow Ballenger’s form almost perfectly in my opinion. I think the “so what” of Hogg’s essay was to show that her entire life she felt like she wanted to meet Davy because she felt like she was so close to him. When she actually me him though, she realized that he was a completely different person than she thought and that she actually didn’t know him at all. Black’s message was just to show how much she disliked Hawaii until she came back years later and worked in a field that was twenty minutes from her house. She is trying to say that you never know if you enjoy something until you’ve experienced what its all about.