This is a big section. I'm wondering if anyone would agree with my argument that this section seems to have an intensity and a momentum that is unlike other sections? Especially at the end.
I couldn't help but notice/wonder about advertisements. Once upon picking up some old magazines, I noticed that advertisements used to contain many more words. As in the Camel ad, ""[It's] a game only for steady nerves. But, then, what isn't in these days-- with all of us fighting, working, living at the highest tempo in years" (268). I don't spend a lot of time reading magazines other than The New Yorker. But I'm pretty sure that sentences like that are scarce. It seems to me to be less about language and more about imagery and a couple of words. Visual literacy. We'll spend some time there. But what does that shift say about language in our society today?
Relating to the second quote at the beginning of this section, I thought it was interesting how smoking has changed in our society. It seems that the ban on smoking in public places has been whittled into nothing. Still, no matter what steps we take to stop it, smoking is a personal choice. It's just like alcohol, (which we tried to get rid of once with prohibition) no matter what people ignore the warning signs of both products.
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