Textual Analysis

Ryan Swenson

“Textual Analysis”

Scientists at the University of Exeter have been studying cell division in fruit flies and have found information that could be a potential link to an underlying cause of cancer. They wrote this because they wanted to be able to communicate with other scientists that they may have found a link to a cause of cancer and show them that there information was legitimate through a few different ways. The article was written to inform the science world, as well as anyone in the general interest field of cancer or cell division. The author of this article effectively conveyed his purpose to this specific audience. It is so effectively conveyed because the diction that the author uses incorporates certain appeal to the audience, as well as having a bulk of scientific substance to back up there implications and to establish more credibility.

Use of diction is an important way that an author can use to adequately lead the audience to the purpose. The use of diction also creates certain appeals which in turn help strengthen the purpose that the author is trying to illustrate. In the article, the author creates ethos by the use of many scientific and lengthy words, some of which include “microtubule, spindle, molecular, Augmin, chromosomes, arbitrary, amplifying”. These words establish a lot of credibility to the author because when the audience is reading this article and they see scientific and lengthy words, then it makes the audience impressed and the author seem like he knows what he’s talking about. By using these words to create a sense of validity the purpose is strengthened because now the targeted audience can build a sense of trust that can go a long way when trying to persuade someone to accept new ideas/information.

The diction used by the author also establishes emotional appeal to his audience. By persuading the audience emotionally, it evokes feelings that are useful to the author when conveying his article’s purpose to whom he targets. Words used such as “remarkable, new, innovative, first, currently” create a feeling of hope and forwardness with science through the discoveries. The possibility of this new research and the fact that it currently is going on, is hopeful to the audience which helps them remember the purpose more in depth. The author links his research to a possible underlying cause of cancer, which can give those wanting to cure cancer and those affected by cancer some hope that one day this disease may be stopped. That is an example of the effectiveness that this word choice had on the emotions of the audience. In some cases how these words are organized into structured sentences and paragraphs strengthen the author’s points.

Another useful strategy to achieve the goal of explaining the purpose well to his target audience is how much scientific data present, and how well the data is explained. This creates a lot of substance which is another way of strengthening his purpose and creating even more credibility. In scientific research papers, you want to be very concise without leaving too much information out. There was a very good balance of information and explanation. There are two specific paragraphs in which this balance can be seen. The first of these two is the second paragraph and the second is the fourth paragraph. They both do a good job at including the facts they discovered, with also description of how everything that was found worked. The use of substance here overall was very effective for communicating his findings to the intended audience.

From the use of extensive and useful substance, to using word choice to appeal to the audience differently, the author used them efficiently and properly to support his purpose and make it apparent. These choices that the author used helped him convey that the research done by this group has a potential insight on one of the possible hidden links to cancer.

MLA citation- Association for International Cancer Research. "Using fruit flies to help understand cancer."ScienceDaily, 22 Oct. 2010. Web. 22 Jan. 2014.