Writing portfolio: Would you like food with that?

The lead article in this week's Listener is on industrial food.  By Nicky Pellegrino, it is called "Would you like food with that?"

In class, we read the article several times, then responded to some questions in groups:

“Would you like food with that?” by Nicky Pellegrino

Listener, 25 July 2015, pp. 17-22

Questions to consider:

1. What is this article about?

2. What prompted The Listener to write this article (clue - see the very end of the article)?

3. Who are the people who are interviewed?  Who do they represent?  Describe the point of view for each interviewee.

4. What are some of the really inflammatory words/phrases/comments in this article?  Why are they inflammatory?

5. What facts are used in this article?  What effect do they have in terms of convincing us of a certain point of view?

6. What does ‘debunk’ mean?  Who debunks what in this article?

7. Choose a food which is discussed in this article.  Describe the food and explain what claims are made about it in the article.

8. What other texts (visual or written) have you read/viewed which also discuss food safety?  Does this article agree or disagree with those texts?  How do the two (or more) texts differ?

9. What do you think the first purpose of this article is?  Who is most likely to buy the magazine because of this article being the cover story?

10. How would a food safety article aimed at a different audience be presented differently? - To answer this, choose an audience (people in their late teens for example) and explain how you would grab their interest.

11. Who do you think has been left out of this interview, and why?  How could different perspectives have been included?  

12. What techniques has the author used to convince us that she is impartial and balanced?  Where can you detect her personal opinion?

On Friday, we brainstormed our thoughts about the article and about our food system more

widely. On the board, we collected a wide range of concepts that we could consider in 

forming our own responses. Then we each took time to develop our own response and 

wrote it up in the second lesson.

Next week, we will bring our finished drafts to class and look at techniques for redrafting.