Mary Oliver Use Of Humor Essay

One of the most obvious things I think anyone would notice in Oliver’s videos, is his use of humor. He does not just use humorous rhetoric to be funny, but it also gets your attention. When Oliver makes comparisons of serious issues to things that are comical, it makes viewers want to keep watching and even want to agree with him because he comes across as a funny, likable guy who knows what he is talking about. Not only do humorous comparisons make his show entertaining, but they also make what he is trying to explain easy to understand. An example of how he does this can be seen in the video about Government Surveillance. In the video, Oliver is trying to explain the seriousness of what the government can see in your personal life like, …show more content…
Another pattern I noticed in almost all of Oliver’s videos was his use of the Basic Rhetorical Recipe. In just about every video, Oliver uses typifying examples to name a problem and then gives statistics and/or additional evidence to back up his claim. The video about standardized testing was a good example of how he does so. Throughout the video, Oliver gives examples like a girl being kicked out of her advanced classes and kids vomiting from fear and anxiety to demonstrate why he thinks standardized testing is a problem. Describing how kids are becoming physically ill from stress of these tests sets the stage for how big of an issue this must be. He also uses statistics and evidence to back up his claim such as only thirty-nine percent of Florida tenth graders pass the reading portion of a test and that even one of the school board members did poorly on the same test. Using statistics like these help in legitimizing his claim that standardized testing in schools is an