Rhetorical Analysis Of This Is Water

Are You Set On Selfishness? David Wallace’s notion on the way to view different situations is not the way you usually approach a situation. There are many times that we have a negative view on the situation we are placed in, but in Wallace’s “This is Water”, he presents his audience, the friends, family and Kenyon University graduates of the class of 2005, with a different way to view a situation. Wallace informs his audience how self-centered human kind is and poses an alternative for this self-centered idea. Wallace starts his speech off with a small story of three fish. “Two younger fish are swimming along and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says ‘Morning, boys. How’s the water?’ And the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and goes ‘What the hell is water?’” (Wallace. 1) This example that Wallace gives is an example of how we are a selfish group of humans. The two young fish were so focused on their self’s that they were to distracted to see what was
She claims that a very common reason students go to college is because it is just a pleasant place to be. She sees it more like a social party than a learning environment. A central argument that Bird makes that Wallace would also point out would be that “for some young people, it is a graceful way to get away from home and become independent without losing the financial support of their parents.” (Bird. 249) Wallace would agree with this because the selfish idea of getting out of the house, far away from their parents is the only thing on the mind of modern day college students. This should not be their sole focus. Their focus should be on their grades and their major, but no to the extent that Deresiewicz discusses. The happy medium needs to be found. With Wallace’s discussion about thinking, that happy medium can be