The article, "Darkness Too Visible" by Megan Cox Gurdon is about the author's opinion that Young Adult books are inappropriate for teenagers. Throughout the article the author provides many evidence to support her claim that Young Adult books contain dark topics such as pederasty, kidnapping, incest and brutal beatings. For evidence the author uses many challenged books to show that Young Adult books have many inappropriate topics that parents wouldn't want their kids to read about. There's many parents that don't want their kids to learn about disturbing topics of reality or the fictional world. Even the most popular books can have a dark side to it.
Throughout "Darkness Too Visible" the author uses a lot of loaded words. For example, the author used words such as brutality, ugliness, crude, despoliation and other words to describe Young Adult books. These words make me feel that Young Adult books aren't appropriate for teenagers after all. This is because such words indicate negativity in young adult books. Throughout the article the author uses a lot of parent's/adult's perspective but does not include a Young Adult book reader's perspective.
The article is definitely argumentative. I disagree with the author claim that Young Adult books are inappropriate for teenagers. Although young adult books can have dark topics, not all of them belong to the category. What is a dark topic depends on the reader as a whole. For example if the reader like violent topics, the reader would have a violent taste. Also if the reader is comfortable with reading Young Adult books with dark topics then there shouldn't be any problem. However the article did make me realize something. What I realized is that many books I have read that I felt comfortable reading were actually some of the challenged books because of adult/parent concerns of dark topics throughout the books. I also realized that parents and other adults think about dark topics in general. They don't think about what readers can learn from them. There's so much values and ideas young readers can learn from Young Adult books. Moreover the article included a lot of parents/adults perspective but didn't bother to add reader's perspective, opinions or quotes. I think Megan Cox Gurdon could've made her argument more stronger by adding reader's perspective because people who actually experienced reading Young Adult books are way different than people who knows about the topics of a Young Adult book. Overall I think throughout the article the author, Megan Cox Gurdon could've added about readers who actually experienced Young Adult books.
Throughout "Darkness Too Visible" the author uses a lot of loaded words. For example, the author used words such as brutality, ugliness, crude, despoliation and other words to describe Young Adult books. These words make me feel that Young Adult books aren't appropriate for teenagers after all. This is because such words indicate negativity in young adult books. Throughout the article the author uses a lot of parent's/adult's perspective but does not include a Young Adult book reader's perspective.
The article is definitely argumentative. I disagree with the author claim that Young Adult books are inappropriate for teenagers. Although young adult books can have dark topics, not all of them belong to the category. What is a dark topic depends on the reader as a whole. For example if the reader like violent topics, the reader would have a violent taste. Also if the reader is comfortable with reading Young Adult books with dark topics then there shouldn't be any problem. However the article did make me realize something. What I realized is that many books I have read that I felt comfortable reading were actually some of the challenged books because of adult/parent concerns of dark topics throughout the books. I also realized that parents and other adults think about dark topics in general. They don't think about what readers can learn from them. There's so much values and ideas young readers can learn from Young Adult books. Moreover the article included a lot of parents/adults perspective but didn't bother to add reader's perspective, opinions or quotes. I think Megan Cox Gurdon could've made her argument more stronger by adding reader's perspective because people who actually experienced reading Young Adult books are way different than people who knows about the topics of a Young Adult book. Overall I think throughout the article the author, Megan Cox Gurdon could've added about readers who actually experienced Young Adult books.
I completely agree with you. Megan Cox Gurdon used many perspectives from parents and adults but did not use examples from the readers' themselves. I think that if she did use statements from the young readers' then she would have gotten a variety of complaints from the other side.
ReplyDeleteI like how you elaborated thoroughly and added your opinion at the end of your response. Your writing is very clear and thoughtful.
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