thick description look over the shoulder

Often integrates imagery and thick description to this end.Ī method of reading, writing, and thinking that emphasizes the interruption of automatization. Chapter Vocabulary constraint-based writingĪ writing technique by which an author tries to follow a rule or set of rules in order to create more experimental or surprising content, popularized by the Oulipo school of writers.Ī rhetorical mode that emphasizes eye-catching, specific, and vivid portrayal of a subject. Each of these situations requires a different kind of description this chapter focuses on the vivid, image-driven descriptive language that you would use for storytelling. Our minds latch onto detail and specificity, so effective description can help us experience a story, understand an analysis, and nuance a critical argument. In a great variety of rhetorical situations, description is an essential rhetorical mode. We can become radical noticers by practicing good description.

By focusing on the particular, we can interrupt automatization. These details, though, make experiences, people, and places unique. In the same way that we might run through a morning ritual absent-mindedly, like I did above, we have also been programmed to overlook tiny but striking details: the slight gradation in color of cement on the bus stop curb the hum of the air conditioner or fluorescent lights the weight and texture of a pen in the crook of the hand. (We often miss even the most explicit stimuli if we are distracted, as demonstrated by the Invisible Gorilla study.)Īutomatization is an incredibly useful skill-we don’t have the time or capacity to take in everything at once, let alone think our own thoughts simultaneously-but it’s also troublesome. This phenomenon can loosely be referred to as automatization: because we are so constantly surrounded by stimuli, our brains often go on autopilot. It’s quite likely that you’ve experienced a similarly befuddling situation. I opened the door and froze-what was I doing? Did I need something from up here? I stood in confusion, trying to retrace the mental processes that had led me here, but it was all muddy. This morning, as I was brewing my coffee before rushing to work, I found myself hurrying up the stairs back to the bedroom, a sense of urgency in my step. Chapter 1: Describing a Scene or Experience

Thick description look over the shoulder