Rhetorical Analysis Of The Backlash Against Serial And...

Rhetorical Analysis In his passionately written article â€Å"The Backlash Against Serial—and Why It’s Wrong,† author Conor Friedersdorf comes to the podcast’s defense following the harsh criticisms that have been thrown at Serial since its debut. Serial is a spinoff series from parent podcast This American Life, which details the investigation and reinvestigation of a brutal 1999 murder involving high school lovers of the Baltimore area. Friedersdorf’s piece not only comes to defend Serial’s honor, but it also fights back and grapples with these disparagements thrown at the podcast. In particular, the accused transgressions from fellow writers Jay Caspian Kang in his own work â€Å"Serial and White Reporter Privilege† and Jeff Yang’s post from Quartz. In my judgement, Friedersdorf does an excellent job refuting Kang’s and Yang’s opposing views and persuading his audience that Serial is innocent of the accused wron gdoings. What are these wrongdoings you ask? Kang claims that Serial is not so much about the cold case it is investigating, but more so the producer and narrator, Sarah Koenig’s, fixation on the case. He also believes that while Koenig may be well intentioned, she is interpreting and making assumptions on facts of the lives of people within minority communities involved with the case. Another writer, Yang asserts that This American Life’s method of narrative journalism displays â€Å"cultural clumsiness† (Yang qtd. Friedersdorf). Friedersdorf argues that these allegations