One thing

In Natalie Angier’s magazine article “One Thing They Aren’t: Maternal”, she presents information about how even though humans have a nurturing connotation of the word mother, it is not always the example we find in the wild. She is writing this article for The New York Times because it is approaching mother’s day and this offers another aspect of motherhood. Since it is a scientific piece, Angier uses the first part of her paper to establish her ethos as a renowned author and research scientist. I found that to be effective in me believing in what she said. She has only a small excerpt in the beginning in order to mirror how insignificant that “moms are great” is to this article. After her small introduction to being a mother, the author spends the rest of the article talking about how mothers from all kingdoms of the animal world are “coldhearted.” In order to do this she uses a vast amount of prickles and very little goo. I did like all the prickles she uses because they keep readers interested on the topic by presenting new, cool facts. Her lack of goo has little consequence in this case because the target audience is the more sophisticated readers on the NY Times who would want to read an intellectual piece. Angier’s goal is to present the information she wants to, so that her readers can realize how special our mothers are before their special day. In addition, her lack of commentary lowers the levels of emotion the readers have because the presents it in a way that makes it seem like what is happening is only natural. The goal is to demonstrate how mothers in the wild do what they need to so that at least some of their offspring survive. I do not like how the article ended so abruptly without any tying together of loose ends. I wish she provided more commentary then.