Blog post #3
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/foodfeatures/meat/
Robert Kunzig and Douglas Emlen, the authors of “The Carnivore’s Dilemma” and “Astonishing Weaponry of the Dung Beetle,” respectively, both crafted essays that involve transforming heady research into something digestible to the general public, while still managing to draw important conclusions from the data. This is not always easy, and fortunately for Kunzig and Emlen, they’re both writing for publications generally targeted for people who are interested in relatively nuanced ideas. Both the authors form concrete connections between the research they are attempting to communicate and popular events and concepts, so that the reader has a strong frame of reference to draw on. For instance, Kunzig associates his research with the larger public discourse on factory farming and consumerism, so the reader can better understand where his points lie in the bigger picture; Emlen relates his description of dung beetle combat to larger global conflicts, so that the reader can draw inferences from the analogy. Additionally, both of the writers incorporate a certain reversal or subversion of expectations to keep the reader hooked and interested in the ideas they are trying to convey. That being said, their strategies differ in some notable ways: Kunzig, in what was likely an effort to humanize a side that has mostly been seen as an antagonist in the public stage, presents his data as ideas posited by actual people—specifically, the cattle-feeders he talked to. Emlen, on the other hand, provides data on dung beetles in order to prove an entirely different point—the beetles weren’t important, but the similarities between them and us were. While both of the writers used fairly straightforward strategies to make the research interesting to the reader, there were some areas where the fell short. Kunzig cited topics that were relevant to the public discussion of the meat industry, but his only conclusion was that people ought to be aware that the issue is more nuanced than it seems; a valuable point, for sure, but it’s fair to say that a large quantity of people interested enough to read such an essay would probably be aware that the issue isn’t black and white. As for Emlen, his essay makes a fairly abrupt change from beetles to human conflict; he crafted an interesting metaphor, but didn’t really take it any further than connecting the bugs to people. Perhaps if he went back to talking about beetles at the end of the essay and left the conclusive statement in the last paragraph unsaid, the reader could come to that conclusion on their own and have a more fulfilling interaction with the essay.