AP 40 minute timed essay: Report: China to Overtake U.S. As World's Biggest Asshole by 2020

Michael Rossi
April 29, 2010
Advanced Placement English Language and Composition
40 Minute Timed Essay AP Test Practice: What is the author's message, and how does he use diction and syntax to achieve that goal?

This Town Ain’t Big Enough for the Both of Us

The United States lost its touch as being the most hated country in the international community, and the torch of despicable public opinion has been handed to China. The author utilizes aggressive messages, diction, and syntax to make for an unreserved, satiric work.
The author questions the significance in which the media and society place in attributes that make up a strong nation. Economic, financial, and political assertion is the stem of national progression in which China paints as positive. The Author’s main message, through syntax and diction, is to demonstrate his biased belief against the commentary in most articles.
The author’s clever us of utilizes syntax lays the censorious seed that eventually blossoms into full blown satire: “It’s the dawning of a new huge bastard era” (Article 1). Here the author weaves vulgarity into an otherwise orthodox editorial paper. Doing this exposes the ridiculous nature of China’s so-called progression. Replacing a vital part of the sentence with bastard shows how disposable and empty the sentence is as; anything could be put in front of it and have read almost exactly the same.
The author further waters his satire with the spring water of well placed diction By adopting the stylistic choices of commonly positive works, the author is able to attribute the written positive connotation into a vulgar denotation. An excellent exhibition of this concept can be seen as the other claims, “A country like Iran is obviously a pretty big dick, but ultimately it lacks the resources to be a truly world-class asshole” (Article 1). Pretty big dick and world class asshole could easily be replaced personify Iran as possessing it with insults that typically pertain only to humans. Through diction, the author is able to simplify the complicated national issues as childish insults, in order to expose the childlike values that some countries posses.
The author utilizes aggressive messages, diction, and syntax to make for an unreserved, satiric work. In the end, the author was forced to plan his satiric work with the hope that he could help revive from society from the fire of immorality that swept the political spectrums of the international community. The tree of knowledge starts stems from the nurturing of satire.