Character change

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

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- [Teacher] Hello readers.

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One of the wonderful things about stories,

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when they're given the
room to grow and expand

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is the idea of character
change or growth over time.

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Characters in stories are
just like real people,

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they have the capacity to change,

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to make mistakes, to apologize,

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to set things right, and to learn.

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When you read, or when you interact

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with any kind of fiction, watch carefully

00:00:24.450 --> 00:00:27.780
for how characters change over time.

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How do characters in a text
interact with each other?

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Does the way a character react to events

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change over the course of the story?

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What's changed and why?

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One of my favorite pieces
of fiction of all time

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is "Avatar: The Last Airbender,"

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and while he isn't the main character,

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I think the character of
Prince Zuko has one of the best

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illustrations of character change

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across the course of the show.

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So spoilers ahoy!

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But Zuko goes from being an antagonist

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in the first few seasons,
to officially joining

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the protagonists, the good guys,

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in the final season of the show.

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I appreciate how the creators of the show

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map Zuko's growth and change,

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because we can see him
unlearning old, bad habits

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and taking on new, more productive ways

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of behaving as the show progresses.

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He fundamentally changes as a person,

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and it's the result of a
lot of hard work on his part

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and a lot of love and patience

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from the people who care about him.

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Zuko is what is called
a dynamic character,

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which is to say that he
changes throughout the story.

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This is the opposite
of a static character,

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who does not change.

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There's a running gag
in the "Avatar" series

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about this one hapless cabbage merchant

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who keeps on showing up in various cities

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only to have the protagonists
knock his cabbage cart

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over again and again.

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Pretty much the only thing
he says in the course

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of the whole show is his
catchphrase, "My cabbages!"

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He doesn't learn, he doesn't grow,

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he only suffers.

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Cabbage guy, static character,

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Zuko, dynamic character.

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Many main characters are dynamic,

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but secondary and background characters,

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like the cabbage guy are static.

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So what causes character
change in stories?

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Other people and events.

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Let's take a look at an
example from our website,

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"Oscar's Musical Odyssey."

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Oscar begins the story
by telling his friends

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on the soccer team that he
can't hang out with them

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that night, he's gotta go to
the symphony with his parents.

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His teammates mock him and he feels bad:

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Oscar was hesitant to say it out loud,

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as he knew exactly what would happen

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when his friends found
out where he was going.

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"I have to go to the symphony tonight,"

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he said quietly.

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The water in Kevin's mouth
exploded into the air,

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propelled by the laughter
that closely followed.

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"The symphony, hey fellas,"

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Kevin exclaimed, as his voice rose

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to address everyone within ear shot.

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"Guess where El Capitan
Rico over here is going?

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"He's gonna go sip tea and
listen to the symphony!"

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Instantly the other soccer
guys joined in mocking Oscar.

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"I didn't know you had a
thing for old gringo music,"

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laughed Lorenzo.

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"What's next, bro," shouted Juan,

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"watching the evening
news in your bathrobe?"

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"What kind of soccer player
goes to the symphony?"

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said Javier.

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Oscar sighed.

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He knew this would happen.

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although he loved the
camaraderie he had with the guys

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on the soccer team, the amount
of grief he was going to get

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over a stupid night out with his parents

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was going to be rough, very rough.

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While Oscar almost always
felt tight with this group,

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this was stirring up some
feelings of isolation within him.

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So this is how Oscar reacts.

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He's hesitant, he's embarrassed
because of how his friends

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feel about his symphony plans.

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They're not even his plans,
his parents are making him go.

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Good readers ask themselves
how do characters

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treat each other?

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Oscar's friends think
listening to classical music

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is something for old white dudes

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or fancy tea-drinking nerds,

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but whatever it is, it's
definitely not for soccer players.

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But then Oscar attends the
symphony and he is bewitched

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by what he hears.

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The experience changes him.

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So we can ask how do events
change how characters behave?

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Well, let's return to the text:

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On the way home Oscar's mom said,

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"I know this wasn't what you
would have chosen for tonight,

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"but I hope you enjoyed it."

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"I thought it was great," said Oscar,

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"I had no idea, I was so
wrapped up in what the guys

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"were saying about me that
I didn't give it a chance.

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"I bet they would love
this music," he said.

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"Maybe," said his dad, "but if
they don't, does it matter?"

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And that's when Oscar
understood something.

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His whole identity
didn't have to be defined

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by only one or two things.

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Who he was could be a
mix, in interwoven harmony

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of many things.

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We can look to the text
to provide evidence

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of Oscar's change.

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He has this moment of clarity
in the car after the symphony.

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He realizes he doesn't have
to be either a soccer player

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or a guy who enjoys symphonies,
he can be both at once.

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So when you're evaluating a character,

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ask yourself for specific
choices that characters make,

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dialogue exchanges, or
interactions with other characters,

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or responses to story events.

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Compare similar events at
different points of the story.

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Does a character react in the same way

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at the story's beginning

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versus how they might react in the middle

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or near the end of it?

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If no, what's changed and why?

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If you can answer those
questions, congratulations!

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You've identified the dynamic character.

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You can learn anything.

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David out.

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My cabbages!


Making objective summaries of literary texts

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.600 --> 00:00:01.550
- [David] Hello readers,

00:00:01.550 --> 00:00:04.250
let's talk about summarizing stories.

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This is a useful skill for life.

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I've found myself describing
the plots of movies,

00:00:08.430 --> 00:00:11.415
TV shows and books to my
friends, my coworkers,

00:00:11.415 --> 00:00:16.290
my family, and it's also
very useful in writing.

00:00:16.290 --> 00:00:17.920
Understanding the plot of a story

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is essential to writing about it.

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You can't write about a story

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if you can't express what happened in it.

00:00:23.636 --> 00:00:25.510
So what I want to do today is talk about

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creating objective summaries of texts.

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Summaries that are free
of opinion, or non biased.

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If you're summarizing a book,

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you wanna get across
the events of the story.

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Objectivity is hard and weird

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and has a very specific purpose.

00:00:41.680 --> 00:00:44.681
You use it to build the
bones of your analysis.

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Once you've got the structure
in place, bring opinions back.

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Here are the facts

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and now here's what I
think about those facts.

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Let me be clear, opinions are good.

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Opinions are where analysis lives.

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The whole field of literary criticism

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would be awfully boring if
nobody ever held opinions

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but all that criticism rests

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on a basis of objectively
summarized texts.

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So let's talk about how to do just that,

00:01:09.970 --> 00:01:12.960
how to objectively summarize a text.

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Here's what you need to do.

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Step one, read the thing
you want to summarize.

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You can't do one without the other.

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Step two, ask yourself,

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what are the important
parts of this story?

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Not the interesting
parts, not the cool parts,

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but the most essential parts of the story.

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Remember we're trying to be objective here

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so it's not about including
the parts you especially liked.

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So who are the main characters,

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where does the story take place,

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what happens in the plot?

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Step three, pare it down.

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Look at all those
important parts you listed,

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and cut out everything that
isn't absolutely essential.

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Major characters only, setting, conflict,

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climax, resolution.

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Step four, put it in order.

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Write it all out as sentences

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in the order the plot happened in.

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The idea is to be able to
summarize a whole story

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in a handful of sentences,

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like a single five sentence paragraph.

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And you're gonna wanna paraphrase here.

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Whatever you need to say,
say it in your own words

00:02:10.290 --> 00:02:13.003
so you can get it across
as quickly as possible.

00:02:13.947 --> 00:02:16.510
Ordinarily, I'd say quoting from the text

00:02:16.510 --> 00:02:20.750
is an important skill but this
is one time you won't use it.

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All right so, those are the four steps.

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To demonstrate, I'm gonna
take a fiction piece

00:02:25.026 --> 00:02:26.950
from a Khan Academy exercise

00:02:26.950 --> 00:02:29.950
and I'll go through that process with you.

00:02:29.950 --> 00:02:33.813
Step one, let's read it all,
read this little story chunk.

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"'Wilky!' Captain Martello
bellowed below deck.

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"'We need your help!' I
climbed the ladder quickly

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"and was astonished that I
hadn't awakened on my own.

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"Usually I could sense a storm brewing

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"hours before it arrived.

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"Captain Martello noticed
my look of surprise.

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"'She's coming on quick, this
one. Here, grab the rope,

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"Help me pull down the sail.'

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"Overboard, the waters had changed.

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"No longer were they
an inviting green hue,

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"they were dark, foreboding.

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"The moon above tried to
peek through the angry sky

00:03:01.959 --> 00:03:05.437
"but the clouds kept
hijacking her hopeful glow.

00:03:05.437 --> 00:03:07.827
"Suddenly, a giant slow rolling wave

00:03:07.827 --> 00:03:10.392
"forced my side of the
vessel to dip into the water.

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"I tried to hang on but the
lurching wave was tugging at me.

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"Captain Martello grabbed my leg

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"and managed to yank me onto
Adelina's salt sprayed deck.

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"'You're safe,' he said
firmly, 'for now.'"

00:03:23.000 --> 00:03:27.364
Okay step two, what are the
important parts of the story?

00:03:27.364 --> 00:03:29.820
Okay so Wilky comes on deck

00:03:29.820 --> 00:03:31.928
when Captain Martello asks him to.

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They're on a boat.

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And note here that I'm just
sort of scribbling down notes,

00:03:36.680 --> 00:03:38.085
these aren't even sentences.

00:03:38.085 --> 00:03:40.787
There's a storm coming
that Wilky didn't predict.

00:03:40.787 --> 00:03:44.489
The captain tells Wilky to
help him strike the sail.

00:03:44.489 --> 00:03:46.650
The water is a scary color,

00:03:46.650 --> 00:03:48.650
a wave nearly washes Wilky overboard

00:03:48.650 --> 00:03:49.960
but the captain saves him.

00:03:49.960 --> 00:03:51.820
Oh and the ship is called the Adelina.

00:03:51.820 --> 00:03:54.600
I think that's a neat name for a ship.

00:03:54.600 --> 00:03:56.800
All right step three, pare it down.

00:03:56.800 --> 00:03:58.130
So the fact that I think that

00:03:58.130 --> 00:04:01.040
Adelina is a neat name
for a ship is opinion

00:04:01.040 --> 00:04:02.610
and not relevant.

00:04:02.610 --> 00:04:04.240
It's also not super relevant

00:04:04.240 --> 00:04:06.290
that Wilky didn't predict the storm.

00:04:06.290 --> 00:04:08.880
Or that the water is a spooky color.

00:04:08.880 --> 00:04:10.800
So do we have all the
important details in here?

00:04:10.800 --> 00:04:12.631
The name of the ship, check.

00:04:12.631 --> 00:04:15.720
The name of Wilky and Captain Martello,

00:04:15.720 --> 00:04:18.291
the fact that there is a storm.

00:04:18.291 --> 00:04:21.801
So part of this is relevant
but not the prediction part

00:04:21.801 --> 00:04:23.870
and Wilky nearly being tossed overboard

00:04:23.870 --> 00:04:25.330
but saved by the captain.

00:04:25.330 --> 00:04:27.740
So step four, let's take all
of that, put it in order.

00:04:27.740 --> 00:04:30.470
Start afresh, full sentences, okay.

00:04:30.470 --> 00:04:33.640
Captain Martello calls Wilky
up to the deck of the Adelina

00:04:33.640 --> 00:04:36.480
to help him prepare the
ship for a sudden storm.

00:04:36.480 --> 00:04:39.390
Wilky is nearly washed
overboard by a big wave

00:04:39.390 --> 00:04:41.150
but Martello saves them.

00:04:41.150 --> 00:04:42.890
That's our strategy, you see?

00:04:42.890 --> 00:04:45.090
Boil down the story to its essentials,

00:04:45.090 --> 00:04:48.450
strip away unnecessary
detail and rephrase events

00:04:48.450 --> 00:04:51.520
in your own words in the
order that they happened in.

00:04:51.520 --> 00:04:53.850
Once you've got that squared
away, you're ready to

00:04:53.850 --> 00:04:57.361
back up that great big dump
truck full of opinions.

00:04:57.361 --> 00:04:59.078
All right bring her in.

00:04:59.078 --> 00:05:00.850
(truck backing up beeping)

00:05:00.850 --> 00:05:02.077
Let them have it, fellows.

00:05:02.077 --> 00:05:04.327
(crashing)

00:05:06.096 --> 00:05:08.010
You love to see it.

00:05:08.010 --> 00:05:10.223
You can learn anything, David out.


Analyzing an author's purpose

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.860 --> 00:00:01.740
- [David] Hello, readers.

00:00:01.740 --> 00:00:04.500
Today we are going on a dangerous journey

00:00:04.500 --> 00:00:07.014
inside the mind of the author.

00:00:07.014 --> 00:00:08.520
(ominous music)

00:00:08.520 --> 00:00:11.060
Every piece of text is
written for a purpose,

00:00:11.060 --> 00:00:13.220
and especially in informational text,

00:00:13.220 --> 00:00:15.880
every author structures
their texts, words,

00:00:15.880 --> 00:00:19.210
and their ideas with that purpose in mind.

00:00:19.210 --> 00:00:22.590
And sometimes that purpose
will be harder to see.

00:00:22.590 --> 00:00:24.480
As readers, our job is to consider

00:00:24.480 --> 00:00:26.860
the author's purpose as we read.

00:00:26.860 --> 00:00:30.440
How is it influencing the
information the author shares?

00:00:30.440 --> 00:00:33.580
How is it influencing my
understanding of the topic?

00:00:33.580 --> 00:00:36.010
Is what I think the same
as what the author thinks?

00:00:36.010 --> 00:00:36.990
Do I agree with them?

00:00:36.990 --> 00:00:38.400
Do I disagree?

00:00:38.400 --> 00:00:41.850
You may be familiar with
the memory device of P.I.E.,

00:00:41.850 --> 00:00:46.250
persuade, inform, entertain,
as three categories of purpose.

00:00:46.250 --> 00:00:48.760
But I'd like to go deeper than that.

00:00:48.760 --> 00:00:50.380
I live in Washington, D.C.,

00:00:50.380 --> 00:00:52.850
which is home to an
entire professional class

00:00:52.850 --> 00:00:54.810
of what are called lobbyists,

00:00:54.810 --> 00:00:56.910
people whose job it is
to advocate to Congress

00:00:56.910 --> 00:00:58.910
on behalf of a special interest,

00:00:58.910 --> 00:01:02.840
for example, the oil industry
or the cheese industry.

00:01:02.840 --> 00:01:04.160
This isn't always bad.

00:01:04.160 --> 00:01:06.420
You can learn more about
lobbyists and advocates

00:01:06.420 --> 00:01:08.870
in Khan Academy's Government
and Politics course.

00:01:08.870 --> 00:01:10.490
But frequently, it takes the form

00:01:10.490 --> 00:01:14.070
of someone from an industry
trying to convince Congress

00:01:14.070 --> 00:01:17.180
to give them a competitive
advantage over other industries.

00:01:17.180 --> 00:01:19.150
Now, let's pull real-world
politics out of this

00:01:19.150 --> 00:01:21.500
and pretend for the
purposes of this lesson

00:01:21.500 --> 00:01:24.770
that there are two warring
lobbying groups in D.C.

00:01:24.770 --> 00:01:27.560
One that represents the cake industry,

00:01:27.560 --> 00:01:30.750
and another that represents
the pie industry.

00:01:30.750 --> 00:01:32.740
An age-old conflict.

00:01:32.740 --> 00:01:34.440
So hold that conflict in your mind

00:01:34.440 --> 00:01:36.290
for a second, cake versus pie.

00:01:36.290 --> 00:01:38.460
Now, when we read informational text,

00:01:38.460 --> 00:01:40.270
we should be learning new information.

00:01:40.270 --> 00:01:43.110
But the author's opinions
can shape the text

00:01:43.110 --> 00:01:44.340
to the point where the information

00:01:44.340 --> 00:01:46.970
becomes biased or misleading.

00:01:46.970 --> 00:01:49.120
When you read informational text,

00:01:49.120 --> 00:01:52.090
maintain an air of healthy skepticism.

00:01:52.090 --> 00:01:56.080
Ask yourself the following
questions constantly.

00:01:56.080 --> 00:01:57.500
What's the author's opinion?

00:01:57.500 --> 00:01:59.500
What information did they include,

00:01:59.500 --> 00:02:01.590
or what information did they leave out?

00:02:01.590 --> 00:02:03.990
And if so, was that on purpose?

00:02:03.990 --> 00:02:06.940
What's the connotation of
the author's word choice?

00:02:06.940 --> 00:02:08.780
You know, how do the words feel?

00:02:08.780 --> 00:02:12.363
And what's the overall tone of the piece?

00:02:13.240 --> 00:02:15.270
So now we have these
questions to ask ourselves,

00:02:15.270 --> 00:02:17.320
let's return to our pie versus cake

00:02:17.320 --> 00:02:19.450
lobby fight in Washington.

00:02:19.450 --> 00:02:21.590
So imagine you're reading
"The Washington Post,"

00:02:21.590 --> 00:02:23.707
and you see this opinion column.

00:02:23.707 --> 00:02:25.377
"Cake Connected to Cavities

00:02:25.377 --> 00:02:28.157
"and Poor Dental Health, Study Finds."

00:02:28.157 --> 00:02:30.787
"A recent study by the
American Dental Association

00:02:30.787 --> 00:02:33.717
"connected the consumption
of cake or similar foods

00:02:33.717 --> 00:02:36.267
"with a 30% increased risk of tooth decay,

00:02:36.267 --> 00:02:38.467
"cavities, and gingivitis.

00:02:38.467 --> 00:02:40.467
"People who reported having consumed cake

00:02:40.467 --> 00:02:43.447
"in the previous 60 days were
significantly more likely

00:02:43.447 --> 00:02:46.057
"to experience problems
related to dental health

00:02:46.057 --> 00:02:47.877
"than those people who did not.

00:02:47.877 --> 00:02:49.667
"Cake is dangerous.

00:02:49.667 --> 00:02:53.720
"Cake, which rarely contains
fruit, will rot your teeth."

00:02:53.720 --> 00:02:56.970
And then if we squint down at
the very bottom of the column,

00:02:56.970 --> 00:02:59.957
it'll say in small text,
"The author is the CEO

00:02:59.957 --> 00:03:04.090
"of Circular Solutions,
a pie-advocacy network."

00:03:04.090 --> 00:03:06.900
And now let's ask ourselves
those same questions again

00:03:06.900 --> 00:03:09.150
while acknowledging that
this is a fake story

00:03:09.150 --> 00:03:11.040
that I made up for the
purposes of this video.

00:03:11.040 --> 00:03:13.440
There is nobody named Wendell Apricotjam,

00:03:13.440 --> 00:03:15.460
although I wish there were,
that'd be a great name.

00:03:15.460 --> 00:03:17.800
So, what's the author's opinion?

00:03:17.800 --> 00:03:19.260
Well, it seems to me that the author

00:03:19.260 --> 00:03:21.330
really thinks cake is dangerous

00:03:21.330 --> 00:03:23.930
and poses a threat to the
nation's dental health.

00:03:23.930 --> 00:03:27.370
We know this because they
literally say "cake is dangerous."

00:03:27.370 --> 00:03:31.330
They want people to buy
and eat fewer cakes.

00:03:31.330 --> 00:03:34.150
What information did the
author choose to include?

00:03:34.150 --> 00:03:35.270
Well, so this is interesting.

00:03:35.270 --> 00:03:36.840
The author talks about the results

00:03:36.840 --> 00:03:38.890
of this study and the big takeaways

00:03:38.890 --> 00:03:41.470
about the danger of cake or similar foods,

00:03:41.470 --> 00:03:43.370
and then they go on to
mention incidentally

00:03:43.370 --> 00:03:46.060
that cake rarely contains fruit.

00:03:46.060 --> 00:03:47.880
That's a curious thing to say.

00:03:47.880 --> 00:03:49.087
It's almost like they're saying,

00:03:49.087 --> 00:03:52.460
"Pie, which has fruit in it,
is better for you than cake,"

00:03:52.460 --> 00:03:54.213
without actually saying it.

00:03:55.490 --> 00:03:58.030
What information did the
author choose to leave out?

00:03:58.030 --> 00:04:02.270
Well, notice that the piece
says "cake or similar foods."

00:04:02.270 --> 00:04:03.750
I would be hard-pressed to come up

00:04:03.750 --> 00:04:06.470
with a definition of foods similar to cake

00:04:06.470 --> 00:04:09.100
that does not also
include desserts like pie.

00:04:09.100 --> 00:04:10.970
But the way that this piece is written,

00:04:10.970 --> 00:04:13.200
it swerves out of its way to avoid

00:04:13.200 --> 00:04:15.760
pinning the same tooth decay risks on pie

00:04:15.760 --> 00:04:17.790
the way that it blames cake.

00:04:17.790 --> 00:04:19.850
I think it would be reasonable to assume

00:04:19.850 --> 00:04:21.670
that if we read the underlying study

00:04:21.670 --> 00:04:23.710
that this opinion piece is based on,

00:04:23.710 --> 00:04:25.290
it would include pies and cakes

00:04:25.290 --> 00:04:27.600
in the same category of sugary desserts

00:04:27.600 --> 00:04:30.540
that are associated with
bad dental outcomes.

00:04:30.540 --> 00:04:32.360
Why would the author do this?

00:04:32.360 --> 00:04:35.000
Well, they want you to
buy pie instead of cake.

00:04:35.000 --> 00:04:36.860
But they don't want you
to think too hard about it

00:04:36.860 --> 00:04:39.160
because if you did, you would buy and eat

00:04:39.160 --> 00:04:42.690
both less cake and less pie.

00:04:42.690 --> 00:04:44.810
And the pie lobby doesn't want that.

00:04:44.810 --> 00:04:47.800
What's the connotation or the feeling

00:04:47.800 --> 00:04:49.930
of the author's word choices?

00:04:49.930 --> 00:04:52.750
Well, they're citing a
scientific study by dentists,

00:04:52.750 --> 00:04:54.960
so they want you to take
their warning seriously,

00:04:54.960 --> 00:04:55.960
and they're using words

00:04:55.960 --> 00:05:00.833
like risk and danger, rot and problems.

00:05:01.780 --> 00:05:03.180
They want you to make an association

00:05:03.180 --> 00:05:06.110
between eating cake and bad tooth health.

00:05:06.110 --> 00:05:07.370
They want you to associate

00:05:07.370 --> 00:05:10.660
scientific language with trustworthiness.

00:05:10.660 --> 00:05:13.193
So I'm gonna put down
scientific authority here.

00:05:14.050 --> 00:05:15.750
What's the overall tone?

00:05:15.750 --> 00:05:16.583
It's negative.

00:05:16.583 --> 00:05:18.550
The author does not want you to eat cake.

00:05:18.550 --> 00:05:19.860
They want you to think it's bad,

00:05:19.860 --> 00:05:21.790
and they've planted a little hint here

00:05:21.790 --> 00:05:23.650
that fruity foods are better.

00:05:23.650 --> 00:05:24.850
And what's a fruity food?

00:05:24.850 --> 00:05:25.710
Pie.

00:05:25.710 --> 00:05:27.650
Can they say pie is safer?

00:05:27.650 --> 00:05:30.350
No, not without lying outright.

00:05:30.350 --> 00:05:32.870
Now, I wanna be clear about two things.

00:05:32.870 --> 00:05:34.430
Sometimes an author's purpose

00:05:34.430 --> 00:05:37.750
really will just be to
inform straightforwardly.

00:05:37.750 --> 00:05:39.580
Not everything has to be a tug-of-war

00:05:39.580 --> 00:05:42.260
between you and the author over the truth.

00:05:42.260 --> 00:05:43.970
Sometimes a writer just wants you to know

00:05:43.970 --> 00:05:46.980
the lifecycle of a butterfly,
or how to make egg salad,

00:05:46.980 --> 00:05:49.130
or the order the U.S. presidents came in.

00:05:49.130 --> 00:05:51.590
But most of the time, there's a purpose,

00:05:51.590 --> 00:05:53.930
an opinion, behind the text.

00:05:53.930 --> 00:05:55.490
Now, the second thing I
wanna be super clear about

00:05:55.490 --> 00:05:56.840
is that I made up this whole thing.

00:05:56.840 --> 00:05:58.940
I made up the article, the statistics,

00:05:58.940 --> 00:06:01.203
Wendell, you know, all of that's fake.

00:06:02.250 --> 00:06:05.330
I like both pie and cake very much.

00:06:05.330 --> 00:06:06.957
And now that I've said that,
I'm sure you're wondering,

00:06:06.957 --> 00:06:09.640
"Oh, is David in the
pocket of big dessert?"

00:06:09.640 --> 00:06:10.940
And the answer is no.

00:06:10.940 --> 00:06:13.520
I'm in the pocket of big free education

00:06:13.520 --> 00:06:15.503
for everyone everywhere.

00:06:16.770 --> 00:06:18.370
You can learn anything.

00:06:18.370 --> 00:06:19.203
David out.


Changes in POV and dramatic irony

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.320 --> 00:00:01.780
- [Instructor] Hello, readers.

00:00:01.780 --> 00:00:03.720
Today, I'd like to talk about differences

00:00:03.720 --> 00:00:06.480
in point of view in literature.

00:00:06.480 --> 00:00:08.760
When we analyze the
perspectives of storytellers,

00:00:08.760 --> 00:00:10.360
whether that's a point of view character,

00:00:10.360 --> 00:00:13.600
an omniscient narrator, or a
narrator that attaches closely

00:00:13.600 --> 00:00:16.560
to multiple perspectives,
we can understand the way

00:00:16.560 --> 00:00:19.570
that an author is controlling
the flow of information.

00:00:19.570 --> 00:00:23.230
Who knows what, when, and
what does that tell us?

00:00:23.230 --> 00:00:25.750
A writer can control which
characters have access

00:00:25.750 --> 00:00:28.740
to information, and they
can control what access you,

00:00:28.740 --> 00:00:32.030
the reader, or the viewer,
have to information to.

00:00:32.030 --> 00:00:33.980
The information you
have and the information

00:00:33.980 --> 00:00:38.120
the characters have help
develop our perspectives.

00:00:38.120 --> 00:00:40.810
Within a story, conflict
between characters

00:00:40.810 --> 00:00:43.100
can come from a difference in perspective.

00:00:43.100 --> 00:00:44.980
In "Avatar: The Last Airbender,"

00:00:44.980 --> 00:00:47.370
the character of Prince Zuko is consumed

00:00:47.370 --> 00:00:49.700
by his desire to capture the avatar,

00:00:49.700 --> 00:00:52.110
as he feels that this will end his exile

00:00:52.110 --> 00:00:53.490
and restore him to a place

00:00:53.490 --> 00:00:55.560
of prominence at his father's side.

00:00:55.560 --> 00:00:59.020
His uncle Iroh, however,
understands based on many years

00:00:59.020 --> 00:01:01.260
of hard experience, that Zuko's father

00:01:01.260 --> 00:01:04.940
is a cruel man who never
intended to take his son back.

00:01:04.940 --> 00:01:08.140
Iroh only wants to keep his nephew safe.

00:01:08.140 --> 00:01:09.930
This difference in
perspective generates a lot

00:01:09.930 --> 00:01:12.220
of conflict between the two of them.

00:01:12.220 --> 00:01:16.010
The show slowly reveals
Iroh's perspective over time.

00:01:16.010 --> 00:01:18.540
Whereas we, as viewers,
know what Zuko wants

00:01:18.540 --> 00:01:20.563
and why almost immediately.

00:01:22.030 --> 00:01:25.720
In fiction, that kind of
information asymmetry between

00:01:25.720 --> 00:01:28.810
the storyteller, the
characters, and the audience,

00:01:28.810 --> 00:01:32.730
leads to something called dramatic irony.

00:01:32.730 --> 00:01:35.840
You're watching a play, or a
TV show, or reading a book,

00:01:35.840 --> 00:01:37.890
and you, the audience, the reader,

00:01:37.890 --> 00:01:40.970
knows something that the characters don't.

00:01:40.970 --> 00:01:44.080
This is possible because
especially in a visual medium,

00:01:44.080 --> 00:01:45.750
the audience has a different point

00:01:45.750 --> 00:01:47.660
of view than the characters do.

00:01:47.660 --> 00:01:49.940
We can see things they don't see.

00:01:49.940 --> 00:01:51.530
This difference in point of view

00:01:51.530 --> 00:01:55.420
is what allows tension,
suspense, and jokes.

00:01:55.420 --> 00:01:57.710
Remember, irony is just the difference

00:01:57.710 --> 00:02:00.040
between expectation and result.

00:02:00.040 --> 00:02:02.030
It can be leveraged to achieve anything

00:02:02.030 --> 00:02:04.660
that uses the mechanism of surprise.

00:02:04.660 --> 00:02:06.580
I don't wanna belabor how jokes work.

00:02:06.580 --> 00:02:08.560
Literally nothing is more boring

00:02:08.560 --> 00:02:10.350
or unfunny than explaining jokes.

00:02:10.350 --> 00:02:13.830
So, let's use suspense as our example.

00:02:13.830 --> 00:02:17.140
Imagine a very low stakes
villain, The Cheeseler,

00:02:17.140 --> 00:02:18.650
who goes around pranking people

00:02:18.650 --> 00:02:22.350
by balancing buckets of
cottage cheese on doorframes.

00:02:22.350 --> 00:02:24.700
You go through the door,
blam, you get cheesed.

00:02:25.710 --> 00:02:27.520
I want you to imagine
a scene in which we see

00:02:27.520 --> 00:02:30.470
The Cheeseler booby trap
the protagonist's door

00:02:30.470 --> 00:02:32.390
with a bucket of cottage cheese.

00:02:32.390 --> 00:02:34.690
Nobody else in the story
is around to witness this.

00:02:34.690 --> 00:02:36.650
After all, The Cheeseler stands alone.

00:02:36.650 --> 00:02:39.470
And now, we see our hero in Tamika.

00:02:39.470 --> 00:02:41.970
She's walking down the
hall with such confidence,

00:02:41.970 --> 00:02:44.060
blindly unaware of the cheesy threat

00:02:44.060 --> 00:02:45.800
that awaits her when she opens that door.

00:02:45.800 --> 00:02:47.080
We come back to the cheese.

00:02:47.080 --> 00:02:49.933
It's still there, oh no, oh no Tamika.

00:02:51.220 --> 00:02:53.600
Do you see what I'm doing here?

00:02:53.600 --> 00:02:55.990
Do you see how this generates suspense?

00:02:55.990 --> 00:02:59.730
You, the viewer, know something
the character doesn't know.

00:02:59.730 --> 00:03:01.470
The difference between her point of view

00:03:01.470 --> 00:03:04.590
and your point of view generates tension.

00:03:04.590 --> 00:03:07.210
This is something that
writers do on purpose.

00:03:07.210 --> 00:03:09.340
This tension, this dramatic irony,

00:03:09.340 --> 00:03:13.670
draws us in because it's very
satisfying to see it resolved.

00:03:13.670 --> 00:03:15.170
We know that there's that possibility

00:03:15.170 --> 00:03:17.610
of Tamika getting splatted
with cottage cheese,

00:03:17.610 --> 00:03:21.950
but what if Tamika, at the last
moment, kicks open the door?

00:03:21.950 --> 00:03:24.880
The cheese bucket drops, and
Tamika catches it neatly.

00:03:24.880 --> 00:03:26.420
Whoo, thank goodness.

00:03:26.420 --> 00:03:29.860
She saw that the door was
slightly ajar and put it together.

00:03:29.860 --> 00:03:32.480
The tension is resolved as the gap closes

00:03:32.480 --> 00:03:35.513
between what Tamika
knows and what we know.

00:03:36.970 --> 00:03:39.770
When characters resolve
interpersonal differences,

00:03:39.770 --> 00:03:42.100
it's through an alignment
of their points of view.

00:03:42.100 --> 00:03:44.370
That's what brings us to resolution.

00:03:44.370 --> 00:03:47.095
The difference between two
points of view can be reconciled,

00:03:47.095 --> 00:03:50.823
and that too, is a way of
relieving story tension.

00:03:52.060 --> 00:03:53.900
Now, I'd like to counsel you against

00:03:53.900 --> 00:03:57.040
making blanket statements
about specific genres of work,

00:03:57.040 --> 00:04:00.200
like sure, a first
person story could limit

00:04:00.200 --> 00:04:02.620
the flow of information
because we're perceiving

00:04:02.620 --> 00:04:05.810
a story through the senses of
the point of view character.

00:04:05.810 --> 00:04:07.850
But, in your analysis of that story,

00:04:07.850 --> 00:04:10.290
be sure to get specific.

00:04:10.290 --> 00:04:12.260
How does that specific character

00:04:12.260 --> 00:04:15.260
in that particular situation see events?

00:04:15.260 --> 00:04:17.510
Why does the author show us, the readers,

00:04:17.510 --> 00:04:20.263
information that character
doesn't get to see?

00:04:21.270 --> 00:04:23.720
Asking yourself questions
about those differences

00:04:23.720 --> 00:04:26.630
in perspective between the
narration and characters,

00:04:26.630 --> 00:04:28.800
between two or more characters,

00:04:28.800 --> 00:04:30.410
between the text and the reader,

00:04:30.410 --> 00:04:32.910
will make it easy for
you to analyze the impact

00:04:32.910 --> 00:04:34.910
of those decisions that the author made.

00:04:36.270 --> 00:04:39.000
And now, I'm going to go walk my dog.

00:04:39.000 --> 00:04:40.770
I will see you all next time.

00:04:40.770 --> 00:04:43.053
You can learn anything, David out.

00:04:44.240 --> 00:04:45.488
All right.

00:04:45.488 --> 00:04:47.655
(humming)

00:04:49.860 --> 00:04:51.252
(metal clanking)

00:04:51.252 --> 00:04:53.787
Oh, curse you Cheeseler!


How POV affects readers

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:01.600
- [David] Hello, readers.

00:00:01.600 --> 00:00:04.500
I wanna talk to you today about
point of view in literature

00:00:04.500 --> 00:00:06.940
and how it can shape what we, as readers,

00:00:06.940 --> 00:00:08.870
take away from a story.

00:00:08.870 --> 00:00:11.660
Now, we've talked about this
in more basic terms before,

00:00:11.660 --> 00:00:14.500
is a story in first,
second or third person?

00:00:14.500 --> 00:00:16.810
But I would like to go deeper.

00:00:16.810 --> 00:00:18.910
Once we've sussed out whose perspective

00:00:18.910 --> 00:00:22.600
a story or a poem is being
told from, what's next?

00:00:22.600 --> 00:00:24.840
What else is there to talk about?

00:00:24.840 --> 00:00:27.060
Well, I think it's useful to remember

00:00:27.060 --> 00:00:30.140
that stories and poems don't just happen.

00:00:30.140 --> 00:00:32.820
They don't just suddenly,
spontaneously exist.

00:00:32.820 --> 00:00:34.300
Creating them is work.

00:00:34.300 --> 00:00:36.710
And it's the result of a
whole bunch of decisions

00:00:36.710 --> 00:00:38.150
made by a writer.

00:00:38.150 --> 00:00:40.880
So, who is the point-of-view
character or characters?

00:00:40.880 --> 00:00:42.490
What does that mean for the story?

00:00:42.490 --> 00:00:45.413
Ultimately, a point of view
is an author's decision.

00:00:45.413 --> 00:00:46.840
So, when an author chooses

00:00:46.840 --> 00:00:48.890
to center a story on one character,

00:00:48.890 --> 00:00:51.063
how does that change the story they tell?

00:00:51.063 --> 00:00:52.590
Would the story be different

00:00:52.590 --> 00:00:54.730
if it were centered on
a different character?

00:00:54.730 --> 00:00:55.710
How does that point of view

00:00:55.710 --> 00:00:57.913
impact the way the story gets told?

00:00:59.270 --> 00:01:03.070
Imagine a rocket scientist
with a mouse in her pocket,

00:01:03.070 --> 00:01:07.280
and they're going to inspect a
spaceship under construction.

00:01:07.280 --> 00:01:09.080
I'm gonna give you two little snippets

00:01:09.080 --> 00:01:11.750
in what's called close
third person perspective,

00:01:11.750 --> 00:01:12.900
where there's a narrator,

00:01:12.900 --> 00:01:15.640
but their point of view is
attached to a character.

00:01:15.640 --> 00:01:19.790
We get to see through their
eyes, experience their thoughts.

00:01:19.790 --> 00:01:22.747
So, first, we're gonna hear
from the rocket scientist.

00:01:22.747 --> 00:01:25.697
"Leaving the lab, Dr.
Harper strode confidently

00:01:25.697 --> 00:01:26.967
"into the spaceship hangar,

00:01:26.967 --> 00:01:29.937
"clipboard in hand, pet mouse in pocket.

00:01:29.937 --> 00:01:31.957
"Launch day was only eight months away,

00:01:31.957 --> 00:01:35.267
"and Project Juno still had
so many bugs to work out,

00:01:35.267 --> 00:01:37.607
"but she was certain that
the test she'd conduct today

00:01:37.607 --> 00:01:40.547
"would help her solve
the air filter problem.

00:01:40.547 --> 00:01:43.357
"The starship sat before
her in a pool of light,

00:01:43.357 --> 00:01:45.757
"a deep bluish-black craft,

00:01:45.757 --> 00:01:48.547
"once an idea that had
lived only in her mind,

00:01:48.547 --> 00:01:51.907
"but now it was a real physical object.

00:01:51.907 --> 00:01:53.277
"She dug around in her pocket

00:01:53.277 --> 00:01:55.707
"and fed Persephone a sunflower seed."

00:01:56.550 --> 00:01:59.573
Now, let's take that again
from the mouse's perspective.

00:02:00.567 --> 00:02:01.867
"Persephone T. Mouse

00:02:01.867 --> 00:02:04.247
"clung to the lip of
Tatiana's jacket pocket,

00:02:04.247 --> 00:02:06.347
"as they passed from a small cold room

00:02:06.347 --> 00:02:09.607
"into a much larger,
warmer, and brighter room.

00:02:09.607 --> 00:02:11.987
"It had been four hours since
she'd had anything to eat,

00:02:11.987 --> 00:02:14.077
"and she was cranky.

00:02:14.077 --> 00:02:15.587
"In the middle of the big, bright room

00:02:15.587 --> 00:02:18.027
"was a big bluish black shape.

00:02:18.027 --> 00:02:19.467
"Persophone didn't know what it was,

00:02:19.467 --> 00:02:21.457
"and frankly, it looked
kind of like a bird,

00:02:21.457 --> 00:02:24.147
"which was weird and a little frightening.

00:02:24.147 --> 00:02:25.037
"But it hadn't moved

00:02:25.037 --> 00:02:27.387
"the last time Persephone
and Tatiana were in there,

00:02:27.387 --> 00:02:28.727
"and it wasn't moving now.

00:02:28.727 --> 00:02:31.027
"So, Persephone guessed it was asleep.

00:02:31.027 --> 00:02:32.717
"She chirped impatiently,

00:02:32.717 --> 00:02:35.500
"and Tatiana gave her a sunflower seed."

00:02:35.500 --> 00:02:38.040
You see, the same things
happen in each story.

00:02:38.040 --> 00:02:40.900
Dr. Harper goes from her
lab to the spaceship hangar,

00:02:40.900 --> 00:02:44.420
and then, she feeds her
pet mouse a sunflower seed.

00:02:44.420 --> 00:02:46.260
But when we hang out with
Harper's perspective,

00:02:46.260 --> 00:02:49.034
we get her thoughts and we see
what she thinks is important.

00:02:49.034 --> 00:02:49.867
But when we're reading

00:02:49.867 --> 00:02:52.470
from Persephone the mouse's perspective,

00:02:52.470 --> 00:02:53.940
she doesn't care about the spaceship,

00:02:53.940 --> 00:02:55.400
she doesn't know what it is.

00:02:55.400 --> 00:02:58.810
As readers, it's useful to
ask how a writer is developing

00:02:58.810 --> 00:03:02.040
a character's point of
view through a story.

00:03:02.040 --> 00:03:04.360
What are the abilities and limitations

00:03:04.360 --> 00:03:06.250
of a point-of-view character?

00:03:06.250 --> 00:03:08.010
Persephone the mouse is small.

00:03:08.010 --> 00:03:10.020
She can sneak through
little holes in the wall

00:03:10.020 --> 00:03:13.330
or hide in the jacket pocket
of a consenting human being.

00:03:13.330 --> 00:03:16.730
But Dr. Harper has, you know,
an astrophysics doctorate

00:03:16.730 --> 00:03:18.050
and opposable thumbs.

00:03:18.050 --> 00:03:20.250
She can open doors, design a spaceship,

00:03:20.250 --> 00:03:22.000
plan its flight trajectory.

00:03:22.000 --> 00:03:23.510
This is kind of an extreme example

00:03:23.510 --> 00:03:25.590
because one of these
characters is a human being

00:03:25.590 --> 00:03:26.700
and the other one is a mouse.

00:03:26.700 --> 00:03:28.460
But even among different people,

00:03:28.460 --> 00:03:31.280
we can imagine very different stories.

00:03:31.280 --> 00:03:33.760
Characters and stories
are just like real people.

00:03:33.760 --> 00:03:35.610
They have strengths and weaknesses,

00:03:35.610 --> 00:03:39.050
knowledge about some things
and ignorance about others.

00:03:39.050 --> 00:03:41.850
Sometimes, they tell the
truth, and sometimes, they lie.

00:03:42.800 --> 00:03:45.560
This is especially important
in first-person books,

00:03:45.560 --> 00:03:47.720
where everything we read
comes to us directly

00:03:47.720 --> 00:03:49.890
from the point-of-view character.

00:03:49.890 --> 00:03:52.190
You have to open yourself
up to the possibility

00:03:52.190 --> 00:03:55.240
that the narrator can
be wrong about stuff.

00:03:55.240 --> 00:03:56.980
They can perceive things incorrectly,

00:03:56.980 --> 00:04:01.060
or be blinded by their own
assumptions, or just be confused.

00:04:01.060 --> 00:04:03.000
They could also just be lying.

00:04:03.000 --> 00:04:06.060
But they could also just be
innocently wrong and confused.

00:04:06.060 --> 00:04:09.000
They could look at a spaceship
and think it's a bird.

00:04:09.000 --> 00:04:11.360
Narrators that are wrong or misinformed

00:04:11.360 --> 00:04:13.160
or actively trying to trick you

00:04:13.160 --> 00:04:16.290
are called unreliable narrators.

00:04:16.290 --> 00:04:18.760
Reading a book narrated
by an unreliable narrator

00:04:18.760 --> 00:04:21.800
turns the relatively
straightforward process of reading

00:04:21.800 --> 00:04:23.680
into a tug of war.

00:04:23.680 --> 00:04:26.800
How do I know I can trust what
the narrator is telling me?

00:04:26.800 --> 00:04:29.510
Ask yourself, what does a narrator think?

00:04:29.510 --> 00:04:32.201
What do they feel and what do they do?

00:04:32.201 --> 00:04:34.550
When you can answer
all of those questions,

00:04:34.550 --> 00:04:37.750
you can begin to put their
perspective into words.

00:04:37.750 --> 00:04:40.400
If you can identify the
biases or the perspective

00:04:40.400 --> 00:04:42.670
or the ignorance of a
point-of-view character,

00:04:42.670 --> 00:04:44.970
you can start to correct
for it as you read,

00:04:44.970 --> 00:04:47.650
and use that understanding
of the point of view

00:04:47.650 --> 00:04:50.700
to better understand the story as a whole.

00:04:50.700 --> 00:04:52.110
Something important to remember

00:04:52.110 --> 00:04:53.720
is that the storytelling character

00:04:53.720 --> 00:04:56.310
is not the same thing as the author.

00:04:56.310 --> 00:04:58.010
The author creates those characters

00:04:58.010 --> 00:05:00.400
and is literally the person
who writes the words.

00:05:00.400 --> 00:05:03.360
But if I wrote a story about
an ogre who eats children,

00:05:03.360 --> 00:05:05.930
that does not make me an
ogre who eats children.

00:05:05.930 --> 00:05:08.250
I would never eat children.

00:05:08.250 --> 00:05:09.363
They taste horrible.

00:05:10.930 --> 00:05:12.560
You can learn anything.

00:05:12.560 --> 00:05:13.393
David out.


Sal Khan Appreciates Teachers

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.160
(chiming music)

00:00:03.160 --> 00:00:05.600
- [Teacher] Four plus one is?

00:00:05.600 --> 00:00:06.433
- 16.

00:00:06.433 --> 00:00:08.116
(laughing)

00:00:08.116 --> 00:00:09.100
(celebrating)

00:00:09.100 --> 00:00:09.940
- Hi teachers.

00:00:09.940 --> 00:00:11.740
Sal Khan here from Khan Academy.

00:00:11.740 --> 00:00:13.070
Now I just wanted to make sure that

00:00:13.070 --> 00:00:15.610
when congratulations
are being passed around

00:00:15.610 --> 00:00:18.127
that we take the time
to say congratulations

00:00:18.127 --> 00:00:20.440
and thank you to teachers

00:00:20.440 --> 00:00:22.860
for all of the amazing work that they do.

00:00:22.860 --> 00:00:25.298
Congratulations for getting
another group of students

00:00:25.298 --> 00:00:26.939
forward in their life.

00:00:26.939 --> 00:00:30.020
(students applauding)

00:00:30.020 --> 00:00:31.690
And I always say, if I had to pick between

00:00:31.690 --> 00:00:34.070
an amazing teacher or amazing technology,

00:00:34.070 --> 00:00:36.382
I would pick the amazing
teacher every single time.

00:00:36.382 --> 00:00:38.360
(celebrating)

00:00:38.360 --> 00:00:40.580
But in times where we're having
to lean a little bit more

00:00:40.580 --> 00:00:44.030
on the screen, I think it only
highlights that much more,

00:00:44.030 --> 00:00:45.960
how invaluable the human element is.

00:00:45.960 --> 00:00:49.120
How invaluable the work that
you do to motivate students,

00:00:49.120 --> 00:00:51.810
unblock them and form
those human connections.

00:00:51.810 --> 00:00:54.520
Are valuable not just for
learning the academic material,

00:00:54.520 --> 00:00:56.300
but for making them stronger,

00:00:56.300 --> 00:00:58.292
more resilient and better human beings.

00:00:58.292 --> 00:01:00.930
(students celebrating)

00:01:00.930 --> 00:01:02.990
So thank you so much all of you teachers

00:01:02.990 --> 00:01:05.330
in this graduation time for
all of the incredible work

00:01:05.330 --> 00:01:06.941
you do day in, day out.

00:01:06.941 --> 00:01:09.608
(chiming music)


Developing themes

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.510 --> 00:00:01.460
- [David] Hello, readers!

00:00:01.460 --> 00:00:04.240
Let's talk about themes and how authors

00:00:04.240 --> 00:00:06.830
can intentionally build
messages into fiction.

00:00:06.830 --> 00:00:08.080
Now, to recap a little,

00:00:08.080 --> 00:00:10.900
themes link big ideas
about the world we live in

00:00:10.900 --> 00:00:13.160
with the action of a text.

00:00:13.160 --> 00:00:16.040
For example, in "The Lord of
the Rings" stories and films,

00:00:16.040 --> 00:00:18.590
the One Ring represents absolute power

00:00:18.590 --> 00:00:20.790
and how dangerous that is.

00:00:20.790 --> 00:00:22.320
How do we know that though?

00:00:22.320 --> 00:00:24.770
How did J. R. R. Tolkien, as an author,

00:00:24.770 --> 00:00:27.080
develop that theme in the text?

00:00:27.080 --> 00:00:28.010
How can we go deeper,

00:00:28.010 --> 00:00:30.710
beyond that headline of the Ring equals

00:00:30.710 --> 00:00:32.850
the dangers of absolute power?

00:00:32.850 --> 00:00:35.750
Good readers can look at a
whole text from beginning to end

00:00:35.750 --> 00:00:38.720
and identify where the author
purposefully chose words,

00:00:38.720 --> 00:00:41.040
included details, or directed action

00:00:41.040 --> 00:00:43.720
that develops or reveals
the overall theme.

00:00:43.720 --> 00:00:45.467
It's not just that characters say,

00:00:45.467 --> 00:00:47.380
"Oh, no, the Ring's super-dangerous."

00:00:47.380 --> 00:00:49.010
In fact, I believe in "The
Fellowship of the Ring,

00:00:49.010 --> 00:00:51.467
Gandalf says, "No, with that power,

00:00:51.467 --> 00:00:53.697
"I should have power
too great and terrible.

00:00:53.697 --> 00:00:55.587
"And over me, the Ring could gain a power

00:00:55.587 --> 00:00:57.477
"still greater and more deadly.

00:00:57.477 --> 00:00:59.330
"Do not tempt me!"

00:00:59.330 --> 00:01:00.540
The characters say that, they do,

00:01:00.540 --> 00:01:03.640
but it's also about how they
behave around the thing.

00:01:03.640 --> 00:01:06.300
It's how the plot is
shaped around this object

00:01:06.300 --> 00:01:08.050
and how a group of people come together

00:01:08.050 --> 00:01:11.190
to identify this Ring as a
dangerous, magical artifact

00:01:11.190 --> 00:01:13.820
that needs to be destroyed
for the good of the world.

00:01:13.820 --> 00:01:15.130
It's not just dialogue.

00:01:15.130 --> 00:01:17.280
It's also descriptions by the author

00:01:17.280 --> 00:01:20.320
and actions taken by the characters.

00:01:20.320 --> 00:01:21.690
So let's go through some of the ways

00:01:21.690 --> 00:01:24.120
that an author can develop
theme within a story,

00:01:24.120 --> 00:01:26.850
with the important caveat
that you won't always be able

00:01:26.850 --> 00:01:29.100
to detect a theme in a text until you're

00:01:29.100 --> 00:01:31.630
already finished reading
it for the first time.

00:01:31.630 --> 00:01:34.940
This, to me, is one of the
great pleasures of rereading.

00:01:34.940 --> 00:01:35.960
You've already worked hard

00:01:35.960 --> 00:01:37.320
to get an understanding of the text,

00:01:37.320 --> 00:01:39.440
so now you can go back
and pick up all the stuff

00:01:39.440 --> 00:01:42.040
you might not have noticed the first time.

00:01:42.040 --> 00:01:45.630
So one way to develop theme
is through the repeated use

00:01:45.630 --> 00:01:47.620
of a symbol or an object.

00:01:47.620 --> 00:01:50.260
The Ring in "Lord of the
Rings" is a great example

00:01:50.260 --> 00:01:52.260
because characters are
always talking about it.

00:01:52.260 --> 00:01:53.790
But it could really be anything,

00:01:53.790 --> 00:01:57.320
a design, an object, an animal.

00:01:57.320 --> 00:01:59.690
Imagine a story about a
child who wants to grow up

00:01:59.690 --> 00:02:02.480
to be an engineer that develops airplanes.

00:02:02.480 --> 00:02:05.300
And throughout this story,
birds keep showing up,

00:02:05.300 --> 00:02:07.240
birds on the protagonist's windowsill,

00:02:07.240 --> 00:02:08.950
her favorite teacher's bird earrings,

00:02:08.950 --> 00:02:11.140
maybe she has a best friend named Robin.

00:02:11.140 --> 00:02:12.980
And from that, we can see the idea

00:02:12.980 --> 00:02:15.040
of flight is a theme in this story,

00:02:15.040 --> 00:02:17.870
and all of these
bird-related things go back

00:02:17.870 --> 00:02:20.243
to this character's desire to take flight.

00:02:21.940 --> 00:02:25.600
Changes in setting are a
fine way to develop themes.

00:02:25.600 --> 00:02:27.340
How is a location portrayed?

00:02:27.340 --> 00:02:29.440
How does it match with
the way characters feel

00:02:29.440 --> 00:02:32.350
or behave when they
appear in these locations?

00:02:32.350 --> 00:02:35.310
Imagine a character who
desperately wants to be alone.

00:02:35.310 --> 00:02:36.930
So at a tense portion in the story,

00:02:36.930 --> 00:02:40.150
she flees to a distant mountaintop.

00:02:40.150 --> 00:02:43.090
When she gets there,
what's the weather like?

00:02:43.090 --> 00:02:46.630
Is it cold, snowy, and
forbidding on the mountain?

00:02:46.630 --> 00:02:50.030
Is it an active volcano,
bubbling with lava?

00:02:50.030 --> 00:02:53.760
Is it clear, peaceful, full of
snowdrops and mountain goats?

00:02:53.760 --> 00:02:56.480
What would an author be trying
to say with those decisions?

00:02:56.480 --> 00:02:57.990
How should we, the reader,

00:02:57.990 --> 00:03:00.710
feel about that character's solitude?

00:03:00.710 --> 00:03:02.430
If it's snowy and forbidding,

00:03:02.430 --> 00:03:04.870
is it a symbol of the
character's coldness,

00:03:04.870 --> 00:03:06.133
of their hardening up?

00:03:07.090 --> 00:03:08.350
Does the volcano reflect

00:03:08.350 --> 00:03:10.760
the character's explosive potential?

00:03:10.760 --> 00:03:12.970
Or does the beauty of
the lonely mountaintop

00:03:12.970 --> 00:03:16.720
mean this was the right decision
for the character to take?

00:03:16.720 --> 00:03:19.940
Dialogue that repeatedly
references a similar idea

00:03:19.940 --> 00:03:22.330
can be a way to develop theme.

00:03:22.330 --> 00:03:23.950
When characters mention something a lot,

00:03:23.950 --> 00:03:26.440
it's probably because the
author is thinking about it

00:03:26.440 --> 00:03:30.000
and maybe wanted to build it
intentionally into the story.

00:03:30.000 --> 00:03:32.500
Imagine a teenager in Ancient Rome

00:03:32.500 --> 00:03:35.980
who's preoccupied with
honor and his family name

00:03:35.980 --> 00:03:37.470
and how he's worried he won't live up

00:03:37.470 --> 00:03:40.510
to the achievements of his ancestors.

00:03:40.510 --> 00:03:42.450
If that's something that
he's insecure about,

00:03:42.450 --> 00:03:43.740
he might think about it often

00:03:43.740 --> 00:03:45.540
or talk about the concept of honor

00:03:45.540 --> 00:03:48.330
or the social standing of his family.

00:03:48.330 --> 00:03:51.260
You can also see this
presented as explicit lessons

00:03:51.260 --> 00:03:56.260
by a sage character,
usually older and wise.

00:03:56.320 --> 00:04:00.120
Think of Moana's grandmother or of Yoda.

00:04:00.120 --> 00:04:01.917
They'll say something explicit like,

00:04:01.917 --> 00:04:04.130
"Go do the thing your heart wants, Moana,"

00:04:04.130 --> 00:04:06.617
or, "Trust that the energy of the universe

00:04:06.617 --> 00:04:09.410
"will make you a really
good space wizard, Luke."

00:04:09.410 --> 00:04:10.850
I'm paraphrasing here.

00:04:10.850 --> 00:04:13.050
Or think of Dorothy in "The Wizard of Oz,"

00:04:13.050 --> 00:04:15.460
saying, "There's no place like home."

00:04:15.460 --> 00:04:17.660
She says it again and again.

00:04:17.660 --> 00:04:19.190
The words are so powerful

00:04:19.190 --> 00:04:21.140
that they're used as a magic spell.

00:04:21.140 --> 00:04:23.710
And words so powerful
that they become magic

00:04:23.710 --> 00:04:26.453
is really just another way to say theme.

00:04:27.290 --> 00:04:30.190
It doesn't need to be
said aloud to be thematic.

00:04:30.190 --> 00:04:31.760
Some of the most powerful moments

00:04:31.760 --> 00:04:35.630
in storytelling come from
action, not just dialogue.

00:04:35.630 --> 00:04:37.310
Momentous character decisions,

00:04:37.310 --> 00:04:40.190
like Maui giving up his
powers to save Moana

00:04:40.190 --> 00:04:42.850
or Harry Potter's climactic
battle with Voldemort,

00:04:42.850 --> 00:04:45.250
are chock-full of themes,

00:04:45.250 --> 00:04:48.110
self-sacrifice, the power of love,

00:04:48.110 --> 00:04:49.880
the importance of honesty.

00:04:49.880 --> 00:04:51.710
Some of these themes can be expressed

00:04:51.710 --> 00:04:53.593
without speaking a single word.

00:04:54.980 --> 00:04:56.240
And I should be clear.

00:04:56.240 --> 00:04:57.980
Sometimes you need to finish the story

00:04:57.980 --> 00:04:59.840
before you can look back
on it and understand

00:04:59.840 --> 00:05:02.220
how parts of it contribute to the theme.

00:05:02.220 --> 00:05:03.630
You might need to get some distance

00:05:03.630 --> 00:05:06.200
before you can see how all
of the pieces fit together.

00:05:06.200 --> 00:05:08.100
If something really sticks with me,

00:05:08.100 --> 00:05:10.550
sometimes I like to go back
and reread parts of a book

00:05:10.550 --> 00:05:12.740
once I've gotten a sense of its theme,

00:05:12.740 --> 00:05:16.000
to see how the author has
threaded theme through the text.

00:05:16.000 --> 00:05:17.910
Now, if you look very closely

00:05:17.910 --> 00:05:20.030
at the videos I make here at Khan Academy,

00:05:20.030 --> 00:05:23.070
if you really squint your
eyes and listen carefully,

00:05:23.070 --> 00:05:25.490
you'll notice that all of
them share the same theme,

00:05:25.490 --> 00:05:28.023
which is you can learn anything.

00:05:28.870 --> 00:05:29.703
David out.


What is an argument?

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.620 --> 00:00:01.600
- [David] Hello, Readers.

00:00:01.600 --> 00:00:04.650
Today we shall take the
field in rhetorical combat,

00:00:04.650 --> 00:00:07.120
also known as argument.

00:00:07.120 --> 00:00:09.900
Argument is when an author
wants to convince you

00:00:09.900 --> 00:00:11.250
of their position.

00:00:11.250 --> 00:00:13.760
"This is my position; you
should share this position,

00:00:13.760 --> 00:00:14.930
and here is why."

00:00:14.930 --> 00:00:16.750
Argument does not sneak,

00:00:16.750 --> 00:00:18.720
it does not come in through the back.

00:00:18.720 --> 00:00:21.900
It is supported by reasons,
evidence, examples.

00:00:21.900 --> 00:00:25.000
Not just pure opinion, not
just cherry-picked stories:

00:00:25.000 --> 00:00:28.360
data, fact, observable reality.

00:00:28.360 --> 00:00:31.180
There is a place for
pure subjective opinion,

00:00:31.180 --> 00:00:34.870
and it is the realm of the
movie and the restaurant review.

00:00:34.870 --> 00:00:36.240
"I did not like this movie

00:00:36.240 --> 00:00:38.410
because I didn't laugh at its jokes."

00:00:38.410 --> 00:00:40.250
"I did not enjoy the hamburger I got

00:00:40.250 --> 00:00:42.510
because I found it too dry for my liking."

00:00:42.510 --> 00:00:44.730
This is not what we're
talking about today.

00:00:44.730 --> 00:00:46.950
Obviously, argument is rooted in opinion

00:00:46.950 --> 00:00:48.590
and subjective personal preferences,

00:00:48.590 --> 00:00:52.560
but those opinions need to
be backed up with evidence.

00:00:52.560 --> 00:00:56.540
Let's compare arguments for
and against a tax on soda.

00:00:56.540 --> 00:00:59.710
Now, this writer argues that
sugar contributes to obesity,

00:00:59.710 --> 00:01:02.320
and therefore, people should
be prevented from buying soda,

00:01:02.320 --> 00:01:03.420
which is full of sugar

00:01:03.420 --> 00:01:06.130
on the grounds that it is bad
for them, let's take a look.

00:01:06.130 --> 00:01:08.780
The soda tax could alter
many people's behavior,

00:01:08.780 --> 00:01:11.330
causing them to stop buying sugary drinks.

00:01:11.330 --> 00:01:14.670
Some foods are necessities
like milk, eggs, and bread.

00:01:14.670 --> 00:01:17.330
People will buy them even
if the prices increase.

00:01:17.330 --> 00:01:19.230
Sugary drinks aren't necessary.

00:01:19.230 --> 00:01:22.030
If the price goes up, people
will buy fewer sugary drinks

00:01:22.030 --> 00:01:24.170
and they won't be consuming as much sugar,

00:01:24.170 --> 00:01:27.230
therefore, the obesity rate will go down.

00:01:27.230 --> 00:01:29.670
Whereas this author counters
that people have a right

00:01:29.670 --> 00:01:32.480
to make what they see
as unhealthy decisions.

00:01:32.480 --> 00:01:34.810
Soda and other sugary
drinks have been targeted

00:01:34.810 --> 00:01:35.990
because they lack nutrition

00:01:35.990 --> 00:01:37.880
and are basically just liquid sugar.

00:01:37.880 --> 00:01:40.280
Most people would agree that
proper nutrition is important

00:01:40.280 --> 00:01:42.020
for maintaining a healthy lifestyle.

00:01:42.020 --> 00:01:45.580
However, do legislators have
the right or responsibility

00:01:45.580 --> 00:01:47.480
to regulate people's sugar intake

00:01:47.480 --> 00:01:49.150
in order to improve their health?

00:01:49.150 --> 00:01:50.760
I say, no.

00:01:50.760 --> 00:01:53.220
All right, let's evaluate these claims.

00:01:53.220 --> 00:01:55.550
For the first argument
in favor of the soda tax,

00:01:55.550 --> 00:01:57.440
how do we know this is true?

00:01:57.440 --> 00:01:59.400
What evidence does this author give

00:01:59.400 --> 00:02:02.000
that this tax will
alter people's behavior?

00:02:02.000 --> 00:02:03.690
What evidence does this author give

00:02:03.690 --> 00:02:06.970
that sugary drinks aren't seen
to be as essential as milk?

00:02:06.970 --> 00:02:10.390
After all, not everyone
can or does drink milk.

00:02:10.390 --> 00:02:12.330
In the piece, the evidence
that the author gives us

00:02:12.330 --> 00:02:14.880
is this table, which shows how much sugar

00:02:14.880 --> 00:02:16.280
is in soda per serving,

00:02:16.280 --> 00:02:18.930
but it doesn't use evidence
to connect sugar consumption

00:02:18.930 --> 00:02:20.780
to unhealthy outcomes.

00:02:20.780 --> 00:02:23.700
All this says is, soda has a lot of sugar.

00:02:23.700 --> 00:02:25.820
I wanna see evidence, I wanna see studies.

00:02:25.820 --> 00:02:28.513
How do we know this tax
would change behavior?

00:02:29.660 --> 00:02:32.980
Good readers think through
the impacts of an argument.

00:02:32.980 --> 00:02:34.550
If this tax went into effect,

00:02:34.550 --> 00:02:37.150
what would the consequences be?

00:02:37.150 --> 00:02:39.500
Are there faults in the author's logic?

00:02:39.500 --> 00:02:41.600
It might stop some
people from buying soda,

00:02:41.600 --> 00:02:43.120
but in an unfair way.

00:02:43.120 --> 00:02:44.930
Here's how I'm processing
this as a reader.

00:02:44.930 --> 00:02:47.993
If you take a bottle of soda
that previously costs, say $2,

00:02:48.890 --> 00:02:50.510
and the tax makes it $10,

00:02:50.510 --> 00:02:52.920
that will make it more
difficult to purchase.

00:02:52.920 --> 00:02:55.610
But to a millionaire, the
difference between $2 and $10

00:02:55.610 --> 00:02:56.660
is basically nothing.

00:02:56.660 --> 00:02:58.560
Whereas to a poor or middle class person,

00:02:58.560 --> 00:03:01.220
that $8 difference adds up pretty quickly.

00:03:01.220 --> 00:03:03.990
I see this as a possible
unintended consequence

00:03:03.990 --> 00:03:06.810
of this proposal, that it
hits poor people harder

00:03:06.810 --> 00:03:08.300
than rich people.

00:03:08.300 --> 00:03:11.120
As readers, it's not just our
responsibility to interpret

00:03:11.120 --> 00:03:13.880
what the author is saying, we
also have to ask ourselves,

00:03:13.880 --> 00:03:16.039
what are they not saying?

00:03:16.039 --> 00:03:18.010
In the second argument,
the author is arguing

00:03:18.010 --> 00:03:20.000
that it isn't the
government's responsibility

00:03:20.000 --> 00:03:22.370
to determine how much
sugar people consume,

00:03:22.370 --> 00:03:25.860
and therefore taxes on sugary
drinks are unnecessary.

00:03:25.860 --> 00:03:28.550
So now I'm asking, whose
responsibility is it

00:03:28.550 --> 00:03:30.350
to determine how much sugar is in a drink?

00:03:30.350 --> 00:03:32.540
Why is sugar so inexpensive to begin with?

00:03:32.540 --> 00:03:34.810
Do legislators have a
responsibility there?

00:03:34.810 --> 00:03:37.110
Now we know it's not
legal to bottle rat poison

00:03:37.110 --> 00:03:40.270
and sell it as tea, but
whose responsibility is that?

00:03:40.270 --> 00:03:41.970
What isn't this author saying,

00:03:41.970 --> 00:03:45.090
and how does not saying
it serve their argument?

00:03:45.090 --> 00:03:47.730
They're not saying what the
government could or should do,

00:03:47.730 --> 00:03:49.300
only what it shouldn't do.

00:03:49.300 --> 00:03:51.730
And this is why I want you to be skeptical

00:03:51.730 --> 00:03:55.390
whenever you read anyone's
argument about anything.

00:03:55.390 --> 00:03:58.990
You need to figure out what
the terms of the debate are.

00:03:58.990 --> 00:04:01.250
What does the argument assume as a given?

00:04:01.250 --> 00:04:03.010
What's a problem worth fixing?

00:04:03.010 --> 00:04:04.050
What are the trade offs

00:04:04.050 --> 00:04:05.710
that the writer thinks are acceptable?

00:04:05.710 --> 00:04:08.110
So when you encounter an argument in text,

00:04:08.110 --> 00:04:11.590
look for the claims, and then
look to see if those claims

00:04:11.590 --> 00:04:14.550
are backed up with
data-supported reasoning.

00:04:14.550 --> 00:04:16.750
Is the author using evidence and logic?

00:04:16.750 --> 00:04:19.040
Do they anticipate
objections to their arguments

00:04:19.040 --> 00:04:22.730
and push back on or
incorporate those critiques?

00:04:22.730 --> 00:04:25.810
Above all else, I want
you to remain skeptical.

00:04:25.810 --> 00:04:28.310
Everyone's selling something, even me.

00:04:28.310 --> 00:04:30.080
It's just the thing I'm trying to sell you

00:04:30.080 --> 00:04:33.840
is the fundamental idea
that you can learn anything.

00:04:33.840 --> 00:04:36.193
You've got this, Readers. David out.


Figurative language

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.750 --> 00:00:01.600
- [Instructor] Hello readers,

00:00:01.600 --> 00:00:03.620
we've got a bear of a lesson today

00:00:03.620 --> 00:00:06.790
and it's all about figurative language.

00:00:06.790 --> 00:00:07.820
Sorry, I should back up.

00:00:07.820 --> 00:00:10.380
I know I said we have a bear of a lesson.

00:00:10.380 --> 00:00:12.020
I don't literally mean
that I've got a bear.

00:00:12.020 --> 00:00:13.280
That would be extremely sweet.

00:00:13.280 --> 00:00:14.850
Love a bear, love bear's whole thing

00:00:14.850 --> 00:00:15.990
with the snacking and the sleeping

00:00:15.990 --> 00:00:17.240
and the eating of fish, but no.

00:00:17.240 --> 00:00:19.310
A bear of is a figurative expression

00:00:19.310 --> 00:00:20.480
that means something difficult.

00:00:20.480 --> 00:00:23.270
So a bear of a lesson
is a difficult lesson

00:00:23.270 --> 00:00:25.190
and that's what we're talking about today.

00:00:25.190 --> 00:00:30.000
Not bears, sorry, but
non-literal uses of language,

00:00:30.000 --> 00:00:33.053
which we call figurative
language or figures of speech.

00:00:34.750 --> 00:00:36.810
Figurative language says one thing

00:00:36.810 --> 00:00:38.460
but means another.

00:00:38.460 --> 00:00:40.110
I could say that my colleague Allison

00:00:40.110 --> 00:00:41.690
is an eagle-eyed editor

00:00:41.690 --> 00:00:44.450
and when I say that I don't
mean that she literally

00:00:44.450 --> 00:00:47.270
has an eagle's eyes in her head.

00:00:47.270 --> 00:00:50.280
That would be a terrifying
achievement of medical science.

00:00:50.280 --> 00:00:53.490
No, I'm saying that she
is sharp and attentive

00:00:53.490 --> 00:00:56.220
in the same way that an eagle is.

00:00:56.220 --> 00:00:58.780
So I'm saying something
that is not literally true

00:00:58.780 --> 00:01:00.970
in order to express
something that is true,

00:01:00.970 --> 00:01:03.140
that Allison is good at editing.

00:01:03.140 --> 00:01:04.560
Would you call that a lie?

00:01:04.560 --> 00:01:05.670
I'm not sure I would.

00:01:05.670 --> 00:01:08.980
It's just a non-literal
way of expressing myself.

00:01:08.980 --> 00:01:10.960
So, having gotten the
question of whether or not

00:01:10.960 --> 00:01:12.560
I'm a dirty rotten liar out of the way,

00:01:12.560 --> 00:01:14.730
let's talk about some different varieties

00:01:14.730 --> 00:01:16.290
of figurative language.

00:01:16.290 --> 00:01:18.053
First, the simile.

00:01:19.040 --> 00:01:21.340
A simile is a comparison
between two things

00:01:21.340 --> 00:01:24.280
that uses like or as.

00:01:24.280 --> 00:01:25.420
If I were really hungry,

00:01:25.420 --> 00:01:29.040
I could say that my stomach
was gurgling like a tar pit

00:01:29.040 --> 00:01:31.720
or that I was as hungry
as a ravenous wolf,

00:01:31.720 --> 00:01:34.090
and again, neither of these
things are literally true.

00:01:34.090 --> 00:01:36.760
If my stomach were making
actual tar pit noises,

00:01:36.760 --> 00:01:39.090
I would probably need to go to a hospital.

00:01:39.090 --> 00:01:41.350
But what do those examples
tell you about the way that

00:01:41.350 --> 00:01:44.370
I, the speaker, think about my hunger?

00:01:44.370 --> 00:01:47.130
Animals and people get stuck in tar pits,

00:01:47.130 --> 00:01:48.900
they're gloppy, they
pull things into them,

00:01:48.900 --> 00:01:50.550
they slow things down.

00:01:50.550 --> 00:01:52.010
Sorry T-Rex.

00:01:52.010 --> 00:01:55.410
Therefore, I'm saying that
my hunger is slowing me down.

00:01:55.410 --> 00:01:57.520
Or, if I'm comparing myself to a wolf,

00:01:57.520 --> 00:02:00.660
you can imagine me looking
lean and desperate,

00:02:00.660 --> 00:02:04.263
saliva dripping from my jaws
at the mere thought of food.

00:02:05.350 --> 00:02:08.100
I could really go for a cheese
danish come to think of it.

00:02:08.100 --> 00:02:09.900
So that's simile.

00:02:09.900 --> 00:02:11.910
The second figure of speech
I wanna talk about today

00:02:11.910 --> 00:02:13.860
is the metaphor.

00:02:13.860 --> 00:02:15.510
And what's a metaphor?

00:02:15.510 --> 00:02:16.908
Cows and sheep!

00:02:16.908 --> 00:02:18.260
Sorry, I couldn't help it.

00:02:18.260 --> 00:02:21.800
No, a metaphor is not a meadow for.

00:02:21.800 --> 00:02:24.450
Metaphors are another way
of comparing two things,

00:02:24.450 --> 00:02:27.800
but this time there's no like or as.

00:02:27.800 --> 00:02:30.340
We're walking this language
tightrope without a net now.

00:02:30.340 --> 00:02:32.400
You aren't signaling with like or as

00:02:32.400 --> 00:02:34.300
that you're making a
figurative comparison,

00:02:34.300 --> 00:02:37.363
so you have to use context
to communicate clearly.

00:02:38.200 --> 00:02:40.940
At the beginning of this video
I said this was going to be

00:02:40.940 --> 00:02:43.130
a bear of a lesson.

00:02:43.130 --> 00:02:44.601
That's a metaphor.

00:02:44.601 --> 00:02:47.180
There's a Linda Ronstadt
country song from the 70s,

00:02:47.180 --> 00:02:49.630
called "Love is a Rose,"

00:02:49.630 --> 00:02:52.460
which is all about how to
take care of a relationship

00:02:52.460 --> 00:02:56.570
through the metaphor of tending
a flower with thorns on it.

00:02:56.570 --> 00:02:59.760
The difference between my stomach
is gurgling like a tar pit

00:02:59.760 --> 00:03:02.210
and my stomach is a gurgling tar pit

00:03:02.210 --> 00:03:05.080
is the difference between
simile and metaphor.

00:03:05.080 --> 00:03:07.500
Simile uses that like or as comparison

00:03:07.500 --> 00:03:09.720
whereas metaphor just
straightforwardly says

00:03:09.720 --> 00:03:11.830
thing X is thing Y.

00:03:11.830 --> 00:03:14.580
Love is a rose, my tummy's a tar pit,

00:03:14.580 --> 00:03:17.420
which was not nearly as
successful of a song.

00:03:17.420 --> 00:03:19.130
Another way to use figurative language

00:03:19.130 --> 00:03:22.130
is personification, which let's
just break that word down.

00:03:22.130 --> 00:03:25.500
It means to describe something
as though it were a person.

00:03:25.500 --> 00:03:26.360
To say that differently,

00:03:26.360 --> 00:03:30.930
it's ascribing human characteristics
to non-living things.

00:03:30.930 --> 00:03:33.390
The wind howled through the mountains.

00:03:33.390 --> 00:03:36.270
The car grumbled as I threw it into gear.

00:03:36.270 --> 00:03:38.330
The storm raged.

00:03:38.330 --> 00:03:39.500
These are things that people do,

00:03:39.500 --> 00:03:41.890
but I'm applying that
language to inanimate things,

00:03:41.890 --> 00:03:45.930
like wind and cars and
storms in order to express

00:03:45.930 --> 00:03:47.870
the way these things are behaving.

00:03:47.870 --> 00:03:49.447
The car is not literally grumbling,

00:03:49.447 --> 00:03:52.310
"Aw man, I can't believe
David has to drive me today."

00:03:52.310 --> 00:03:54.200
It's making noises that I am choosing

00:03:54.200 --> 00:03:56.683
to identify as unhappy.

00:03:58.030 --> 00:04:00.160
The greatest kind of figurative language

00:04:00.160 --> 00:04:02.513
in the entire universe is hyperbole.

00:04:03.470 --> 00:04:07.690
By exaggerating, I'm expressing
emphasis and importance.

00:04:07.690 --> 00:04:10.400
This summer, I'm going
to read a million books

00:04:10.400 --> 00:04:14.360
and eat a literal actual ton of hot dogs.

00:04:14.360 --> 00:04:15.610
This is not true.

00:04:15.610 --> 00:04:17.040
In fact, this is impossible.

00:04:17.040 --> 00:04:20.600
That is too many hot dogs,
those are too many books,

00:04:20.600 --> 00:04:23.200
each of which are sentences
I never expected to say,

00:04:23.200 --> 00:04:25.500
but I'm trying to express my enthusiasm

00:04:25.500 --> 00:04:27.820
for both books and encased meats,

00:04:27.820 --> 00:04:31.133
and I'm doing that by
being, you know, extra.

00:04:33.030 --> 00:04:34.860
The final kind of expressive language

00:04:34.860 --> 00:04:37.850
I wanna talk about today isn't
exactly figurative language,

00:04:37.850 --> 00:04:41.780
it's the language of
allusions and references.

00:04:41.780 --> 00:04:44.640
Where you make comparisons
to characters or events

00:04:44.640 --> 00:04:47.530
from literature, or movies, or culture.

00:04:47.530 --> 00:04:50.490
Also note that it's allusion with an A,

00:04:50.490 --> 00:04:52.630
as opposed to illusion with an I.

00:04:52.630 --> 00:04:56.120
An illusion with an I
is like a magic trick.

00:04:56.120 --> 00:04:58.670
Here are some examples of allusions.

00:04:58.670 --> 00:05:02.210
Oh, you'd have to be Superman
to lift that fallen tree.

00:05:02.210 --> 00:05:04.930
Or, you have a Gollum-like obsession

00:05:04.930 --> 00:05:06.210
with that stuffed animal.

00:05:06.210 --> 00:05:08.130
Now these comparisons only work

00:05:08.130 --> 00:05:11.680
if the person you're talking
to understands the reference.

00:05:11.680 --> 00:05:13.610
Superman has super strength,

00:05:13.610 --> 00:05:14.990
Gollum, from "The Lord of the Rings,"

00:05:14.990 --> 00:05:16.100
can't stop talking about

00:05:16.100 --> 00:05:19.230
how much he loves this
one object, the ring.

00:05:19.230 --> 00:05:20.847
If you don't know the reference,

00:05:20.847 --> 00:05:22.880
then it's all just noise.

00:05:22.880 --> 00:05:26.410
One tip is to read up on mythology.

00:05:26.410 --> 00:05:28.590
You'd be surprised how
many times ancient gods,

00:05:28.590 --> 00:05:32.550
like Zeus, Poseidon, and
Apollo come up as you read.

00:05:32.550 --> 00:05:34.180
So that's what we're working with here.

00:05:34.180 --> 00:05:36.760
Simile, love is like a rose.

00:05:36.760 --> 00:05:38.940
Metaphor, love is a rose.

00:05:38.940 --> 00:05:41.800
Personification, my car grumbled.

00:05:41.800 --> 00:05:46.240
Hyperbole, my mom grounded
me for eight trillion years.

00:05:46.240 --> 00:05:50.910
And allusion, I feel
mightier than Hercules.

00:05:50.910 --> 00:05:52.537
That's figurative language folks.

00:05:52.537 --> 00:05:55.243
You can learn anything, David out.


Reporting measurements

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:01.410
- In this video,

00:00:01.410 --> 00:00:03.930
we're going to talk a little
bit about measurement.

00:00:03.930 --> 00:00:06.830
and the idea that you really can't measure

00:00:06.830 --> 00:00:09.880
exactly the dimensions of something.

00:00:09.880 --> 00:00:10.740
And I know what you' re thinking,

00:00:10.740 --> 00:00:11.650
You' re like, well, no, of course,

00:00:11.650 --> 00:00:13.600
we can measure the
dimensions of something.

00:00:13.600 --> 00:00:14.755
Let's say I have

00:00:14.755 --> 00:00:18.740
some type of a gear over here.

00:00:18.740 --> 00:00:22.620
So let me draw my gear,

00:00:22.620 --> 00:00:26.910
and if I were to ask you, that's
not the best drawing gear,

00:00:26.910 --> 00:00:28.030
but if I were to ask you,

00:00:28.030 --> 00:00:31.340
what's the inner diameter
of the hole of the gear,

00:00:31.340 --> 00:00:32.610
right over here?

00:00:32.610 --> 00:00:35.230
Maybe you take a ruler
out, right over here.

00:00:35.230 --> 00:00:36.620
So this is my ruler.

00:00:36.620 --> 00:00:39.590
And that you are able to
see when you measure it,

00:00:39.590 --> 00:00:43.930
that it is one centimeter in diameter.

00:00:43.930 --> 00:00:46.340
But then I say, is it
exactly one centimeter?

00:00:46.340 --> 00:00:47.173
And then you realize,

00:00:47.173 --> 00:00:49.770
well, yeah, let me get a
little bit more precise.

00:00:49.770 --> 00:00:51.950
Maybe you get a magnifying glass out here.

00:00:51.950 --> 00:00:55.030
So this is the lens of
my magnifying glass.

00:00:55.030 --> 00:00:56.700
And you zoom in a little bit.

00:00:56.700 --> 00:00:58.060
Maybe you get a better ruler

00:00:58.060 --> 00:01:00.050
that marks off the millimeters

00:01:00.050 --> 00:01:01.050
and you actually say,

00:01:01.050 --> 00:01:02.870
Oh, well, when I look a little bit closer,

00:01:02.870 --> 00:01:05.720
it actually turns out it's
not exactly one centimeter.

00:01:05.720 --> 00:01:09.450
It's actually closer to 1.1 centimeters.

00:01:09.450 --> 00:01:10.690
And then I ask you,

00:01:10.690 --> 00:01:14.770
is that exactly the inner
diameter of this gear here?

00:01:14.770 --> 00:01:17.050
And like, okay, well let
me get out of microscope.

00:01:17.050 --> 00:01:17.883
And then you realize,

00:01:17.883 --> 00:01:21.883
Oh, you' re right, it's
actually 1.089 centimeters.

00:01:24.310 --> 00:01:26.460
And then I ask you, is that exactly right?

00:01:26.460 --> 00:01:28.690
And then you' re like,
yeah, I guess you' re right.

00:01:28.690 --> 00:01:30.063
I haven't measured to the nearest,

00:01:30.063 --> 00:01:32.600
to the height or the width of an atom,

00:01:32.600 --> 00:01:35.090
to do that I would need
a lot more precision

00:01:35.090 --> 00:01:36.240
right over here.

00:01:36.240 --> 00:01:39.230
And so maybe I need some type
of an electron microscope,

00:01:39.230 --> 00:01:40.540
but even if you're able to do that,

00:01:40.540 --> 00:01:42.250
and that would be many decimal places

00:01:42.250 --> 00:01:43.700
to the right of the decimal point here,

00:01:43.700 --> 00:01:45.380
if you're measuring in centimeters,

00:01:45.380 --> 00:01:47.780
you can still ask, was
is that exactly right?

00:01:47.780 --> 00:01:50.830
Maybe you can measure the parts of an atom

00:01:50.830 --> 00:01:53.270
or to a measurement even
smaller than an atom

00:01:53.270 --> 00:01:55.530
And if later on, you might
study quantum physics

00:01:55.530 --> 00:01:58.340
and there are some levels of granularity

00:01:58.340 --> 00:02:01.470
where you can't get a true
measurement below that,

00:02:01.470 --> 00:02:03.950
but as you can see, it
is somewhat arbitrary

00:02:03.950 --> 00:02:06.030
for our everyday life.

00:02:06.030 --> 00:02:08.720
And so the question is,
which one do you pick?

00:02:08.720 --> 00:02:10.500
Or how much trouble do you get?

00:02:10.500 --> 00:02:11.850
Or how much trouble do you take

00:02:11.850 --> 00:02:14.610
to get to these different
levels of precision?

00:02:14.610 --> 00:02:17.610
And the answer is, it just depends.

00:02:17.610 --> 00:02:21.940
If the goal was, hey, we just
wanna make multiple copies

00:02:21.940 --> 00:02:26.100
of maybe jewelry of this little car gear,

00:02:26.100 --> 00:02:28.180
so we're gonna wanna put,

00:02:28.180 --> 00:02:29.680
some type of, I don't know,

00:02:29.680 --> 00:02:31.540
gold chain through it.

00:02:31.540 --> 00:02:34.810
And we say, hey, we need
at least three quarters

00:02:34.810 --> 00:02:37.210
of a centimeter in order to get the rope

00:02:37.210 --> 00:02:38.530
or the chain through it.

00:02:38.530 --> 00:02:42.060
Well then this first measurement,
that's enough precision.

00:02:42.060 --> 00:02:43.760
But if I told you this gear

00:02:43.760 --> 00:02:47.290
is going to be an essential
part of the space shuttle,

00:02:47.290 --> 00:02:49.580
or some type of really
important machinery,

00:02:49.580 --> 00:02:52.750
that has really fine tolerances,

00:02:52.750 --> 00:02:54.530
I guess people aren't
using the spacial anymore,

00:02:54.530 --> 00:02:57.000
but some finally engineered automobile

00:02:57.000 --> 00:02:59.390
or something that's going
to have a lot of needs,

00:02:59.390 --> 00:03:00.740
really close tolerances

00:03:00.740 --> 00:03:02.520
it needs to be really, really precise.

00:03:02.520 --> 00:03:05.950
Well then even this 1.089
centimeters might not be enough.

00:03:05.950 --> 00:03:08.040
You might have to get to something like

00:03:08.040 --> 00:03:12.960
it's 1.089203 centimeters,

00:03:12.960 --> 00:03:16.920
to be able to be really,
really finely crafted.

00:03:16.920 --> 00:03:18.740
We're nowhere close
with our everyday tools

00:03:18.740 --> 00:03:20.270
to get anywhere close to say the width

00:03:20.270 --> 00:03:21.110
or the height of an atom

00:03:21.110 --> 00:03:24.623
and you could even theory
measure within the atom.

00:03:25.620 --> 00:03:26.560
And so you just have to think

00:03:26.560 --> 00:03:28.950
about what the measurement is for.

00:03:28.950 --> 00:03:30.250
I'll give another example,

00:03:31.270 --> 00:03:34.300
this right over here is a
picture of Mount Everest.

00:03:34.300 --> 00:03:37.510
You might know it as the
tallest mountain in the world.

00:03:37.510 --> 00:03:41.180
And if you were to ask someone,
how tall is Mount Everest?

00:03:41.180 --> 00:03:43.870
If you were to do a web
search for it right now,

00:03:43.870 --> 00:03:47.683
you would find that it
is 8,848 meters tall.

00:03:50.490 --> 00:03:54.800
Now, this is clearly
rounded to the nearest meter

00:03:54.800 --> 00:03:56.610
because if you were to go
to the top of Mount Everest,

00:03:56.610 --> 00:03:57.443
you'll see little pebbles.

00:03:57.443 --> 00:03:58.900
In fact, those pebbles might move around.

00:03:58.900 --> 00:04:02.200
And so the actual precise
height of Mount Everest

00:04:02.200 --> 00:04:04.570
might change actually second by second,

00:04:04.570 --> 00:04:06.730
depending if rain is
falling, snow is falling,

00:04:06.730 --> 00:04:10.110
how the wind is moving
different pebbles around,

00:04:10.110 --> 00:04:13.440
but for most of our daily
purposes, this is sufficient.

00:04:13.440 --> 00:04:14.420
In fact, for a lot of us,

00:04:14.420 --> 00:04:16.780
we might not even need
this level of precision.

00:04:16.780 --> 00:04:19.160
We might say, hey, it's roughly

00:04:19.160 --> 00:04:21.240
or it's approximately, we'd estimate

00:04:21.240 --> 00:04:25.300
that it's about 9,000 meters.

00:04:25.300 --> 00:04:26.480
But there are applications

00:04:26.480 --> 00:04:28.640
where you would need at least
this level of precision,

00:04:28.640 --> 00:04:30.670
or maybe something even more precise.

00:04:30.670 --> 00:04:32.140
For example, if you wanted to compare it

00:04:32.140 --> 00:04:35.200
to another mountain, say K2,

00:04:35.200 --> 00:04:37.030
which is the second tallest
mountain in the world.

00:04:37.030 --> 00:04:39.010
And let's say they are close in height,

00:04:39.010 --> 00:04:41.360
and actually, if you were
to do a Google search,

00:04:41.360 --> 00:04:46.360
you would see that K2, has
a height of 8,611 meters

00:04:46.760 --> 00:04:49.100
rounded to the nearest meter.

00:04:49.100 --> 00:04:51.540
You'd see that, that
9,000 meter approximation.

00:04:51.540 --> 00:04:52.373
It wouldn't be enough

00:04:52.373 --> 00:04:54.730
if you're round to the
nearest kilometer, I guess,

00:04:54.730 --> 00:04:55.680
that wouldn't be enough

00:04:55.680 --> 00:04:57.890
to be able to compare Mount Everest to K2,

00:04:57.890 --> 00:05:00.020
because rounded to the nearest kilometer,

00:05:00.020 --> 00:05:03.220
they're both approximately
nine kilometers.

00:05:03.220 --> 00:05:06.720
So this is approximately
9,000 meters as well.

00:05:06.720 --> 00:05:08.660
So you would need more precision.

00:05:08.660 --> 00:05:10.370
If you wanted to answer
which one is taller,

00:05:10.370 --> 00:05:13.030
you'd have to get at least
to the closest hundred meter.

00:05:13.030 --> 00:05:13.930
And then there's reasons

00:05:13.930 --> 00:05:16.140
why you might wanna get even more precise.

00:05:16.140 --> 00:05:19.330
Maybe you wanna create a
slide from the top of K2

00:05:19.330 --> 00:05:20.920
to the bottom of K2.

00:05:20.920 --> 00:05:23.750
And so you can imagine
if your slide is too long

00:05:23.750 --> 00:05:26.090
by, let's say three meters,

00:05:26.090 --> 00:05:28.620
what's going to be hard to
get on that slide on the top,

00:05:28.620 --> 00:05:31.000
or it's going to dig into
the snow at the bottom.

00:05:31.000 --> 00:05:32.930
And if your slide is too
short by three meters,

00:05:32.930 --> 00:05:35.080
that's a pretty unpleasant
thing to have you go on

00:05:35.080 --> 00:05:36.986
this seemingly super fun slide,

00:05:36.986 --> 00:05:39.810
you have to drop nine feet at the end,

00:05:39.810 --> 00:05:40.780
or really if you' re off,

00:05:40.780 --> 00:05:42.110
what if you're off by 10 meters

00:05:42.110 --> 00:05:43.580
and you're gonna drop 30 feet off the end,

00:05:43.580 --> 00:05:45.500
which could really break some bones

00:05:45.500 --> 00:05:47.390
and be unpleasant.

00:05:47.390 --> 00:05:49.011
So the big takeaway is,

00:05:49.011 --> 00:05:53.200
it's very hard to measure
anything perfectly precisely.

00:05:53.200 --> 00:05:54.710
And you have to think about,

00:05:54.710 --> 00:05:55.840
what's the application?

00:05:55.840 --> 00:05:57.080
What are you trying to answer?

00:05:57.080 --> 00:05:59.250
What are you trying to
judge about those things?

00:05:59.250 --> 00:06:00.710
To determine how much precision

00:06:00.710 --> 00:06:02.493
you need in your measurement.


Reasoning with systems of equations

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.230 --> 00:00:01.610
- [Presenter] So let's
say I had the equation,

00:00:01.610 --> 00:00:04.830
two x plus y is equal to eight.

00:00:04.830 --> 00:00:08.410
This is an equation, one single
equation with two unknowns

00:00:08.410 --> 00:00:10.330
and there's many different x, y pairs

00:00:10.330 --> 00:00:12.830
that would satisfy this equation.

00:00:12.830 --> 00:00:14.730
Now let's add a second equation,

00:00:14.730 --> 00:00:17.980
x plus y is equal to five.

00:00:17.980 --> 00:00:20.610
And once again, if we only
looked at the second equation,

00:00:20.610 --> 00:00:23.040
there's many different x, y
pairs that would satisfy it,

00:00:23.040 --> 00:00:25.640
you could have x is equal
to four, y is equal to one,

00:00:25.640 --> 00:00:27.860
x is equal to three, y is equal to two.

00:00:27.860 --> 00:00:30.103
Many, many, actually
there's an infinite number

00:00:30.103 --> 00:00:32.950
that would satisfy this right over here.

00:00:32.950 --> 00:00:36.470
But what's interesting
about a system of equations

00:00:36.470 --> 00:00:40.420
is you're using both of these
equations as constraints.

00:00:40.420 --> 00:00:43.970
You're saying, is there
at least one x, y pair

00:00:43.970 --> 00:00:47.140
that would satisfy both
of these equations.

00:00:47.140 --> 00:00:49.380
And as we'll see in many future videos,

00:00:49.380 --> 00:00:52.610
this is a very useful thing
to think about in many,

00:00:52.610 --> 00:00:54.060
not only fields of mathematics

00:00:54.060 --> 00:00:57.310
but in many fields of knowledge generally.

00:00:57.310 --> 00:00:58.900
But the focus of this video

00:00:58.900 --> 00:01:02.840
is to think about why the
operations we can perform

00:01:02.840 --> 00:01:05.420
on either or both of these equations,

00:01:05.420 --> 00:01:09.260
why they are valid and
why they're intuitive.

00:01:09.260 --> 00:01:11.120
So the first series of operations is when

00:01:11.120 --> 00:01:14.580
we just try to manipulate
one equation by themselves.

00:01:14.580 --> 00:01:16.970
So for example, we could
multiply both sides

00:01:16.970 --> 00:01:20.930
of this purple equation, this
top equation by negative one,

00:01:20.930 --> 00:01:25.010
you would get negative two x minus y

00:01:25.010 --> 00:01:27.130
is equal to, you multiply the right side

00:01:27.130 --> 00:01:30.120
by negative one as well, negative eight.

00:01:30.120 --> 00:01:33.050
Now all I did right over here,
this is, you could do this

00:01:33.050 --> 00:01:34.500
even if we weren't thinking about a system

00:01:34.500 --> 00:01:37.680
is two x plus y is truly equal to eight,

00:01:37.680 --> 00:01:39.530
we're assuming that that is true

00:01:39.530 --> 00:01:41.490
because they're telling us that's true.

00:01:41.490 --> 00:01:44.640
So if two x plus y is equivalent to eight,

00:01:44.640 --> 00:01:46.910
then the negative of two x plus y

00:01:46.910 --> 00:01:49.050
should be equivalent to negative eight

00:01:49.050 --> 00:01:50.080
or another way to think about it,

00:01:50.080 --> 00:01:52.020
if both of these sides are equal,

00:01:52.020 --> 00:01:54.410
if I multiply the left side by something,

00:01:54.410 --> 00:01:56.270
in order for the equality to hold true,

00:01:56.270 --> 00:01:59.630
I have to multiply the right
side by the same thing.

00:01:59.630 --> 00:02:02.240
And so this equation on the right,

00:02:02.240 --> 00:02:04.772
this purple equation is
an equivalent equation

00:02:04.772 --> 00:02:06.600
to our original one.

00:02:06.600 --> 00:02:09.770
It looks different,
but the same x, y pairs

00:02:09.770 --> 00:02:11.980
that satisfy this right equation

00:02:11.980 --> 00:02:15.393
are going to satisfy this
left equation and vice versa.

00:02:16.260 --> 00:02:19.730
Now another operation that
sometimes feels a little bit

00:02:19.730 --> 00:02:21.390
less intuitive when you first learn it

00:02:21.390 --> 00:02:22.670
when you're solving systems

00:02:22.670 --> 00:02:25.790
is when you add two equations together.

00:02:25.790 --> 00:02:28.350
So for example, we have
that purple equation,

00:02:28.350 --> 00:02:30.850
the one that we've now
multiplied by negative one

00:02:30.850 --> 00:02:32.320
and now we have our original,

00:02:32.320 --> 00:02:34.190
I guess that's teal or blue equation.

00:02:34.190 --> 00:02:38.000
So x plus y is equal to five.

00:02:38.000 --> 00:02:40.494
And we learn when we're
solving systems of equations

00:02:40.494 --> 00:02:44.090
that we can get a new equation
by adding the two left sides

00:02:44.090 --> 00:02:45.800
and adding the two right sides.

00:02:45.800 --> 00:02:47.780
And so you might have
seen something like this

00:02:47.780 --> 00:02:49.910
when we add the two left sides,

00:02:49.910 --> 00:02:53.310
let's see negative two x
plus x would be negative x

00:02:53.310 --> 00:02:55.460
and then negative y plus y, well,

00:02:55.460 --> 00:02:56.750
that's just going to cancel out

00:02:56.750 --> 00:02:58.350
so we have no ys left

00:02:58.350 --> 00:03:01.200
and then that's to be equal
to negative eight plus five

00:03:01.200 --> 00:03:03.000
which is equal to negative three.

00:03:03.000 --> 00:03:05.200
And before I even go on
to try to solve this,

00:03:05.200 --> 00:03:07.110
why were we able to do that?

00:03:07.110 --> 00:03:09.010
Pause this video and think about that.

00:03:10.380 --> 00:03:11.930
Well, let me give you an example.

00:03:11.930 --> 00:03:15.490
If we had started with
negative two x minus y

00:03:15.490 --> 00:03:17.007
is equal to negative eight,
just as a single equation

00:03:17.007 --> 00:03:21.540
and if I added five to both sides of that.

00:03:21.540 --> 00:03:25.150
So if I added five

00:03:25.150 --> 00:03:27.470
on the left hand side and I added five

00:03:27.470 --> 00:03:28.760
on the right hand side,

00:03:28.760 --> 00:03:31.360
I think that would've made
intuitive sense to you.

00:03:31.360 --> 00:03:34.970
Negative two x minus y plus five

00:03:36.380 --> 00:03:41.380
is equal to negative eight plus five.

00:03:41.540 --> 00:03:44.010
Hopefully, this is a little bit intuitive

00:03:44.010 --> 00:03:46.070
because once again, and I'm
really saying the same thing

00:03:46.070 --> 00:03:46.903
over and over again,

00:03:46.903 --> 00:03:49.870
the left side is truly
equal to negative eight.

00:03:49.870 --> 00:03:51.410
So if I add five to it,

00:03:51.410 --> 00:03:53.150
it's still going to be truly equal

00:03:53.150 --> 00:03:55.060
to negative eight plus five.

00:03:55.060 --> 00:03:58.600
So hopefully this makes a
little bit of intuitive sense.

00:03:58.600 --> 00:04:01.169
And the key realization
with what we did up here is,

00:04:01.169 --> 00:04:04.280
we essentially added five to both sides.

00:04:04.280 --> 00:04:06.090
you see, you might say when
I know we only added five

00:04:06.090 --> 00:04:08.210
to the right hand side but remember,

00:04:08.210 --> 00:04:11.470
x plus y we are saying is equal to five

00:04:11.470 --> 00:04:14.240
so it's just like adding the same thing

00:04:14.240 --> 00:04:16.780
to both sides of the equation.

00:04:16.780 --> 00:04:19.240
And then when you do that,
that's why we essentially

00:04:19.240 --> 00:04:21.320
were able to eliminate this y variable

00:04:21.320 --> 00:04:24.160
and now we got one
equation with one unknown

00:04:24.160 --> 00:04:25.710
and then from there you can just do

00:04:25.710 --> 00:04:27.540
a valid algebraic operation.

00:04:27.540 --> 00:04:29.560
You could say, okay, I
just want to x over here.

00:04:29.560 --> 00:04:31.990
What if I were to divide
both sides by negative one?

00:04:31.990 --> 00:04:33.720
And once again, because negative x

00:04:33.720 --> 00:04:36.010
is equal to negative three,
if I divide negative one

00:04:36.010 --> 00:04:38.300
if I divide negative x by negative one,

00:04:38.300 --> 00:04:40.900
I also have to divide
negative three by negative one

00:04:40.900 --> 00:04:43.500
in order to maintain the equality.

00:04:43.500 --> 00:04:45.550
And so then you're going to get,

00:04:45.550 --> 00:04:48.760
x is equal to three.

00:04:48.760 --> 00:04:52.740
And so that would be the
x value of that x, y pair

00:04:52.740 --> 00:04:53.870
that satisfies both

00:04:53.870 --> 00:04:55.560
and then to figure out the y value,

00:04:55.560 --> 00:04:57.240
you would say, all right,
if x is equal to three,

00:04:57.240 --> 00:04:59.880
I should be able to go back
into either of these equations

00:04:59.880 --> 00:05:01.780
to find the corresponding y value

00:05:01.780 --> 00:05:04.080
and it's a little bit easier
to go into that second one,

00:05:04.080 --> 00:05:08.250
you could say, all right,
three plus is equal to five,

00:05:08.250 --> 00:05:11.267
three plus y must be equal to five.

00:05:11.267 --> 00:05:14.630
And then of course, if you
subtract three from both sides

00:05:14.630 --> 00:05:16.120
'cause once again, we're saying,

00:05:16.120 --> 00:05:19.590
three plus y is literally equal to five

00:05:19.590 --> 00:05:23.330
then you're going to
get y is equal to two.

00:05:23.330 --> 00:05:28.330
And so we found an x, y pair
that satisfies both equations

00:05:28.350 --> 00:05:31.470
and really everything that
we wrote down over here,

00:05:31.470 --> 00:05:33.590
these are all equivalent statements.

00:05:33.590 --> 00:05:35.830
One of them is going
to be true if and only

00:05:35.830 --> 00:05:39.480
the other statements, the
other equations are also true.

00:05:39.480 --> 00:05:41.460
So two x plus y is equal to eight

00:05:41.460 --> 00:05:43.720
and x plus y is equal to five

00:05:43.720 --> 00:05:47.460
if and only if x equals
three and y equals two,

00:05:47.460 --> 00:05:50.270
if and only if negative two x minus y

00:05:50.270 --> 00:05:51.640
is equal to negative eight,

00:05:51.640 --> 00:05:54.963
if and only if negative x
is equal to negative three.