Wednesday, March 1, 2017

Kairos of the Suzy Creamcheese Poem

The kairos of the poem is interesting as the poem is not actually from the 60s, but from a 2012 collection of poems. This indicates that despite talking about an event that took place decades ago, its effects are still important enough to revisit and give a perspective on. It seems like the poet is giving commentary on the craziness of the Sexual Revolution and how societal norms concerning modesty, chastity, and promiscuity got warped to the point were people couldn't keep track of how many others they slept with. I believe Huntington intentionally wrote this later to show people nowadays how sex is still sometimes treated as a game and a means of "victory"--exactly how it was treated as a poem--instead of something more complex and deeper. It suggests that some aspects of the Sexual Revolution were thrilling yet also negatively affected that thought of what sex is to us, and that some of those aspects still linger on today in modern culture as a legacy of the movement. For a lot of people even today, there is still some shock factor on how the characters viewed and practiced sex, which makes the message effective even today as commentary on modern sexual practices. This kairotic buildup helped set the stage for the use of the three other main rhetorical devices, particularly pathos, to be used and be effective. Therefore, despite it being written nearly half a century after the event, the poem still contains relevant meaning and social critique due to its special way in building up its kairos.

1 comment:

  1. I agree, I find it interesting how many discussions regarding human sexuality are still considered controversial to this day.

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