Assignment 6- Choices [Due: February 28th]

There is no secret that Orlean chose the words of her article for a reason. She had a purpose behind her article, and the words that she uses are her way of showing that to us- whether they come right out and say it, or they make us take a step back and think about it.

On the first page Orlean brought up several quotes she must have overheard from other taxidermists. The four quotes consisted of the following- "Acetone rubbed on a squirrel tail will fluff it right back up" "My feeling is that it's quite tough to do a good tongue" "The toes on a real competitive piece are very important. I think Bondo works nicely, and so does Super Glue" and lastly "I knew a fellow with cattle and I told him, 'If you ever have one stillborn, I'd really like to have it.' i thought it would make a really nice mount." In my opinion Orlean uses these quotes because most of us think taxidermy is a weird abnormal thing, and by her knowing this and incorporating these quotes it helps us feel like we relate to her more. We as readers need to relate to the reading before we can let the writer sway our thoughts.

Orlean talks about the history of taxidermy, as well as Taxidermy.net, and the 2003 World Taxidermy Championship in Illinois(which she attended). In her using multiple forms of information I think it helps us trust her as readers and gives her credibility. Orleans immersion journalism techniques really pay off because it makes her a reliable source of information because she did communicate and interact with these people, as well as the basic research about their world.

On the second page when Orlean lists all the things necessary to be good at taxidermy is a very important piece of the article to me. She writes, "To be good at taxidermy, you have to be good at sewing, sculpting, painting, hairdressing, and mostly you have to be a little bit of a zoology nerd. You have to love animals-- love looking at them, taking photographs of them, hunting them, measuring them, casting them in plaster or Paris when they're dead so that you have a reference when you're say, attaching ears or lips and want to get the angle and shape exactly right. Some taxidermists raise the animal they most often mount, so they can just step out in the back yard when they're trying to remember exactly how a deer looks when it's licking it's nose, especially because modern taxidermy emphasizes mounts with interesting expressions, rather than the stunned-looking creations of the past. Taxidermists seem to make little distinction between loving animals that are alive and loving ones that are not."This paragraph speaks to me the most out of the whole six page article. She goes into so much detail talking about the intensity of their lives as taxidermists. It completely changed my view at this point. Instead of thinking taxidermy was just some creepy obsession- I am now able to see it as an art. Although many of us could never do taxidermy, these people take their work very seriously and there is a lot more behind it than we think. I think Orlean went into such depth in this paragraph to show us that. Like any other hobby we like to perfect it, we spend a lot of time on it, and we find pride in it- just like taxidermists do with there work.

Orlean did a great job on the piece. While first reading it I hated it. Taxidermy was just extremely unappealing to me. After discussing it in class my views totally did a 180. I saw Orlean's point to writing this story a lot more clear. Although I'm still unsure as to why anyone would chose to go deep inside the world of taxidermy she does her job well at getting the point of what goes on behind it across to us as readers.