Death Cab for Cutie, is an indie alternative rock band that
formed in 1997. The frontman, Ben
Gibbard, studied environmental chemistry before touring full time, which
establishes some extrinsic ethos. Gibbard
has a background in science, allowing him to understand the complexities and
nuances of environmental concerns such as pollution and waste management. But mostly, the song, “Why You’d Want to Live
Here” establishes intrinsic ethos through its narrative lyrics. The entire song is a critique of the band’s
experience in Los Angeles and a comment on the environmental problems that are occurring there. The band is known for being antiestablishment and rebellious,
making them exciting to their audience, teenagers and other alternative music
listeners. To appeal even further,
the register of the song is very informal and conversational, using first and
second person perspective. While Death
Cab for Cutie may not be experts in the environmental science field or have any
authority in the science community whatsoever, their credibility is established
through personal experience and by appealing to the audience’s nonconformist
lifestyle.
I appreciate the way you mention that Death Cab for Cutie has no expertise or authority on the matter of the environment. I think the fact that the band makes no attempt at claiming any sort of expertise, they make come across as more appealing to a larger audience of people who may consider themselves to be environmentalists in the sense that they want what is best for the world, even if they have not spent years researching such issues. Do you agree that this helps broaden their appeal, or do you think it limits the band's ethical appeal?
ReplyDeleteI liked how you touched on extrinsic and intrinsic ethos. It would have been easy to skip over extrinsic to focus on intrinsic ethos. Your post flowed well making it easy to understand your points in the post. Well done.
ReplyDeleteYour post made very good points about the band's credibility, but it seems to me that a large part of any environmentalist message involves the speaker appealing to the audience's sense of ethics; "it is our duty to maintain and sustain this planet, because we are the dominant species and we are responsible for its decay," or something to that effect. This aspect of ethos was absent from your post, although I admit it may be more implicit than explicit in the song.
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