2012 PRACTICE SAC TOPICS

Choose one topic and write an analytical response.
Length of the response should be 700-900 words.

1. How does the structure of 'Dear America' work to maximise the emotional impact on the reader?

OR

2. "War has a damaging effect on all those involved." Do you agree?

OR

3. "It is easy to understand the experience of a soldier whilst on a tour of duty in Vietnam because of the intensely personal nature of the letters." Do you agree?

See pp. 69-72 of your 'Insight English' for information on constructing a text response.

SAC Practice Paragraph

EACH OF THE LETTERS REPRESENTS THE EXPERIENCE OF HUNDREDS OF YOUNG MEN. HOW DOES THE TEXT COMMUNICATE THE HUMANITY OF THE CONFLICT?

The epilogue of the text is a letter written post-war from a mother to her dead son Bill. Eleanor Wimbish’s depth of love for her son and suffering over his loss is put to the reader and though it lays bare one of the primary cruelties of war, the anguish of a parent at the death of their child, the implied reader sees that Edelman has used her story to show the strength that people draw from their ability to be connected. Wimbish’s letter gained media coverage and in this she touched many others, including another mother who found relief in a shared grief. While Wimbish asks, ‘…how can I help her with her pain when I have never been able to cope with my own?’, the reader understands that the links people make with each other when they communicate substantiates humanity. From the waste of the Vietnam War, love has found a way to come to the fore and soothe those who remain. ‘But this I know. I would rather … all the pain that goes with losing you, than never to have had you at all’, concludes Wimbish.

Diigo Instructions: (Version 1)

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A Tool For Conferencing

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Student Practice Plan and Response

EACH OF THE LETTERS REPRESENTS THE EXPERIENCE OF HUNDREDS OF YOUNG MEN. HOW DOES THE TEXT COMMUNICATE THE HUMANITY OF THE CONFLICT?

Humanity – human kind, civilisation, compassion, kindness, charity, people, sympathy

Contention: Letters do represent experience of young men-soldiers. War and life experience. The text communicates humanity of conflict in many ways – letters, photos, biog details, voices other than soldiers, considers Vietnamese perspective, poetry.

Supporting points (quotes/incidents/characters):

Letters share feelings, experiences and actions of soldiers.
- show loyalty and comradeship
- concern to protect their loved ones from their pain
- show compassion towards Vietnamese

The photos and poetry enhance the reader’s understanding of the humanity in the conflict
- soldiers’ suffering, despair over horrors of war, despair at what is inhumane shows humanity, ‘Beyond the Body Count’
- voices against war, Poetry
- ‘What am I doing here?’ Peace helmet, ‘World of Hurt’ – soldier hugging injured comrade

The strength of human relationships – letters to/from home support everyone survive the war
- import of contact/connection
- love
- Wimbish – depth of human emotion – honour always and remember

Humanity of conflict us highlighted by representation of inhumanity in text
- juxtaposition of characters’ attitudes towards Vietnamese. Downs/
- ability to see beauty of Vietnam despite conditions of living
- The letters, by representing exp of hundreds of men, explore both positive and negative sides of human nature in conflict

EACH OF THE LETTERS REPRESENTS THE EXPERIENCE OF HUNDREDS OF YOUNG MEN. HOW DOES THE TEXT COMMUNICATE THE HUMANITY OF THE CONFLICT?

The letters featured in Dear America – Letters Home from Vietnam provide a snapshot of what a tour of duty in Vietnam was like for the soldiers. The editor of the text, Bernard Edelman, has selected a series of letters that work to represent the experience of hundreds of young men involved in the conflict. These letters explore various aspects of the Vietnam War, one certainly being the humanity of the conflict. However, the letters are not the only way the text communicates this. Edelman also employs the use of photographs, poetry and voices and perspectives other than the soldiers to draw attention to the humanity inherent in the Vietnam War.

In Dear America the soldiers’ letters share their experiences, feelings and actions while in Vietnam. All of the letters add to each other, allowing the reader to gain a broad perspective of what the war was like and how humanity can be a part of it. The soldiers’ loyalty and comradeship to each other is a feature of most letters. George Olsen, an author of multiple letters, comments about how ‘…Men have gone on operations here with broken ankles in order not to let their buddies down’. Kindness and sympathy are demonstrated to be other common values held by the soldiers. Many express their concern for the Vietnamese civilians they see suffering due to the conflict in their country. Bruce McInnes explains how being in Vietnam has shown him how ‘very well off’ he has been in life. He implores his Mom and friends to help the Vinh-Son Orphanage, ‘These kids aren’t underprivileged - they’re nonprivileged …They need, and we have. We must help them’. The fact that some of the soldiers could still feel such compassion for the Vietnamese, despite the Viet Cong being the ‘invisible enemy’, leaves the reader sure that the Vietnam War, or any other conflict, cannot completely eradicate the humanity of people trained to be soldiers.

To enhance the reader’s understanding of humanity as an element of the Vietnam War, Edelman has included photographs alongside of the soldiers’ letters. These two features of the text provide the reader with an insight to the conflict that deepens their ability to relate to the circumstances the soldiers found themselves in. The images that precede the chapters ‘Beyond the Body Count’ and ‘World of Hurt’ strongly communicate the ideas that the soldiers were despairing of the war and suffered greatly. In ‘Beyond the Body Count’, a soldier sits sullen and forlorn in his tent, his only solace a cigarette. In the accompanying exposition a soldier’s writing is quoted, ‘I’ve seen some things happen here that have moved me so much that I’ve changed my whole outlook on life’. This is complemented by Burrows image that begins ‘World of Hurt’. It portraits two soldiers, young men. One has been heavily wounded with his head bandaged so that his sight is obscured, he could possibly be dead. Though it would be easier to engage as little as possible with such a frightening reality that could soon be your own, his fellow soldier hugs him tight to his chest offering comfort and reassurance. These soldiers, in their capacity to not be emotionally desensitised by the horrors they have witnessed, demonstrate the enduring nature of peoples’ humanity.

The text further highlights the humanity of the conflict by exhibiting how the support of the soldiers by their friends and family, and other sectors of the American society, helped them to endure the conflict. Edelman includes letters that the soldiers received from home so that the reader can appreciate the power of human relationships. Children wrote to the soldiers, showing them that they cared about what they were doing. Eight year old Roger Barber wrote, ‘I’m sorry you had to fight in the war. I don’t like to fite do you? Please watch out’. Children such as Roger would not have realised the extent to which their letters would have lifted the soldiers’ spirits, reminding them of the innocent and honest gentleness that people can have. Kenneth Peeples’s parents let him know that they were, ‘… extremely proud … because you did an honourable thing … bitterly against going into the service … [you] stuck it out … You should feel proud of yourself!’ Such affirmation was important to the soldiers due to the climate of hostility surrounding the Vietnam War. To know they were ‘coming home a hero’ to at least parts of the American community allowed them to retain a sense of self respect and dignity. As they had either gone to Vietnam to protect their society’s ideals of freedom and democracy or, they had been conscripted, had they returned home and received no understanding from anyone, it would have destroyed any faith they had remaining in the positive side of human nature.

An irony of Dear America is that the text brings to light the humanity of the Vietnam War even in its representation of the inhumanity of the conflict. Much of the poetry in the text graphically details the atrocity of war. ‘But they just lay there, You could hardly see the holes, It was all so strange, strange, These dead men freshly killed’, relates a soldier. Juxtaposed with the letters of the soldiers, the poetry enables Edelman to ensure the text has a clear purpose behind it, to raise the reader’s awareness of the cost of violent conflict. Thomas Smith suggests in his poem that young men should not let their sense of patriotism cajole them into war because the price is not worth it. He asserts, ‘I Love My Flag, I Do, I Do … I Love My Country, Yes, I Do … Young Men With Faces Half Shot Off Are Unfit To Be Kissed, I Guess I won’t Enlist’. The human dimensions of the conflict come together in the soldiers’ poetry; the vulnerability of young men to be engaged in war, the physical and emotional costs, the feelings of futility it causes, the inhumanity it reaps. In this, the experience of the young men who went to Vietnam is shared in such a way that it will work to deter humankind from war. Through the voices of the soldiers who fought in Vietnam, the text implores future generations to live humanely.

By representing the experience of hundreds of young men at war, Dear America is able to explore both the positive and negative sides of human nature in conflict. By constructing the text to feature photographs, poetry and voices and perspectives other than the soldiers, Edelman enables the reader to connect deeply with the experience of those involved in the Vietnam War. Edelman has constructed a text that is powerful because, despite its honest depiction of the horrors of war, it overwhelmingly communicates the humanity of the conflict.

Student Practice Response

How does the structure of Dear America work to maximise the emotional impact on the reader?

As a compilation of various letters written by a range of participants in the Vietnam War, one could expect Dear America to be erratic and detached in its depiction of the experience. However, the editor, Bernard Edelman, has been able to structure a selection of letters into a format that works to maximise the emotional impact of the text on the reader. He presents multiple narratives with the polyphony of voices at his disposal, allowing the reader to understand the diversity of feelings and opinions that people have felt in terms of the Vietnam War. By maintaining a focus on the soldiers as the central characters in the text, he highlights the raw reality of their combat experience to heighten the reader’s awareness of the physical and psychological toll this war exacted all around them.

The arrangement of letters in Dear America is very calculated. They are positioned in such a way as to make the reader empathise with the situation of the soldiers. Edelman comments, ‘chapters suggested themselves…into a sequence that would relate a year’s tour in Vietnam’. The chapter titles work on a metaphorical level to show the reader that the soldiers are involved in an intimate, humanistic relationship with the war. From their first encounters as ‘Cherries’ they travel through a series of pivotal moments akin to those of a disastrous romantic relationship. As a ‘cherry’ George Olsen comments to Red, ‘…I really loused up…I was afraid’. A little time later, in ‘Humping the Boonies’, he reflects that during a battle he found ‘The whole thing…morbidly fascinating…I was never scared…which scares me now’. Yet, further into the text, in ‘Beyond The Body Count’, the fact that it ‘is so very easy to kill in war’ makes him ‘more afraid [than] you’ve ever been in your life’. The likening of the soldiers’ encounters in Vietnam to the ups and downs of a volatile romance and the loss of innocence that is associated with that certainly achieves Edelman’s goal to ‘amplify the human dimensions of Vietnam experiences’. The fact he has been able to do this enables the reader to transpose their own knowledge of human suffering towards the situations of the soldiers so as to better understand their experiences.

To further enhance the reader’s ability to connect to the situation of the Vietnam War emotionally, Edelman has decided to include photographs within the compilation of Dear America. Photographs by Larry Burrows, Mark Jury and Edelman appear on the front cover and at the beginning of each chapter right before an introductory exposition that works to set the scene for each selection of letters. For the most part the photographs provide a human face for the reader to consider as they encounter the letters that follow. For example, the shot of a grim faced soldier wearing a bullet necklace with a rifle thrown over his soldier is juxtaposed against the peace emblem he sports emblazoned prominently on his helmet. The exposition imparts, ‘Any impression that those who fought in Vietnam were in universal agreement with its justification or its conduct is false’. This introduction to the chapter entitled ‘What Am I doing Here?’ positions the reader to closely sympathise with the ‘frustration’ and ‘bitterness’ a broad section of contemporary society felt towards the West’s involvement in the Vietnam War. Remember, many of the soldiers who fought in Vietnam were there subject to conscription. Edelman has been judicious in his selection of images, consciously choosing a number of pictures that will make readers think of their sons, brothers, nephews, cousins and friends. The reader loses objectivity as they read each letter with a personal response, imagining someone they love and know being in the position of the letter writer.

Edelman has ensured the human cost of the war is reiterated throughout the entirety of the text. An amalgamation of voices that are both fleeting and enduring in the text work to exhibit to the reader the fickle nature of war and how, whether a soldier survived service or was killed in action, their legacy of pain and anguish continues. Edelman does not ignore the voices of those left at ‘home’ or for whom home was Vietnam. The juxtaposition of three letters by first time fathers within the chapter ‘We Gotta Get Out Of This Place’ rams home to the reader the extent of despair that war can render to whole families. The poignancy of the last letter written by Marine 2Lt. Tyrone Pannell to his ‘Dear Tracey’ who ‘More than anything I want … to know me and love me’ wrenches at the reader’s guts. When they read in the biographical notes that ‘He was killed on 30 November 1965…24…Tracy…[is] now a student at Stanford University’ they put themselves in her shoes, imagining the impact of the loss of one’s father on someone’s life. The reader is further extended by Edelman’s choice of letters to consider the plight of the South Vietnamese. Though there is much denigration of the Vietnamese and the ‘invisible enemy’ by some soldiers, numerous letter writers express concern for the civilians. One soldier tells his Ma, ‘There are a few kids … with no parents … I hope that’s one reason why we’re here, to secure a future for them. It seems to be the only justification … for the things that I have done!’ Edelman has been able to expose the reader to an array of characters through the relationships the soldiers maintained and discussed in their letters. As the reader deals with the text they are involved in these relationships and become witnesses to the sorrow that has manifested due to the war and continues to echo ever since. In fact, they are employed by the text to be an element of that sorrowful echo.

Furthermore, in Dear America Edelman has incorporated within the overarching plot some sub-plots particular to certain soldiers to ensure the reader is taken on a narrative journey that can deliver to them the level of emotional impact that is needed to in some way grasp an understanding of the traumas endured. The letters and a dream list written by Alan Brudno during his seven and half years being held as a prisoner of war have been presented in the text as photocopies of the original. These are the only letters presented in such a way and it is obvious Edelman expects the reader to connect to Brudno on a special level. In between Brudno’s letters to his wife and his dream list, Edelman shares his biographical details. He reveals to the reader that ‘four months after his release and one day before his 33rd birthday, Major Brudno committed suicide’. This delivers an affronting emotional blow to the reader, especially as it occurs in the latter stages of the text. By this stage the reader has established a closeness with the soldiers through the contact they have had in reading their personal letters home. The disclosure of a suicide at this point catches the reader at a time when they will be most vulnerable to the grief such news elicits. Edelman also manipulates the reader’s feelings in the case of Fred Downs. Downs is the author of multiple letters to his wife Linda. His letters strongly convey his love for his family. He writes, ‘When it got bad, I thought of you and the kids and it got better’. Edelman uses the biographical notes on Downs strategically, feeding the reader new details about his life as they read through his letters. This works to heighten a sense of disbelief and grief when, at the end of his second last letter, they are told Fred and Linda have ‘since divorced’.

The letter by Eleanor Wimbish to her dead son Bill, features as the epilogue to the text. Edelman has exhibited it as a stand alone letter to enhance the impact it makes on the reader and finish the compilation with a moving ending. The letter takes the reader ‘home’, after the war, and leaves them to consider how, as one soldier put it, ‘The Vietnam war will never end’. The photograph accompanying the epilogue is the only one in the text that is not a portrait, instead it is of some of the many names that adorn the ‘Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington’. Wimbish’s letter was discovered left next to her son’s name on the wall. The magnitude of the death toll is exemplified to the reader by this image, then the ‘World of Hurt’ that the war has created is entrenched in the reader’s psyche through Wimbish’s address to her son. She ponders, ‘…I wonder if anyone ever stops to realize the that next to your name, on this black wall, is your mother’s heart…broken…when you lost your life in Vietnam’. At this query the reader is drawn to commiserate with Wimbish, they are aware of and share in her pain. Though it is not only her pain they are drawn to recognise. Due to Edelman’s placement of the memorial image, they are subtly led to acknowledge the breadth of grief established by the Vietnam War.

The structure of Dear America is deliberately designed to maximise the emotional impact of the text on the reader. Edelman organises the text to exploit the emotional vulnerabilities of readers. Though it is a text that falls into the war genre Edelman makes it accessible by ensuring the human element of the conflict is at the fore of the representation. Poetry by the soldiers adds to this, one expresses, ‘We suffer in agony, as women, In labour. But we die with the birth, for Our child is war’. Readers are able to convey their own life experience alongside the stories of the soldiers. Though it might rarely be comparable to the ordeals of the soldiers it enables them to sympathise and view their torment with compassion.

Student Practice SAC 2011

War has a damaging effect on all those involved. Do you agree?


War does have a damaging effect on all those involved. Not only the soldiers do it tough, but also the families back home, the Vietnamese people and even the reader it some sort of effect on. Bernard Edelman, the editor of the text ‘Dear America’, has composed a series of letters wrote by soldiers fighting in Vietnam, to express to the reader their thoughts, and all the damage that has been done. The photographs at the start of each chapter send a message to the reader how much it has affected all of them through the process of what they went through.

All of the soldiers in the Vietnam War all experienced the worst experiences and saw the most horrible sights. Some soldiers witnessed their friends being shot right in front of their eyes, and had to shoot others. Even after the war has passed, the soldiers would’ve still not been able to get the images they wish to forget, out of their minds. This therefore would’ve put terrible things in the soldiers mind, making mental problems occur to majority of the soldiers. Being away from their families made the soldiers value what they have, and appreciate everything back at home much more than usual. The solders witnessed a lot of heartbreaks, with them being so far away from their families and them not knowing if they were going to survive and ever see them again, and seeing their friends be killed right in front of their eyes. That brought the soldiers even more determined to win the war and work with their mates to get back home safe to their families.

Vietnam was the country where the war was taken place in, which completely destroyed what was once a beautiful place. Also all of the Vietnamese people who were badly injured and even were killed during the time of the war. Even now, the damaging effects still exist from the war, for example the tunnels and the orphanage history.

The families, friends, and loved ones of the soldiers were also somewhat damaged by the Vietnam War. All everyone back home would do was worry about their loved one out at war and if they’ll ever see them again. And unfortunately some never did, therefore lot of the families also suffered a great amount of grief. It brought stress and strain on relationships and the families, especially if the soldier had a wife and children back home. As one of the soldiers mentions that “its great to know your family’s safe, living in a secure country; a country made by thousands upon thousands of men who have dies for that country.” The soldiers are glad that their families back home are safe, but the families can’t feel the same as the soldiers, because they are the ones not in danger or risk of never returning back home. The families try to accept the fact that their loved one is out there doing what he can for his country.

Overall war does have a damaging effect on all those involved, and not just at the time of the war, everyone involved had to live with the damage that had been done and the sights that they saw, and some never overcame those issues. Many of the soldiers believed that the war was pointless and “what am I doing here?” War caused a lot of damage, and it has an impact on the reader feeling sorry for the soldiers.