Study questions
The following questions may help you work with Beth Macy’s article “‘I Am Going to Die if I Keep Living the Way I Am.’ She Was Right.”
Note that you will probably not have space to answer all of these questions within your analytical essay, so it is a good idea to pick some of them to focus on.
Study questions for the rhetorical situation
Who is Beth Macy, and how does her experience with the opioid crisis come across in her article?
Who is the target audience of her article?
Study questions for structure
What does the headline reveal about the contents of the story?
Why has Macy chosen to frame her article around Tess’s death?
Why has Macy chosen to alternate between sharing Tess’s story and sharing more general facts about the opioid crisis?
Study questions for style of writing
What do medical terms such as “Suboxone” and “endocarditis” reveal about the style of Macy’s language?
What does words and phras...