Lesson of Santa Barbara oil spill: Leave petroleum in the groundBy David HelvargMAY 22, 2015 1. Memorial Day marks the beginning of high beach season, but there are miles of coastline near Santa Barbara that will be out of commission this weekend thanks to a pipeline oil spill.

　　2. This is how most offshore oil works: You drill miles off the coast, pump the oil onshore to be processed and pipe it along the coast. On Tuesday, an underground pipeline that runs between Gaviota and Refugio State Beach ruptured, and the oil followed gravity into a culvert and back out to sea.

　　3. More than 100,000 gallons of oil may have spilled, including an estimated 20,000 on the beach and in an oil slick in one of our nation's richest marine habitats. The pipeline company has apologized for the “inconvenience” all this will cause. What's particularly troubling is that compared with drilling rigs, pipelines are supposed to be the safe part of offshore oil operations.

　　剩余正文部分请参考原文，本文不做展示。

　　Analysis：In order to propose the rebellion toward the current offshore drilling in the United State, David Helvarg refers the accidents happened decade ago in his passage Lesson of Santa Barbara oil spill: Leave petroleum in the ground, in which techniques of irony, statistics and quotation are well utilized to backup his argument, with the target audience being informed.

　　开头段需要同学们特别关注文本信息的融合即文章基本信息，作者的意图及使用手法。其次由于是写作部分，因此在语言上还要注意串联以及单词的相关使用。增强句子的表达性。 The whole passage/article starts with the description【突出文本的位置】of the oil spill in Santa Barbara via the irony. The phrase “thanks to” is originally meant to introduce a positive cause for some situations, however, it is applied to the upsetting incidence. In addition,“high beach season” is added to form the background of joyful atmosphere leading to the contrast of the leakage. This skill successfully directs people’s attention to the phenomenon following the argument discussed later. The focus will be strengthened and become concrete when David intrigued the statistics “more than 100000 gallons” and “2000”. The seriousness and urgency is degenerated to audience who may not be so familiar with the leakage scale. This is then emphasized by David’s mentioning the company who just called it as“inconvenience” and “pipeline is supposed to be the safe part”.The misconception is pointed out to the readers with the usage of ironic tone. It highlights David’s dissatisfaction and his calling for stopping the offshore drilling. Readers would have the emotional occurrence with the writer. This directly lays the foundation【突出文本的位置】for further discussion/prone in prohibiting the drilling.

　　此处我们采用合并手法进行分析。通过段落区分我们可以看到主体段前三段是文章作者的背景介绍及引入，因此在分析中需要把这一部分的内容涵盖在一段中进行分析。主要是讽刺与数据串联。

　　要点补充：什么是讽刺？

　　Irony is the contrast between what is expected and what actually happens. This type of irony can be used to surprise readers.E.g.[A] strange thing has happened in the American arts during the past quarter century. While income rose to unforeseen levels, college attendance ballooned, and access to information increased enormously, the interest young Americans showed in the arts—and especially literature—actually diminished.

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