In chapter 4: "Dead Man Driving", Roach celebrates the achievements of cadavers by personification, she writes, " The dead's first contribution to safe driving was the non-face-gashing windshield." (88).
In chapter 5, she articulates an investigation of cause of death, in which Dennis Shanahan- an injury analyst- works to solve the mystery of the Flight 800 which departed from JFK International Airport (1996) but never landed at its destination: Paris. Next, Roach continues and reflects on the history of science of injury analysis, which first started in 19954 when two British Comet airliners fell into the sea, never returning. An investigation then was conducted, led by Sir Harold E. Whittingham- director of medical services for the British Overseas Airways Corporation.
In Chapter 6, Roach reveals other methods cadavers are used in experiments, some that are beneficial to the U.S. army. She states why the U.S. army took interest in using cadavers saying, " Incapacitation-or stopping power, as it is known in munitions circles- became the Holy Grail of ballistics research." (132) [perhaps alluding to the film: Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975) ]. She explains that La Garde (U.S. army) investigates the army's various guns and bullets ability to end the life of an enemy, using cadavers to discover how momentum of hanging bodies relates to stopping power of a human when shot at.
Roach's purpose is to assert the various methods cadavers are used for the advancement of science and other needs or benefits. She seems to have a young audience in mind because she is very humorous and makes the information understandable.
Vocab.
1. mutilate: (n) to cut up or alter so as to make imperfect
2. ballistic: (adj) being or characterized by repeated bouncing, suddenly excited,
3. attenuate: (adj) reduced in thickness, density, or force
4. verisimilitude: (n) and verisimilar (adj) - having the appearance of truth, depicting realism
5. lacerations: (n) the act of lacerating, a torn or ragged wound
6. munitions: (n) archaic
7. frangible: (adj) readily or easily broken
8. calibers: (n) a degree of mental capacity or moral quality
9. effluvium: (n) offensive smell
10. chagrin: (n) distress caused by humiliation, disappointment, or failure
11. gauge: (n) dimension, size
12. viscera: (n) internal organ
13. scourge: (v) whip, one used to inflict pain or punishment
15. osteonecrosis: (n) necrosis of bone
16. deleterious: (adj.) harmful often in a unexpected way
17. debilitating: (n) to impair the strength of a human body
18. patronizing: (v) Treat with an apparent kindness that betrays a feeling of superiority
19. intracranial: (adj.) situated within the cranium
20. fuselage: (n) central body portion of aircraft designed to accommodate
21. culprit: (n) one accused or guilty of crime
22. deflection: (n) a turning aside or off course
Just in case your taking Physics:
1. Amplitude: (n) the maximum departure of the value of an alternating current or wave from the average value; extent or range of quality
2. Momentum: (n) property of a moving body , which has mass and velocity, a property of a moving body that determines the length of time before it rests when under constant force or moment
Rhetorical Strategies:
1. Antithesis: " You can't give a dead man a concussion, but you can check his skull for hairline cracks, and this is what researchers did." (88)
2. Personification: " Chest injuries are the other generous contributor to crash fatalities." (90)
3. Parallelism/ listing : "Child data aside, the blunt impact tolerance limits of the human body's vital pieces have long ago been worked out, and today's dead are being recruited mainly for impact studies of the body's outlying regions: ankles, knees, feet, shoulders." (95)
4. Fallacy* : " She doesn't look like an engineer. She has magazine-model skin and wide, white, radiant smile and thick, shiny brown hair pulled back in a loose ponytail. If Julia Roberts and Sandra Bullock had a child together, it would look like Deb Marth." (99) My thoughts: I love these actresses but what does she mean by that? So Deb is white, is that what makes her magazine-model skin beautiful? And, why can't an engineer be a beautiful woman? And to think this author is female..
5. Litotes: Understatement: " For the most part, it has been the lowly swine that has borne the burnt of munitions trauma research in the United States and Europe." (134)
Questions to consider:
1. In Chapter 4, what might have been the author's motives for writing so enthusiastically about ballistic gelatin?
2. The author favors interrupting her passages with tiny stars which are supposed to direct the readers to continue reading long often hilarious allusions, those located at the bottom of the pages, these are foot notes.. Why?
3. What is the significance of cadaver use in today's U.S. army?
Memorable Quote:
" It is an unfortunate given of human trauma research that the things most likely to accidentally maim or kill people- things we most need to study and understand- are also the things most likely to mutilate research cadavers : car crashes, gunshots, explosions, sporting accidents." (152)
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