My Life is a Tap Dance

Discussion Questions

Into what persuasive genre would you categorize this video? Is it a narrative? Is it definitional? Is it something else? Explain which features of a particular genre you see most prominently.
Analyze the decisions the student made in terms of framing the video. What do we see in the frame? What do we not see? How would the video potentially have been different if the shot had been closer? Further away? From a different angle?

Author

Eleanor Zinsmeister

Eleanor (Elie) Zinsmeister is a Mechanical Engineering Student in the class of 2024. Born and raised in North Central San Antonio, TX, Elie is the only daughter and child of Diana and Scott Zinsmeister. Elie has been dancing for over sixteen years and is a current member of the Notre Dame Dance Company. She often attributes her love for math and numbers to the fact that she learned to think in 8-counts before she could tie her shoes. In Elie’s piece, “My Life is a Tap Dance,” she hopes to draw parallels between life, perseverance, and tap dancing. By combining her fast-paced choreography and purposefully-timed narration, she hopes to remind others that stress and pressure is what we control, not what controls us.