Post 4: Cricket Fighting by Hugh Raffles

Cricket Fighting

In China the act of cricket fighting has been a part of the culture for hundreds of years and is still in practice in modern day. Hugh Raffles is the author of the essay Cricket Fighting first featured in Granta. Raffles is a professor of Anthropology at the New School liberal Arts College in New York ("Hugh Raffles"). Basics of the Cricket Fighting in China, including the five virtues and three reversals, is written about in the essay. The author in detail describes interaction between humans and crickets. Training and fighting of the crickets in the Chinese culture is also part of the essay context and is extremely informative. The purpose of the essay was to inform readers about the practice of cricket fighting in China while drawing parallels between humans and crickets. The essay was directed towards people who have no background knowledge of the Chinese cricket fighting culture and have an interest in anthropology. In the essay personification was used as a strategy by Hugh Raffles and was important to achieving his purpose in writing. Cricket Fighting had numerous facts about the actual cricket fights to inform readers about the crickets however the personification involved in the essay was the element needed in order to get the purpose across. Personification is used for the crickets giving them human qualities and making them more relatable to the reader. The personification makes the connection between humans and crickets believable. The author did accomplish his purpose in my own opinion. Hugh was able to show the connection between the crickets and the Chinese people quite well and was able to do it in entertaining manner. I had no previous knowledge of the custom of cricket fighting and after reading I was able to see the similarities between the crickets and the humans in the essay Cricket Fighting. 

Work Cited

                                                                                                                                                        "Hugh Raffles - Professor of Anthropology." The New School | A university in New York City. The New         School, n.d. Web. 12 Aug. 2013. <http://www.newschool.edu/lang/faculty.aspx?id=1690>.