Running head: Genre Analysis

Genre Analysis
Lorenzo Ramirez
RWS 1302
T 9-10:20
University of Texas at El Paso

Genre Analysis

3D printing has become a very important development in the world of technology and the
medical arena. 3D printing has evolved from printing images on paper to creating 3d sculptures
that you can actually place in your hand. 3D printing is still in its infancy but is quickly evolving
into a driving force for many fields of the business world. One field that has felt the positive
impact of 3D printing is the medical field. In the articles The Strange and Radical New World of
3-D Printed Body Parts, an article found in Wired Magazine, and How 3D Printers Are
Reshaping Medicine reported on the CNBC website, 3d printing has had a huge impact in the
medical field and changing lives.
The possibilities are endless with regards to 3D printing for medical purposes. The
medical field has begun to take advantage of 3D printing and its many possibilities to combat
some of the more serious illnesses and amputations to the human body. The two articles
presented here seem to be directed to the people in the medical field, although 3D printing has
many other uses, printing food, car parts, guns etc., the intended audience here is specifically
people who work in the medical field. When writing these articles the authors seemed to be
writing to people that could use the technology of 3D printing to advance medical procedures,
making them less painful and in some cases a lot quicker for the patient in order to help people
with different kinds of ailments. The main purpose of the articles is to give the people in the
medical field hope and to persuade them also to start thinking about this new technology that
could change the way things are done for patients. For example in the article How 3D Printers
are Reshaping Medicine, the author mentions that bio-printers are being used to print out living
tissue by using a special ink called bio-ink which is made up living cells to help replace organs.
Thompson writes:

Genre Analysis

Bio-printers use a "bio-ink" made of living cell mixtures to form human tissue.
Basically, the bio-ink is used to build a 3D structure of cells, layer by layer, to form
tissue. Eventually, medical researchers hope to be able to use the printed tissue to make organs
for organ replacement. (Thompson, 2012, para. 6)
With the 3D printing still fairly new, the medical community will spend a lot of time
testing and evaluating the pros and cons of this new technology. 3D printing is already being
used for replacing lost limbs, prosthetics, and so far seems to be doing well in that area of the
medical community. The authors are trying to bring awareness to more complicated uses for 3D
printing such as replicating tissue cells, arteries, veins etc. more of the smaller, complicated
aspects of the human body. The emotional response or pathos that comes from the medical
community is on the positive side, in the article The Strange and Radical New World of 3-D
Printed Body Parts, there are several examples of how this 3d printing has helped many people
evoke a sense of hope and excitement for the future in the medical field. For example the article
mentions a case where an 83 year old woman had lost her jaw due to some infection, the article
does not mention what infection caused the jaw problem and surgery would last about 14 hours,
but with a 3D printed jaw the procedure would actually last only 4 hours due to the surgeon not
having to sculpt a new jaw by hand. The authors of these articles have been very effective in
bringing much more awareness to this new technology by giving us examples and medical cases
that have had to use 3D printing. By showing us 3D printing in action that gives the medical
community a sense of hope for the future especially for those people that have been effected in
profound ways, for example amputees can now feel better about themselves knowing that there
could be a possibility of getting that new arm or leg so that they can feel normal again.

Genre Analysis

The evidence that supports both genres are given in both articles each citing an example
of how 3D printing can be used for medical purposes. For example in the article How 3D
printing is Reshaping Medicine, found on the website CNBC, the author Thompson states:
Researchers in regenerative medicine at Wake Forest University in North Carolina
partnered with the Armed Forces Institute for Regenerative Medicine to make a 3-D skin
printer that deposits cells directly on a wound to help it heal quicker. Researchers at the
university have also had success printing off kidney cells. (Thompson, 2012, para.10)
This type of evidence uses the rhetorical strategy ethos very well, ethos mainly relies on
the credibility of the writer, and in this article the writer does use reliable resources that show
experimentation was used to back up the claims they are making that 3D-printing is a very
important technological instrument that can be used to save lives. Furthermore the writers use of
this type of research helps support the claims that 3D printing can be used in the medical field for
purposes to help the human body heal itself from traumatic incidents. In the other article The
Strange and Radical New World of 3-D Printed Body Parts, the author Macneal gives us these
example as evidence,
In France this summer, Medicrea made a spinal cage for a patient with a deformed
spine. The new disk fit perfectly between the two affected vertebrae. A Belgian woman had lost
bone in her shoulder this year. Mobelife engineers mapped the area to craft an implant
that

would fit the joint and not require removing any additional bone. (Macneal, 2014)
The way that each genre is structured in order to convey their message differ from each

other. For the article The Strange and Radical New World of 3-D Printed Body Parts, found in
Wired Magazine, the author uses some pictures to try to convey their ideas to the reader, to give

Genre Analysis

them a visual experience that they can relate to what is being described to them through words,
second the article comes from a magazine that is somewhat geared towards a specific audience
that is into technology. Bold fonts are used to capture the readers attention in some sections of
the article, overall the articles does a good job in grabbing the readers attention and then
presenting them with some good information on the subject. In the second article How 3D
printing is Reshaping Medicine, which comes from the website CNBC, is structured differently
from the magazine article. There are no pictures to convey any images to the reader while they
read the article to try to give them some visual information, second this is a website so there is no
specific target audience only the general audience that likes to read news in general. The website
doesnt do much to try to capture the readers attention with pictures of colors or fonts of varying
sizes like the magazine does.
In conclusion the article that does a better job in conveying its message would be the
magazine article, with its pictures colors, and overall structure. Although they both convey the
same information about 3D printing, their styles are different and it seems their target audiences
are different. One targets the medical community and the tech enthusiast while the other has not
specific target audience.

Genre Analysis

References
MacNeal, David. (2014, Oct 14). The Strange and Radical New World of 3-D
Printed Body Parts
Wired Magazine

Thompson, Cadie (2012, Oct. 12). How 3D Printers are Reshaping Medicine. CNBC, Retrieved
from: http://www.cnbc.com/id/49348354#.