Chapter 3 Process Analysis Often thought of as a way to develop scientific papers, process analysis can be used with a variety of topics and in combination with many of the other methods of development illustrated in this text. It is the type of writ- ing used to convey instructions—how to change a tire, take someone’s temperature, or write the draft of a college essay. Process analysis can also explain how something happens or happened—the birth of a planet, the way you convinced your boss to give you a raise, or even how light and sound are transmitted to our eyes and ears. Like narratives, essays on such topics generally follow chronological order, with all the steps in the process unfolding like the events in a well- developed plot. Much is made of transitional words and phrases to keep the reader on the right track. “When you have said everything you can say in this [first] draft,” Richard Marius tells us, “print it out . .” And like any good storyteller, the writer of process analysis usually begins at the beginning and follows through to the end, sometimes listing steps by number, and sometimes not, but always providing sufficient detail to help the reader picture the activity accurately and concretely. Sometimes writers of process analysis infuse their work with vivid, if not unnerving, description such as the kind we find in Gretel Ehrlich’s “Chronicles of Ice,” which traces the process by which the world’s ice floes are deteriorating. Note that this essay also comments on the causes of the problem in language that is both moving and persuasive. Nonetheless, the purpose of process analysis is instructive in the most practical sense: Narration and description may show what happens, and causal analysis may explain why it happens, but process analysis always focuses on how it happens. The most important aspect of any process essay, therefore, is clarity. Readers will not follow unless your explana- tions are complete, your language is familiar, and your organization is simple. Take your lead from Richard Marius, who lists important advice and information about writing in easy-to-follow steps. And whenever you give instructions, pay your readers the courtesy of preparing them for the task by mentioning required tools, materials, and expectations. Note that John (Fire) Lame Deer and Richard Erdoes mention the quilt, the peace pipe, and the gourd used during Lame Deer’s first “vision- seeking.” 85 bus92577_ch03.indd 85 1/7/09 5:32:39 PM 86 Chapter 3 Process Analysis Of course, explaining a process does not give you license to produce prose that is dull. Indeed, there is no rule that process papers can’t be sus- penseful and exciting. Take this paragraph from Edward Abbey’s “The Serpents of Paradise”: I’m sitting on my doorstep early one morning, facing the sun as usual, drinking coffee, when I happen to look down and see almost between my bare feet, only a couple of inches to the rear of my heels, the very thing I had in mind. No mistaking that wedgelike head, that tip of horny segmented tail peeping out of the coils. He’s under the doorstep and in the shade where the ground and air remain very cold. In his sluggish condition he’s not likely to strike unless I rouse him by some careless move of my own. Like selections in other parts of this text, those that appear here rep- resent a variety of subjects, approaches, and styles. But there is a common denominator. As you might expect, the selections that follow are models of clarity, but their authors never come across as cold and detached, even when explaining what might at first seem recondite or abstract. The committed—even impassioned—voice of the writer always comes through. That is probably why we read these sometimes “technical” pieces eagerly. Each selection has something important to teach us, but the lesson has relatively little to do with the process its author describes. What we learn here is a need to respect the reader, to understand our attitude toward the subject, and to believe that what we have to say is important. Why Leaves Turn Color in the Fall Diane Ackerman Diane Ackerman (b. 1948) was born in Waukegan, Illinois, and was educated at Pennsylvania State University and Cornell University. A versatile writer and student of nature, Ackerman is probably best known for A Natural History of the Senses (1990), from which this selection is taken. Her prose works include The Rarest of the Rare (1995), A Natural History of Love (1994), and On Extended Wings (1985). She has also published several volumes of poetry, among which are Origami Bridges (2002), I Praise My Destroyer (2000), and Jaguar of Sweet Laughter (1991). Ackerman’s books for young people include The Senses of Animals (2001), Bats: Shadows in the Night (1997), and Monk Seal Hideaway (1995). Her latest work is An Alchemy of Mind: The Marvel and Mystery of the Brain (2004). Ackerman is a recipient of the John Burroughs Nature Award (1997), the Lavan Poetry Award (1985), and the Art of Fact Award for Creative Nonfiction (2000). She has even had a molecule named after her: dianeackerone. Ackerman has been a staff writer for The New Yorker magazine and has been a visiting professor at Cornell and at the University of Richmond. She has also directed Washington bus92577_ch03.indd 86 1/7/09 5:32:40 PM Why Leaves Turn Color in the Fall Diane Ackerman 87 University’s Writing Program. In 2008, Ackerman won Orion magazine's Orion Book Award for The Zookeeper's Wife, a War Story, the story of a Polish couple's heroic activi- ties in saving many who would otherwise have fallen victim to the Nazis. “Why Leaves Turn Color in the Fall” shows that scientific writing, although clear, accurate, and objective, can also be quite engaging. The stealth of autumn catches one unaware. Was that a goldfinch perching 11 in the early September woods, or just the first turning leaf? A red-winged blackbird or a sugar maple closing up shop for the winter? Keen-eyed as leopards, we stand still and squint hard, looking for signs of movement. Early morning frost sits heavily on the grass, and turns barbed wire into a string of stars. On a distant hill, a small square of yellow appears to be a lighted stage. At last the truth dawns on us: Fall is staggering in, right on schedule, with its baggage of chilly nights, macabre holidays, and spectacular, heart-stoppingly beautiful leaves. Soon the leaves will start cringing on the trees, and roll up in clenched fists before they actually fall off. Dry seedpods will rattle like tiny gourds. But first there will be weeks of gushing color so bright, so pastel, so confettilike, that people will travel up and down the East Coast just to stare at it—a whole season of leaves. Where do the colors come from? Sunlight rules most living things with 22 its golden edicts. When the days begin to shorten, soon after the summer solstice on June 21, a tree reconsiders its leaves. All summer it feeds them so they can process sunlight, but in the dog days of summer the tree begins pulling nutrients back into its trunk and roots, pares down, and gradually chokes off its leaves. A corky layer of cells forms at the leaves’ slender petioles, then scars over. Undernourished, the leaves stop producing the pigment chlorophyll, and photosynthesis ceases. Animals can migrate, hibernate, or store food to prepare for winter. But where can a tree go? It survives by dropping its leaves, and by the end of autumn only a few fragile threads of fluid-carrying xylem hold leaves to their stems. A turning leaf stays partly green at first, then reveals splotches of yellow 33 and red as the chlorophyll gradually breaks down. Dark green seems to stay longest in the veins, outlining and defining them. During the summer, chlo- rophyll dissolves in the heat and light, but it is also being steadily replaced. In the fall, on the other hand, no new pigment is produced, and so we notice the other colors that were always there, right in the leaf, although chlorophyll’s shocking green hid them from view. With their camouflage gone, we see these colors for the first time all year, and marvel, but they were always there, hidden like a vivid secret beneath the hot glowing greens of summer. The most spectacular range of fall foliage occurs in the northeastern 44 United States and in eastern China, where the leaves are robustly col- ored, thanks in part to a rich climate. European maples don’t achieve the same flaming reds as their American relatives, which thrive on cold nights and sunny days. In Europe, the warm, humid weather turns the bus92577_ch03.indd 87 1/7/09 5:32:40 PM 88 Chapter 3 Process Analysis leaves brown or mildly yellow. Anthocyanin, the pigment that gives apples their red and turns leaves red or red-violet, is produced by sug- ars that remain in the leaf after the supply of nutrients dwindles. Unlike the carotenoids, which color carrots, squash, and corn, and turn leaves orange and yellow, anthocyanin varies from year to year, depending on the temperature and amount of sunlight. The fiercest colors occur in years when the fall sunlight is strongest and the nights are cool and dry (a state of grace scientists find vexing to forecast). This is also why leaves appear dizzyingly bright and clear on a sunny fall day: The anthocyanin flashes like a marquee.