Hi. This is the eighth and final installment of my blog for my English Composition I class. Our in-class face-to-face semester was switched to online classes due to the outbreak of the novel coronavirus (COVID19), which is the reason for this being my last blog post. In this week’s blog post, I will be writing and sharing a blog for my semester reflection. My first use of reflective writing will be in this blog. We had two articles/videos to interpret for this blog one was Reflective Writing the other was Genres in Academic Writing: Reflection. I will also elaborate on the acronym “GRITT”, as it applies to my development as a writer through this course, this is an idea that is unique to our class, and it stands for: Genre awareness, Rhetorical awareness, Identity as an author, Theory of writing, and my Transfer of writing to future writing situations, how I plan to transfer my knowledge of writing to future classes and in life in general. 1. Your Genre awareness: What is genre awareness? How has it changed in this course? Please discuss the genres of your memoir and either your MLA research paper or your op-ed. Genre awareness is becoming aware of how certain texts are similar in their structure and organization, how content is dealt with, and how vocabulary, sentence structure and tone are used. Genre awareness helps us meet the expectations of our audience. Now I understand, when you are aware of your genre and you know what the guidelines for that genre are, it is a big step in meeting the expectations of those who read your work. As a reader, to know what to expect from a piece, is knowing what is expected in that genre. My genre awareness has changed dramatically in this course. I went from not knowing or caring about the genre of what I read, to trying to determine what genre it is and understanding why it would be in that genre. Using the guidelines of all the different genres we used to write our blogs and projects helped me write the memoir that is now my Narrative Project on this website. Writing the dialogue wasn’t that hard it was the showing of emotion and trying to convey that emotion, during the time when my memoir took place, that I found to be more difficult. Just finding the right words to make everything flow and fit together correctly and convey the emotion. My Research Project, which could be either an op-ed or an MLA research paper, and because I’m pretty sure that I will have to write another MLA research paper somewhere in the future I chose to write an MLA research paper. It was something that I hadn’t done before, at least not in that format, and wanted to experience that genre of writing. The research paper wasn’t that difficult to write, it was more the guidelines of the genre that were a little frustrating at times. The guidelines of an MLA research paper are pretty strict. Citing your resources correctly, having a “works cited” list, making sure that your quotes are presented correctly so that there is no question of plagiarism. Making sure your making your argument correctly with enough cited information to back it up. It can be frustrating, but I think I did pretty well for my first time. 2. Your Rhetorical awareness: What is rhetorical awareness? How has it changed in this course? How did you apply rhetorical awareness in your research project writing? Here are helpful resources: What is Rhetoric? / Exigence in Rhetoric (ThoughtCo.) / Rhetorical Purpose / Rhetorical Modes Rhetorical awareness is understanding what is successfully fulfilling the purpose of your writing, it is dependent on your ability to anticipate and address the needs of your audience. Rhetorical awareness is recognizing which techniques work for different audiences and situations. A rhetorical situation is made up of three components that determine how you construct your particular document.
My rhetorical awareness has definitely changed because of this course. I’ve become more aware of what rhetoric is and how to use it when I’m writing. I’m more aware of the goal of the piece I’m writing, who’s going to read it, where I need to go to make the point I’m trying to make. I’m also becoming more aware of the audience that will be reading my work and trying to give enough information to inform them, but not too much as to overwhelm them, which could lead to their unwillingness to read any further. In my research paper I used rhetoric to inform and persuade the reader to change or reinforce their beliefs in the argument I was posing. Making sure the opening paragraph informed the reader what the topic of the paper was, along with stating my thesis, and giving just enough information to inform but not overwhelm the reader. In the main body of the paper I made sure to try and persuade the reader to see the purpose of the paper with my argument and sufficient information from professionals to back up my argument. Again, just enough to inform but not overwhelm the reader. 3. Your Identity as an author: How are your past academic writing experiences different from your present experiences with writing in this course? How are the past and present experiences the same? How has it changed in this course? Include a conversation about naming and establishing a relationship with your author-self. Also discuss some or all of the following: being a blogger/vlogger, web site author, memoirist, research author, reflective author, found poet, counter-narrative writer, etc. In the past my academic writing experiences were a lot different than my experiences now. In the past the subject matter of what I was writing was always an assigned topic, and usually something that I didn’t have much interest in writing about. Basically, my writing in the past was much like one of our reading assignments in which Don Murray talks about it being a product not a process. Now my writing is more of a process where I try to use all of the things I’ve learned to this point, genre awareness, rhetorical awareness, writing as a process, and I try to make meaning with them. I don’t think my past experiences with writing are anywhere near the same as what I’m doing now, like I mentioned before my writing back then was definitely a product, and there was very little to no process at all involved in it, nothing like I’m doing today. I’m more excited about writing, I actually enjoy writing the assignments and posting them for the discourse community to read. Which is a total 180° from where I was when I started writing for this course back in January. I was very self-conscious about other people reading my writing. My identity as an author has changed dramatically from being in this course. When we started in January, I had no relationship with my author self. “In a letter to my author self” I described that, and I actually ask for forgiveness from him “because he has been locked up in a dungeon in my mind for decades.” Letting him out was definitely a good thing to do. I never did name my identity but I don’t think he needs one right now, we’re working well together. Right now, he is helping me in other classes I’m taking, and I’m pretty sure is going to help me in the future with my education and definitely with career dealings. Writing for English comp as a memoirist, research author, counter-narrative writer a blogger and reflective author has given me a better understanding of theses genres and the ability to repeat the writing if I need to. I do feel really good knowing that I have written effectively in each of these genres, and the pieces I wrote are on my web site for everyone to read, I guess you could say there’s a little pride in knowing that I wrote them. 4. Your Theory of writing: How has this course impacted the way you define and value writing? Which composition concepts/terms do you most value? Include a one-sentence thesis or tag line that represents your theory. This course has definitely impacted the way I define writing. It has taught me that writing can be exciting, you can enjoy the process of writing, and not dread the thought of having to write. Writing can have all of the emotion that you would feel or see in everyday life. We covered quite a few composition concepts that have become valuable to me when it comes to writing. The one that I always think of first is thinking of writing as a process and not just the finished product. I think the process is more important than what is produced. Another one is revision, I think Mary Karr puts it best “other than a few instances of luck, good work only comes through revision.” Revision has become my friend, and a necessity to me. It has become something that I see as a tool now, and understand why it is important to writing. Becoming more in tune with my author self, getting to know him again and letting him out of the dungeon that he used to live in, and using him more than I used to has really become important now. I think the concept of writing being a process not a product is one of the ones I value most, just because I’ve learned that there is a process to writing, and that it has made writing more enjoyable for me. Genre awareness is another one that I’ve learned to appreciate. Having to take this course and learning more about what genre awareness is in writing and what makes up a genre’s guidelines. A line from one of the videos I watched for this course comes to mind when I think of genre awareness and that’s “Genre awareness helps us meet the expectations of our audience.” I’m supposed to come up with a tag line to brand my theory of writing, first let me say that I’m not sure if I have a solid theory of writing but writing has become exciting for me now that I have an understanding of what writing can be so here’s my tag line, “Writing can be exciting when you have the knowledge to do it effectively.” 5. Your Transfer of writing to future writing situations: How do you plan to use your growing writing knowledge to compose texts in future academic and non-academic contexts? Include a discussion about your writing processes, writing mindset/author identity, genre awareness, and rhetorical awareness. Conclude the conversation with a future scene of writing to illustrate how you might enact writing transfer in a different context. I plan to use my growing knowledge of writing to compose texts in the future as much as possible. While writing for this course, I’ve been getting more confident about my writing and that intern has helped me immensely with the writing of assignments that I’ve had outside of English comp. I think this course will continue to help me with the rest of my academic career, especially with future writing assignments. In the non-academic context I think it will definitely help with writing of reports, presentations, and emails. Writing as a process is one of the things that I will definitely take away from this semester in English comp. The process of writing a first draft, then revising it until it becomes something that can inform or persuade, has become a much more enjoyable process for me, more than what it used to be. Along with a better understanding of genre awareness and rhetorical awareness and how they are both used to convey to the audience the purpose of what I have written. My process of writing has become much more enjoyable more so than what it used to be. Coming up with the words to put on paper isn’t that difficult for me it’s the genre and rhetorical awareness that I have to be mindful of, making sure I stay within the genre and not wander outside the guidelines, and not to over load the reader with too much information, keep them interested to read more. My author identity is good right now and I’m trying to keep it that way, like I mentioned earlier, I never did name my identity but I don’t think he needs one right now, we’re working well together, and I need to keep it that way. My author identity has grown as well, I have expanded the tools I have to write and tailor my writing to the audience it is intended for. One other thing, writing for the discourse community has made me a lot less self-conscious about people reading what I write, which makes every second of this course worth it. I see myself using the tools I have learned in English comp. now as I try to navigate my way through the rest of my time in college. I’ve already been putting what I’ve learned to use this semester in my other classes. I see having to use rhetorical awareness quite a bit to persuade, inform and maybe even inspire, the target audience in order to change or reinforce their beliefs and actions. When I’m working, I see myself having to write reports and emails. Writing these for or to bosses or even co-workers to inform, persuade or inspire for whatever the reason, and having to use my growing knowledge of rhetorical awareness to inform them of my position on the subject to try and persuade them to change their beliefs or reinforce what they already know.
1 Comment
Sabatino
5/4/2020 04:31:18 pm
Thank you for publishing such an informative, entertaining, and insightful reflection. I really enjoyed reading this and feel as if I have an even deeper understanding of your story and growth as a writer in our course.
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Bill LewisThis is where I try to make meaning with the assignments for my English Composition class. Archives
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