sunshine-mohler-blog

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MY EPORTFOLIO

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me- as KT explained the Eportfolio

SUNDAY SOMETHING: WEEK 9

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LETTER AND POSTER

Rhetorical Advertisements

2000 E Asbury Ave

Denver, Colorado, 80210

27 February 2018

Mr. F.Y. Learning

Author

New York Times

1901 E Iliff Ave

Denver, Colorado, 80210

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UNVEILING

Justin Bieber on His Wife’s Writing:

In the past twelve months of being married, my wife, Mrs. Bieber, has helped contribute to the success and creation of my songs. I never knew how strong of an understanding of writing she had until just a few months ago. She has taught me a lot more about the academic side of writing and how I need to evoke feelings and rhetoric within my work. Sunshine is less of an academic writer even though she has the attributes to be, but she is more of a personal and creative writer. I always catch her journaling before bed and writing a million to do lists throughout the day. She writes for personal reasons and often doesn’t like showcasing her work. But I want to give her credit because she never gives herself enough. I think she gets insecure about her writing not having perfect punctuation or grammar, but there is a lot more to writing than just that. She clearly understands the use of key terms for successful writing and rhetoric but sometimes has a hard time putting it to work. By no means is she an expert, and she knows that, but I think that she should act like she is to push herself to be the best rather than hold back to just stay on pace.

Reflection:

Just like my husband wrote (lol) I find myself holding back from things I really want to say because I am scared of the consequences. I am more of a creative person than an academic one, so following a rubric and assignment requirements can be hard but I feel is the only way to succeed in some disciplines. I also critique my work harder than anyone else would, but I do not think that is a horrible thing to do. I would say that this course has helped me understand a lot more of the logistics of writing and the understanding of key terms. I also think I have gotten more comfortable with things outside of my comfort zone.

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SUNDAY SOMETHING: WEEK 8

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MAP 2

For my second map, I stuck with a lot of key terms I used in the first. First, imperfection and vulnerability. I took a picture of rocks on campus because each of them is different and that represents the individuality of writing as well as the voice of that indifference. Next, I have creativity, which is why I took a picture of the graffiti wall, that represents art and uniqueness- in which each paper has. Then I have vulnerability and I took a picture in the bathroom because I think that is one of the only places where you have time to yourself- which also represents reflection. Lastly, I took a picture of the car garage to represent genre because each car is different. I also added the term audience to my map but I couldn’t find a place that represented it best on campus because everything and everyone is a different genre so it was hard to pick the best. 

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Theory of Writing 2

Although I believe that my first draft of my theory of writing is still a good representation; I have slight tweaks I would make to it. I still think that my theory of writing is an outlet to free previous knowledge and experiences and a way to show rhetorical engagement, but I think there is also more to it. I liked how in the last reading, the author mentioned that you can reject rhetoric just as much as you embrace it. Rhetorical engagement is the same. It is an intellectual work and in order for it to be successful and embraced it has to be fully overviewed by all parties involved. Just like I mentioned before Crowley and Hawhee do a really good job explaining this engagement. I have found that I use my theory of writing every time I do reading responses for this class and also our argument pieces/drafts. Theories of writing help you as an individual produce the pieces of literature necessary to get your point across. In that process, you have to take into consideration the disciplines of the audience, genre, tone, etc. Since the last time I wrote about the theory of writing, I think I have developed a better understanding of those terms that are key in this process. Just like I said in the opening, my theory of writing is applying experiences and knowledge and that comes from reflection. This is another key term that I better associate and understand now. Reflection plays a key part in the theory of writing because in order to reach that engagement and rhetorical exchange you must understand what you are talking about, and to best understand things in the now you must be able to understand your roots. All of these things working together will then come together and help you write the best that you can. So for my final theory of writing, taking into consideration my original and new terms, it is an outlet to use reflection and rhetorical engagement to contribute towards an appropriate discipline for your writing.

s/o to my roommate for the acting 

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MOMENTS

So far in this course, the past reading has been my favorite. Murder (Rhetorically Speaking) pretty much tied together all of the terms we have focused on through this course and related it to real life students, like us. I also thought that the exercises we did with it were really beneficial to see the importance of audience and genre. My “moment” with this piece was realizing how often we change our style of writing and choice of words to appropriately portray what we want to. In this reading, they call it jargon and talk about how it the choice of words you use to fit a given setting. Overall the piece introduced a lot of new vocabulary words that just helped build on what we have already learned. The reason this reading sparked such a moment in me is that I felt that everything it talked about will always apply to my writing and won’t change over time. It is a timeless discipline to understand. This also applies to real life situations because it is not just in writing but also in talking.

My second “moment” is my improvement with reflecting. We have focused on reflection through our reading from Yancey as well as just overall class discussions. Since I had already spent time on learning about reflection last quarter I have been more able to actually focus and apply it this quarter. I find reflection being present in all of my classes and since I am now aware of it I am able to take advantage of it. I think that it not only helps with writing and improving academics but also just overall self-care. In college we tend to get lost in loops (maybe feedback loops from hell) and having a moment of reflection is helpful. At the beginning of class when we all just kind of rant to one another, it is a moment of reflection and puts us off on a good note to start the lesson.

My last “moment” for learning in this course has come from our argument projects. Spending time learning so deeply about one topic and viewing both sides has honestly been very fun. Maybe that's just because I am passionate about the topic and entertained by it, but I think seeing all arguments on a certain topic is a beneficial academic lesson. It also takes a lot of time to find opposing sides of arguments and then furthermore, making yourself believe it so you can write a strong argument. I also like how we are playing around with different disciplines and audiences.

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MURDER!

Detective:

Earlier this weekend on Saturday evening at roughly 10:37 p.m. Mark Smith; a local resident of Denver, Colorado- was murdered in the parking garage on the corner or Detroit and 1st Street. My partner and I were notified of this murder when we received an anonymous call at about 10:45 p.m. We reported to the scene immediately and discovered Smith’s body covered in stab wounds; mostly on his chest. As we arrived at the scene the cameras were searched with very little evidence since they had been tampered with about 5 minutes before the murder time reported. However, we caught a glimpse of a car that was in and out of the camera frame minutes before the murder; a silver Chevrolet Equinox with Oregon plates. This could have been the murderer or just a witness minutes before the scene but either way, we have the force on a search for the vehicle. We are working out the details to start further investigating potential suspects for Mr. Mark Smith’s murder.

Coroner:

As I examined the body of murdered suspect Mark Smith on June 10th at about 10:49 p.m. I concluded the injuries that caused his death. Smith was a Caucasian male with green eyes and brown hair- freshly cut and groomed. He was about 6 feet tall exactly at 160 pounds and dressed in business casual clothing. The suspect seems to have been hit by a car to be knocked unconscious before the stabbing occurred. He had large bruises on the tops of his legs right above his kneecaps as well as obvious damage to his head. These injuries were followed by eight stab wounds. Six on his chest and abdomen and two on his back. Whoever murdered Mr. Smith probably had two knives, one in each hand because the stab wounds on the left side of his body were wider than the right. The stab wounds most likely directly affected his heart or just led to the extreme amount of blood loss resulting in his death. More details to come soon.

Eulogy:

My best friend Mark Smith passed away this weekend on June 10th on his way home from work. The amount of heartbreak I have towards this death is unfathomable. He was not only the best colleague and friend, but also a loving fiancé to Karen, and uncle to his nephews. He did so much for everyone in his life, and he left earth far too soon for all of us. He left this world in such an unfortunate and unfair way, but he will always be remembered. I pray for everyone’s grief in this room as well as everyone’s safety. We never think such horrible things will happen to us or the people in our lives, but this is proof that bad people are out there and will do horrible things to innocent people. We will honor and celebrate Marks life rather than mourn because I know that is what he would want. Rest in peace Smithy.

Closing Argument:

Ladies and gentlemen of the Jury, I hear-by call to order the prosecution of George Lyward for the murder of Mark Smith on June 10th 2010 at 10:37 p.m. As seen through the footage of the parking garage cameras at the location of the murder, a silver Chevrolet Equinox with Oregon plates was seen entering the scene minutes before the murder. As the plates were tracked we found the car headed Westbound back towards Oregon. The Utah Highway Patrol was able to pull over the car in Utah and found Mr. Lyward in the vehicle with four knives in his possession as well as a dent on the front of his car. The car was searched and inside was also papers with general information on Mark Smiths home address, job location, and schedule. Lyward has five other tickets regarding trespassing and speeding over state lines without a license. He has a past friendship with Mark Smith and was recently diagnosed with Bipolar disorder. George Lyward will be looking at a sentence of a minimum of 100 years in prison, for manslaughter and driving without a license.

Discussion:

I found the eulogy easiest to write. Although I have not written one before, I have seen multiple scenes in movies where eulogies are read. I am not fond of crime scene TV shows or movies, therefore, I am less familiar with the other exercises with this specific situation.

I found the hardest one to write was the coroner, more so because of a personal reason. I have a very weak stomach and get very queasy at the thought of any blood or injury so writing about a stabbing made me quite nauseous. I also overall found it difficult to write in a very factual manner rather than a personal side of view.

Rhetorical situation demands that you understand your audience, genre, tone, and context. As we are introduced to in this reading, Jargon is extremely important. Jargon is a rhetorical tool used to adjust your writing to fit a given situation. It is a specific kind of “talk” that differs as your audience and genre does as well. Each exercise for this is focused on a different audience which completely changes your jargon and tone of the writing. As mentioned in this reading you include and reject given information. Like the eulogy; you wouldn’t include the description of the stab wounds because that would not be appropriate. Knowing what to include or not is essential for a successful piece of writing.

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SUNDAY SOMETHING: WEEK 7

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PEER REVIEW

Sterling:

1. Sterlings argument was about Meek Mill and if he should be in jail or not. For his argument one, he was arguing that he should not be in jail and for his argument two, he was arguing he should. 

2. Sterling did a really good job at incorporating more than just facts in his pieces but rather touching on more sensitive subjects like racial discrepancy and celebrity platform use. I think that these aspects especially develop ethos, pathos, and logos. He evokes emotions by writing about alarming facts regarding prison statistics and facts behind Meek Mills hometown- Philly. 

3. If I had no idea about this topic and read Sterling’s columns I would 100% believe that Meek belonged in jail. For his argument one, I also would believe them and think that meek shouldn’t be in jail.

4. The audience was obvious for each argument. The memes for his first argument are very appropriate for the pre-teen group and his columns fit a popular audience and are more mature content. I would expect to read his columns in a popular magazine.

5. Two things I think Sterling did an amazing job on:

-Reporting extremely credible information in his columns.

-Tying in a lot of aspects to his arguments- racial discrepancy, police brutality, etc... It was much more than just the rapper being in jail or not.

Two things I think Sterling could improve on:

-Being more clear on the exact magazine/tabloid/blog he is writing for.

-Once that is developed he could decide to add more opinion/fewer facts or more facts/no opinion. 

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WRITING AND LEARNING: FY

Reading the “Disciplinarily and Transfer: Students’ Perceptions of Learning to Write” I notice myself relating and disagreeing with the studied students about writing. The ‘transfer’ in writing is all about taking the curriculum you learned in high school and your first years of college and being able to apply it to your future learning and life. The transfer is essential in education because you must be able to apply your previous knowledge to your current learning. This whole concept of transfer relates to what we have learned about reflection.

There is a lot more importance in rhetoric and composition rather than just editing and fixing small errors, which is something we aren’t taught in high school. I can speak on my behalf that our class has taught me a lot more about different writing disciplines. A few examples from the reading that we have also covered in class are argument theory and academic discourse. With writing in high school, we only touch the surface level of writing with few disciplines. High school writing courses are not engaging with intellect but rather just focused on the traditional lessons of writing. It is important to transfer our learning because it will make it easier to engage with objective, fact-based, and information telling styles of writing. I think one of the key parts of the reading was when it was mentioned that in high school you focus on trying to “not bore the reader”; this is so accurate in my opinion. I think they try and force you to make your thesis such a focus and the most important part of an essay just to grab the attention of the reader, which isn’t always necessary. However, I disagreed that writing in high school felt it was personal and expressive. To me, it was the opposite; rather just academic based but in a very shallow way. Transferring in writing is necessary to build off your groundwork.

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SUNDAY SOMETHING: WEEK 6

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REVISION

Revision is a process to restructure your writing to adopt new perspectives and ideas to better what you have already written. Revision is most successful when you do it throughout your writing. You don’t want to completely write something then go back and just fix the noticeable errors, but rather, fix and change things as you go along.

This is an essential process for writing because it helps you analyze and understand what you are saying and then further better whatever that is. It is a process that will hopefully help eliminate entrenchment in your writing. Editing your writing is simply just going over and checking for grammar, spelling and basic punctuation errors instead of truly finding ways to make your paper more interesting or just overall better. We tend to be comfortable with just editing instead of fully revising because it’s seen as a technique that does use as much ‘seeing.’ Revision takes time with your eyes and you have to see further past just the words to discover meaning.

In high school, you are entrenched in a specific way or writing and how to do things right versus wrong. You are used to writing five paragraph essays with an opening thesis and then a closing conclusion. Nancy Sommer’s mentions how having a thesis ruins the writing before it’s even written because writers get a preconceived thought of what the essay should be about before they even know what they want to say. I think this is something that is very present in high school; you kind of revolve your essay around the thesis. Becoming better at revision requires you to be comfortable with it. You have to be willing to change your vision and want to do so.  

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THEORY OF WRITING

TAKE ONE:

My Theory of Writing is…

An outlet to free previous knowledge and experiences, and a way of first hand showing rhetorical engagement. As stated by Crowley and Hawhee rhetorical engagement is “intellectual work and for another, it requires that all parties to an argument listen to positions stated by others.” The reason I believe this is apart of my theory of writing is that in order to write good, you have to know more than what you believe or what you trust in. You must be willing to engage with different points of view and must be able to work with them and build from it. We talk a lot about audience and the effect it has on a piece of writing, and I think that in order to fully understand audience in writing you must be rhetorically engaged. Writing is also, like I said, a way to apply your previous knowledge and experiences; this relates to reflection in writing.  As referred to by Dr. Kara Taczak “reflection has the unique ability to connect across the various threshold concepts because it offers writers the ability to be active agents of change, making meaningful contributions to any rhetorical exchange.”

Reflection, it may be a hard detection

But it composes my theory of writing

Don't be a rejection

Rather engage in rhetoric

Its easier than being geometric

Remember your audience

It will create radiance

But don't use it incorrectly

Or you will fail directly

Writing is fun

Don’t you run

It gets easier with time

So sit down and write

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(EN)TRENCHMENT

Being vulnerable and aware is essential in order to compose a successful piece of writing. 

I have previously read “Excerpts from Naming What We Know” and although I thought it was an impactful reading I didn’t fully understand it to the extent that I do this time around. Throughout this course and studying the different essential terms of writing (audience, genre, etc..) I can grasp a strong understanding of threshold concepts. As a writer that spent all of high school just writing informational essays in a basic five-paragraph format, this completely entrenched me. I am a creative and outgoing person that has little to no filter, so being stuck in this form of writing truly held back my success.

My threshold concept includes being vulnerable; this is because that will push your writing to the next level. I think the word vulnerable encompasses all the important parts of writing like passion, voice, and character. With vulnerability also comes a time of reflection which we know is essential in order to use prior knowledge and experiences to better our current and future writings. I also think awareness is essential in successful writing because you must know your audience, genre, and purpose to produce writing in a clear and accurate way given a situation. As a novice writer, it is important to be aware of not only your given situation but also be aware of the misapplication of habituated practices. Habituation being “the struggles more proficient writers experience when they've practiced the same genres for years and then try to display their abilities in new settings.”

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SUNDAY SOMETHING: WEEK 5?

I loved this blog post because it relates reflection to personal life.