Transfromation 2 (adult)

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BxBe2_tU_Px1emp1djNXcTRYZkE/view?usp=sharing

Transformation 1 (Youth)

Sorry, I had some technical difficulties uploading this brochure through the word template. I'll continue to attempt it, but for now I just took screenshots of the cover and the informational columns.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BxBe2_tU_Px1WURDT3JucEVLV2c/view?usp=sharing
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BxBe2_tU_Px1RVNzTTlaNEczYms/view?usp=sharing

Self-Analysis

Susli Leon

Zack De Piero

Writing 2

May 29, 2016

                                                                        Self-Analysis

            Within each and every genre there are conventions that target a certain audience. For this reason, to transform an abortion article into a youth’s brochure and an adult’s bible, I had to not only change the setting of the article, but also change the structure, the diction, and the tone. The goal was to eliminate any trace of the conventions of the abortion research article, without changing its meaning. To make this transition, I had to manipulate the perspective of my targeted audience by incorporated my own word choice, imagery, tone, and many other conventions that each transformation required.

            For my youth’s transformation I decided to create a young teen’s clinic brochure. I knew that because of my intense topic my targeted audience had to be limited to young children in middle school. My peers helped me realize that targeting an audience younger than middle schoolers would have been forced and unrealistic. Due to the high increase of sexual activity in young children, I decided to go with a clinic brochure that would be handed out after a sex-ed class.  For this reason, my brochure is not merely based on abortion, but also has other material that would be offered in a sexual education class. To establish the audience for this brochure, I used specific “Moves” to differentiate this clinical brochure from that of an adult. As a way to emphasize the young teenage audience for this brochure, I concentrated on the wording, the appearance, and the way I presented my information.

            In the brochure I implemented simple wording. Because my brochure is intended for the middle school population, I had to use short simple phrases to explain the topics, and bullet points to eliminate huge paragraphs. By doing so, I made it easier for the younger population to read and understand. As for the appearance, I strayed away from lengthy paragraphs, and boring colors. I had to get the attention of the middle school population, and persuade them to want to read my brochure. For this reason, I used a pop of color and numerous pictures to catch their attention. To explain my information, I used headings and bullet points to make the information they are interested in reading easy to find.  

            The beginning of my brochure begins with the name of the clinic and a friendly picture. The name of the clinic is the same name as the organization that was provided in the abortion research article. The friendly picture provided serves as a way to perceive the clinic as friendly and welcoming to teens. At the bottom of the picture I used the researcher’s name as the Dr.’s name to show that the information from both the research article and the brochure were from her. The brochure then proceeds by incorporating helpful information for teens. The columns are organized from different protective barriers to use in sex, to methods available to prevent an unwanted pregnancy. For this reason, the first column discusses contraceptives, the second column discusses Plan B, and the third discusses abortion.

To stay true to the original article, I incorporated the main focus of Shellenberg’s research in the abortion column. Shellenberg’s main argument concentrated on how stigmas effect the experiences and perspectives women go through abortion. To represent this claim, the abortion column informed girls of the stigmas that surround abortion, as well as the positive and negative effects of abortion. Its purpose is to inform teens of facts about abortion so they are fully informed and un-influenced by stigmas when making an important body decision. To help convey this, I used McCloud’s methods presented in Writing with Pictures. For example, I used choice of moment to decide the information that was important to incorporate and the information that was unnecessary (McCloud 157).

I had to choose which moments discussed by Shellenberg flowed the best with my clinical brochure. Is it more important to include how Shellenberg did her research or the results she got from her research? I decided to include the results of Shellenberg’s research. Shellenberg discovered that the way a community perceives abortion effects the women’s experience with abortion. If a community is religiously against or shameful towards abortion, women will feel guilty and hide the fact that they have had an abortion. After abortion, the community’s response will also cause fear. Women will begin to fear that they will not be able to have another child, as well as that they are unworthy of marriage. To represent all these aspects, I had choose the words I wanted to use in my frame correctly (McCloud 158). In a clinical brochure I cannot speak about religion, nor have a biased opinion about abortion. Which is why I chose to state the stigmas, then state both the pros and cons of abortion to allow women to make their own decisions without any false claims or fears.

For my second transformation, I took in consideration the religious stigmas that were discussed in the article. Because of Schulenburg’s research, it was discovered that religious communities have a negative perspective on abortion, and therefore women who abort have a fear of being punished. To represent this religious effect, I decided that my adult transformation would be a bible. To create the bible effect, I had to do as Losh and Alexander suggested, and change the identity of the research article (Losh 145). I changed the role of the article, and fit the ideas and circumstances into the new genre and audience (Losh 149). How did I do this? Well like in the youth’s transformation, I had to change the word choice and choose a flow that fits best with the image of a bible. The bible usually includes a lot of stories that teach the word of God. In order for the transformation to be effective, I had to change the flow of the research paper into the flow of a story. I made this possible by incorporating a beginning, a middle, and end to my bible transformation. I began with a story of a king, then followed the purpose of the story, which was how the king aborted the child of his wife, and I ended the biblical story with a lesson – how aborting a child was considered murder and thus will not go unpunished.

In order to stay true to the structure of a bible, while incorporating the information from the original article, I had to use transitions, sentence numbers, and dialogue. The transitions, were used to move the biblical story along. For example, I used therefore to infer that the previous part of the story leads you to this specific section. The sentence numbers were used to number of each sentence. In an original bible, all the sentences have number to use as references when orally citing, so I included them to stay true the original structure of a bible. Lastly, I used dialogue to represent the biblical story presented in most common bibles.  

Transforming an abortion article into a clinical brochure and a bible took a lot of trial and error. It was very time consuming to see what information works and what does not. Transforming has a lot, if not almost all, to do with the targeted audience. A clinical brochure for adults would look very different to that of a clinical teenage brochure. For this reason, audience is everything. Knowing your audience guides you through the rest of the transformation. It helps you figure out what information is necessary and which is not, what language is appropriate, how the structure should look, and so much more. Without any knowledge of the preferred targeted audience, transformation like those are rigorous to complete. 

PB3A

Effect of Manipulated State Aggression on Pain Tolerance by Richard Stephens and Claire Allsop, argues that a person’s state aggression correlates with the individual’s ability to tolerate pain. To test such claim, Stephens and Allsop evaluated two different group’s pain tolerance – one group was a controlled group and the other was not− based on swearing and video games. To test the state aggression of the both of those experiments, Stephens and Allsop gave each person a questionnaire. To examine their first component –swearing− Stephens and Allsop allowed their “normal” group to react to ice cold water in whatever way they pleased, but limited the controlled group actions by not allowing them to swear during the ice cold water experiment. The results of this experiment showed that the group that was allowed to swear while placing their hand in ice cold water resisted longer than the group that was not allowed to swear. For their second component, their “normal group” was given a golfing video game to play with no extra help, while their controlled group was given a shooting video game with the assistance of cheat codes. This video game experiment indicated that regardless of the extra assistance given, the group that played a violent video game also had more resistance when placing their hand in ice cold water in comparison to the group which played a golfing video game. To finalize their experiment, Stephens and Allsop provided each group with a state hostility questionnaire to test each individual’s state aggression levels after each of the previous experiments. After evaluating the results of these questionnaires, Stephens and Allsop concluded that state aggression does indeed influence or effect the level of tolerance and individual has towards pain.

 Youth:

While reading Stephens and Allsop’s scholarly article, two things stood out to me that shed some light into my lightbulb. One was the concept of pain tolerance, and the second was the concept of swearing. Now, I know that most children genres do not incorporate foul language. However, an important thing to remember is that what is considered foul language to us is different than what is considered foul language to a child. With that said, I thought that I would use a doll’s toy package as my transformation from this article to a children’s genre. The toy package would be of a doll that likes to be tickled, but will use “foul language” to inform the player when the tickling is causing pain, and laughter when it is causing joy. Some examples of the foul language would be: Oww, poo that hurts or Oww, no not there you’re being “mean!” Some more to come as soon as I degrade my knowledge of foul language. I will leave a link to a picture of what I was thinking of below, but with a better, more realistic, looking doll of course. 

http://vignette1.wikia.nocookie.net/mlp/images/7/77/Friendship_Games_Sporty_Style_Fluttershy_doll_back_of_packaging.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20150409162335

          

Adults:

         For the adult genre transformation, I decided to only stick with the concept of pain discussed in the article. As I was reading, the words “ice cold water” reminded me of an ice pack, and the constant mention of pain tolerance reminded me of going to the doctor. Therefore, for the adult genre I am deciding to do one of the following: a doctor’s slip, doctor’s prescription for medication form, or a medication/drug label. I am still not sure which one of these would be the best fit in regards to the article, but I do know I want to stay within the doctor/hospital theme. By using a doctor related theme, I think I could incorporate a lot of the data and evidence from the article without it confusing readers or lacking sense.

            

Thlog 7

This week in class we focused on finishing up WP2 and beginning to discuss WP3.

               On Monday’s class it was all about WP2 draft. We discussed the strengths and improvements of our paper, and a few tips to help use complete the final draft. In my WP2 I saw a lot of room for improvement. I was not a fan of my draft one single bit. I had an argument that did not relate with the articles, and my first body paragraph was just words on words with no meaning. I really did not know where I was heading with the paper, so I just began to write gibberish. I wished I had put more effort into my rough draft because that would have made it the final a whole lot easier. For my final draft, I ended up starting over from the beginning. Although, the result was ten times better than the draft, it was a little complicated to finish.

               On Wednesday’s class we did something drastically different. Instead of our normal class we had an online course. At first, I was a little hesitant about this online class. I felt that with my luck I would accidentally forget to attend the online class or be completely lost throughout the entirety of the class. However, the online class was pretty easy to follow through and really fun. I like the way the WP3 was introduced to us. The young vs. old genre activity was really helpful to decipher the difference between the genres in the two age groups. After all the explanation, I am still confused on PB3A. Is PB3A a simple brainstorming exercise or are we discussing our articles? I don’t know, I am confused. I am just hoping all confusion is cleared up in next week’s class. 

Videos (online class questions)

Moves :
   
Bob Ross and His "Happy Trees"

• Bob Ross as a cartoon animation.
• Using contradicting personalities, but same appearance. 
• They show the cartoon with the same hair and clothes as the original Bob Ross's video, but in the cartoon they make him a painter with a sudden temper to add comedy.
• It has the same tone of voice. 
• When Bob Ross teaches how to paint a tree he makes it sound and look very simple, even though it is not so.
• Shows the well-done nature picture frame in the back. 

Bob Ross Clips

• Display his canvass appropriately to the best angle of the camera. 
• Make sure the paint palette is visible to the viewers 
• Emphasizes the importance of using the right tools
• When he is about to paint a tree he specifies which type of brush you have to use as well as the color of the paint.
• Gives a very detailed description of how the paint brush should be stroked when attempting to draw the tree or mountain. 

4 Disney) Artist paint one tree 

• The artist is not the one speaking through the process. 
• instead the video has a narrator, maybe to stay true to the "Disney" vibe.
• Each artist has a quick clip 
• focuses more on the techniques of the artist rather than trying to show you how to draw a tree. 
• Artist are drawing outside while looking at the object at hand. 

Artist Description

Bob Ross and His "Happy trees"

• This animated cartoon the artist describes his actions in a very simple matter. Instead of going into detail the cartoon simply says we will put a bush here. It focuses on what the cartoon will be doing, rather than how they did it. This clips is style is mostly to entertain and for fun, 

Bob Ross Clips 

• Bob Ross on the other hand, is very detailed with his descriptions. Although he makes the process look and sound very simplistic, he does not undermine the importance of specifics. In his clips he is always very calm, and makes sure to specify the tools he will use and specific hand motions to get the ideal tree. Bob Ross's style is very simple and calming. It makes me hopeful that if I attempted to draw a tree it would come out just like his did. 

4 (Disney) Artist Paint one tree 

• These painters were very interesting to watch, but not as helpful. This clip has a narrator to describe the painters as if it was a Disney novel. In this clip the artist themselves don't speak they just draw. They take their canvass and painting tools outside for inspiration. This clip is mostly so that the viewer gets impressed by how well their artist can draw trees, since the artist were not really explaining their steps nor they techniques. 

Journal (Online class)

Q1;
      After completing my WP2, I was happy with the articles I choice. I was very interested in my topic and therefore had a lot of fun writing it. I was also very happy with the organization of my essay. I think it was easy to follow, and easy to understand the theme of my essay. On the other hand, I was not really happy with paragraphs. My organization was very chronological and easy to follow, but I just had a hard time deciding where to split my paragraphs so that they would not be to long. I also think maybe I could have organized my thoughts slightly better. Because of all the questions we had to answer, I sometimes felt I was losing my argument while I was writing my paper.

Q2:
   
     The two or three comments that were the most helpful were those regarding my argument and clarification. While my partner was reading my paper, she made sure to tell me that my argument had to be more clear. As of now, she said, "it does not seem like you are arguing anything." This comment helped me rethink the theme of my paper and helped me decide exactly what I wanted to argue. In addition, my partner also said that I should clarify what some of the words we learned in class, since I do not want to assume that my audience already knows the definition of those words.

Thlog 6

This week in class we reviewed a subject that was much needed. Because I missed the second class of last week, I was little thrown off by moves. However, the first class of this week was all about reviewing moves which helped me clarify some misconceptions. Knowing the difference between conventions and moves was also very helpful. I now understand that moves are an Author’s choice and conventions mostly focus on the genre of a writing piece. Something interested that was stated during class was that conventions could be used as moves, but moves could not be used as conventions. I thought that was a clever way of looking at the two. In addition, we also learned new writing tips to help improve our writing. One that really caught my attention was the hedge language and qualified claim. While writing, I never noticed how right I though my claims needed to be. As Zack stated, I did always think that my claim or argument had no room for error. If I uses words like most, the majority, or often I felt like I was doubting myself, thus losing credibility from my readers. Now I know that using these words provides more credibility in a paper, because of the available room for error.

            In the second class, we began to peer-review WP2’s from other students. This was extremely helpful because it showed me what my paper should look like. Before I thought, I was going to write an essay on the topic I chose using the different articles as evidence, but now I know that we are suppose compare and contrast the moves, conventions, and rhetorical styles of each article. Which kind of demolished my excitement for writing WP2. 

Thlog 5

Yay! Another successful week. This week was one those heavy weeks filled with a mass variety of information.

               In Monday’s class we once again learned a few tricks and tips to improve our writing. One of which was italics. According to Zack italics have a variety of purposes and can improve writing if used correctly. One way of using italics I am well known with is in titles. That is about the only time I would ever use italics. Now however, I know that italics can be used as way of emphasis on certain words. We also looked at different topics and all the different perspectives they could be looked at. The activities in class helped me get a better understanding on how one topic could have many disciplines. It was fun to see how the perspective of a psychologist differs on a specific topic differs drastically from that of a religious studies major.

               Another topic we focused on was the IMRAD structure.  It was interesting to learn the meaning of each part of a research article and what it does for the paper. I also did not know the reason for use of this structure is because it mimics the order of steps an individual does while doing research. My conclusion on why they would use this specific structure is simply because it made sense.

               On Wednesday’s class, the topic of Moves was discussed. We defined moves and established what they do to a paper. It was interesting to see how the way an author presents a sentence or topic is strategical. It all has a purpose and is part of their well-developed plan to reach a specific goal. The They Say I Say appendix was very helpful in understanding this topic especially while writing PB2B. 

PB2B

Lets Move it Along

 “Moves” are rhetoric devices used by writers to reach a specific goal in writing. “They say, I say” provides a few examples of the most common moves most writers tend to use.

               One of these moves is called Something you Say. Something you Say is presented as being the opinion of the writer. It is the part of the paragraph where the writer describes its own thoughts, beliefs, and feelings about their specific subject. This move is used very commonly as it was very easy to find it amongst our readings. In Navigating Genres, the writers presents this when he writes “I think it’s time to try our hand at approaching genre...” (24). As you can see, Dirk begins this sentence with “I” to inform the reader that what he is was about to say is coming from Dirk, himself, and not a text book.

               The second move I will be discussing is Introducing Standard Views. Introducing Standard Views is when the writer incorporates a common subject and their writing piece. Whether it is a common belief, ideology, quote, or fact, it will discuss −as the name implies− standard views. Unlike the previous move this one was a little more challenging to find with in our readings. Carroll manages to present this move in her writing pieces, Backpacks vs. Briefcases. As Carroll discusses personal interactions with in people, she writes “we have all heard that you can’t judge a book by its cover, but in fact, we do it all the time” (38). In this sentence, Carroll brought up a standard view known by the general public, and then added her two cents in by commenting on the phrase.

               The third move mentioned in the appendix is Explaining Quotations. In shorter words Explaining Quotation technically means analysis. It is when a writer further explains and analyses a quote. Like the first move described above, this one is also very common. All writers need to provide evidence in their papers, therefore need to provide an analysis as well.  This is seen in Carroll’s writing piece once again. After introducing a quote to one of her paragraphs she follows by writing “In other words (…)”, explains the meaning of the quote (40). That is basically the just of Explaining Quotations. After, introducing a quotation in a paragraph the writer must further explaining by breaking it down or provided further information on the quote used.

               The fourth move that will be discussed from the appendix is Introducing Objections informally. As a writer you know many readers will not agree with your argument no matter how well supported it is. For this reason, writers use something called a counter argument. Introducing Objection Informally is similar to a counter argument. The writer discussed certain objection one may have of their topic and defends it. For example, in page 33 Elbow writes “But does freewriting or uncensored, generative writing really enhance creative first-order thinking?” By stating this, Elbow is challenging the readers to question his claim, but then establishes credibility by providing evidence to support his point of view.

               Last but not least, the fifth move I will be discussing from the appendix is (drum roll please), Agreeing and Disagreeing.  As the name infers, it is when the writer discusses why someone might agree with something, but then explains his/her reasons for disagreeing with it. An example of this is shown in the So what who Cares reading. In page 53, the write wrote “Although answering the “who cares?” is crucial, in many cases it is not enough, especially if you are writing for (…)”The author first begins by saying something positive about the topic, “it is crucial” however, he/she then disagrees by saying it is not as important standing alone.

               Now let’s get into moves not described in the appendix.

               The first non-appendix related move is give me directions. In give me directions the reader provides information to their reader in form of directions. For example, Carroll provides an example of this in her subtopic called beginning to analyze. Her first sentence of this paragraph is “once you have established the context for the rhetoric you are analyzing, you can being to think about (…).” In his paragraph Carrol is directing the reader through a process. She is providing the reader with directions to successfully analyze.

               The second non-appendix move is the checklist. Similar to that of give me directions, the writer uses a checklist to direct the reader in the direction they want. The checklist is a list of thing presented in a form of bullet points to provide a guide for the reader. For example, in page 66 Boyd inserts a list of bullet points as a check list for reports.

               The third move I will discuss is engaging the reader. There are different ways to engage a reader to a writing piece. The check list with questions of how to do or how the reader did something could be one, but a specific type if when the writer forces the reader to engage. If they are discussing a confusing topic and then provide a “you try”, or any form of hand on hand practice. A good example of this is in page 52 from So What Who Cares. The author provides a list of practice examples so that the reader can understand the topic with more clarity.

               The fourth move seen in many writing pieces is the use of italics.  Many authors italicize different word to create emphasis and make the word stand out to the reader. For example, in Navigating Genres Dirk states “people learned how to do small talk to ease the social discomfort of the large group (…).” In this sentence Dirk italicized small talk to emphasize that it is the word of importance and the focus of that particular sentence.

               The final and last move I will be discussing is the long quotation effect. This move is when the writer is inputting a long quotation, and changes the spacing and possibly the font of that the specific words in the quotation. An example of this is in How to Read like a Writer page 83.

Thlog 4

This week’s class was all about preparing for PB2. The class was introduced to academic genres and how they differ based on something common like major. A humanities academic genre will have different content than that of a hard science. The different major activity we did in class was also helpful to get an idea on how I could tell the difference between each academic genre.  For example, if the academic genre was a hard science I would look for context involving chemistry, engineering, graphs, or biology. As oppose to if the academic genre was a social science, then I would look for content that discusses current research that it is mostly factual.

The murder activity was a boost of hands on experience. We all had to represent a certain genre for the murder assignment, and as much as I thought it was going to be easy it was not. All I thought we had to do was follow the conventions that we had the assignment on. After reading my fellow classmates responses however, I realized that academic genres can have similar conventions. For example, a local newspaper vs. a national one has similar conventions and are very hard to tell apart. For this reason, it is very important to focus on the voice of the writer and the syntax of the writing piece. Focusing on the voice of the writer helps the reader decide what type of tone they are trying to use, and therefore decide what the purpose is. A writing piece with a calm apologetic voice will not be the same as a writing piece with a factual, emotionless tone of voice. With pieces that have similar voice, syntax comes in handy. For example with the local newspaper and national newspaper, syntax is the one thing that set them apart. You could not tell the difference between them unless the reader focused on their word choice and who it was directed to. While one would mention community another would mention nation that little difference would be the key to figuring out what type of newspaper it is.

PB2A

For my scholarly article I searched up kidnapping and its psychological effects. Out of all the results I decided to go with Holding on to Clarity: Reconciling the Federal Kidnapping Statute with Trafficking Victims Protection Act.

After browsing this scholarly article, I realized that the format of this article is very similar to that of a research paper. This article begins like any other paper with a title and authors name. The interesting part however, is that there is a brief italicized paragraph providing background information about the subject at hand. This helps the audience get a better understanding of the subject, and its content before digging through the actual paper. As a reader, I know this small paragraph will also limit confusion throughout the article. For example, if I did not know what the protection act was I would not enjoy nor understand reading this article, but luckily this author provides information about the protection act in his first small paragraph. Following the background paragraph, there is another unique piece not seen in many essays or articles – which is a table of contents.  The table of contents is separated into three specific parts the topic and subtopics of the introduction, body paragraphs, and conclusion.  Each main theme is attached to a roman numeral to differentiate them from the sub topics which are attached to a letter. They are all also then given a number to make it easier for the reader to find specific information he/she is interested in. Finally, the article goes into depth about each theme and its subtopic in the appropriate category. The article follows the table of contents and organizes the article according to the introduction, body paragraphs, and conclusion.  Last but not least, after each paragraph this article has footnotes of all the sources used to create this article. Which is helpful to prevent plagiarism, and to establish credibility amongst the readers.

After taking a closer look at this article there is one particular thing that strikes me as odd. The first thing is the footnotes. I understand the purpose and why they are necessary – especially in a scholarly article like this one− however, it confuses me to see the footnotes at the end of an unfinished paragraph. It distracts me while I am reading, and pushes back my understanding of the article. Are footnotes simply supposed to go at the end of a page regardless if the current paragraph is finished or not? In the other hand, the organization of the content is very easy to understand. The author made the topics of each paragraph very clear. Mostly, by providing the same roman numerals and letters as in the table of contents throughout the article. Which helps the reader separate the main topic of the paragraph and the evidence or support of the paragraph.  For example, in the introduction the author gives the reader a little summary or preview of what the entire article is going to discuss in depth. Right as the reader gets to the first body paragraph, there is a very visible roman numeral 1 with a short title description for the paragraph. After the end of the first paragraph, there is then a letter A to present the sub topic, and a small description of the sub topic as well. In this specific article this looks something like: 1. The Ongoing Effort To Combat Human Trafficking, and then at the end of this paragraph the reader sees, A. The Prevalence of Human Trafficking in the United States. This goes on throughout the entire article most likely to help both that reader and the author stay on track.

In the end, this article was very organized and overall formatted in a way that made it easier for readers to understand and follow along. Out of all the information in this article I would have to say the beginning background information is the most important. Without this piece of information, the average reader would be confused through the entire article unless they did research on the case discussed and the protection act− and really who wants to do that.

Thlog 3

In Monday’s class we focused on preparing for WP1 and learned a few tricks along the way. We discussed the use of dashes and hyphens in writing, which was very educational. I have actually used hyphens a lot in my writing, but I have never used a dash. Monday’s class was actually the first time I have heard about using dashes in writing. The differences that it could make in just one paragraph in comparison to a comma is remarkable. I actually attempted to use both hyphens and dashes in my WP1, and realized that using dashes made my essay look slightly better. It was not confusing, and it separated the important from the extra without changing the meaning of the sentence. That is of course if I used them correctly.

In Wednesday’s class we went over our WP1 drafts and received additional help from our peers. From our journal, I realized that most students were having the same difficulties as I was. ID 14 said, “I found myself struggling with writing my intro. I spent hours trying to figure out how to start my first paragraph.” Like ID 14, I also have trouble with my introduction, and wasted a lot of time thinking of ways to begin my first paragraph. I have this really bad habit of overthinking my introduction. Which makes it really difficult for me to complete essay assignments, because I cannot move forward with my paper unless I have an introduction. However, I think I am starting to get better. For the wp1 draft, I took forever to get an introduction on paper, and it wasn’t even that great. However for my final paper, I completely changed my introduction, and took less than half the time it took me the first time. I think the reason for this improvement was my draft. From the draft, I knew where I was trying to go with my essay, which made it easier to write an intro to my paper. 

Thlog 2

While I was writing PB1B, I realized that it was coming along a lot easier than PB1A. I noticed that in this PB, I was considering the advice my classmates provided in their journals. For example, ID 6 said that his/her writing process includes brainstorming for a bit before he/she writes. For PB1B, I decided to brainstorm an outline of how I wanted the structure of my PB1B to look, which ended up cutting my writing time in half.

I was also very intrigued to learn about the effects of visual literacy. At first, I thought that visual literacy referred to the details embedded in a paper that provides a visual image to the reader. For me, it was about how to show the reader instead of just telling him/her.  However, now I know that visual literacy refers to actual images and how they represent a story. I learned the each image is specific to what the author is trying to say, and any alter in an image can drastically change the meaning of the image.

One thing however, that I am still confused about is exigence. Our classmates stated that exigence is the thing that caused the piece of communication that you’re writing. I feel like I am confusing exigence with purpose. When I read, “what caused the piece of communication you’re writing,” I thought of the reason that I am writing this piece of paper. However, I know in class Zack said that exigence and purpose are different, but I am having trouble differentiating these two words. Our class mates also said, that exigence helps you understand the purpose of the writing. Which confirms to me that exigence and purpose are different, but I just do not know how. If anyone has a good example to help me understand exigence, and how it is different from purpose please leave it in the comments below. 

PB1B

As of now, we have learned that a genre is a broad category of literature, composition, etc, and that each genre has its own set of conventions. Using these genre generators helped me get a closer look at the uniqueness of each genre.

While using the computer science research paper genre generator, I noticed a particular pattern that resided with in all of my generated examples. All of the CS research papers I received, had similar formats. They all began with an introduction, had some sort of body, had a results paragraph, and had a conclusion as an ending. The topics discussed in the CS research papers, were also very similar. They all incorporated a relation to mathematics or science in their body or results paragraph. The majority also included a graph to further explain their research, or as evidence to support their research. Another common element displayed by the generator was a reference page. Each reference page had a list of the sources used on the research paper, to give the reader a better understanding of where the information came from, and to establish credibility for the author. Overall, this generator aids the user to establish their own conventions on CS research papers. By providing the user with multiple examples, the user is forced to produce their own patterns, and make their own analysis of what makes this generated example a CS research paper. However, not all generators had the same results.

The comic strip generator was a bit confusing to me at first. At the start, I thought that the purpose of this generator was going to be similar to the previous generator. I was expecting to see a lot of comic book examples, and then decipher the patterns I saw into conventions. However, there was a lack of variety in this generator. The only bits that actually changed were the positions of the comics. Which then made me think of visual literacy. Although, each comic section repeated multiple times, the positions of each did switch. The comic square that was first in the previous strip was now on the third, and so on. This helped me contemplate about the grand effect of each comic square, and how changing one square to a different side changes the entire story behind the strip. Even though, the main concept grabbed from this comic strip generator was the topic of visual literacy, I did find that because of the repetitiveness the user could still interpret a comic’s conventions. Based on the comic strips provided, it was easy to assume that the conventions of a comic strip rely on images and think bubbles. Each comic is highly represented by a cartoony effect as an image. The effect of a comic would change drastically if the images presented were more visually realistic. For the most part, no matter what the comic’s topic is about, the images and think bubbles are what makes a comic book an enjoyable literature.  

Another generator that I used was the meme generator. This meme generator was very similar to the CS research paper generator. They both focused on generated multiple examples of a specific genre, which assisted the user in deciphering its conventions. While I was reading the memes on this meme generator, I caught myself laughing at most of the memes. Which, made humor my first convention of memes. Most of the memes focused on something comical, sarcastic, or “punny.” All categories that result in a laughter, smirk, or giggle. This meme generator also depicted a majority of causal, laid back memes. Almost, nothing related to politics, research, school, or government. From this meme generator, I was also able to notice that like in comics image is everything. For every meme, there is a precise photo that goes perfectly with the text. Whether it is the facial expression on the photo, or what a media character represents in the image, both have a close relation to what the text is trying to communicate.

               For my own generator, I decided to use a mystery novel generator from generatorland.com. This generator is unique in itself, but most common with the comic strip generator. It did not provide the user with multiple examples of mystery novels, but instead it provided multiple examples of what a theme of a mystery novel could be based on. For example, one of them read “unfaithful spouse, December 26, Pipe wrench Anger.”  This sentence lets the user assume that the story in the mystery novel occurred December 26, and is focused on an unfaithful spouse that may have been hurt or may have hurt someone with a pipe wrench. Based on the multiple topics or storylines that are provided by this generator, the user could come up with some conventions. From this meme generator, I got that mystery novels have an unanswered question that readers solve while reading. They also rely on themes of murder, tragedy, kidnappings, and the supernatural. This meme generator shows that in a broad genre like mystery novels, there are mini genres within, that have their own conventions. For example, all the themes are a specific kind of mystery that have different conventions from each other.

               After playing around with all these generators, I noticed that each generator works in different ways depending on the genre. Each generator’s priority was to focus on the best way to get the user to understand the genre as a whole, and then they focused on how creating patterns within their examples to help with conventions. 

PB1A

Love has been around for ages, but the ways in which one expresses love has drastically change. What used to be a simple concept, has now evolved to people saying “oh, you have time to go on snap chat, but I can’t even get a text back.” Let us release ourselves from this stress, and go back to a simpler time. A time where there were no texts, no text-back stress, just love letters.

            Love letters are a one of a kind experience. Who knew, that a piece of paper could bring so much joy to a person’s life. The receiver will read it, then re-read it, and somehow never get tired of it. So, what is it about this specific piece of paper that brings someone such grand joy?

Well, there are a few things that distinguish a love letter from a normal letter. Like any letter, a love letter has a beginning, middle, and end. However in a love a letter the focus of the topic is love. The sender’s priority is to concentrate on being romantic and attempt to emotionally impact the receiver in some way. To do so, the sender’s love letter may start with an intriguing greeting like darling or dear beautiful. The beginning, will also introduce the reasons for the love letter. For example, the sender might say, “I am writing this to you to tell you that you’re beautiful”, or “you and I have not talked very much, but I just wanted to let you that I think you’re amazing,” etc. When the sender adds a clear reason for writing the letter, it helps guide the receiver to a specific response.

Another component that helps influence the receiver’s response is the component of cheesiness. The sender may sometimes exaggerate certain emotions and say, “you make me feel alive again.” These type of sentences tend to be cheesy because of their lack of authenticity and their overload of corniness. However, these cheesy comments do help create a strong love letter. The cheesy comments sway the receiver to feel special, wanted, and adored. All, which are criteria needed to make an emotional impact on the receiver.

In addition, a love letter also includes a word vomit of compliments to the receiver. This allows the sender to emphasize his feelings by making it blatantly obvious that the receiver is the only topic of conversation. During this period in the love letter, the sender will begin to mention all the reasons why he/she likes the receiver. This goes back to the word vomit of compliments. For example, the sender will mention what he/she likes about the receiver’s physical appearance or personality. Almost mimicking the pattern of a list.

            The one thing that is most commonly seen in a love letter is a love poem. Most love letters mimic the style of a love poem. These types of love letters however, lack to conclude what they want from the receiver. Instead, they concentrate on rhymes and secret meanings. By the end of the love letter, the receiver knows that the sender has an interest in him/her, but the receiver does not know the reason for the love letter. Whether the sender wants a relationship, date, or phone number. For this reason, using a love poem as your love letter is quite impersonal, and may not give you the response you desire from your special someone.  

Thlog (Week 1)

Today in class we learned about genres, and the components of genres. We focused on how to specifically identify the components of a genre in detail. As well as, how to minimize a broad component into a more concise one.

To do so, we analyzed Dirk’s Navigating Genres in our free write to get a better understanding of how to separate a genre into components. We also had to contribute in practice activities to get some hands on experience. In which, I learned about textual genres that I would have never categorized as textual genres. For example, in our free write ID 13 mentioned that text and notes are textual genres. Whenever I heard the word textual genres my mind would always go to books, articles, etc. I never thought to open up my mind to common everyday things that we write.  For this reason, I personally really enjoyed receiving a few moments to attempt the in class activities alone. Besides allowing me to learn new things from my peers, it also helped me realize what I understood, and what I need further help on. In doing the practice problems I realized that I need to practice getting to the grain of the component, instead of writing down broad components of a genre.

In addition, we also learned about Elbow’s first and second-order thinking. Which I think could not only be related to school activities, but also everyday activities. Elbow’s first and second-order thinking is such a broad spectrum that it can even apply to how someone learns or plays sports. For example, in dance it is important to first use first-order thinking to get comfortable and learn the choreography, but it is also important to then use second-order thinking to clean up the dance and be performance ready. That is one of the main reasons why I enjoyed Elbow’s reading. It did not only relate to writing, but also everyday life. 

About Me

Hello,
My name is Susli Leon, and I am a second year at SBCC, ha just kidding. I am currently a pre-psych major in the process of switching to philosophy. I am from North Hollywood, right next to a very yummy Jack in the Box. My hobbies include playing soccer, basketball, dancing, and hiking. I love exploring new "parks" in hopes of finding a waterfall. On my lazy days, I love to sit home and binge watch my favorite television shows like: Pretty Little Liars, Criminal Minds, Young and Hungry, and Supernatural. My favorite snacks are kettle corn, chocolate, and dried mangos. Well that is all I really I have to say about myself, can't wait to get to know all of you. See you soon.