Blog 13B

Throughout my experience of learning of the writing process I have found quite a few things to be very helpful to me personally. One of the tools that we have to our benefit is a website called the Purdue Owl. This is a writing tool or 'help' that I have found to be extremely helpful. It has within it a ton of helps and examples that are to be used while writing. This has helped me tremendously in my own writing. Another thing that I found really helpful was going to class and visually and verbally learning. I couldn't have understood if it weren't for my professor explaining and giving us visual examples of the writing process itself. I also really liked how in each essay we learned a couple more rhetorical tools and had to incorporate them into our papers. Practice really does make perfect!! The more you practice using the writing process the more you will understand and become a more fluent writer. These things have been so helpful to me and would definitely be helpful for anyone else that is learning to write and use the writing process.

Blog 13A

After looking over my past blogs, the first thing that one will want to remember about the writing process is that our goal is to reach our desired audience. This is super important because it is our main purpose of writing in the first place. Everything we do we need to then ask ourselves the question, "does this relate to our desired audience?" Next we need to know the outline of how our paper should look. We first start out with the first draft which is our 'information dump' this is when we take all of the information we have about a topic and dump it all on a page no matter how messy it is. The next draft we need to clean it up and make it pretty and comprehensible. After that we will have a peer review and add a introduction and conclusion. We also need to make sure we incorporate rhetorical tools throughout our paper while writing it. These can include things such as narratives, classification and division, and many other tools that we find useful in reaching an audience.

Blog 12A

The process explanation is important because it explains to the audience why we do something. Like in the video we watched today, she explained what steps to take in cooking the food but then also explained to us why we do those certain steps. This also helps us realize the value of things we do I think. I personally like knowing why I am being told to do something or what value it may have. This really can help us relate to our audience.

Blog 11A

I personally think that the introduction of an essay is one of the most important parts of the text. However, it is only good if you have the important aspects that should be in the introduction. These aspects are a thesis statement and a road map of the entire essay. The introduction should basically be a rundown of your entire essay so  the audience as an idea of what your essay is about. I don't think your audience should have any question on what you are talking about after reading the introduction to your paper. This also helps me know to what I am writing and in what order to put things in. Just put them in the order that you put in your introduction!

Blog 10A

Classification and division is a way for authors to define and put points across to their desired audience in a way that is organized and understandable. They take definitions and classify them together into separate groups so the reader can better comprehend the text. To do this, they apply subheadings that states the general classification that different subjects are a part of and them describe them more in depth. The divisions of all classifications helps to organize a text. I personally think this because it helps me to better understand what I am reading and helps me divide what is important within the text and what is not.

Blog 9A

• "This growth, here and elsewhere in the West, is coming at a cost, according to conservationists: harmed wildlife habitats, higher regional temperatures, air and water pollution, more traffic and the introduction of invasive species."

Urban development is not only ruining the wildlife and environment that once was there but it also does several other things like harms wildlife habitats, higher regional temperatures, air and water pollution and introduces traffic and invasive species. It harms wildlife habitats because we are literally building right over them. How is an animal supposed to live within chaotic streets? Higher temperature result because of all the things going on to develop cities. We are not clean people even as hard as we try to be, which results in air and water pollution. Also, every city is going to have traffic which does not help with the pollution whatsoever. Finally, of course we would bring invasive species with us because many people simply don't care about the environment as long as they have a big shiny mall to shop in.

• Like Scottsdale, many cities and towns across the West that grew up after World War II have struggled to maintain their quintessentially Western features while encouraging growth and economic development. Hanging on to the West's characteristic "wide open spaces," officials say, is a constant battle.

The phrase of "the wild west" shouldn't be a new phrase to anyone; yet if development continues, the further generations will turn their heads in confusion when this phrase is spoken. Is that really what we want as citizens? Urban development EVERYWHERE? Personally, I love to look at the scenery of some places. This is slowly becoming extinct. 

• "You could talk to the most hard-core Republican in my community," Cave Creek Mayor Vincent Francia says, "and preservation is the most important thing -- it's the one thing we all agree on."

More and more people are joining the side of sustainability, yet urban development has ceased to build and build. We as society are the only ones that can do something about this. The west needs to stay wild and that is exactly what they people that live there think as well. If only all of us could agree with this, something could be done. We could keep the scenery and not do any damage to the environment. This is something that is overlooked in today's busy world but needs to be noticed. If only we could all agree, we could do something big. 

Blog 8A

There is a lot of importance when it comes to definition. Authors need definitions to help their desired audiences comprehend what they are really trying to say. An example of this that we discussed in class is say you are talking about girls and you say, "the definition of 'girls' in the dictionary is 'female'." This does not give the audience anything to go off of. Just the word female does not fully describe girls. This reason is why we don't really want to use the dictionary answer while writing. My article that I chose is about development hurting the environment. It talks about a town called Scottsdale Arizona and how what used to be beautiful western landscape is now shopping malls, golf courses, jewelry shops, and major league baseball training facilities. (The link of my article is found below.) The conversation that this fits into is environmental sustainability. The conversation is preserving environments.

facilities. http://search.proquest.com.dist.lib.usu.edu/docview/1460843522?accountid=14761

Blog 7A

In class and in our readings we learned about how visuals can help reach an audience and also how different gazes have different memory values to different people and audiences. Things that help us are tools such as indirect persuasion, visual structure, verbal anchoring, and openness. Indirect persuasion is when an author is trying to persuade an audience in an indirect way which could be really helpful to reach an audience. The next one is visual structure which is the way that an element is visually presented; we need to take this into consideration when trying to reach an audience. Verbal anchoring is when they hint at a metaphor but they may not come right out with it. The last one is openness and this is where the image is open to many different interpretations that just one or two. These are good tools to have when adding visual elements to reach your desired audience. We also need to realize that different people are going to have different gazes upon things. The example we used in class for this is when talking about the air force, most of us would think of our country as a whole where professor Merchant thinks of his comm rads that he served with.

Blog 6B

I compared my blog with Hailey Howells blog, of course because we have the same name so it was inevitable. Ironically I compared both of our compare and contrast blogs. Hailey's is a lot more simple and to the point than mine is. I like hers better in this way. In my blog I talked about compare and contrast in a way that it helps students put two things together and help them decipher between the two while Hailey talks more about compare and contrast helping people that are "on the fence" with different things. Hailey also talks about the side by side and subject by subject element where I talked more about venn diagrams and helping students more comprehend.

These are the two blogs I compared

http://howellhailey.blogspot.com/  
http://haileyschvaneveldt.blogspot.com/2015/10/blog-6a.html

Blog 6A

The element of compare and contrast help students obtain skills of comparing two subjects and distinguishing differences between the two. The idea is to teach students the skill of using Venn diagrams and visually seeing the differences between two similar things. Students learn in a more sufficient way when they are able to visually see the differences between two subjects. Venn diagrams are very important when it comes to the element of compare and contrast. In the article we read dealing with compare and contrast it said that students comprehend best when asked, "can anyone spot out the differences between these two songs?" The students could easily distinguish the differences after using the compare and contrast method. Using this method makes it so much easier for students to compare things and understand the text which they are reading. 

Looking in a writing perspective, compare and contrast makes it quite a bit easier when trying to explain differentiate between two things. Using the compare and contrast method helps the audience put the two ideas side by side and easily pick out the differences between the two. It is much easier to compare two subjects when they are placed and talked about close to each other. When the rhetor can successfully compare two subjects together in their writing, it makes it much simpler for the audience to understand the comparison and find the contrast between the two. It is important to remember the element of compare and contrast because it can help get a point across to the audience of what the desired ideas of the author are. It also helps the reader think visually and see the contrasts in a visual sense. 

Blog 5A

There are many rhetorical gazes. These gazes consist of social gazes, business gazes, pretty much any kind of gaze you could think of. These gazes help people visualize and actually see the rhetorical tools. Gazes help people comprehend by visualizing things. Gazes are important visual rhetorical tools. You can use these tools to reach an audience because it is easier to comprehend things when people see them with their actual eyes. People connect with images. It makes it so much easier for audiences to comprehend the things they are wanted to comprehend.

Blog 4A

There are many cause and effects in the things we write whether we really notice them or not. Cause and effect structures go in a way where something starts the actual chain reaction and the effect turns into the cause and then the effect of that cause turns into the next cause and so on. This goes on until there is an ending resolution. Pulling out the cause and effects of a narrative and putting them into a chain reaction diagram makes it easier for the reader to comprehend. Cause and effects are visual aids in comprehending a story. This helps the reader comprehend what is going on in the text and the reason that certain things are happening. Cause and effect can really help to reach an audience because it helps them spot out what is happening (cause) and why it is happening (effect). Also the audience can relate to cause and effects because it happens daily in everyone's daily lives.

Personally, I think the best way for a writer to analyze cause and effects is to create a chain reaction chart or diagram. This is the best way to pick out which instances are causes and which ones are the effects of those. It really helps to see them visually and see how each event effects the next to get to an ending result. Pointing out what events cause what and which events effect others, can be challenging unless you can visually see them on a chart or diagram.

Blog 3B

I really love the idea of the peer review. Peer review is a chance to get fresh eyes on your essay. Personally, as I wrote my essay I couldn't see most of my own mistakes. I skipped over a lot of things that other people could spot out easily. The point of peer review is to revise your paper and let others spot out any small or large mistakes that you simply looked over! I love peer review because all it can do is help you. I feel like my paper is going to be so much better now that I have done the peer review and had different perspectives on it. I also missed a lot of simple mistakes that my group caught that I can now edit! My group also gave me some really great ideas to put into my paper that will only improve it that much more which I appreciate. I loved all the criticism I received because it is making me a better writer.

Peer review also helps you come up with ways to connect to your audience. Your peers are your audience so peer review helps them tell you what to leave out and put into the essay to really connect with them. The only thing peer review does is help the writer so it is foolish not to use it to your advantage. It is an important aspect to editing your paper and making it the best it can possibly be.

Blog 3A

There are many different rhetorical tools used in Zambreno's article that I never thought about before reading it. However she did also use the basic rhetorical tools that are in basically every narrative such as, a thesis, chronology, conclusion, etc. Her thesis was very blatant and straight forward which is, in some cases, nice. She also introduced tools such as plasticity which is the ways that narratives can be reshaped or re written in order to reach different audiences. Then second tool she introduces was "piecemeal" which is the way a narrative is assembled by several different sources. In other words, pulling main points or subjects you'd like to talk about and putting them all together into one piece. The third tool she brought to attention is the "windows of opportunity." These are basically holes or openings where one can insert different stories or insights. Finally, the last rhetorical tool she introduced was "open-ending closure." This is probably my favorite tool. This is kind of leaving the reader hanging. This is what creates sequels to books and movies. It is making the reader want more.

I really liked the style Zambreno wrote in for this article. I liked the way she was so straight forward and you never questioned if she used the rhetorical tools or not. She did a great job using the rhetorical tools correctly which is crucial. By using rhetorical tools, the author can really connect with the audience of their choice. Rhetorical tools also make an article more interesting. By using the tools she talked about throughout the article, one could really write something awesome. Rhetorical tools can make or break an essay. If you use rhetorical tools correctly, you can reach your desired audience and be successful in your writing. If you don't use the tools correctly, or not at all, you are less likely to connect with your audience, or you may even connect with the wrong audience which could be even worse.

Rhetorical Elements (continued)

For the paper I am writing, I have found several rhetorical elements. I have also started using them in my own paper. In the article that I chose, I wrote about how the chronology is very interesting. It starts out with talking  about the problems we have with fashion and sustainability. It then continues to talk about certain industries that have already introduced sustainability into their industries. My article I chose also has very well used transitions throughout the story. In my paper, I wrote how the reader probably wouldn't comprehend the story if it wasn't for the transitions it has. The article runs very smoothly because of this. The story also has a very good conclusion that is short and to the point, yet well thought. The New York Times did a very good job using rhetorical elements while writing this article.

While writing my paper, all I think about is rhetorical elements. If you would have asked me a week ago what they were and what they do to a paper, I wouldn't be able to tell you. However, now that I know what rhetorical elements are and what they can do to an article or essay, I take them very seriously. I have tried to think of ways I can use story grammars in a way that my paper flows together smoothly and is properly written the way I want it to turn out. I have realized what rhetorical elements are supposed to do, and what they can do to a paper if used correctly.

I really like this description of structural narratives I found on the internet by by David Raudenbush, Demand Media, it says, "Writing about narrative structure is like walking around a roller coaster, spotting the loops, drops and curves, and reviewing them for other riders. To analyze a narrative, you need break down plot elements, sort out the sequence of events and recognize how the author's style and the narrative point of view influences the storytelling. By examining these elements, you expose for your reader the path the author devised as a journey through his story." This was said by David Raudenbush in his article named "How to Explain Narrative Structures in Writing"

Reaching an Audience

Narratives

Narratives are very important when wanting to send a message to someone or to an audience. When done properly, narratives can reach people when other things cannot. For example, when advertising something on television they can either be a huge success or a complete failure. An example that was talked about in class was the Carl's Junior commercial when they showed an inappropriate ad in the middle of the day, when only children would be around to watch it. This is an example of an epic fail. This is also why choosing your audience is crucial. Narratives should also follow the certain steps to be successful. This means that it goes from the author, to the text, and then to the audience. It follows these steps many times as the author or artist refines it to meet the needs of the specific audience. Narratives can be either really successful or a complete fail, it just depends on if one did it right or not.

The rhetorical tools are the key to having a successful narrative. As authors write, and take the steps necessary to make a good narrative, the rhetorical tools are super important. As the narrative goes through the 'triangle' and refine and edit their narrative as they go, it becomes not only what they wanted it to become, but what they think their audience will want. If the narrative isn't what the specific audience wants then it is basically a waste of time for everyone involved. Without the rhetorical tools, authors and artists couldn't get any feedback to refine or edit the narrative.

Writing Process

The Writing Process

The writing process includes writing a rough draft of our papers in class, then clean it up. After cleaning it up we will summarize our paper to make a conclusion. Following this, we will take our paper to class for a peer review and clean that up to add our introduction.

Essay Structure

Intro, body, conclusion