Project 1 Intro & Conversation

There will come a time in every writer's life that (s)he will be criticized for improper use of grammar. In the writing community, most consider grammar to be extremely important. Even outside of the writing community, teachers and other people in positions of authority use grammar to judge pieces of writing. In the society we live in today, however, grammar seems to have taken a backseat, especially since there are so many ways to communicate these days. The question remains: Is grammar as important now as it was fifteen years ago? Should someone's grammar determine their quality as a writer? 

In his article, "Good English and Bad," Bill Bryson takes a look at grammar and its effect on the English language. He describes the average "grammarian," who is so obsessed with the correct use of grammar that it is all they focus on when reading and/or writing. Bryson also points out, however, that there are many grammarians who have committed numerous faux pas in their own writing. If these so-called experts at grammar are capable of making mistakes in their own field of knowledge, then how are the rest of us supposed to be able to recall the proper verb tenses at the drop of a hat, much less use them correctly? 

While grammar is still important, it is worth remembering that in some cases, there are people that simply do not have access to knowledge that provides them with a sense of grammatical expertise. Certain schools don't even think that teaching grammar is that important anymore. Naturally, there will always be the regulatory two-week emphasis on subjects, prepositions, and verb tenses, but other than that, a student can go through their entire school experience without being properly educated where grammar is concerned. I was in "advanced" English classes all through middle school and high school, yet I didn't receive a proper lesson on prepositions until my senior year. It is important to remember that these days, even the most accomplished student can get to college without the knowledge that others receive in the first few years of elementary school. 

Reading Response #9 (Bernhardt)

Before You Read:
In a text-heavy advertisement, I am usually drawn first to the visual aspect of the text, that is, how it is set up.  I have always thought that images help emphasize text, and have never seen an example where the opposite has been true.

QDJ
4. I believe that we are supposed to write essays that follow specific formats so that they are easier for teachers to read and it gives teachers a standard as to what you are writing. If every student used a different format, it would give other students an advantage, depending on how they set up their paper.

AEI
4. The website that I looked at was Twitter. Twitter doesn't really guide you; it basically lets you do what you want. However, this is what I like about it. I don't think that it could be improved to help the reader at all.

After You Read
Scott McCloud would have used a completely visual way to present his point. He wouldn't have disregarded text as a whole, but he would have minimized the use of it. I actually believe that McCloud would have presented this point in a much more interesting way.

Reading Response #8 (Porter)

Getting Ready to Read

I get help for writing from teachers, peers, the internet, books, and magazines. I also get feedback about my writing from peers and teachers.

Summary:

In his article "Intertextuality and the Discourse Community," Porter stresses the importance of the idea that writing is always individual, even when writers use the words of other authors to illustrate their points. He maintains that writers who use other author's words are merely "borrowing" to more effectively get their point across. 

This article is similar to others we read in that, once again, we are hearing a writing construct be debated and looked at from a different way. 

QDJ

4. I have always been under the impression that writing is evaluated by how well a point is made, or how well you are able to communicate your ideas. In the past, this has certainly been how my writing has been judged. 

5. I believe his work very well reflects his point. Porter is still being original, he is just using other's ideas to do it. 

AEI

2. If I were able to rewrite the plagiarism policy, I would still require students to cite sources and give credit where necessary, but I would allow for the use of other ideas to get to an original idea. 

MM

This article did not make me feel any differently about writers or writing. I have always believed that that originality in writing is very rare. I try to be as original as possible when writing, but Porter's article may affect that. 

I really liked this article because it took an idea which so many others are against, and turned it on its head so we were able to look at it from a new perspective. I liked how Porter gave plagiarism a new twist, showing how it wasn't always this terrible thing, and how it could actually be a good thing in regards to audience. 

Reading Response #6 (Berkenkotter & Murray)

Before You Read
I don't really have a pre-writing ritual. I just need somewhere to sit with background noise--I hate quiet.

Summary
In her article "Decisions and Revisions...," Carol Berkenkotter attempts to show the reader the process of a writer, and how easily it can be affected. Berkenkotter studied the writing habits of writer David Murray for a while, having him record his thoughts and writing down all of his ideas. She also inspected the area where Murray usually wrote. She then placed Murray in a strange room and asked him to write a piece for a magazine he had never read, for an audience that was suspect. Murray was immediately knocked for a loop.

QDJ
1. I understand Murray's process. I know a lot of people that have to have a certain environment to write in, although I personally don't require much.
3. This study showed Berkenkotter that it is very important to go back and forth in the editing and revising process. It also showed that many writers value this process and have problems when it is messed with.

AEI
1. When writing, I usually drift back and forth between ideas relatively quickly. I would characterize my writing experience as being pretty limited, which is why I tend to not focus as much when I'm writing. I don't like to revise, I don't like to edit. I like to write something and be done with it.

MM
I learned that having a constant writing environment could help me in the future.

Reading Response #5 (Berger)

Before You Read :

1. If I were to draw a woman, she would be facing front, probably the only focus of the picture. I wouldn't put her in a scene; I would want her to be the main point of the picture. I doubt she would be nude, though. I like my paintings clothed.

3. <a href="http://photobucket.com/images/mila%20kunis" target="_blank"><img src="http://i744.photobucket.com/albums/xx85/96bearcat/mila_kunis.jpg" border="0" alt="Mila Kunis Pictures, Images and Photos"/></a>

<a href="http://photobucket.com/images/james%20phelps" target="_blank"><img src="http://i49.photobucket.com/albums/f259/malinwen/James%20Phelps/f26.png" border="0" alt="james phelps Pictures, Images and Photos"/></a>

I chose Mila Kunis and James Phelps. In these photos, both are depicted as very happy. However, I believe that Mila Kunis looks almost sarcastic in her picture, while James Phelps just looks generally content.


Summary:
In his article "Ways of Seeing," Berger attempts to explain the differences between the ways that women and men are depicted in art. He argues that women are always made to look beautiful, and almost objectified in art to make men think that they are the main object of the painting, and theirs to look at.

QDJ
2. Images of posed women are everywhere in advertising. Just from where I'm sitting I can see a clothing ad in a magazine on my bed with posed women. Although these women are not nude, most are posed in such a way that either men would want them, or other women would want to be them. I think that there has been a little bit of change in how we see women, but there are definitely people who still see us as objects and things to be desired rather than other people.

3. I believe that although these assumptions may have changed a bit, they are still relatively the same. A man's presence is most definitely defined by his power. When a wealthy, powerful man walks into a room, you can immediately tell. However, times have changed to the point that this can sometimes be the case with a woman, as well.


AEI
3. There is definitely a determining factor in how women are positioned today, especially when it comes to advertising. If an ad is geared toward women, a woman is not going to be posed in a provocative way. She'll be doing something that any other woman would want to be doing. However, if an ad is more for men, it can almost be guaranteed that the woman will be doing something that men will admire, or something that makes men want her.

4. I don't think humor compensates for other things. Humor is simply part of a person. I also don't believe that it falls on gender lines, although others may say differently. Men and women are both humorous, although definitely in different ways.


Meta Moment:
This was important to read because it explains how certain pictures are geared toward audiences. The fact that the article explains what appeals to people is meant to show us how we need to consider our audience and write in such a way that we captivate our audience, much as paintings are painted with a certain audience in mind.

Reading Response #4 (McCloud)

Before You Read:
My favorite cartoon character when I was younger (and probably now, as well) was Belle from Beauty and the Beast. I think that I liked her so much because I definitely could relate to her. I loved to read, just like she did, and I remember that when I was younger I thought that we were basically the same person because we both had brown hair and brown eyes (I apparently didn't realize at the time that this is very common).

In my room alone, I see many objects that seem to have faces. The wood on my closet door is stained in just a way so that it looks like a face is smiling back at me. I have a chair that looks like it has one eye and is frowning at me. Before I did this activity, I could look at these things without seeing faces, but I feel like now I'll see the faces all the time.

Summary:
In his comic, "Vocabulary of Comics," Scott McCloud tries to illustrate to the reader how every time we see an image, we somehow relate it to ourselves. McCloud also shows that we have the tendency to see faces and emotions in random shapes and objects, and that they are a projection of how we see ourselves and how we feel at the time.

QDJ
1. I think adults enjoy the simplicity of cartoons because it reminds them of a time earlier in their lives, when they were a child, and could see themselves simply without getting into detail. I don't think there is ever a time when one should stop reading comics or watching cartoons, although McCloud might disagree. I believe he thinks that you should grow as a person and start seeing yourself in full detail instead of simply.

2. McCloud chose to write this way because he knew people would relate to it more easily rather than if he had just written it. If he had just written this, I would have immediately dismissed him as another boring intellectual trying to tell me how I should read things.

AEI
1. Maybe it's because I'm right-brained and a very visual person, but I think many students would benefit from more visual imagery. It teaches how to look rather than just listen, to pay more attention to detail where it is necessary.

3. Adults "grow out" of watching cartoons because they believe that part of growing up is leaving things you did as a child behind. You don't grow out of comics and cartoons. And, as McCloud shows, you will always see yourself in images throughout the rest of your life, be it in a comic or in a totally random stain on the sidewalk.

Thoughts:
I really liked this piece. I read another comic like this by Scott McCloud my junior year of high school, and enjoyed it as well. This piece appeals to me because it gives me something to look at along with what I'm reading, and that helps me understand the idea more clearly. This piece relates to others we've read in that McCloud gives us yet another way to look at the world around us, although instead of doing it in reading, he applies it to walking down the street and paying attention to what you see.

Project Proposal #1

The construct that I am trying to disprove is that for an article or any other piece of writing to be valid, it must have good grammar, punctuation, etc. This construct is most visible in high school or college environments, where teachers believe that perfect grammar and punctuation are the only keys to having a "perfect" piece of writing. There are also people out there (myself included sometimes) that immediately discredit a piece of writing if there are one or two spelling, grammar, or punctuation mistakes. This influences our way of thinking because it makes people believe that unless you have impeccable writing mechanics, you can not write anything that will truly be considered good. This directs people to focus more on grammar and mechanics rather than ideas in their writing. 

Grammar misconceptions

Does grammar make a paper good?

Is grammar important?
Grammar in socioeconomic groups
Literacy
Right to dialect

Reading Response #3

Getting Ready to Read:
Fact - something that can be proven as true.
Claim - an idea that can be proven true or false.
Opinion - thoughts on a certain idea or topic
Argument - differing of thoughts on a certain idea or topic

In her article, Margaret Kantz tries to give readers a new idea about researching topics. Kantz believes that research should be a matter of treating each "fact" as a claim instead; as an idea that can be debated. Kantz believes that if a topic is treated this way, it is easier to write about. By not trusting everything you read, you are free to question ideas and broaden your writing to expand more.

Kantz's piece strongly reminded me of Stuart Greene's article in that both authors are trying to get the reader to look at ideas in a more abstract way. Much like Greene compared arguing to a conversation, Kantz gives the reader a new way to look at research, to treat it as something that might not necessarily be factual, which gives the reader more room to interpret the text as they please.

QDJ
1. Kantz maintains that facts, opinions, and arguments are fairly different. While facts and opinions can both be described as claims, arguments must be backed up.
2. Kantz thinks that students read articles as stories. She also believes that students tend to treat everything they read as facts. I believe these assumptions are very true, and did not realize how much I agreed with Kantz until I read this article and realized that I am guilty of these very things.

AEI
2. While I believe that creativity and research can go hand in hand, I don't necessarily agree with Kantz in stating that students should treat facts and opinions as claims. While her ideas on how students view articles and research do interest me, I don't believe that the way to fix this is to treat everything you read as being a claim. I believe that you should trust most of what you read, and only doubt it when you are given a logical reason to.

MM
Kantz is trying to refute the idea that all research should be trusted. She believes that most should view research as a claim rather than a fact. It is useful to understand what she says because it gives you a new way to look at how you read an article and how you treat research, so that maybe you are able to change how you think.

Thoughts:
While some of Kantz's ideas did interest me, this was very hard to read. It may help me with research in the future, but I doubt that I will take Kantz's advice on treating research as a claim, because I simply don't believe it is the best idea.