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Thlog 9

            In writing 2 this week, we talked about how to “write with pictures,” which may be particularly helpful for some people when creating WP3 if they choose to use a visual genre, like a comic. I learned about 5 major aspects of comics that must be considered if someone wants to create one that is concise and effective, meaning that it gives the reader all of its relevant information in a way that is not confusing and gets whatever point across that it may have. I never considered these 5 aspects, but I see now that they are always present in comics but may also drastically alter its meaning if changed. The choice of “moments”—the moments in time of a story that are chosen—are crucial, as well as choice of frame—the extent to which background is included and what angle a scene is portrayed from--, choice of image—how an image is drawn--, choice of word—what text there will be and how it will be used effectively--, and choice of flow—how a reader will be navigated through the comic. Each aspect has many of its own features that need to be considered as well when creating a comic; for instance, when choosing what sort of moment to use, some of the types include moment to moment, action to action, subject to subject, scene to scene, aspect to aspect, and non sequitur. In class, we also went over different sorts of genres that could be used to translate academic articles to be age-specific. In this process, I was reminded that there are A LOT of genres out there. When reviewing other classmates’ ideas for WP3, someone brought up prescription-medication labels as a genre. My eyes are now opened bigger, and I realize the vast choices I have for creating my genre-translations.

Dawkins’ “Punctuation as a Rhetorical Tool” Translated into a Children’s Book and a Guideline for College Applicants on how to Punctuate College Essays

            For Writing Project 3, I will be translating and transforming Dawkins’ piece on “Teaching Punctuation as a Rhetorical tool” into a children’s book and a guideline for prospective college students and how they should be structuring their college applicant essays, particularly regarding the use of punctuation. The childrens’ book, the instructional guide, and the original piece by Dawkins will all have some similarities in form and language, but will have more differences. Their main similarity, however, will be the author’s intention, which is to educate their audiences—regardless of whether or not that audience may be much younger, slightly older, or academic—about the rules, options, and rhetorical effects of using different types of punctuation in writing.

            In his article, Dawkins begins by introducing the issue of the lack of specific rules with certain types of punctuation: no real rules exist, but there are general practices that are used that have specific effects, and commas, semi-colons, etc. all have their own uses and effects. Next, Dawkins discusses sentences and independent clauses and what they are in the language.

He provides different tables for these which include: 1) a hierarchy of functional marks, 2) the basic functions of those marks, 3) the patterns for those marks, and 4) the rules for those patterns. Next, Dawkins discusses cases involving multiple independent clauses, which concern degrees for separation between clauses (maximum, medium, minimum). Then he goes into “pedagogy,” or the ways in which the subject is taught.

            The children’s book will be a very condensed, simplified form of Dawkins’ article. There should not be more than a few sentences per page, and there should not be many pages overall. The book will have to be interactive in some sort of way, in order to draw in and interest the young readers. I am thinking about putting in pictures, but this might not be necessary. Right now, I’m imagining a pamphlet-sort of book with super-sized font on each page that introduces the topic and asks questions for the reader fairly frequently. The biggest issue will be the simplification of the material. Regarding the complexity of the material, it will be very important to provide a somewhat surface-level description of the ideas I will be sharing. The ideas will have to be explained and understood very simply. I think a good way to go about this would be to make the young readers think and have a sparked interest in the material—it will need to be interesting. I don’t think that pictures will be absolutely necessary for this, because I am not sure if they will just distract the reader. If I do provide pictures, they will need to represent and support the content well. They may just provide visual representations of the reasoning behind using different techniques for punctuation, such as the different sorts and levels of emphasis created when using a comma, semi-colon, hyphen, period, etc.

            The form of an instructional guide for prospective-college students writing college applications will have many differences than the childrens’ book of course. For starters, the instructional guide does not need to be as interesting. The guide will need to be succinct however, and the different content within will need to be easily accessible to the reader, for the reader to be able to access quickly while writing or planning the essay, for example. The guide won’t be there to educate a writing student, in the case of Dawkins piece, but it will be used as a functional guide; therefore, the guide will be much more succinct than Dawkins’ piece, which serves as more of a dissertation.

            The children’s book, the instructional guide, and Dawkins’ piece will all be similar in that they will intend to educate their audiences. The children’s book and the instructional guide will be significantly shorter than Dawkins’ piece, but for different reasons and different effects: the childrens’ book will be shorter because it will have very basic, surface-level information, that will hopefully spark interest in the reader; the instructional guide will be shorter because it will need to be succinct and to-the-point, to serve a functional purpose of guiding the readers—college applicants—through how to use the different types of punctuation in an essay, and the effects those choices will have on their specific audience.

Benjamin Seilhamer

Zack De Piero

Writing 2

08 May, 2016

The Biologists’, Sociologists’, and the Popular Critics’ Perspective on the Impact of Music on People

            The academic fields of biology and sociology and the popular field of music criticism have literary genres written by writers; this means that they include genre-specific conventions and rhetorical features and writer-specific “moves.” These three genres will have some similarities and some differences concerning their general conventions and rhetorical features, and specific pieces from these genres will exemplify the ways in which their writers engage their audience using moves. In order to demonstrate how different academic fields provide different perspectives, conventions and rhetorical features from each other—and how academic fields provide different perspectives, conventions, rhetorical features and reader-directed implications than popular fields—, this essay will examine the genre-specific conventions and rhetorical features and the writer-specific moves of two academic articles’—biology and sociology— and one popular article’s—music criticism—approaches to analyzing how music impacts people. As broad of a topic as this may be—the biologist’s approach concerning a single person being impacted, the sociologist’s and music critic’s approach concerning large groups of people being impacted—, the three sources chosen all represent their specific genres sufficiently by providing solid examples of the conventions and rhetorical features specific to their genres and have writer-specific moves that are worth analyzing. Academic articles from different perspectives and non-academic articles all are different genres with different moves being utilized because different academic and non-academic disciplines have their own conventions and audience expectations and their writers’ moves differ due to both genre expectations and the writers’ personal decision for execution.

            The first article (PNAS article)—written for the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, and analyzes music and people from the biologist’s perspective—is academic, entitled “Intensely pleasurable responses to music correlate with activity in brain regions implicated in reward and emotion;” The second article (MERIP article)—provided by the Middle East Research and Information Project, and analyzes music and people from the sociologist’s perspective—is academic and entitled “Egypt’s Music of Protest;” the third article (RS article)—written by someone from Rolling Stone, and analyzes music and people from the popular music critic’s perspective—is nonacademic and entitled “Nirvana.”

            The biologist’s article has many recognizable moves. These moves can be thought of as conventional to the academic-biology genre, but are moves nonetheless. For instance, the IMRAD-esque structure is employed for this piece, starting with an “Abstract”, then “Methods,” “Results,” and “Discussion” (Blood), all ordered and labeled accordingly. Under these subheadings for this piece are even smaller subheadings, including “subjects,” “stimuli,” “scanning procedures,” “data analysis,” all existing particularly under the “Methods” section. Although this sort of structure may be considered conventional for academic, scientific pieces, the ordering of the paper in this way may be considered a moves by the writers; the structuring of this article may definitely was a conscious decision. Small variations from the conventional structure of this genre prove that this is the case—for instance, the “A” section of the IMRAD structure, “analysis,” exists within the “methods” section, instead of being its own section (Blood). This may have been done because the writer decided that the “analysis” section may have been too small or insignificant to warrant its own section, or that the “analysis” of the data may be been a “method” used in the experiment. The purpose of this article is obviously to provide a peer-reviewable report of an experiment done for the scientific community to approve and add to their vast plethora of credible investigations. The types of evidence used, primarily graphs and photocopies of scans done of patients’ brains during the introduction of music, and the scientific jargon used throughout the article, “neuroanatomical regions…regression analysis...” indicate that the intended audience are of the scientific community, primarily peers of those doing the experiment, or students of universities. It can be inferred that the audience expects to see the “IMRAD” sort of structure, and that they expect to see—and probably be able to analyze and understand themselves—the visual graphs and photocopies that are included in the article. It can be expected for the audience to be ready to criticize or corroborate the arguments made by the writers of the article.

            The moves made by the writer of the sociological article on music and protest, with respects to the Middle East, can also be seen as conventional of the genre. In his article, “Egypt’s Music of Protest,” Ted Swedenburg separates his ideas into sections; these are not labeled particular to a sociological-academic structure, like IMRAD is for the sciences, but is separated into section of Swedenburg’s own choosing, labeled as “Music of Protest” (introduction), “Anti-Imperial Struggle,” “Revolutionary Memories,” “Poetry of Resistance,” “Working Class Posses,” and finally, “Endnotes” (Swedenburg). The only label that may be conventional of academic writing for sociology is “Endnotes,” which provide cited works and further explanations for particular ideas throughout the article. This article’s purpose is to collect information from many other already published sources and reorganize it to make it more accessible to the reader; there is no original field work done in this paper, only research. The sort of evidence provided is from other authors or other works, as well as specific music examples. The audience is expected to be primarily students. There is a considerable lack of jargon, which makes this article accessible to pretty much anyone, and the nature of the article does not necessitate peer-review. There is no field work or new research introduced in this piece, but rather, it is an argument based off of information already provided by other academic sources. Those who may be particularly interested in this article would be students of the “soft” or “social” sciences, who may need a succinct article to use that has a collaboration of many different articles to inform the specific topic of the role of music in protest in a Middle-Eastern context. The author’s decision, or obligation, to provide endnotes at the end of the article gives students the means to research other articles that may be relevant to the topic they are studying, if that topic has to do with music in Middle-Eastern protest.

            The nature of the Rolling Stones’ non-academic article on Nirvana—a biography—could be described as much more laid back than the other genres. One can recognize immediately that when juxtaposed with the other academic articles in question, there are a few aspects missing. One obvious aspect is the lack of subheadings; ideas are just separated into different paragraphs, and the main title is just “biography” at the top of the article. One can argue that the lack of subheadings is a move made by the writer to make his article feel a lot “cooler” to read; the lack of effort put into separating main ideas in the article, such as chronological events like “On March 30, Cobain check into the Exodus Recovery Center in LA” from other time-insensitive information like “Nirvana’s impact was also felt by some of Cobain’s own musical heroes…” (Simon/Schuster). Maybe the writers moved for a lack of organization by subheadings to make the reader feel more casual reading the article. The article does not provide any direct evidence with citations, but it provides many dates that can be corroborated. Open-ended statements, especially concerning who Nirvana impacted and how do not have any evidence; the article does not need to have citations, which may be conventional of biographies. It can be inferred by the article that the audience is supposed to be casual, looking to learn simple facts, but not for research or anything of the like, because of the lack of citations or even endnotes with the mentioning of cited works; in other words, the audience is not expecting too much, just a casual read. The audience can include anybody, not just those of a specific discipline, like an academic science article.

            There is a significant difference between the structures, conventions, and moves of academic and non-academic genres. Academic genres tend to have more “strict” conventions with standards for how they are supposed to be written, for practical purposes—peers and other researchers want to be able to know how to read the article as efficiently as possible, and must be able to find information within it quickly, especially regarding original research done by those in the science field. The audience-span is much narrower for academic articles, which are intended to be understood—and reviewed—only by those within that particular academic circle; the extensive use of discipline-specific jargon supports this idea. On the other hand, non-academic articles have a much larger audience-span because they can be understood by anybody. There is not an overarching structure that must be followed, the reading and writing process seems to be much more relaxed and open to personal preference by the writer. Academic articles have affordances that are the same as their limitations—their nature of being strictly organized and succinct with high audience expectations of understanding the discipline-specific jargon off the bat enables them to shoot information and arguments into the readers’ brain very precisely. This same characteristic, however, is what limits the article in its scope of audience—not necessarily a bad thing, because your average Joe probably will not care about “complementary subtraction analysis” or “regression maps” (Blood). The non-academic article’s affordances and limitations are the opposite—it is able to be understood by a greater span of audience, yet does not communicate as specific, high-level information as academic articles. Both types of articles are successful in their own ways, however; they deliver to the audience what they expect, whether it may be in-depth analysis about brain function supported by visual evidence such as photocopied brain scans and visual aids such as bar graphs, or whether it may be a simple, casual timeline outlining a rockstar’s life and tragic end. The nature of an article, in this sense, depends primarily on the intended audience of the piece.

Bibliography

Blood, Anne J., and Robert J. Zatorre. "Intensely Pleasurable Responses to Music Correlate with    Activity in Brain Regions Implicated in Reward and Emotion." Intensely Pleasurable Responses to Music Correlate with Activity in Brain Regions Implicated in Reward and Emotion. Proceeding of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 11 July 2001. Web. 06 May 2016. <http://www.pnas.org/content/98/20/11818.full>.

Simon/Schuster, and Evan Serpick. "Nirvana Biography." Rolling Stone. Rolling Stone, 2001. Web. 06 May 2016. <http://www.rollingstone.com/music/artists/nirvana/biography>.

Swedenburg, Ted. "Egypt's Music of Protest | Middle East Research and Information Project." Egypt's Music of Protest | Middle East Research and Information Project. Middle East Research and Information Project, n.d. Web. 06 May 2016. <http://www.merip.org/mer/mer265/egypts-music-protest>.

Online Class Journal Q’s

I am happy with my specificity concerning WP2.  I started looking and writing specifically about what was asked for the prompt, and my ideas are more succinct than in the last WP. Part of the reason why I am a lot more succinct on my second WP is that I pre-wrote effectively. On my first WP, I tried attacking it using primarily first order thinking, with little review and self-criticism during the writing, and even the review, process. This time around, my structuring of my argument used a combination of first and second order ways of writing. I began with an outline this time, but this was just to provide a skeletal idea of how I was going to organize my paper; I did not even look at any articles yet. After reading the prompt, I created an outline that would deliver a better, more convincing argument--it even helped me zone in on the moves I would use myself.

I would like to know how my methods of argument were delivered in this WP, meaning how were they received by the reader?

Thlog 6

            This last week in Writing 2, we clarified more clearly what moves are and how they are different from conventions. In general, there is a consensus that moves may be specific to certain writers, while conventions are general and exist within all pieces of the same genre. However, this does not mean that conventions themselves cannot be moves as well. A writer may employ conventions in their piece as a move, which may in turn make it part of a specific genre. For example, if someone was writing a research essay, he or she may structure it with the IMRAD structure. Although this is common to research papers, it may not be put in because it is conventional for the research paper genre, but rather because this specific move may have a convincing impact on the reader, and may end up convincing the reader of a certain point. We reviewed how to find moves in pieces as well. The idea of “reading like a writer” keeps coming up, and similar ideas come up as well, such as “listening like a producer” or “seeing like an architect.”

            We went over some important grammar guidelines in class as well. In particular, we went over the idea of “parallelism.” It is important to recognize and utilize this technique for many reasons, one of which is to show professionalism, and also to guide the thought process of the reader. Parallelism exists in many forms, not just literarily, but visually as well. When creating a resume, it is important to make sure that its parts are grammatically and visually parallel for the reasons discussed above, in order to demonstrate one’s professionality and to help expedite the reader’s reading process.

PB2B

            Moves are very important to consider when it comes to writing—and reading—literary sources. No matter what genre of source one may be writing or reading, it is guaranteed to have moves. Moves are pretty much methods that writer utilize in order to get a certain effect on the reader. In this assignment, I will begin by identifying five moves particular to “They Say, I Say” that are used by Julia Nguyen—a Writing 2 student—in the essay entitled “Disciplines of Love” that are used specifically in academic writing; next, I will find and name five other moves from different articles.

            In the first paragraph of the essay, Julia Nguyen captures authorial action when she paraphrases the common ideas of biologists: “Scholars within the discipline of biology approach this idea that…” At the end of the first paragraph, Nguyen adds metacommentary regarding the approaches that biology and communications scholars use for their research and writing: “To sum up, scholars…” Near the beginning of the second paragraph, Nguyen introduces a quotation with the according to X move: “According to Debiec, ‘William James…’” Nguyen uses another move that captures authorial action on page two in the third paragraph: “Debiec provides…” A third move that captures authorial is further down on page two, third paragraph: “Gonzaga concluded that…”

            Peter Elbow uses moves as well in his book entitled “Embracing Contraries: Explorations in Learning and Teaching.” In the introduction of chapter three, Elbow uses a move that I would like to call the “Satirical-exaggeration quote.” In his introduction, Elbow is describing how people react to his proposition of using first order thinking. His satirical-exaggeration quote is used to exaggerate how people react negatively to this idea: “Horrors! Their vigilance muscles will get flabby…” The author used this move in order to hook the reader, and make obvious the controversy risen by people who disagree with or are resistant to the idea of using first-order thinking to write; this is an effective move, because it has caused me to be more engaged with the text and has enlightened about the issues some have with the idea, and it has revealed to me that the reasons to deny first-order thinking are really quite silly.

            A second move that Peter Elbow utilizes I will call the “rebutted/clarifying aside.” This is in the second paragraph, in which Elbow clarifies that he does not just teach first-order thinking but that he values and teaches second-order—or critical—thinking as well: “Of course it’s not the only way I teach thinking through writing….” This is used colloquially by Elbow in its own paragraph to have the effect of an aside, as though he is speaking secretly to the reader, or as though this idea could exist within parenthesis, but is too large to do so; it is done in an aside-sort-of sense because it is not particularly important to the main idea of the paper. This move is effective because it makes me feel closer to the writer and more engaged with the writing, and it is not distracting from the main ideas of the paper; of course, it is not too distracting, but it is more of a rebuttal, so it is good to separate from the rest of the ideas being asserted.

            A third move that Elbow uses will be called the “second-person quotation” or “reader call-out.” This involves Elbow bringing the readers into the text by telling them to do something, or initiating a call of action. For instance, on page fifty-six, Elbow asks the reader to “ask them a hard question and then [say] ‘Now think carefully….’” This move is effective because it engages the readers by calling them out to act on something, which makes his message more relatable and personal; the reader now feels more engaged with Elbow and can visualize a situation in which he or she may do what is asked, and also visualizes a hypothetical situation, which is further engaging.

            A fourth move that Elbow uses will be called the “self-aware concession.” In this case, Elbow is considering counterviews, but is making it apparent that he is aware of considering counterviews: “I have learned not to forget to tell the other side of the story” (pg. 57, PP. 2). This move shows that Elbow is aware of how a solid argument works, and is effective because it makes the reader aware that he knows how to argue well, and consider counterarguments; it establishes his credibility.

            The last move that I will identify will be called the “alliterative counter-ideas,” utilized when he asserts that “the two kinds of thinking have the opposite virtues and vices.” This is a cool move he uses, because it brings up two opposing ideas, but poetically. This is effective because it sticks in the readers mind more because of the way they sound in the ear.