Will Duffy’s English 100 Blog

I see the primary thesis of “Everything is a Remix” as Ferguson explaining that almost everything we see is not original, but a work of art inspired by or even a direct copy of an existing piece. Remixing is “a piece of media which has been altered or contorted from its original state by adding, removing, and changing pieces of the item.” Ferguson’s concept of remixing connects to our understanding of rhetoric because, we’ve learned that rhetoric is someone’s way of persuading or getting their ideas out to people in the most effective way possible.

I’m looking forward to project 3, I feel that it will give us a great opportunity be creative and to express ourselves. In the reading Shipka seems doubtful about the idea of composition “made whole.” She doesn’t want the definition of composition to be seen in a narrow-minded view because it is limiting the “texts, tools, and processes” of communication. I think that Shipka is trying to say that if we limit our communication abilities, then we will struggle to communicate with one another. This relates to project 3 because we are going to express ourselves without being confined to standard communication (writing, talking, etc).

During my time working on project 2 I learned what a white paper was and how to use the resources on the Fairfield library website. I learned what a white paper was by reading our assigned reading and doing some independent research. I learned how to use the resources on the Fairfield library website in the class session that we had in the library. I felt that the librarian gave us a very good walkthrough on how to use the resources at our disposal to their full potential. This new knowledge is significant because being able to research credible sources that support your position is an important skill to have. Also, being able to write a white paper will be useful because I may have to write another one before I graduate Fairfield or later when I enter the business world, and now I have the experience of writing one.

A white paper is a formal document intended to fully inform the reader on a particular topic or idea. It is a combination of knowledge and research in a document that argues for a specific solution, recommendation, or idea that the writer of the paper has. A white paper can be written by a person who has minimal authority in a company or government, but has an idea that they’d like to suggest. White papers typically are read by the higher ups in a company or government. The rhetorical purpose of a white paper is ultimately to persuade the reader to agree with the author’s idea or recommendation. A white paper is a formal paper that typically has a lot of data, which is used to support the author’s viewpoint. The format of a white paper is similar to an article, with many visuals, such as graphs or data. A white paper is typically six to eight pages long. The profession that I have selected is finance. Finance students typically write emails, reports, and spreadsheets. Finance students write about how specific companies are doing financially, they write professional emails to teachers or possible future employers, and they write down data concerning companies on spreadsheets. Some research methods that finance students are learning are exploring and interpreting data, samples and populations, testing hypotheses, regression analysis, and time series analysis. Professionals in the business of finance often write memorandums, reports, proposals, and emails. Common research methods in finance are exploring and interpreting data, samples and populations, testing hypotheses, regression analysis, and time series analysis. People in the business of finance often write for their clients, or for their higher ups. Their writing is mainly used to inform the reader, or to suggest a proposition that they have. Professionals in the field of finance place value in the clarity and the thoroughness of the writing, meaning that the writing needs to be informative and easy to understand. The consequences of poor writing are misinforming your client or boss, which could result in you getting fired, which is less than ideal.

The author of When Discourses Collide is Jason Palmeri, who is currently an associate professor of English at Miami University. This text is from the Journal of Business Communication so I’d say that the primary audience is most likely high level academics. This text implies that rhetoric is writing with a purpose. That purpose being either to provide facts or to persuade someone. This text implies that genre is similar to Bitzer’s example of the rhetorical context a person is writing in. The main argument of the text is that the difference in discourse communities (i.e rhetoric) between nurse consultants and attorneys can lead to misunderstandings due to different writing expectations in both fields. The text describes the importance of rhetoric in other fields like law and medicine by highlighting the importance of writers because they know how to adapt different works of rhetoric to fit the audience and context of what genre they are writing in.

I chose to read Research Starts With Answers by Alisson C. Witte. Research is the process of finding answers to your questions. “Researching isn’t meant to be a narrow task of looking up information, but of creating and discovering new information in response to problems” (Witte 228). People use research to find information about questions that they have. Researchers use different methods because we all think differently, and some methods may suit one person more adequately than it might suit another person. I haven’t used many research methods outside of traditional reading, but I remember that I did need to conduct some surveys for a project during high school. I was initially confused by the notion of creating more questions in my research as that seems rather counterintuitive, but then I figured that the more questions I ask about my topic, the more in depth my research will be.

In our rhetorical ecology map and memo, I learned how to transform an essay into a memo format, and how to make a rhetorical ecology map. I learned how to transition an essay into a memo format because I originally wrote my memo as a stereotypical essay. I had to decide what parts of my essay I wanted in my different sub-columns to best describe my map. I had no idea what a rhetorical ecology map looked like coming into this project and I feel that I had a pretty good understanding of them after completing this project. This learning is significant because I will be able identify other rhetorical ecologies in my life. I don’t know what I will do with this information, but at least I’ll have it I guess(?). I expect to learn more things/skills that I am unaware of in project two, and hope that they can influence my time here at Fairfield.

The author of you can learn to write in general is Elizabeth Wardle. Elizabeth Wardle is a Howe Professor in English and Director of the Roger and Joyce Howe Center for Writing Excellence at Miami University. The primary audience seems to be writing students like us. Wardle implies in the text that genre is the context, audience, purpose, medium, history, and values of the community that effect what the writing needs to be based in the situation. The main argument of the text is that there is no such thing as writing in general, you are always writing about something with at least some sort of specification. Wardle is implying that there is always a purpose, no matter what you’re writing about, which I feel is pretty similar to Bitzer’s and Edbauer’s ideas. The primary rhetorical purpose of the text is to teach or to inform.

The author of Genre As Social Action is Dr Carolyn Rae Miller who was a long serving member in NC State’s department of English. She founded and taught the first graduate courses for rhetoric and composition at NC State. The primary audience of this text appears to be other high level rhetoricians, as it was published in the Quarterly Journal of Speech in 1984. Miller implies that “genre should be limited to a particular type of discourse classification, a classification based in rhetorical practice and consequently open rather than closed and organized around situated actions” (Miller 155). The main argument of this text is to disprove other rhetoricians’ ideas of genre and to clearly state Miller’s idea of genre. I think the main argument is similar to Edbauer’s ideas, since Miller believes that the rhetorical practice should be open. The primary rhetorical purpose of this text is to teach or inform.

I felt pretty good about the ideas in my rhetorical ecology map, and as a result I did not change any of my rhetorical concepts. I made minor changes in design to my rhetorical ecology map, mainly just shifting a few things around to make the design look a bit cleaner. During the revising process I went back and forth between my bed and my desk, depending on how I felt. In terms of writing the memo, I did not feel like like the process was too different from initially making the map. I felt unsure about what I was putting down because this assignment is so open and can be interpreted so many different ways. I was pretty stressed at the beginning of writing my memo because I did not really know where to start, but as I went along I got a bit more comfortable since I recalled that everyone starts with a bad first draft and I focused more on just getting the ideas down, instead of whether or not they’d be good enough to get into my final draft. I did not feel super invested in revising my map because I did not have any feedback so I felt that my ideas were okay since I am the person who came up with them. The one thing that I would change for my next revising process is to look to get feedback earlier in my writing process.

Before I began my rough draft I sat down on my bed and read Shitty First Drafts by Anne Lamott. After reading, I pulled out my laptop and started working first draft of the map on lucid chart because I wanted to get the feel for the website. It probably took me about an hour and a half to two hours to map out everything the way that I wanted to. I felt this compared pretty well to my ideal writing but without the writing, pretty much just brainstorming and reorganizing. During the process I got stuck a few times, but then I thought back to the passage and realized the important part was just to get my ideas down and not worry if they were gonna be perfect or even good ideas. I’d say that Lamott’s ideas about a first draft are pretty similar to mine, where she says that you just need to get whatever you think of down no matter how stupid it sounds, because that’s when you are most creative. Creativity has its growing pains, but you need to get through them if you want a good final product.