Thlogging 7

I hate it when I can't think of anything to say for my thloggings, so I'll just start blurting everything at once. Thinking of an idea for WP#3 wasn't as difficult as I thought it was going to be. I definitely didn't try to force ideas out and instead waited for something interesting to catch my attention. I'm pretty glad that the idea I had wasn't awful and can actually be done. I feel rather hopeful for this writing project and plan to start first thing tomorrow. The comments I received from my classmates were extremely helpful and successfully got me thinking about where I could expand my ideas and consider other aspects. I truly enjoyed reading what they had to say and how I could make my ideas more clear.

I always enjoy the practices when we look at different genres because it reminds me that not every single item from the genre is going to have the same conventions. It allows me to begin thinking about all the different conventions that could be within a genre but don't have to be. I plan to use this little activity in preparation of the two genres that I will be creating. I hope it will help in getting my first order though process started, so that it will be easier to go ahead and actually create the two different genres. I want to de well on this WP, so I'm working hard to start to early instead of leaving it till the end.

PB 3A: Getting Old

As I've stated before, I don't really consider myself a very creative person, therefore thinking of ideas for WP Numero Tres has been considerably difficult for me. It wasn't until class that I became slightly inspired by the idea of making a funny birthday card for an older person, in their sixties or seventies, but then I realized that wasn't enough of a genre I could translate a scholarly article into. However, the birthday card led me to the topic of the emotions people feel when getting older through two different age stages.  I actually found two articles that would somehow go along with the topic titled, Change In Subjective Age Among Older People Over An Eight-Year Follow-Up: 'Getting Older and Feeling Younger?' and Age Differences in Emotion Recognition Between Chinese Younger and Older Adults, both in different areas of psychology. I know I need to choose one, but I want to break both down a little bit more to see which is more related to my topic. 

It is sort of interesting to me, how most children and teens are extremely impatient to become older and gain freedom. As tweens, they feel so much excitement to be eighteen and then to turn the glorious age of twenty-one, but at some point as people get older, most start dreading their birthdays and begin feeling old. Once individuals are in their fifties, sixties, etc, most want to truly ignore how old they are becoming and some will stop saying how old they are turning. The excitement of celebrating another year alive is definitely gone and it nearly all becomes consumed with dread.

Because of this topic of getting older, I decided one of the genres I would like to turn my academic article into is something similar to a Buzzfeed post about turning twenty-one. The audience for Buzzfeed posts are usually individuals in their late teens up to their early thirties. Specifically for my post, the audience will be people in their late teens and twenty-year-olds actually turning twenty-one. The post is going to slightly amusing, informal, probably contain images that are related to the topic, a really interesting title, and so on. All of these are common conventions of these types of post. I'm not still exactly sure what route I'm going to with, either the positive parts of turning twenty-one or the negative parts.

The other genre that I want to turn my academic article into is a personal letter to my grandma wishing her a happy birthday and comforting her about turning eighty-seven years old. The objective of a friendly personal letters is to demonstrate a strong personal connection between the writer and the reader in a way that is more touching because it takes longer to construct that a simple text or email. Even though personal letters can be sent to complain about a company or something similar to that, this letter is to convey a specific emotion. Because personal letters can be sent to anyone, the audience is rather large, although younger generations don't send personal letters as often as older generations.

I'm still wondering if these genres will be enough to satisfy the requirements of WP #3. 

Thlogging 6

WP Numero Dos is over and done with but we now continue to Writing Project Numero Tres. I do think I could have worked harder on WP#2 and done a better job, however I think I improved the overall flow and purpose of the essay. I do not think my thesis was the best thing I ever wrote but I also don't think it was horrible. It could have been more debatable, and I'm just glad it is over.

I'm pretty nervous about WP #3 because I'm not a very creative person and needing to make something up on my own is going to be pretty fucking difficult for me. I hope that I get some cool ideas that will allow me to be inspired instead of dreading the whole thing. I really want to do a good job and be satisfied with the work I turned and not be bored throughout all of it.

The online class was definitely a new experience for me, so that was preeetty interesting. I enjoyed "going to class" while being in the comfort of my own bed. Except, I had too many distractions and I'm not discipline enough to pay attention virtually. I much prefer the experience of listening to a teacher and having that interaction. It was a little crazy when I first logged in with all the questions, comments, concerns, and all that jazz. After twenty minutes though, I got it together and was able to follow the outline pretty easily.

Questions on Bob Ross

• What are some "moves" you see in these videos? 

Bob Ross' move when explaining his thought process is being so dam specific. He starts off by naming a very particular paint color, paintbrush, and amount of paint, etc. 

• How do these artists describe what they’re doing?  What do the artists refer to while they describe their work?  What do they talk about?  What do they direct our attention towards?  

Ross tells you when to get more paint and how, "pull the paint through, and wiggle it", the type of stroke you should be performing, and how many types you should be doing. The Disney Artisits refer to their artsy jargon-texture, diffuse light, pressure, distinct, subdued, etc. 

• How would you characterize each artist's style, and what impact does their style have on you (a viewer/audience member)?  How have these artists chosen to portray their subject matter?  

Each Disney Artist did their own thing while painting the same tree. One artist was really creepy and reminded me of like black magic. Another one was more abstract, he says he wanted to keep it simple and not add many details. Each of the artists had their own goal of what they wanted to present the tree as-decorative, detailed trunk, textural for movement, architectural.  

Journal Questions

Q1. So, in the end, how’d your WP2 paper go? What were you happy with?  What weren’t you? Why?
I tried really hard to improve the overall flow on my paper, and connect paragraphs and sentences to each other. I'm happy I focused on a specific similarity and difference between academic and non-academic texts instead of going all over the place like WP#1.  I still wasn't one-hundred percent satisfied with my thesis,  I was continually going back and forth between two different ones.

Q2. Which 2 or 3 comments that you received yesterday were the most helpful for you?  Why?
A helpful comment was when I was told to connect my quotes and add more analyzing on my part. It was great that was pointed out because I wasn't planning on explaining the quotes much more. Another comment given to me was being more specific on with my thesis but in the end I still didn't love my thesis.

Thlogging 5

PB 2B was intense, long, and dull, however it has made me waaaaay more comfortable in being able to identify moves. I definitely was confused on how to format the PB without being too monotonous and  lengthy, even though I don't think I did a great job on either of those things. My goal for the WP Numero Dos is to separate the work into everyday of the weekend instead of just doing it all in one suuuuuper long sitting, and hopefully that will result into a much better WP.

I thought "How to Read Like a Writer" by Mike Bunn was helpful in starting to question what I'm reading. At the end, I reaaaaallllllyy liked how he went back to the beginning of the essay and started revealing all the thoughts, moves, and questions we should be recognizing and experiencing from now on to Read Like a Writer. 

Legit how I felt...

The activity where we all came up with verbs that weren't "says" was really great because I know I definitely overuse "reveals, states, and writes." It was good to learn new vocabulary for the same word because I plan to put them to use for the WP. The brackets activity was also aaaaamazing because I'm pretty sure I have never even used brackets in my writing. I never even realized when, where, and how other writers used them until now. Both of these tips are going to be well-used in my WP.  

I'm gunna be honest and say I'm not super excited to start this WP, but I do want to do well on it.

PB 2B: Making a move

Do I have moves? I'd like to have moves when I write. I wonder if my moves are obvious to everyone but me? Moves in writing can be really small, for example, using the phrase "such as" to start an example, or they can be large and visual, for instance using block quotations instead of adding a regular quote within the text. In the articles we have read, the authors have used numerous amounts of moves, because they are great writers trying to help others become great writers. Even though some of the moves that I chose are kind of obvious, I really liked that I had a reaction to the move, and I would like for my writing to produce reactions or emotions.

In the They Say, I Say appendix, some of the templates were common because we see and use them in most writing and some are slightly less familiar, at least for me. For instance, in "Navigating Genres" by Kerry Dirk, to explain a quote, Dirk starts the first sentence after the quote with, "In other words..." Dirk uses the same phrase at least four other times and uses similar phrases even more in his twelve page essay. Using this move and ones similar to it, allows the author to be very specific about what the reader should have concluded from the quote, especially because it is followed by another sentence that analyzes the meaning of the quote even more. In "Teaching Two Kinds of Thinking by Teaching Writing," Peter Elbow uses phrases to introduce ongoing debates, "When I celebrate freewriting and fast exploratory writing...it seems to many listeners as though I'm celebrating holidays from thinking." Elbow's decision to use these phrases informs the reader of the positions other academics might have on freewriting and why Elbow's opinion is contradictory but valid. He further explains how his position is advantageous because it includes two kinds of thinking. Some of the less familiar templates, are phrases that I very rarely use in my writing but I take notice when I see them in readings.

In "So What? Who Cares?" the author uses two templates in one sentence, "When pressed, for instance, most academics will tell you that their lectures and articles matter...Yet many academics fail to identify...." The author uses this template to identify exactly who has an opposing opinion on this subject and how it is not accurate. Similarly, another move the author made was using questions to introduce objections to his own opinion informally, for example, "Isn't it obvious that everyone cares about such problems? Does it really need to be spelled out?" The use of asking questions-a reader might have-in writing, enables the author to clearly identify why it is important to follow their position. Finally, in "Murder! (Rhetorically Speaking)" by Janet Boyd, she uses a template to add an explanation about what she just wrote, "More importantly, you can now see that when I told you at the beginning that you are already in possession...I wasn't feeding you a bunch of bull." Boyd sums up her essay without using the unoriginal, In conclusion, a phrase that I very much still use. These three moves aren't phrases that I include in my writing, but should definitely be incorporated.

These next moves are ones that I really felt strongly about, whether is was with dislike or appreciation. Right off the bat, Spaces for Writing has a very clear visual move, which I'm calling The Comic Book. The authors use a comic book format to allow their audience-college students-to understand concepts in an unusual format by not only reading a text but also seeing visual graphics. Even though, the visuals are helpful, they sort of distract from the text and are kind of excessive. Personally, the comic book format was more annoying than helpful, because all I wanted to do was look at the images and not read the bubbles. Kerry Dirk's "Navigating Genres" used moves that I loved. Dirk started off his essay with a joke, even though it wasn't necessarily the funniest joke I've heard, it caught my attention right away because it was unexpected in my usual college readings. His joke effectively hooked, me into the essay and made me wonder what his point was going to be. Then, Dirk wrote out a ransom letter scenario that was another really funny move. This scenario truly allowed me to understand his point of genres and conventions without being extremely academic and monotonous. Both of Dirk's moves were plainly successful because he knows his audience is going be young college students who are tired of reading dull essays and want to obtain information in entertaining ways. In "Backpacks vs. Briefcases: Steps toward Rhetorical Analysis," Laura Bolin Carroll starts off by telling the reader to imagine a scenario of the first day of class. Carroll's move is great in capturing my attention because I did experience that exact scenario and can easily relate. Her move is successful in gaining my interest and eagerly continuing to read the rest of her essay to learn the purpose of the scenario. I recognized both Dirk and Carroll's use of hooks as moves because in my personal writing my hooks are awful, and I deeply appreciate when other people include great hooks.  Finally, Anne Lamott's move is in the title of the chapter, "Shitty First Drafts." Lamott's move of using a curse word gives the reader an impression they will be reading something that isn't formal and can be relatable. She continues her writing by adding more examples that anyone who was ever written anything can connect to because they've experienced it.

I hope to use more of these moves in my writing, except for in a comic book format, at least not anytime soon.