Reflection on Project 2

In the following blog post, I will be reflecting on my finished rhetorical analysis by answering nine questions provided by Writing Public Lives.

1. The biggest detail that I changed from one draft to the next was the inclusion and analysis of specific evidence in my essay. My first draft was completely lacking in the evidence department and, realizing it's importance, I devoted a huge amount of time into the inclusion of strong evidence and its analysis. I also looked into changing up the structure of my sentences and dried to make the composition more diverse.

2. I made my thesis a little less dense and less cookie cutter. I also restructured my introduction to relate more to my readers and grab their attention, rather than throwing dense summarizing and contest at them. I also tried to break up my example analysis into separate paragraphs because they were too dense as one.

3.  It was tricky cutting my thesis down but I realized that a dense thesis can be overwhelming and drive the reader away. It was the same idea with the body; a body that is just too dense will lose the interest of the readers. I focused greatly on the hook of an introduction because I realized the importance of getting the reader interested in the topic early, before diving into the more nitty gritty.

4. I'm not sure these changes had a huge impact on my credibility. They might make the paper seem less text-book, but I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing in regards to my credibility. I still wrote about the subject well, just made it more understandable.

5. These changes made me and my writing more relatable for a new student (i.e. my audience). Cutting down on overwhelming content made it so that I was more believable as someone interested in teaching students about a rhetoric.

6. As I said in my first response, I paid particular attention to restructuring my sentences in order to make them more diverse. I didn't include diverse end punctuation, but I don't think it's an impactful choice.

7. Diverse sentences will help my audience to remain interested in the content, as well as comprehend some of the key ideas better. I consistently avoided run-on sentences and that will improve reader understanding.

8. I'm familiar with a rhetorical analysis and this assignment made me completely reconsider how to write in this genre. For my previous rhetorical works, I wrote for a captive audience, so I was not interested in maintaining their attention or writing specifically for them. This assignment made me realize that you write for an audience and with their interests and goals in mind.

9. By reflecting on the specific changes I made and how I feel about the paper as a whole has helped me seen my growth as a writer and realized the importance of straying from a cookie cutter format in order to better my writing as a whole. I feel I've developed greatly after reflecting on my project because I was willing to throw out writing that, though I liked, didn't help my analysis.

Alfarroba, Antonio, "Mirror" 4/26/09 via Flickr.com

REFLECTION

After reading the reflection of Swati and Casey, I found that they had a very different approach to different areas of the reflection than I did. Casey and I have a similar revision process, but I feel that I made more drastic changes over the course of my revision process then she did, as well as focused on different aspects (she focused on intro and conclusion, while I looked more into evidence and analysis). Swati had a different mindset going into the writing process and I found myself surprised that she was still in a QRG mindset when I was already in full swing of rhetorical analysis.