Category: Reflection

The authors of Op-ed pieces present a problem and state how the problem has an impact on society. In order to strengthen their arguments, authors will use many rhetorical devices such as logical reasoning, statistical analysis, sound research, or expert quotes to support their claim.  Then, the authors provide a clear analysis that explains how the evidence they have provided supports their argument. These authors will follow this procedure of evidence then analysis several times to support their claim. One of the Op-ed articles had an extensive autobiographical component and in doing so the author was able to achieve his credibility which is an effective method to convince the audience. To conclude their argument, these authors will restate the main points and deliver a possible solution to their targeted audience. The authors’ tone for this type of writing shows their commitment and passion for the specified problem. 

The Op-ed is a genre that enables authors to present their ideas to a readership through the art of persuasion. It is a genre that allows for the use of rhetoric which is a very powerful and useful method to deliver a message to the reader. It is also a genre that has at its core an inherent bias based on the author’s perspective on a specific issue. It is in this sense that the reader should always be aware that within an Op-ed piece the goal of the author is to convince the audience of his or her perspective and to leave the audience with a sense of passion or intrigue toward the specific topic. As a norm, the Op-ed genre aims to convince the reader. 

Since the Op-ed genre allows for an author to argue for a specific claim within an issue, I focused on an issue that I am passionate about – global climate change. I searched for Op-eds that were related to this issue and found a range of opinions and perspectives expressed surrounding this issue. I noticed that the Op-ed articles that I found within the global climate change umbrella had overall a sense of urgency and alarm. The solutions presented in each article varied and illustrated the interconnectedness of global climate change in all aspects of society. I realized that the articles I selected supported my stance on the topic I chose. I found that in this regard, Op-eds had an inherent bias. As the targeted audience, I didn’t read or use articles that denied global climate change. I selected articles that acknowledged and supported my view that global climate change is a very real and urgent problem. 

I identified how rhetorical analysis was used within this genre and realized how I could implement the same type of analysis within my own writing. I was able to use this technique in a presentation for my Public Speaking class. I focused on Local Law 97 which is the regulation of greenhouse gas emissions for about 50,000 residential and commercial buildings throughout New York City. I used sources from several government departments to give my claim credibility. In doing so, I felt that my presentation persuaded my audience of the importance and necessity for the law to be followed. I ensured that I appealed to my audience’s emotions as I made clear the connection between current and future prosperity is dependent on ensuring that this law is properly followed.

I would like to continue my growth as a writer by taking more classes like English Composition I. Since English is my second language, I do not have as firm of a foundation in the mechanics and norms of English in comparison to native speakers. Despite this deficit, I truly enjoy learning English. I want to write grammatically correct and acquire the tools I need to express my thoughts and feelings on paper. I want to write in a way that my reader can clearly understand. I want to write more effectively as I have difficulty connecting ideas and sentences. Some challenges that I have are: coming up with unrelated ideas from brainstorming, failing to draw strong connections between ideas, and having weak or no transitions between paragraphs. 

To become a better and more effective writer, I need to read more in English. I still read mainly in Korean and I realize how reading more in English I can start to learn the patterns in writing. I can also watch videos that explain specific writing techniques. I can participate in more writer’s workshops and share my ideas with others. I can also read different genres in English to learn new techniques and styles of writing. 

I realized that by focusing on the Op-ed genre and learning about the way the genre functions was powerful. It directly impacted the way I was able to express my own ideas on an issue I was interested in.  

Pop music sends messages behind it that can benefit individuals to understand the struggles that singers faced. I specifically choose the six songs that relate to pop music, such as “I was here” by Beyoncé Knowles-Carter, “I’d rather go blind” by Beyoncé Knowles-Carter, “New Rules” by Dua Lipa, “Sober” by Demi Lovato, “Firework” by Katy Perry, “All About That Bass” by Meghan Trainor. Overall, all six songs have in common expressing their feeling throughout there tone of voice, describing their struggles, relates to teenager’s strifes, and their videos play a significant effect on the song. Every music is stronger than another. They all have messages behind their music. For example, “Sober” by Demi Lovato, her message was to tell her fans that being drugs and alcohol addicts like her is not okay and thous who are struggling to seek help and never give up. She even mentions that she was sober for a couple of years but want back to her addiction. Yet, at the end of her song, she promised that she would look for help. Which she actually has done and got helped, and that tells her fans never to give up. She is so brave to tell everyone, even through song! I have so much respect for her because spreading the words through the song can quickly spread the words faster to commentate with people that are struggling to allow them to understand that they are not alone. And there is a chance for them to found help. Every song that was chosen seems to have struggles, but they all have different types of problems that are faced by everyday life, such as self confidants, sexuality, alcohol addiction, and a broken heart from loved ones. I have learned that nowadays, music is so popular that it’s faster to spread words. I would like to see more artist that has a beautiful and strong voice to take advantage and spread more messages to advise others to become better.

However, I have learned as a writer that I need more time to able to put all my thoughts together. Also, before I write, i like making a grid or a timeline to determine how I can start my first sentence. Writing isn’t my best straight, but I have become better in expressing my thoughts and feeling well, I’m writing. I have noticed from the Annotated Bibliography assignment, searching the lyrics can also have more meaning behind it. This task has taught me while searching for an expressly subject isn’t easy and can be frustrating sometimes but worth of search when you’re able to understand the overall message.

One of the topics that I have an interest in, an issue that can relate to me or the generation that I am experiencing. The reason it’s easy for me to able to write an essay that can relate to me because I can compare myself and the rounding me. However, I need to learn about extending my words and learn how to write creatively to make the reader not bored with the topics that I will be writing. For me to able to reach my goals on becoming better on writing. I need to focus wheel I’m writing, read many articles and books to gain experience also most importantly, practice, practice, and practice because that’s the only way i can get stronger with my writing.

For my genre, I chose true crime, true crime is non-fiction literacy, podcasts, films, etc. which involves the author inspecting thoroughly a real crime and it’s detailing. A couple of trends that would reoccur in these true crime stories is spreading a moral message to the audience who consumes it. For example, if a crime were to happen in a specific neighborhood like in Forest Hills, Queens, the audience living there would be the ones who would mainly consume the details the case introduces and would take further steps to ensure that their neighborhood is safe and become more aware of their surroundings. Another trend that makes a good true crime story and gets the point across is typically putting the effort in the research, meeting with, spending time around, and interviewing people who were involved in the true crime case. In one of my sources “Charles Manson’s Own Story of Why the Manson Family Killed,” the author, Olivia B. Waxman, wrote an interview that Charles Manson previously had and interpreted to get the deeper meaning behind it.  True crime stories also have a very neutral and unbias tone because the authors are here to inform the audience and to not influence them to think one way or another, that is for us to decide whether we agree or disagree with the case presented. Another key factor that goes into true crime stories is being respectful to the victim’s families and the case itself, authors need to make sure that everything they use to write about the true crime is facts. These true crime stories deal with real people, real events and real consequences, and the story you tell is being spread to multiple audiences interested in this topic so it’s best to not play around with the truth. As I researched my genre, I learned that there’s more to a true crime story than just gathering all the evidence and presenting it. There needs to be a tone, a moral message conveyed to the audience, extensive research such as traveling to somewhere for an interview with the victim’s families or with the actual criminal, making sure the truth gets out and not twisting it. However, one thing I want to know more about my topic is keeping a neutral tone throughout the storytelling, it is very easy to insert an opinion, making it one-sided than rather seeing the whole picture behind motives. Throughout this assignment, I learned that as a writer I always like to input background information before actually telling the story, it gives me a place to start and feels more organized. My strength in this assignment is that I can gather evidence and analyze it, breaking it further down to make it easier to understand. But I struggled with identifying the author’s main argument because true crime stories to me have the same structure, a victim; a crime; and the outcome. So I was not entirely sure where the main argument in my sources showed up. I think what could help me improve in this area is by looking at my peer’s annotated bibliographies or other ones online and seeing how they extracted the author’s main argument from their source.

 

For someone who started writing in this genre is one thing that you must do is state where you got all your sources from. One thing that is also important is referring to the authors names in alphabetical order. Well in mine annotated bibliography i mention how the author connects the movie to real life that is also something important to do to better your  annotated bibliography. I tend to use the word review a lot in my annotated bibliography i use that word a lot to further my writing and that the word that gets repeated frequently. For anybody who wants to write in any genre the most important thing you need is evidence to further and strengthen your annotated bibliography. things that I have learned from my annotated bibliography is how much dedication authors put into their work. They make sure that the audience understand what the movie is about and is it worth watching it. There’s still things that I want to learn what makes them different from other people and what I mean is how do people trust their opinion. And in what ways do they handle negative feedback with u satisfied audiences. What I have learned about myself as a writer is if I give myself enough time for an assignment it actually turns out better than I thought and I tend to be more creative with the words I use. My strength as a writer is being able to interpret things in my own way. The way I write and think is different from others. I usually try my best to act like i am the author to try to better understand what their message is. Even though I just got into writing and i see a lot of windows on how I can improve like changing my style of writing using different words and context to further my points and make it stronger. The best way to improve on these things is to continue to write more and seek help on how to improve there is no other way to do it than to put in the effort. This annotated bibliography shows us different ways of writing. It gets us to think of ideas and that we never think of and to combine all of it to make one main idea. It gets us to improve the way we write and it also shows us different methods we can use than what we already know.

Jada Mathurin

Professor Jewel 

ENG

11/14/2019

 

            Reflection on annotated bibliography:Spoken Word Poetry 

 

    In my annotated bibliography most of the author’s tones are mournful because of the situations they are in or because of the story they are trying to tell whether its feeling “alone” in a world where everyone needs each other or knowing the strength of your beauty or simply not being able to speak your mind truly . They mostly have an emotional appeal towards the audiences because they want to persuade the audience to connect, feel empathy and also to make a change within their own lives . Expect for two poet’s they use a reason Appeal Maya Angelou “phenomenal woman” wants her audience to believe having confidence to face the world can be a challenging task but you can do it she also wants them to know that being a woman is a blessing , it’s god’s gift to nature to protect and to balance life. Women hold the strength to do anything in this world. For the next piece “ lord is coming” by H.E.R she talks about the reality of life in all of her poems and it’s clear that she does a lot of research and knows a lot about her history in this poem she wants her audience to know that what’s going on in the world rn isn’t right . She talks about disapproving racism and how immigrants are being separated from their families. Theses type of things been going on for way too long and things needs to be a change now.

From all of the Research I did with these poems I learned that you shouldn’t be afraid to help to help someone in need of help because everyone needs someone to lean on , don’t let what’s going on in society put fear in your heart brighter days are coming , you are still capable of love you just need to believe in yourself and love yourself and last but not least if you feel like something needs to be said to speak your truth don’t hold back because your afraid someone won’t understand . speak your mind you never know what will happen. I feel like the authors did an excellent job getting their audience to feel everything they said they also did a good job persuading them to make a change because ik after reading / listening to these poems I want to make a change.

Although I worked on this assignment very hard and tried my best to understand each prom word by word. I would still want to know how to exactly make a poem . I don’t understand how some people can understand how they feel and just write it down and make it into a beautiful poem . Don’t get me wrong I love poem and I understand them but for it just hard to write down my emotions because I could barely understand them . I also wanna know more about my history I feel as though if I don’t know all of my history I will never move on in life “ Those who can not remember the past are condemned to repeat”- George Santayana when I read the quote it hit me hard and it made me want to teach myself more about my history.

 

 

          Motivational speeches are not all one and the same but after extensive listening and reading of these speeches I have noticed many similarities throughout multiple examples of motivational speeches. Similar components are found throughout speeches, even in the sources I have chosen for my annotated bibliography have many similarities. One similarity would be the use of pathos(emotion) over logos and ethos. This is not to say that these speeches do not use logic or credibility but that pathos is more commonly used throughout a multitude of these speeches. the use of emotion is powerful enough to fuel/ motivate someone to action yet also has the power to cloud your reasoning and logic. Another component found in my sources is the use of Rhetorical questions to make people think/reflect. This is powerful in that due to the question being rhetorical an answer is not expected yet the question is meant to stick in your head forcing you to reflect on yourself. Another component used a multitude of times was the use of history whether it be an event in history or a certain time in the speaker’s life. This was used mainly in the form of comparison or callback, where the speaker would compare the past to the present to give their audience a real scope of the amount of time passed and how much change this time brought with it whether large or small. Speeches are a rare use of language in that it motivates people like nothing I’ve ever seen before, a speech will make people risk it all their friends, family and lives no matter the cost and it takes a certain charisma to do it speeches are the ultimate form of rhetoric in that they aren’t subtle they have a point and they have a huge impact on their audience when done right. Speeches are impact they are filled to the brim with passion, emotion and charisma yet i want to know what makes them so deep and meaningful to some that they may inspire a generation, a movement and the world to seek change.

 

          I am a picky writer. I cannot write an assignment that I am not interested/passionate about I will end up putting it off or procrastinating till the last day. Though this is also where I believe my best work comes out and shines. I can ramble on certain subjects/ topics for days at a time when i’m interested in the topic but when i’m not interested it seems as if I have a mental block on the creative part of my brain up until the deadline gets closer and the flood gates seem to open slowly. I know I need to get over this because we are not always going to get topics we are passionate about though i believe the only way to get past this is to get out of my comfort zone and read texts i would class as boring and uninteresting to find a different perspective.

In my Annotated Bibliography, I chose different speeches delivered by different speakers and put them in the same genre named as motivational and inspirational speeches since they all share motivation and inspiration as a similarity. Each and every speech I chose is similar to each other because all of them share an idea of change for the better. The speakers are expecting change because of their speeches and they trying to convey their message to the audience by adding inspiring words and dialogues. For example, Martin Luther King Jr. said, “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character”. Similarly, Malala Yousafzai said, “one book, one pen, one child, and one teacher can change the whole world”. These types of inspiring lines are said by the speakers that helped them spread awareness and catch attention of their audience. The most important thing these speeches share is the idea of freedom of speech. Every speaker delivered their speeches without holding any thoughts in them. They let it all out just so the speech can have the content that is related to the real-world problems. Another similarity is the tone of the speeches, they all give us the feeling of hopefulness which is the main point of their work. They want to make the audience believe that there’s still time for the change to occur. Speakers transporting their beliefs and ideas to the audience in hopeful and optimistic tone is the way to communicate to the audience because it provides audience with a motive for doing something better for the society.

However, I learned about the power of words from this topic. I realized that tongue can be a very powerful element depending on how a person use it and it can impact a lot of people. In my opinion, as a writer I learned the art of creativity. Combining all the speeches in one piece of writing and make a specific genre out of them was the main task I performed. It made my thinking and writing skills even better. To grow as a writer, I need to work more on my craft of writing and my genre to become expert at it. Reading books related to my genre could be the best way for me to accomplish my goal and it can also help me get more creative with my writing because I can choose more sources from different books and write annotated bibliography on them. I might try different genres too just to get a little hint about them and it can be beneficial for me because sometimes it’s better to look into new categories. Speech is the genre where figurative language is used quite often, so I have to work on breaking down the metaphors, simile, personification etc. in my explanations of the speaker’s quote to give more details to the reader.

Arnelle Martinson

English  1101

Professor Jewell

November 14,2019

 

Annotated Bibliography Reflection

 

       My annotated bibliography genre was based on restaurant reviews. In the restaurant review annotations, I saw many similarities that all the sources share which is very significant in writing a restaurant review.  All of my sources share the same point of giving the audience a description of the food that is being sold at the restaurant. For example, in one of my sources it directly states the type cuisine being served which is Caribbean food and it tells the audience the specific foods to order when they visit. The second thing that all my sources share is a casual and informative tone in order to describe the restaurant. The reviewers of the restaurant also share one common dislike about the restaurant which is the high pricing of the food served.This sticks out to me because it shows that many restaurant reviewers like to have a restaurant that is affordable and not too expensive. Lastly, the restaurant reviews all share first person point of view because it describes the food and customer service based on how they feel about the restaurant’s environment. This shows that all restaurant reviews are very opinionated and biased. After looking through my annotated bibliography I learned that within my genre you need to have a claim or a well developed opinion and you need strong substantial evidence to back up that claim.  This evidence and claim will help persuade the audience to visit the restaurant or not. I don’t really have a question that remains with me.

 

Self Reflection

 

        After writing my annotated bibliography genre for restaurant reviews I realized that I have a lot to work on my writing skills. One of the hardest parts of completing this assignment was using a lot of details in order to describe what I am trying to say. I realize that when I wrote my annotated bibliography I was very vague.I feel like I could have gone more into detail and explain my reasoning better. I need to work on using more evidence to describe my work. That was a major challenge doing this annotated bibliography because it is hard when you have to express what the reviewer is trying to prove. This makes you have to look at it from a different angle without copying everything the writer mentions in order to describe the reviewer’s claim. I also feel another challenge I had  was using more vocabulary to express myself instead of using basic words such as “ good,bad, sad,etc”. In order for me to become a better writer I have to expand my vocabulary. I feel that I need to read a little more and copy down different words that I don’t understand on a daily basis and this will help me improve.. My strengths for my annotated bibliography was pinpointing the authors claim and being able to detect whether this restaurant review was well detailed and the evidence was substantial in order for it to persuade the audience.

My genre is a cover letter. The cover letter is usually sent to the recruiter along with the resume, which is used to brief the recruiter about his motivation to apply for the position.  People write cover letters in order to get a job they like.  Since the main purpose of the cover letter is to introduce myself to the recruiter, the cover letter I shared was written in the first person.  Recruiters need to understand each other’s strengths when looking for talent.  Therefore, every cover letter requires the author to show his own strengths.  However, only the specialty is not enough to attract recruiters, but also needs enough work experience, readers can learn from my work experience, my ability to deal with special things, and my work skills.  The cover letter is intended to attract recruiters. It is obviously not enough to introduce yourself. It also requires certain skills, such as: praise the company you applied for and praise the advertisement for recruitment.  The beginning of the cover letter I shared mentioned the praise.  I learned in the topic of cover letter, I need a good diploma, my own strengths, and a wealth of work experience to find a good job.  So I plan to go to another company for an internship for a while before I find a job, to increase my knowledge.  When I write my cover letter, I need to find a way to make readers feel good about myself, so it is necessary to praise the recruiting company.  Finally, I also want to learn how to write a cover letter that is of interest to recruiters.  Because proper funny can make readers feel good about me.

Through this writing, I learned how to summarize and simplify what to express.  I think that Imagination is my strength when I was writing. For example, when I saw a report about the hygiene of a restaurant being unqualified, I can imagine the process of the chef smudging food in the cafeteria.  And not found.  I can express the same thing in different ways.  For example: “I like other people’s girlfriends” can also be said as “I like girls already have a boyfriend.”  But at the same time, I also found that I have many shortcomings.  I hope that my ability to use words and grammar will be improved. These two aspects are my weakest places.  To achieve this goal, I need to read more English books and watch English TV programs.