“Using Sources” Summary & Response

There are advantages and disadvantages of having an unlimited amount of information at our reach. The advantage is that there is information about anything imaginable, but the disadvantage is that the information must be deciphered as to being credible or not. The term “infotention” was created by Rheingold as to combine attention skills and information filters and I think that’s very clever because from experience I know that having a long enough attention span to filter large amounts of information is such a dreadful task. The dread begins as soon as a long article is seen or many articles, for that matter. The passage also states that to practice “infotention,” synthesizing and critical thinking is used from the “collective intelligence”of the internet. The passage sums it up as saying focus is needed for attention. There is also the mentioning of “circumstantial evidence” that does not explicitly state the occurrence of something and should not be the only piece of evidence to support a claim. I think the aspect of synthesizing is fairly explanatory but, the question I have is how far can you twist the evidence in your favor without having it be twisted so much that it’s no longer the truth? The passage also talks about paraphrasing and summarizing in which paraphrasing is putting the authors original ideas in your own words and summarizing where enough of the gist of the passage is identified to emphasize a certain point. I was pleased to see the difference between the two because they seemed similar to me even though I knew there was some difference. However, I never knew that the summary was supposed to lean toward a certain point rather than just succinctly rephrasing the text.

“Intro to Refining Your Writing Style” Summary & Response

Writing Styles differ with that of the audience and rhetorical situation/context. There are different styles because different professions or field value different things. The passage gives the example that the scientific field’s writing style differs from the humanities writing style because scientific scholars value timeliness more than the author of the works cited. The following parts of the passage remind me of the previous lectures in which professor mentions the audience should not be the “universe” but should be a specific group or person to give the writing a focus. There is also the aspect of rules/conventions in writing that should be known in order to maintain credibility. The passage raises a good point in that if you break the rules on purpose it could be a writing style or have meaning behind it, but if you’re not aware of the rules then the breaking of them will be meaningless. The point raised about being honest with the audience I think takes a lot of pressure off when it comes to impressing the audience. I think when the writer is just being honest there is a more sincere tone and the argument is more convincing.

Using Sources

When writing a paper, it is important to be sure that you are using good sources to back up your claims. Professor Howard Rheingold coined the term “infotention” in order to describe the action of differentiating between important information and information that can be discarded. By using the infotention process, writers are able to pay attention to the information and sources that they gathered from in an effort to cautiously be aware of which pieces of information to use in a paper. After carefully acquiring your information, the next step is to try and figure out how all these pieces of information can be put together to help form a single claim. At this point, it might be easier if you look for themes, patterns, and commonalities or striking differences between all your sources. After a thorough analysis of all your sources, you will usually have to either paraphrase or summarize the author’s major and minor claims into your own writing. Using quotes may also be helpful in reflecting the claim that you are trying to make to the reader by using examples or phrases from a credible source.

This reading helped me realize the methods in how to differentiate between a credible and non-credible source through the process of infotention. It also helped me realize what to do with the information I gathered, how to connect it all together, and how to include all of it into my own writing.

Introduction to Refining Your Writing Style

Similar to how everyone has their own style of fashion, everyone also has their own style of writing. The way in which someone writes something can determine their audience, purpose of the paper, and how they choose to present themselves to the reader. This is because in different discourse communities, there are different ways in which people speak. For example, in professional or academic discourse communities, one would expect everyone to talk in a more professional or academic manner as opposed to the casual way in which one would address their close friends. This sort of writing applies to many different contexts as well such as in politics, journalism, law, and small talk. This is why it is important for a writer to determine the audience that they have in mind before beginning a paper, so that they can decide on a tone of voice and the type of language that the whole paper will evolve around.

This reading helped be realize the importance of envisioning an audience in your mind before writing a paper. By doing so, it will help you realize the type of discourse that you should use and how professional or casual your writing has to be.

Using Sources

Summary

The information a writer has gathered is meant to supplement their writing. It has to be persuasive for the intended audience. Rheingold has coined the term “infotention” to describe what deserves attention and what doesn’t. Practicing Infotention asks the writer to be cautious of the information available to us on the internet. As a writer, you’re going to need as much evidence to support your claim and understand it as best as you can. After finding your sources you have to synthesize them, and figure out how the sources relate to each other, or not, and help support your claim. The intended audience has not read your sources, most likely, so to bring them up to speed you can paraphrase, where you put an author’s ideas into your own words. You usually paraphrase sources that you expect to use frequently. You could summarize, where you capture the gist of the source by including the key ideas that are emphasized in the source. It is usually shorter than a paraphrase. Quotes are used to show that the writer has referred to experts in their writing. They can either support your claim or present counter-arguments. However, before introducing a quote, give context and signal words. An academic writer who has gone through the trouble of finding and properly using the information will gain more credibility from their audience. The resulting paper will demonstrate the writer’s knowledge on the subject.

Response

From this reading, I have learned that there is a lot of planning involved in academic writing, at least, in well-written ones. As a writer, you are in a position of power/ influence where you will be informing a particular audience about a particular topic. The writer has to be aware of how they use their power, it is their responsibility to do the research and present the information properly.

Introduction to Refining Your Writing Style

Summary

Different rhetorical situations call for different requirements for your writing. Various discourse communities in terms of professions/fields of work use different styles of writing. In order for your writing to carry some credibility in a particular field, you have to appropriate it to fit into the writing conventions used by that field. When writing you want to always keep your audience as well as have your purpose in mind. This will affect what you write and how you write it. As the writer, the audience will look to you for information so write like you know what you’re talking about. 

Response

This is another one of those readings from the book that would’ve been useful at the beginning of the semester. The reading uses language that is inviting because it repeats the notion that there is a lot to learn when writing at the college level. Although I can see its relevance to our current project.