Category: Uncategorized

What is “Academic” Writing?

• Carroll, Lee Ann. Rehearsing New Roles: How College Students Develop as Writers. Carbondale: Southern Illinois UP, 2002. Print.
• Basically giving pin points of what exactly writing is when you get to college. Several myths that you might think are true about writing. It also gives you a way on how to analyze writing and what exactly ‘analyze’ means.
• Coming into college, writing seems much more harder because you might feel like you have to meet some sort of expectation in college. Theres always room for improvement an this article talks about the complications of writing and what you need to know, somewhat puts a beginner into college at ease.

Why is Academic Writing So Academic?

• Rothman, Joshua. “Why Is Academic Writing So Academic?” The New Yorker, The New Yorker, 18 June 2017, www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/why-is-academic-writing-so-academic. Accessed 24 Sept. 2017.
• This article is talking about how academic writing is part of a system by professors. Seems to be saying that in journalism, theres far more people that you have to write for. In academics, you write for professors. Professors generate traffic in academics and the people generate the traffic of popularity in journalism. In academic writing the target is smaller, so pleasing one person will do you the trick rather than trying to please a larger group of audience.
• I guess it is a bit odd that academic writing can sometimes be like journalism writing. Right now I’m down academic writing, but it’s on a blog so its somewhat of journalism and academic. He says in the article that the professors shape academic writing , so does that mean if professors begin to get more tech savvy, academic writing will portray to journalism writing ?

Why I Write

• Rothman, Joshua. “Why Is Academic Writing So Academic?” The New Yorker, The New Yorker, 18 June 2017, www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/why-is-academic-writing-so-academic. Accessed 24 Sept. 2017.
• the author wrote as a child but did not really begin to punish until he was older. He wrote about current events such as the Spanish American War. He wrote a lot of stuff as a kid just for fun. So he says that there are essentially four motives of writing: Sheer Egoism, Aesthetic Enthusiasm, Historical Impulse, and Political Purpose.
• It seems to me that the author writes for political purpose and aesthetic egoism. He wrote against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism. Basically what I’m getting from reading this short story is that when he was younger he wrote things that were amusing to him, for example the poem about the tiger and the play. As he got older, he began to write about what was going on around him. He seems to be a political writer and likes to write about what is going on in society. It is kind of confusing how he says writers are selfish ad vain, considering he is a writer himself.

After reading my own writing and performing the ethos/pathos/logos analysis, I saw how If I had not used it, my writing would’ve been very in effective. Re-readng my own wording again made me notice a lot of changes I could have made. Using these methods to write would really improve my writing  and allow me to be more detailed than I am right now. Using ethos/pathos/logos make persuasive writing far more balanced and adequate. Using the rhetorical method of analysis, I distinguished a lot of things I could have done differently to make my writing more conniving and proper. The Toulmin method is a great method to write clear and efficiently. Both of these methods can help me improve as a writer. The more clear I can write out my thoughts, the more higher quality my writing will be. These methods, were enhancing my writing as I was analyzing my own writing from last year in high school. If I were to use these methods instead of the way I wrote, I would have an exceptional piece of writing.

In this reading “Content and Form”, the author is talking about  the difference in how things are said, and what things are said. He says that there is a difference between the both of them and goes on to talk about how they differentiate.  The author references Aristotle and Quintilian to support his claim. Aristotle’s logos and lexis definitions support his claim about what is Sid, and how it is communicated. Furthermore, Quintilian shows the difference between res and verba. The author talks about how language is more than just delivering a thought, it affects the thought process.

There doesn’t seem to be much rebuttal here, as far as I can tell. When he says that the division between what is said and how It is said is problematic, I would consider that a rebuttal because he compares that to religion, philosophy, and science and makes a comparison to that.

I think the Toulmin method isn’t very affective to me. In my opinions, it doesn’t do anything better for me, just another technique to analyze a reading and understand it.

Ethos

• Ethos is a persuasive appeal based on ones character.
• For example, in order to persuade someone to make them believe that smoking is bad, you could quote a doctor or use someone that has researched smoking for years. Because they have more knowledge in the topic and are credible resources, it would be considered ethos when quoting the in writing.
• This appeal is successful because both parties have excessive knowledge in the area of smoking and its affects, therefore it would be more believable than someone on the bus saying smoking is bad.
• You mainly use ethos when trying to persuade someone to take your side.

Pathos

• Pathos appeals to emotion.
• For example, once I was buying makeup for my mom for mothers day and the cashier rung it up and I thought it was too expensive so I told her to take something out, the cashier made me feel bad and said my mom did so much for me and I ended up buying it and paying for everything.
• This appeal  is successful because your emotions are very constant in your decision making.
• You can use pathos when emotions are taken into consideration when choosing sides.

Logos

• Logos is an appeal to logic and reasoning.
• For example, when trying to persuade someone which drink has more sugar: coke or pepsi, you would use statistics and logic to convince someone.
• This appeal is effective because it states facts and gives logical reasoning.
• Logos is normally used when giving statistics and giving true statements and facts. It is best used to convince someone giving true logical thinking and reasoning.

My name is Rida. I am 18 years old and I’m currently in my second semester of college. I was born and raised in New York and my parents grew up in Pakistan. I always grew up acknowledging that hard work always leads to success which is why I’m studying Finance with the goal intended to come out as a success. I took this class due to the reason that I am currently not confident in my writing and have trouble writing publicly as well. I would like to improve my writing skills and hopefully be able to write a piece that sounds well written and professional. I think I write like I am in middle school, and I really need to improve that so I’m really hoping that to class will help with that. This is also a required class, so I really have no other choice but to take it now or later. I hope you guys enjoy reading my posts!!