Blog one post discussing your ideas for Project 3. How do you think you will approach this composing project? What things about yourself or your interests would you like to highlight? How might you be able to do that effectively? Also, what software do you think you’ll use? Do you have a few you can try?

I’m a little stuck on my idea for project three. I am not the most creative person, so it’s hard for me to think of something at the moment. I really want to think of something great, because I am really excited for this project, but nothing comes to mind. I have some ideas, however. I am really into music and it has become a huge part of my life. My favorite artist, Juice Wrld, died a couple months ago and he was really special to me. His music helped me get out of a real tough time in my life. I wanted to implement something involving him into my self portrait, because I really take his music to heart. I am also a really big sports fan. The Patriots and Celtics are really important to me. I know this project is supposed to describe your own personality and I’m not sure if those two ideas would be considered as a representation of my personality, but they are definitely a big part of my life. Maybe I can take a goofy picture of myself wearing some apparel, because I am definitely a goofy person behind the scenes and this will implement important things to me.

Hearing the details of project 3 has got me very excited. I appreciate, so much, the creativity we are allowed to have with all of our assignment, but this one in particular. This project gives me a chance to express myself and make a piece of artwork that I created myself, from start to finish. I am very excited to start this project. I have a boatload of ideas on what I am going to do to express who I am. Sometimes, in this world, we forget who we are because of all of the outstanding pressures applied in our everyday lives. For me, it is hard to express my creativity with constant bursts of mass homework and tests and quizzes. These online classes have really been stressing me out and I truly feel like this project is a perfect way to calm my senses and work on a fun and creative piece of art. Shipka’s idea about a composition “made whole” is the idea that it is important to see, and so to understand, the final product in relation to the complex and highly rigorous decision-making processes the student employed while producing artwork. This project directly relates to Shipka’s theory, because we are digging deep inside who we really are and this will teach us a great deal of our person.

Blog one post to determine the following things for today’s text (these are two chapters from the same book so you can treat them as one text): 

1. Who is talking/writing?
2. Who is the primary audience for this text?
3. What does the text say (or imply) “rhetoric” is? What does this text say (or imply) “genre” is?
4. What is the main argument or message of this text? 
5. What does this text say about the importance of rhetoric in the sciences?

Robert R Johnson is the author of the excerpt, “For the Love of Pretty Things: The Radium Girls and ‘Dying for Science'”. Before getting into the story of Katherine and the other radium girls, he starts off by describing the term ‘invention’ and where the word originates. He says how invention comes from the Greek and Roman term ‘inventio’ which means “making new”. He describes that humanity continuously invents, reinvents, makes new technology. At one point in time humanity invented the atom bomb. This occurred during the time period of World War II. Power went to the heads of military figures and they started abusing their knowledge of atomic bombs and radiation. This brings us to the story of how four women factory workers would make clocks and dials and, while making them, would use this radioactive luminescent paint. The paint was highly toxic, however. The factory knew of this, but decided not to tell the factory workers. This story is a story of these brave women who fought for a cause. They gave their lives for the greater good and equal rights.

• What discipline/profession have you selected? 
• What do students of that discipline/profession write in school? 
  • What topic do students write about?
  • What genres are students asked to write in? 
  • What research methods are students learning?
• What do professionals of that discipline/profession write at work?
  • What topics do they write about?
  • What genres do they write in?
  • What research methods are common?
  • What (groups of) people do they write for? Who reads their writing?
  • Where do professionals in this field place value in writing? Meaning, how do professionals in 
  • this field conceptualize “good” writing? 
  • What are the potential consequences of writing poorly, being sloppy with documentation, or 
  • not adhering to disciplinary conventions?

For project 2, we are asked to write about our research of a discipline/profession and the way they use specific rhetoric for that field. I chose to research Mechanical Engineering. This is the major I am pursuing in college, so I thought it would be a smart idea to do some research on this topic, it also will be interesting to me since it directly involves me. Students in this profession mostly write different reports and resumes for school. Students can write about anything from electric fields to a report on how they built a boat from scratch with a budget of $100. The main research method we learn is via experimentation, I feel as if most engineers have similar ways of learning and from my experience it seems that we learn best doing hands on activities. Mechanical engineers utilize writing daily to communicate design ideas, create manufacturing instructions, report test results, verify project progress, create user manuals, and disseminate information. Writing provides an essential means of communication. Different types of engineers and scientists would find these writings useful. Most professionals in the science fields all work together in their own ways to advance the science world. “Good” writing is considered very specific and to the point reports that can be easily read, but have a lot of information to them. Potential consequences of “bad” writing can be messing up a whole experiment and delaying the progress of science. Rhetoric and writing is very important in the engineering field and I can’t wait to finish my research.

Blog one post to determine the following things for today’s text (Palmeri): 

1. Who is talking/writing?
2. Who is the primary audience for this text?
3. What does the text say (or imply) “rhetoric” is? What does this text say (or imply) “genre” is?
4. What is the main argument or message of this text? 
5. What does this text say about the importance of rhetoric in other fields like law and medicine?

“When Discourses Collide” is written by Jason Palmeri, who is a doctoral student in English at Ohio State University. I think the primary audience of this text is the academics of rhetoric, more specifically those in the fields of health care and law. Palmeri explains how he thinks it can be difficult to conduct experiments or researches with only one specific field doing the research. He thinks that collaborations between fields can be greatly beneficial towards research. The article written presents a case study of collaboration between nurses, attorneys, and professional writers for law firms. Palmeri thinks that a roster as versatile as this, should be able to solve a majority if the problems thrown their way. This is a good strategy to tackle different experiments or research and can be very beneficial for future research. The rhetoric in the different fields coincide together and each field uses their own rhetoric to work together.

Blog one post outlining your thoughts about research (aka “inquiry” or “information literacy”). What is research for? Why do people do it? Why do researchers use different methods? What research methods have you used? What about research is confusing for you? Respond to two posts in your group

Research is very important for learning. My whole life, I have had to do research for all different types of things. In school there were research papers, essays, and projects. Alison Witte says in her text, “RESEARCH STARTS WITH ANSWERS”, that most students that work on research papers, have the process of choosing a topic, presenting a claim, and then look for ways to confirm it with evidence located through ‘research’. Witte claims that the problem with research papers is that it teaches students to do research for something by looking it up, but it represents only a small part of the research paper. I personally think research is for learning more about a certain subject. The more research you do, the more information you obtain. Researchers use different messages, because everybody learns in different ways. Some people can sift through a bunch of academic readings for their research, but other people learn more from hand on experience. A research method that I use is experimentation. I learn best from doing this hands on and repeating some act over and over again, so doing experiments is a good way for me to learn. Research is confusing for me when I have to read through a bunch of different articles and papers. I have trouble focusing when reading long papers.

Blog one post reflecting on what you learned from completing Project 1. Address the following:

• What did you learn from this assignment?
• How did you learn it?
• Why is this new knowledge significant as it contributes to your learning in (or beyond) this course?
• What do you need to know/do next to prepare for Project 2?

Weeks of working on my first English project of the semester are finished with, and I have finally completed my assignment. This assignment taught me a lot of necessary information, not only about rhetorical ecology, but also about Boston. With regards to rhetorical ecology, I learned that an ecology is similar to a certain culture. It has a specific audience with specific likes and similarities. This project also helped me learn more about my own ecology. Creating a mind map allowed me to expand my thinking and go into the different aspects of the culture of Boston. This new knowledge is significant to my future learning, because it helped me directly relate to the understanding of rhetorical ecology. I can now enter my everyday life, identifying all the different types of rhetorical ecology with my new knowledge. I think, for project two, I need to look more into the topic and then follow all of the writing steps I did for project one and I will do just fine.

Blog one post to determine the following things for today’s text (Miller; Wardle): 

1. Who is talking/writing?
2. Who is the primary audience for this text?
3. What does the text say (or imply) “genre” is?
4. What is the main argument or message of this text? How is this main argument different from Bitzer, Edbauer, OR Herndl & Brown?
5. What is the texts primary rhetorical purpose (i.e., what is the text trying to do)?

The author of this text is Elizabeth Wardle. The primary audience for this text seems to be students, or people trying to learn about writing. The text talks about how there is no such thing as writing in general. Everybody has a purpose when writing an essay or whatever it might be. There is always an audience or purpose of a writer. Wardle says, “context, audience, purpose, medium, history, and values of the community all impact what writing is and needs to be in each situation” (page 30). The author says that writing is always in particular. This kind of reminds me of rhetorical ecology and discourse community. Since everybody is writing to some audience, or to persuade some audience, they are in some sort of ecology or discourse community. This also relates to genre. The purpose of genre is to categorize certain writing to make it easier for readers to determine their interests. Different genres are technically different types of discourse communities. I feel like this text has the purpose of trying to inform people that all writing has a purpose. Although it might not seem like there is a purpose or meaning for some writing, there always is.

Blog one post detailing your revision process for P1 and what you think/feel about your process (So, first, what was your process for revising P1? When/where did you do this? How long did this take? Was this process different than the first draft? If so, how? Then, second, describe how you felt while revising. Where was your stress level? How invested did you feel in your revising process? Is there anything about your process you’d like to be different?)

My writing process for the second draft of our first project, was not too different from my first draft. For my first draft, my process was done in my room where there was no noise and no distractions. I had a clear state of mind and I was able to get all of my work done more quickly. For the second draft I also found a place in the library where I had a space all to myself. I also had no distractions and I was able to concentrate on my work and I made the corrections necessary to fix my project. These corrections took me about an hour. I felt good about my draft when I was revising it. I feel like I met all of the requirements. My stress level was not too much, I was calm for most of the revision process. I can not think of anything that I would change about my second writing process.