Feb 27

Summary

In the article Reading and Writing without Authority Penrose and Geisler argue that knowledge or lack of knowledge is not what determines one’s authority. To show this, Penrose and Geisler examine a text from a first year student and a text on the same subject written by a doctoral student. After the two texts were examined Penrose and Geisler came to the conclusion that authority is determined by the level of one’s experience with writing and the confidence that comes with it.

QDs

3. The information transfer model refers to Janet’s writing because she is still a student in the writing world, and the way that she writes is by finding research and transferring the information into her writing. Another reason that Janet uses this method is a lack of knowledge of the subject, which leaves her with no other choice than to regurgitate information. Roger, on the other hand, is a graduate and may look at writing in a different way then Janet because, he sees his writing as conversational and less structured. Also his knowledge of the subject allows him to have a “continual process”.

4. I think that this was the case because as a student Janet was probably more confident in her sources because they are published articles and she probably looks at herself as an amateur. I also experience this with my writings, and I would rather rely on my sources then my own thoughts.

5. My writing is more like Janet’s because I am more of an information- transfer model rather than a constructivist model of knowledge. I am an information- transfer model because I feel that I am an amateur with my writings, so I rely on my sources and findings to compose my texts.

MM

After reading this article, the next time I write a research paper I will try not to just regurgitate the information I find. I will write with more a constructive and conversational way. Also, I will not lessen my abilities by second guessing my own thoughts and relying mainly on my sources.

Reflection

This article really made me think about how I lessen my ability to have authority. The whole article I referred to Janet’s ways of writing as my way because we share many similarities. I hope that from now on when I write I will be able to have more authority in my writing.

Cover Letter #3

The main point the our group was attempting to address is that there are many factors that contribute to people's literacy stories. To show this, we interviewed six individuals and asked them about their stories as to how they became literate and what their thoughts about it are now. We got a variety of answers which backed up our point that there are many contributing factors to people's literacies. I liked this project because it was a nice break from the standard papers that have been previously assigned. However, there were some difficulties that came with making the website, but all in all, it was pretty easy to compose a website

http://literacyhistory.webs.com/

Feb 24

Summary

In her article “Identity, Authority, and Learning to Write in New Workplaces”, Wardle argues that in order to succeed in your writing, you sometimes must change. Wardle discuss how your identity may conflict with a new discourse community. She presents this information by telling a story about Alan who has recently graduated from college and is struggling to communicate with his fellow employees.

QDs

3. I think that Alan and his work community did not have positive results because, he was not willing to change in order to “fit in”. I think that if he allowed himself to change for his fellow workers, then he would be able to communicate more fluently.

4. I do agree with Thompson when e states that people use language unconsciously. I think that in my writing, along with everyone’s writing, you put yourself in the writing without even attempting to. When you put yourself in your writing there may often be underlying meaning that you never intended to put.

5. I agree more with what Wardle by saying that Alan was resisting the discourse community. I think that Alan would have been able to successfully join his discourse community if he would have been able to adopt the identity that people in that community imagined for him.

6. I think that Alan is a community member not a tool, because he is a random sampling.

7. One example of a person that has institutionally ascribed authority that lost it by linguistic behaviors is my basketball coach. This incident happened after a game when he was giving his post game speech but, he used language and words that were not necessarily appropriate for the situation. He temporarily lost authority from me because of his actions.

AEI

1.     I think that a person that has authority over texts and within a discourse community is someone who has been educated thoroughly. They must be able to answer questions and educate others about the topic. The only authority I seemed to have was on my sports teams when I was an upperclassman. I feel that I slowly gained authority with my experience and skill with the game, and by the time I was a senior others looked up to me and respected me with my decisions.

Feb 22

Summary

In her article, Discourse Communities and Communities of Practice Johns extends the thoughts that Swales and Gee discuss about discourse communities. However, Johns goes further by explaining the problems that can occur with discourse communities. She discusses issues such as rebellion from certain communities.

QD

1.     John’s discusses the political aspects of joining in a discourse community. Some people may feel that you do not belong or they are above you, which makes it difficult to join a certain community. Also, Johns says that when a discourse community changes views it is difficult for some people within the community to change with everyone else.

2.     John’s means that people who join a discourse community may not have the EXACT same views as the others, and they can make minor changes to others thoughts. I feel that this is always happening in the exploration of science. First, the world was thought to be flat until Christopher Columbus persuaded people it was actually a sphere. Another example could be that everyone thought the earth was the center of the solar system until Copernicus declared that it is actually the sun that is in the center.

3.     I haven’t felt that learning to write or speak in a new discourse community conflicted with my sense of self, values, or beliefs. However, I have attended a public school my entire life, which is filled with a plethora of different personalities, and gave you an opportune environment to express yourself. Also my family is very supportive in whatever it is that would make me happy, which also could be another reason I have been exempt from this conflict.

4.     I do agree with what Johns is saying because in my opinion, to be fully submerged in a discourse community your views should be strong about the subject. An example of this could be the Greek life on a college campus. I have heard people say how much they have disliked fraternities but once they join they swear by them

5.     My authority over the types of texts I have done so far in college is very slim. Every writing assignment that I have done has set rules to follow and a certain viewpoint to argue. The only authority that I have had in college is when the teacher allows us to pick the topic to write about but, that is still very limited.

6.     Rule breaking is a “minefield” for students but not for more famous or established academic writers because as a student it is a big risk to break the rules because, it is our teacher’s final decision in the end. While established writers can take the risks because they are already well known, so they can basically make their own rules.

Meta Moment

The ideas that Johns discussed made me not want to abide by the rules of a discourse community. I feel that when you do not fully abide by the rules you contribute to the community.

Reflection

I thought that this article was somewhat repetitive because some of the ideas discussed were previously mentioned in Swale’s and Gee’s articles. However, I did like how Johns brought up questions to think about that have not been brought up before.

Feb 20

Summary

In the article The Concept of Discourse Community Swales describes his “six characteristics” of a discourse community. These six characteristics are what allow people to know which community they actually fall into. When these characteristics are utilized it makes it easier for people to join another community.

QD

1.

·      A community will always have known common goals that are trying to be met. When there are goals to be met, the interactions are more effective.

·      Every community will have its own means of interactions. There are many forms of interactions that are used: meetings, technology, letters, memos, etc.

·      Members of the community use the interactions to get constructive information back.

·      If thoughts or opinions of the group change, then they will use the change to their advantage, and absorb new information from the change.

·      Each community have a specialized way of speaking or writing. Some communities have abbreviations for certain words, while others will use different punctuation.

·      Discourse communities will see many different changes in its members, however, in order for the community to remain stable there must be balance between the experts and the amateurs.

3. Swales would not look at first- year college classroom as a discourse community because the thoughts and opinions of the students of the classroom are probably not the same. However, a graduate class would be a discourse community because you probably share the same values with others in your class after so many years of college.

5. A discourse community that I am currently in is one involving my friends. Our goal, most of the time is to have fun and enjoy life with one another. The way that we talk to each other can be viewed as our lexis, because we sometimes use terms and make jokes that others will not understand.

Meta Moments

I personally don’t understand anything differently in my own writing, but Swales made it very clear to what a discourse community needs to survive.

Response

Beginning this article was very hard to understand and follow, but when Swales began discussing the different characteristics it was more clear. At times I felt that this article was difficult to read. I did think it was interesting how he listed the six characteristics that discourse communities are consisted of.

Gee Summary

In the article Literacy, Discourse, and Linguistics Gee discusses how language and grammar are not important at all, but ways of “being in the world” are what make up a Discourse.

QD

3. A discourse just describes the connected strengths that make sense. Discourse with a capital D is describing how one is “being in the world”. Discourse with a lower case d is a part of Discourse.

4. Primary Discourse- This is the first thing we do to understand the world.

Secondary Discourse- We leave our comfort zones at home and interact with institutions not at home

Dominant Discourse- these are when we find our inspiration

Non dominant Discourse- These are interactions between your community

5. The implication of this claim is that we all are one big discourse community, however, we are separated with different views.

6. This is connected to his claims about the relationship between Discourse and identity because when a person learns how to read and write, a person can interact with their own community. Also they will be able to find out what they “say, do, value, believe”.

7. I think that Gee is explaining a form of survival of the fittest, because in order to stay in that dominant Discourse you need to be able to be knowledgeable and prove that you belong in that group. This reminds me of fraternities in college because, the pledges need to learn the fraternity’s ways and prove to them that they would like to join,

8.The benefit to having tests within a discourse community is to maintain a strong and intelligent group.

11. A discourse community that I am involved in is the one with my friends. I know that I am in it because I feel a sense of acceptance.

 AEI

2. My primary discourse, along with many other people began with the values and views of my family. My family was my first influence on me, which put me in the same discourse community as them. We understand each others communications either by tone of voice, or phrases.

4. The way that a person should navigate between this type of Discourse communities by learning what others values are and use that information to expand your horizons.

Response

This article was very difficult for me to thoroughly read. However, I understood the main ideas that Gee was trying to get across to the reader. 

Cover letter #3

Link: http://literacyhistory.webs.com/

In our website we discussed the different types of motivations, and literacy sponsors that people had as children and as their literacy skills increased. Each of us interviewed two people and asked them what their motivation was to learn how to read and write, and if they enjoy reading and writing. We got many responses, but many people said that their parents were the ones who began the learning process. We also found that there were some differences in the schooling the people have been through. We interviewed individuals that have attended both private and public schools, and the responses that we received did reflect that. A problem that we had was that the website we were using to compose our own webpage caused some problems. There were numerous times that the website froze and we would have to wait for long periods of time to make any more changes. Another difficulty that we had was making a clearly stated argument to write about. I did like how this gave us a break from the basic paper format.

paper #4

For my fourth paper I am going to expand on my thoughts about grammar, like I attempted in my first paper. I would like to discuss how teaching grammar is flawed and the stress put on it is also not necessary

link to final paper

http://www.scribd.com/hartmanb93/d/81146752-Paper-2-Draft

Cover letter

With this paper I was trying to dissect my writing process to find what has always been holding me back. I discuss how I alway wait till the last minute to write a paper although I make numerous attempts to begin every writing assignment. I thought that I was able to relate my writing process very well to Allegra Goodman's thoughts about the inner critics. I did find it difficult to have my paper have a good flow throughout the paper, however, I thought that this paper was a lot easier to write than the previous one.

Feb 8

Baron Summary

In his article From Pencils to Pixels: The Stages of Literacy Technologies Dennis Baron discusses the impact that technology has on writing. He explains the evolution of writing technologies that we would not have classified as “technology” if he hasn’t brought it to our attention.

Response

I thought that this article was somewhat interesting because of Dennis’s thought process. I thought it was interesting how he explains that there has always been technologies with writing, however, technologies now are more elaborate, and expensive. He would go as far as to say that a simple pencil was once state of the art technology.

QD

2. I do not agree with Baron’s idea that new technologies change the shape or nature of writing, because I feel that the ideas of writing will always be the same. I do not think that simply enhancing the technologies to do so will change the nature of writing as a whole.

4. Another literacy technologies that were once “high technology” but is no longer is the typewriter. The typewriter, when newly introduced, was a fast, simple, and neat way to write without using a pencil. However, now a typewriter is something of the past and it is no longer a luxury to have. The new technology that substituted for the typewriter is that computer which is still being used today.

6. The illustrations and pictures that were shown throughout the article really did help contribute to his ideas throughout the article. All the pictures showed some sort of thought towards technology. I like the Marilyn Monroe and Abraham Lincoln picture to show that technology can now be used as forgery.

Malcolm X Summary

In this excerpt Learning to Read Malcolm X discusses how he learned to read despite his unfortunate upbringing. He discusses how he would read for motivation, which would fuel him to read more and more.

Response

I thought that this excerpt was somewhat inspirational because Malcolm X was able to overcome his many obstacles and become very skilled in the field of literacy. I thought it was interesting how he discussed his education as “homemade” and even in the worst conditions (prison) he made the best out of it.

QD

1.     I think that Malcolm’s audience is people who do not have the same opportunities as others, but they have a drive. I think that he wants these people to take his life stories and use it as motivation to accomplish their own goals and dreams with literacy.

2.     He defines literacy as being able to read and to be able to understand. This is similar to the school based definition, but his was of defining it is more vague.

3.     School, prison, books, and letters would be the main sponsors that Malcolm X discusses throughout this excerpt. I think that books and prison were the most influential because prison gave him the environment to continue reading and books were the information that he was retaining.

4.     I think this was the case for Malcolm X because he was never privileged as a child to become successful in literacy.

6.     I have never had a huge motivation in writing, however, I have had motivation towards sports, which is similar to Malcolm’s reading motivation because I would put great deals of time towards sports.

AEI

I think that new technologies are beginning to change the way we look at literacy because now there seems to be other criteria other than just reading and writing. We now communicate through other forms such as texting which has its own form of literacy.

Alexie Summary

In his article The Joy of Reading and Writing: Superman and Me Alexie explains how he taught himself how to read with the superman comics. He also talks about his father’s contribution to his teachings by motivating him and buying him books.

QD

1.     I think that having expectations as a child plays a very large role in their literacy learning. I think that minority ethnicities are the most negatively impacted because their expectations are not as high as others. I think that my experiences with this were positive because I was privileged to have parents that cared about my learning and I was able to attend a school with skilled and caring teachers.

AE1

I do think that everyone can overcome poverty and discrimination with determination and motivation, but it will not be an easy road. The person must have somewhat of a mental toughness and a drive.