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UWP 001
Benedetti
13 March 2017
Reflective Essay
standards of the Council of Writing Program Administrators. The compositions and class
activities I have completed in UWP 1 has given me the opportunity to think critically about
reading, writing, and research. Each assignment in the course has allowed me to expand my
views on writing and analyzing text. In my portfolio consisting of the rhetorical analysis essay of
Rosie the Riveter, discourse community research paper about student activists, and this current
reflection, I feel that I have satisfied the five learning outcomes of the course.
A prominent portion of the course was understanding rhetoric, and I have gained a
thorough understanding of its concepts through the process of creating my rhetorical analysis
essay. In my essay examining the rhetoric of Rosie the Riveter in its primary and secondary
audiences, I display a clear understanding of the other concepts of purpose, context, genre, and
the discourse communities my chosen cultural object appeals to. My understanding of genre and
mode are shown through my explanation of the context of the image as a propaganda poster. The
discourse community essay has also given me opportunity to apply rhetorical concepts by my
discussion of the audiences my selected activist groups appeal how it relates to their individual
purposes. The teaching of rhetoric in the course was significant and I think I have exhibited my
readings, I applied the practice of approaching reading as a social process by actively annotating
my thoughts and questions as I read. The idea of reading with or against the grain influenced me
to see the interactions that take place in reading. The use of cover letters was also a critical part
of the social writing process and helpful to me since it allowed me think critically about my
writing and articulate the areas of improvement in my work. I also benefitted a lot from
collaborating with my peers during peer review and the instructors comments to apply their
suggestions to my revised draft. For example, in my rhetorical analysis, my peers and the
instructor commented to expand more on how the modern use of Rosie differs from the intended
rhetoric in the original image. The contributions and comments others provided on the essay
opened my perspective on my essay to expand more on the modern context of Rosie the Riveter
and write more about the modern adaptations of Rosie. The collaborative and social process of
writing and reading has great value and allowed me to make major improvements for analysis.
Another essential course concept was the knowledge of conventions that are shaped by
discourse communities. For my discourse essay, I did some research on how meetings of these
organizations I studied displayed the modes and genres that exists within these spaces. This
activity gave me the opportunity to think more about the forms and languages of these
communities and the context that created these conventions. The class discussions about
discourse communities also made me understand the various expectations that are shaped in
different communities as people shared their primary discourse communities. The differing
natures of students cultural discourse communities and the academic one made me see how my
own discourse communities and my peers from the academic discourse community allowed me
learning. For my discourse community project, I had to contact campus organizations so I could
do my research and observe their interactions and conventions at their meetings. Prior to this I
did research from the university library about student activist groups and some of the notable
organization in history. This guided me for my primary research since I found that SDS was a
large group in the 1960s. I also researched what activism related groups were at UC Davis and
from there selected CALPIRG as the second subject of my primary research. The tour of the
library website opened me up to the many options to research as a college student. The activities
on how to cite different genres was helpful review for me on how to properly cite text, which is a
of being unhappy with my writing without pinpointing the reason I was not satisfied with it. For
example, in my rhetorical analysis, my main issue was with describing the rhetorical appeals the
image of Rosie the Riveter has within its original context as well as its current political context.
The process of revision and writing cover letters allowed me to think about specific areas where
my rhetorical choices were lacking. Also in the discourse community project, I thought about the
structure of my essay since it was difficult to organize an essay discussing two different
organizations.
If I were given more time to compose my portfolio, I would have created more drafts and
would have conducted more research to expand the content of my portfolio. The quarter system
of the university gives students a very limited time span to write these essays which limits the
depth of my research, specifically for my discourse community project. For this project, I wanted
to further my primary research by interviewing the leaders of the activist groups that were the
subject of my project. The short amount of time made it difficult for me to schedule
appointments with them, so much of my research was limited to my observations from attending
meetings. An issue I had difficulty with during the writing process was incorporating more
analysis and organizing the structure of my essays. In my other essays, I examine two
campus within the discourse community of student activists and my rhetorical analysis explores
the rhetoric of Rosie the Riveter in its original context and its current context. Since I wrote
about two categories within a subject, I had challenges making my essay flow and organize them
clearly. Although I feel mostly content with my work in the course, there could be room for
and metacognition are all important skills that I will use throughout my college education. As a
student, I will take many courses that include writing papers. In the future, I will employ the
ideas of cover letter and revision process to improve my writing and apply metacognition to
think critically about my work. The strategies of research and conventions will be extremely
relevant to me as a Biology major as well. I will likely have to write papers on science-related
topic which require effective research strategies and knowledge of conventions and formats in
scientific writing. Also, the perspective of writing and reading as social processes will assist me
in collaborating with peers when discussing or writing about a topic as well us acquire deeper
knowledge in the many forms of text I will come across during my college career. Overall, I
believe the outcomes of the course are successful in preparing students like myself to write in an
academic setting.