Major Inquiry Project So Far...

So far, we've made a lot of progress with our major inquiry projects. I turned in my pieces of rhetoric to Dr. Minslow. My paper is going to go very well and I'm pretty sure that making my portfolio will be very fun.

Next week we will begin working on outlines and gathering more information for our persuasive papers. I think there is a ton of helpful information for my topic but I don't want it to be too broad. I can't decide on whether or not I want my paper to be solely based on children in abusive domestic situations or if I want to work on how men, women, and children in abusive domestic situations. I think I will work on the latter due to the fact that I can express every thing that I want to without having to limit myself so much.

Pieces Of Rhetoric

I had a lot of ideas for my pieces of rhetoric that I would make for my NPO and I decided I will do all of them and then narrow it down when I'm finished. So far I've made one of the posters and a bumper sticker, next is a wordle and another poster idea that I have. A lot of good ideas were shared in our peer review groups.

Lately, the thing that needs to be focused on the most is my research paper. Everything for the most part is laid out I just need to put it all together. We were introduced to what will be needed for our portfolios and resources that we could use to make them. The portfolio looks like it will be really fun to work on.

The majority of our time lately has been spent working with our project groups and deciding what we are going to use as our two types of rhetoric for our NPO's. I decided to change my topic from veteran homelessness and have made a lot more progress. After sharing ideas with my group-mates I clearly understand what I want to do now. Dr. Minslow has given us great ideas on what to use as online resources and reminded us to keep working on those research papers. My to pieces of rhetoric will be bumper stickers and a posters, I have the ideas already laid out for how I want them to look so that shouldn't be much of a problem. These two pieces of rhetoric wil go great, hopefull I wont have to change NPO's.

Collage

How does this collage represent my identity?

This collage shows the things that I care the most about in my life and special memories. I had a lot of fun picking the pictures but found it a little difficult to narrow it down to which photos I actually wanted to represent who I am. The first picture is my puppy, Buddy. We used to be stuck like glue and were always together having fun; he was what cheered me up when I was down and made my day. The picture of the Bible represents my religion because it is very important to me. The violin and poetry have been passions of mine for as long as I can remember, and there's a picture of my friend HT's party a couple weekends ago. These things give an idea of who I am or what I stand for, things that people probably wouldn't know just from me introducing myself. Pictures are worth a thousand words and just these few do an okay job of describing who I am.

What are the links between images and identity and our society? What types of images do identify with?

Pictures in society represent what we want our reality to be. We associate things in photographs with the way our lives our supposed to be lived and try to alter the way we do things or record our lives through photographs to how we've seen others in our everyday lives. Like the Dove ad that we watched in class shows, many photographs can have different impacts on how we think and change our lives. The types of images that I identify with the most would be things like manga, abstract, religious, or things like my friends and I having fun together.

“America 24/7: A Family Photograph Album”

I'm assuming the exhibit will have pictures of the American flag, Presidents,old history, fast food places, or old rock and roll. Essentially these are things that could also describe the old America but are used to describe for the most part the way that things are today. In order to capture the essence of American character in communities the photographer needs a vast variety of backgrounds and areas because there are different definitions of the words, "American Culture".

I wasn't surprised to see Abraham Lincoln or Native Americans paddling on a lake, but I think the photographer really captured culture by adding in photos of Mexican American children, a woman doing yard work, or a young girl posed in front of a mirror caring a lot about prom and her appearance. These are things that for the most part are what the "new" American culture is about . Technology, appearances, and independence are what now represent us and the photographer and Patrick Cox did a remarkable job capturing it in mere photos.

This picture is pretty self-explanatory. Dr. Minslow asked us to find a picture that we felt represented America and described it in a photograph. This photograph shows the main corporations that everyone knows about and that pretty much run the economy. In a weird way our fate is in the hands of the corporations. These corporations on the flag are replacing the importance of the stars that are meant there and the people that the stars represent. This is a photo that in some ways represents America the best to me.

Reality

So, our homework assignment for this weekend is to post an unedited picture of us doing something everyday. As I am a fan of dental hygiene I easily chose brushing my teeth. Don't laugh to hard! XD

Class so far...

This past week we've been working more in depth with rhetorical analysis'. We learned more about what affects how we view the world, and how reality is sometimes not even apart of the way we see things; that in ways reality is something we both create and defy. We turned in our research proposals for our Major Inquiry Projects.We got a lot more in depth on the film "Capitalism: A love story" by Michael Moore and discovered biases, gaps, and hypocrisies through reflection. We will begin working on our letters to the non-profit organizations this upcoming week.

Capitalism: A love story

There are many opinions of Michael Moore. Some believe he's too drastic, obnoxious, or that he's just plain annoying. He uses statistics, different uses of pathos, and his personal experiences to influence beliefs on capitalism. Personally, I like that Michael Moore is willing to take drastic measures for what he believes in. Not keen on his political preferences, but I agree with a lot of the points made in his film and how he handled them. He shed a new light on a topic that everyone has heard mentioned before, but that no everyone necessarily understood or the seriousness of it. There are some thing that I do disagree with though, he blamed the fear of the people on George Bush, the messenger. Bush wasn't the smartest president in office, do you really think he knew what he was delivering or the consequences? The economy was set up by the banks so that if people revolt the economy fails and if they don't the banks still get what they want and the economy still fails. The passion enough to make this documentary made me happy, because instead of just complaining or talking about it, Moore actually is doing something. Whether it's the "proper" way of settling things or not doesn't matter at this point. The banks don't seem to know what proper is anyways.

MIP

We've officially been introduced to the processes that will be necessary for our Major Inquiry Project. Our project's proposal is due Wednesday, and I've settled down on the topic of Homelessness in Veterans. We found more ways of finding research and expanding our projects this week. I really got a chance to find more directions of taking this project, and ideas and questions to ask that would propel the process of examining this problem in society. The free write we did this week gave us a chance to also face our anxieties about the project and clear our heads to prep for the work to come. With a research and no procrastination, this project should go pretty well.

English thus far.

So far, the class has gone more into depth on Ethos, Pathos, and Logos. We watched different videos and saw different mediums and how they are used to influence how decisions, emotions, and how we live our everyday lives. We discussed more on the influences of situations, advertisements, and different types of media rhetorically and how to think critically about how everything around us influences us and the decisions we make.

Also, we have not only been introduced to our Major Inquiry Project but have started figuring out what topics we want to use. My first idea was to do animal cruelty, due to the fact that I have volunteered at humane and animal shelters in the past. The next idea to do was domestic violence especially in women from personal experiences and homelessness in Veterans. I have had first hand experiences or sen all three so it's hard to pick a certain topic. I've been narrowing it down with research but I haven't come to a specific topic that I want to work with.

English 1102

So far in this English 1102 class, I have learned a lot a bout rhetorical analysis, the processes of writing academically, and steps to arguing in a paper academically. We need to know the purpose of our work, have a motivation for writing it and understand the motivation, and be able to reach the intended audience in a way that can clearly explain what we mean. I've also learned how important contexts are to different related to certain audiences. We have learned the bigger meanings of reflection and editing and how important it is to proof read. Last but not least we were introduced fully to our "Major Inquiry Projects" that are required for our class. This project may seem long and difficult now but with a few steps it should be manageable.

Rhetorical Image

I found this image on another blog about environmentalists and earth conservation since the early nineties. The image is obviously of the planet Earth melting on a cone like ice cream. This is a direct message of global warming and although no words are on the image it screams, Earth first!". The Earth is distorted in the image as would ice cream be if it were melting. The dark background gives a calm feeling leaving the main target to be the message about global warming. This artist clearly put a lot of thought into the depiction of what global warming is doing to the Earth and conveyed it in a simple yet powerful way.

From the time that I was two and a half years old books have played a prominent role in my life. My mother began teaching me to read at a very young age using various methods. I would take my naps and go to sleep with headphones on my ears hooked-on-phonics playing through them. I was constantly wanted to read everything I could get my hands on, or have my parents, siblings, or nanny read them to me. I had a very large selection of books for a toddler, almost every reading program for children imaginable to the entire Dr. Seuss series. I was watching educational videos about reading constantly whenever I wasn’t playing. People always complimented my mom, wondering how she got me to reading at such an early age. And I really have her to thank for being as comfortable and fluent with the English language as I am today.

When it comes to writing, it is one of my favorite hobbies. I write stories, journal entries, poetry, or whatever sparks my imagination. I write usually in my free time or depending on my mood, when I am really inspired. Sometimes poetry or stories from m come from feelings, or simply what I see in my surroundings. Sometimes watching my surroundings sparks me to see other people's lives as a story and I try to imagine an entire plot for them.