Interview - Addie's Bag

Addie's bag initially struck me as a comfortable, utilitarian bag. It is large enough to be a bookbag, yet retains the look and shape of a purse. The blue, cream and green flower design is elegant. It reminded me of a purse that I had bought a friend a couple years ago.

She bought the bag last January at the Alley Cat store on High Street, beside Cold Stone. She considered a black bag instead of blue, but decided the black one would be too similar to a black and green Vera Bradley bag she already owned for over a year. Addie noted that Vera Bradley bags were the only items in the Alley Cat store that weren't meant for old women -- they specialize in more conservative items such as crafts. The bag was the first thing she had ever bought with a credit card.

Addie bought the bag instead of a traditional backpack because it was a more common style for college students. Even though she bought the bag to carry her books, especially on Tuesdays and Thursdays, she now uses it everyday, carrying her books to class, as well as using it for carrying her laptop. She also takes it to work. Even in the summer, she uses the bag everyday. She has also used it as a carry-on bag on a plane, as well as using it on weekend trips. My initial assumption that the bag was comfortable was correct -- she loves the bag's fabric. The design reminds her of her friend Molly, from Maryland. Addie jokes that the bag has a high class, snobby look to it, much like Molly's decor in Maryland.

2/5/09

The Sierra Club is a good example of a public interest group that is trying to use persuasion to further its goals. Its web site's purpose is both to educate new-comers about what its overall goals are, as well as to provide a way for members to stay connected. The website's clean layout is visually appealing, and the main color scheme - green - logically represents the natural environment that the Club is trying to protect.

The site gives many different examples of how it is striving to achieve its goals. For example, it gives a brief summary of its Curbing Carbon Intiative, which involves working with Congress to decrease greenhouse gases. The Club's multiple goals are listed in this fashion, which makes for an effective presentation. The site also features several pages on the history of the foundation, including its founder, John Muir, as well as famous supporters such as Teddy Roosevelt. This is a persuasive tactic, in a way, because it may convince a prospective member of the organization's prestige. The site also features links to newsletters, magazines, blogs, and radio - all ways for members to stay updated and enthusiastic about their membership. For all of these reasons, the web site achieves what it tries to do: convince its audience that is a bonafide purveyor of a worthy cause, and keep its membership enthused and motivated with regularly updated features.

2/3/09

Jack Selzer references a prior publication at the very beginning of his article, when he mentions Janet Emig's The Composing Processes of Twelfth-Graders as an important document in studying writing habits. He uses Odell's Research On Composing as a guide to analyze his subject's writing. Later, Selzer mentions the authors Perl, Pianko, and Stallard, who did research in the same field. He compares the statistics of his subject to the subjects of these authors, as well as Donald Murray and Nancy Sommers. Finally, Selzer quotes Cooper and Odell by pointing out that research in composing "is tentative, subject to continual revision," and pointing out that researchers in the field don't submit to "the fallacy of reducing the composing process to a simple linear scheme," which is a quote by Sondra Perl.

These references to prior publications give credibility to Selzer's article. By showing us that he is aware of the previous research in his field, he ensures us that he knows what he's doing. He is also able to use these prior publications to emphasize certain points, or to compare and contrast with his own findings.

1/29/08

The writer’s opening paragraph is clearly influnced by feedback from the instructor on an earlier draft of the cover letter. In his feedback, the instructor told the writer that the opening paragraph needed a stronger argument to convince the employer that the writer was the worthy candidate for the job. As a result, the final draft has a much more confident tone. For example, in the early draft, the writer says, “I have completed two and a half years at West Virginia University as an undergraduate in civil engineering.” However, in the final draft, he says, “I will bring with me the strong foundation of engineering concepts and principles that I have learned in two and a half years at West Virginia University as an undergraduate in civil engineering.”

The instructor proposes adding an “X,Y,Z” list to two sentences in the writer’s second paragraph. This results in the writer adding more detail to his account of his education in civil engineering. For example, instead of “I have purposely taken a variety of civil engineering classes…”, he writes, “I have purposely taken a variety of civil engineering courses such as transportation engineering, structural analysis I, and fluid mechanics.”

Following the instructor’s advice, the writer strengthens the opening sentence of the third paragraph by making it more confident: “Throughout my work experience I have learned many skills such as hard work, teamwork, and reliability.” Finally, the writer adds several sentences concerning his Mylan Pharmaceuticals internship as a result of the instructor’s advice to do so. This helps emphasize the success of the writer in his previous internship.

To participate effectively in what Faigley describes as the "continuous process of communication," it's important to avoid limiting yourself to one particular type of discourse or style. Faigley's point is that a professional writer has to be in touch with everyone that he or she is communicating with. This includes factors such as dialect, age, or even technology (as shown in the example where the biologist uses an electronic pie chart to display information).

Selzer gives plenty of evidence to back up his descriptions of Kenneth Nelson's work. Selzer organizes the information logically by four different aspects of Nelson's writing: planning and inventing, arrangement, drafting, and revision. He provides enough examples to make it clear that a good amount of observation was conducted for the article. He observed Nelson's notes, memos, drafts, and his finished work. He also kept track of how much time Nelson spent working on different parts of the writing process; he found, for instance, that Nelson spent only 20% of the project development in the composition stage. Selzer also describes Nelson's minimal revision procedure, for example, where Nelson's secretary transfers his handwritten draft into a word processor, so that he can then move on to the editing process.

There are several different kinds of professional writers. Some writers create original material, such as novels, textbooks, film scripts, songs, etc. Other writers, called "technical writers", specialize in translating technical concepts and jargon into something easier to understand. Someone who creates an instruction manual for a bulldozer would be a technical writer. "Copy writers" specialize in marketing a product; they are responsible for the conceptual and technical details of whatever they've been assigned to publish. Editors oversee the writing process, and make necessary changes in the product where they see fit. In many of these fields, technology is becoming an increasingly important factor. Many employers require at least some knowledge of the Web and how to use a computer effectively. Of course, writing, research, and editing skills are critical in any writing job.

I'm very interested in freelance writing as a source of supplementary income. I keep a look out for small job postings on the Internet. A lot of start-up websites look for people to contribute to their site just to get it up off the ground. I'm interested to learn more about copy writing, because it seems like a creative position, but also one with a lot of responsibility. More than anything else, I'm interested to learn what skills are most important for someone who wants to be a writer.