One of the reasons my wife, Nancy, and I moved back to the East Coast was to be closer to family. My sister is coming to town this weekend to help celebrate Nancy's birthday, so I suspect I will be out of touch over the weekend and won't be available to help you.
During this time, if you have questions look to your group or to the class as a whole. You can send questions to the email list or you can call or email a group member.
Right now, you are finishing creating groups and creating a google document and sharing it. In terms of writing, you are moving the rhetorical analysis you have already drafted into the google document and reading those analysis shared with you to try to discover ways of improving your own.
The upshot is I suspect most questions which might arise about how to use google documents, and there are many folks in the class who are already doing so successfully. Draw on these relative experts. Having said this, your best source for help with google documents are the links in my post on them on the class blog, and the Google Documents Help Center found here:
http://documents.google.com/support/
Over the course of my life, I have learned to write and adapt my writing process to using pencil and paper, a typewriter, early computers (I had an Atrai), WordPerfect, several versions of Word, several other computer based word processes, several online applications (like Google, Zoho, and Adobe Buzzword), and voice dictation and transcription. One reason I am having you learn to use google documents is to begin to develop the skills necessary to adapt your existing writing process to new modes of writing and new tools to help you write better. Believe me, you will have to learn to adapt in your careers. The pace of technological change will give you little choice.
Docs is a very, very useful writing tool. No tool is perfect for it's job, just as there isn't a text which can't be improved. Learning to use new tools and "keeping your tools sharp" (as my father used to say) is all part of being a good crafts person.
Having said this, when you're learning to use a new technique or tool and adapting what you already know how to do to these new ways, it can be frustrating. Remember, part of what you are doing is learning how to learn patience with the work it takes to develop new technique.
The upshot? If you find yourself frustrated with learning Google Docs, take a moment to reflect on this frustration, identify the specific reason(s) behind your frustration or the problem you are having, and look to the resources you are learning to use, like the Docs Help Center, other authors, and the community. Remember, when you begin your professional life, you will not have professors to consult, that is, unless you pay my exorbitant consulting fees (currently starting at $50-$100/hour. Yes, this is my *starting* rate, and people and companies pay it.). My advice? Figure out now how to to deal with the frustration of learning new tools now. There are many, many cheaper resources than relying on an expert in the field. Take my being dark this weekend as such an opportunity.
Me? I'm planning on getting in some good visiting.
As always, write with questions. I will tackle them Monday.
Steve
Steve
06 June 2008
Pathos, Ethos, and Logos: Together Greater Than Their Parts
Recently one of your fellow students, Khalid, and I had an exchange I thought you might learn from, so I decided to highlight it here rather than leaving it buried in class list, where it might go unnoticed.
First, you should know the exchange deals with Khalid's analysis of the speech he gave at the funeral of his daughter's half-sister, Leila, who was only seven when she died, so the situation being described is quite personal. However, at some points in your life, you will be either the author or the audience in similar situations, and getting a handle on how this common but very complicated genre of writing and communication does its work is one of the reasons you are taking a class like freshman writing.
Khalid's speech, called a eulogy, was particularly effective, and figuring out why should give you some important insights into how logos, ethos, and pathos can work together to produce a greater effect and greater good than they can accomplish individually. This rhetorical situation will also show you how author and audience and the occasion which brings them together can sometimes come together to create a space which helps everyone involved. The resulting rhetorical analysis can show you how getting enough distance to analyze and then making your private insights public helps your community. Finally, since this was a very private moment Khalid agreed to share, I want to thank him, and I hope in a very, very small way, he accepts your learning as a tribute and a part of the legacy of Leila.
Here is Khalid's exemplary description of the message and analysis of the rhetorical situation:
Author: Myself
Audience: Family and Friends
This past Saturday was the funeral of my daughters half-sister Leila. Leila was only 7 weeks old. I was asked to say a few words to the audience about Leila. I started out by thanking everyone for coming and how much Leila's mother enjoyed the turnout. I explained to them that Leila was like my second daughter and because of that i naturally compared her to my daughter Kyra. Kyra is 3 and a half years old. I told them that when Kyra was born i didn't have much, money was tight so i wasn't able to document the birth as much as i would have liked. In a somewhat soft tone, i excitedly told them that when it was time for Leila to be born i had every top notch piece of technology available to document the event and in a playful, but respectful manner i re-enacted how i had filmed Leila right after her birth. I guess you could call it a light comedic performance. The audience seemed to really enjoy my reflections on Leila's life. This was confirmed by the smiles on their faces.
I believe the author's purpose was to present the subject in a joyful manner, while not mourning her loss, but rather celebrating her unfortunately short life.
The author appealed to the audience by being genuine, and this was proven by his example of the Leila when she was first born.
While hard to use Logos in a situation where feelings and opinions are more present then facts, I believe the love and care shared by the audience and author for the child was logos.
Pathos was demonstrated in the way the author decided to "re-enact" the filming of the minutes after Leila's birth. I also believe that thanking the audience for coming was also another example of Pathos. The fact that the audience was smiling or better yet, feeling more cheerful at the end was proof enough for the author that he connected with them emotionally.
Ethos was demonstrated when the author stated that he had little money at the time of his daughters birth. Money problems are universal. A problem that most people face at least once in their life. I believe that by doing this he not only placed himself in the shoes of the audience, but the audience could immediately identify with his situation and the eagerness to do better the next time around.
In my opinion the author's message was successful. The audience seemed touched and reacted in the way the author had intended.
Some of the audience members may not have children and this "noise" may have kept them from fully understanding the depth in which it is to love a child, much less lose one.
Here's my slightly edited response:
Khalid,
Let me begin by expressing my sorrow at your loss. It is always sad
when you lose someone close; it is even worse when you lose someone so
young, with all of their life before them.
I find it remarkable you are able to get so much distance between
yourself and so private a moment, and you've done an excellent job
with your analysis. Aristotle was among the first to write about
rhetoric [find a Wikipedia artical on Aristotle's contribution to the study of Rhetoric here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhetoric_(Aristotle)], and he created a special category for situations like yours
where you celebrate the exceptional life and hold it up as an example
for others. It was very like Aristotle to look at death and loss as a
chance for the speaker and audience to do public good.
What I like about your eulogy--what the kind of speech you did is
called--is that you focused on your audience and their need to find
joy in a joyful life. One reason you were so successful is that your
comedic performance touched on moments in almost everyone's life, that
is, the shared experience of recording the joy we share in major
events. What most people don't realize is how full of pathos these
moments, like Thanksgiving, are. Not only are you full of happiness,
on some level, one also realizes how fleeting such moments are. We
take pictures to have a symbol to remind us and bring back such
happiness. In short, you made a perfect choice of topic for your
audience. You brought ethos to your topic by being Kyra's father and demonstrating how closely you held the relationship with Leila. Since
part of ethos, that is, your credibility, deals with your audience
being able to relate to you, your actions, and your feelings and being
able to see themselves in you, both your situation and your
presentation of it resonated with your audience.
Artistotle also wrote about the notion of catharsis, that is, watching
another perform, identifying with the performer, and then getting to
feel because the performer feels. Catharsis is one reason we enjoy
football games, movies which make you laugh or cry, comedy, and drama. Catharsis happens most readily when your audience wants to feel with you and get their emotions to the surface, and it's one major way that ethos and pathos work together to make the sum of their appeals more than their parts. The message you constructed, your ethos, and the pathos inherent in the situation all combined to do with a good eulogy should: get the
audience to purge their own grief, get the audience to reflect on
their own lives, bring the community together for mutual support in a
time of great stress, and do it all by reflecting on the life you come
together to celebrate.
Finally, I don't want you to underestimate the value of logos in your
situation. There is a logic to how and why people feel, and you
tapped into this logic. You did it by presenting information from
your own life to which people could relate. Anytime you use
communication to express emotion, you have to place the emotions in a
context of words and make them more abstract and logical than emotions
ever are without the context of words. Such acts of putting how you feel into words helps you make sense out of such high emotions as
the loss of someone whom you had come to regard as a daughter; but, equally important, your having to frame how you feel provides a logical framework your audience can use to make sense out of the situation for themselves. This is one of the most powerful uses for logos, and it's one reason we tell stories about our lives, that is, to help us better understand them by putting into words.
Whenever my students go to a funeral, I tell them two things: 1)
create situations where you and others can tell stories about the life
and the loss; and, 2) remember to touch base with those at the funeral
in the weeks and months to come. So often, folks see the funeral as
a ritual which allows the community to move beyond loss and grief, but grief doesn't end as you walk away from a grave; it is only beginning. It is wonderful to have friends and family around during those the first days and week after a loss, but it's more important to be there over the next weeks and months.
With your permission, I'd like to post your analysis on the class blog
along with my response, both because it is an excellent example of a
well done analysis and because it provides a teaching opportunity to
present how the genre of the eulogy works.
Steve
First, you should know the exchange deals with Khalid's analysis of the speech he gave at the funeral of his daughter's half-sister, Leila, who was only seven when she died, so the situation being described is quite personal. However, at some points in your life, you will be either the author or the audience in similar situations, and getting a handle on how this common but very complicated genre of writing and communication does its work is one of the reasons you are taking a class like freshman writing.
Khalid's speech, called a eulogy, was particularly effective, and figuring out why should give you some important insights into how logos, ethos, and pathos can work together to produce a greater effect and greater good than they can accomplish individually. This rhetorical situation will also show you how author and audience and the occasion which brings them together can sometimes come together to create a space which helps everyone involved. The resulting rhetorical analysis can show you how getting enough distance to analyze and then making your private insights public helps your community. Finally, since this was a very private moment Khalid agreed to share, I want to thank him, and I hope in a very, very small way, he accepts your learning as a tribute and a part of the legacy of Leila.
Here is Khalid's exemplary description of the message and analysis of the rhetorical situation:
Author: Myself
Audience: Family and Friends
This past Saturday was the funeral of my daughters half-sister Leila. Leila was only 7 weeks old. I was asked to say a few words to the audience about Leila. I started out by thanking everyone for coming and how much Leila's mother enjoyed the turnout. I explained to them that Leila was like my second daughter and because of that i naturally compared her to my daughter Kyra. Kyra is 3 and a half years old. I told them that when Kyra was born i didn't have much, money was tight so i wasn't able to document the birth as much as i would have liked. In a somewhat soft tone, i excitedly told them that when it was time for Leila to be born i had every top notch piece of technology available to document the event and in a playful, but respectful manner i re-enacted how i had filmed Leila right after her birth. I guess you could call it a light comedic performance. The audience seemed to really enjoy my reflections on Leila's life. This was confirmed by the smiles on their faces.
I believe the author's purpose was to present the subject in a joyful manner, while not mourning her loss, but rather celebrating her unfortunately short life.
The author appealed to the audience by being genuine, and this was proven by his example of the Leila when she was first born.
While hard to use Logos in a situation where feelings and opinions are more present then facts, I believe the love and care shared by the audience and author for the child was logos.
Pathos was demonstrated in the way the author decided to "re-enact" the filming of the minutes after Leila's birth. I also believe that thanking the audience for coming was also another example of Pathos. The fact that the audience was smiling or better yet, feeling more cheerful at the end was proof enough for the author that he connected with them emotionally.
Ethos was demonstrated when the author stated that he had little money at the time of his daughters birth. Money problems are universal. A problem that most people face at least once in their life. I believe that by doing this he not only placed himself in the shoes of the audience, but the audience could immediately identify with his situation and the eagerness to do better the next time around.
In my opinion the author's message was successful. The audience seemed touched and reacted in the way the author had intended.
Some of the audience members may not have children and this "noise" may have kept them from fully understanding the depth in which it is to love a child, much less lose one.
Here's my slightly edited response:
Khalid,
Let me begin by expressing my sorrow at your loss. It is always sad
when you lose someone close; it is even worse when you lose someone so
young, with all of their life before them.
I find it remarkable you are able to get so much distance between
yourself and so private a moment, and you've done an excellent job
with your analysis. Aristotle was among the first to write about
rhetoric [find a Wikipedia artical on Aristotle's contribution to the study of Rhetoric here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhetoric_(Aristotle)], and he created a special category for situations like yours
where you celebrate the exceptional life and hold it up as an example
for others. It was very like Aristotle to look at death and loss as a
chance for the speaker and audience to do public good.
What I like about your eulogy--what the kind of speech you did is
called--is that you focused on your audience and their need to find
joy in a joyful life. One reason you were so successful is that your
comedic performance touched on moments in almost everyone's life, that
is, the shared experience of recording the joy we share in major
events. What most people don't realize is how full of pathos these
moments, like Thanksgiving, are. Not only are you full of happiness,
on some level, one also realizes how fleeting such moments are. We
take pictures to have a symbol to remind us and bring back such
happiness. In short, you made a perfect choice of topic for your
audience. You brought ethos to your topic by being Kyra's father and demonstrating how closely you held the relationship with Leila. Since
part of ethos, that is, your credibility, deals with your audience
being able to relate to you, your actions, and your feelings and being
able to see themselves in you, both your situation and your
presentation of it resonated with your audience.
Artistotle also wrote about the notion of catharsis, that is, watching
another perform, identifying with the performer, and then getting to
feel because the performer feels. Catharsis is one reason we enjoy
football games, movies which make you laugh or cry, comedy, and drama. Catharsis happens most readily when your audience wants to feel with you and get their emotions to the surface, and it's one major way that ethos and pathos work together to make the sum of their appeals more than their parts. The message you constructed, your ethos, and the pathos inherent in the situation all combined to do with a good eulogy should: get the
audience to purge their own grief, get the audience to reflect on
their own lives, bring the community together for mutual support in a
time of great stress, and do it all by reflecting on the life you come
together to celebrate.
Finally, I don't want you to underestimate the value of logos in your
situation. There is a logic to how and why people feel, and you
tapped into this logic. You did it by presenting information from
your own life to which people could relate. Anytime you use
communication to express emotion, you have to place the emotions in a
context of words and make them more abstract and logical than emotions
ever are without the context of words. Such acts of putting how you feel into words helps you make sense out of such high emotions as
the loss of someone whom you had come to regard as a daughter; but, equally important, your having to frame how you feel provides a logical framework your audience can use to make sense out of the situation for themselves. This is one of the most powerful uses for logos, and it's one reason we tell stories about our lives, that is, to help us better understand them by putting into words.
Whenever my students go to a funeral, I tell them two things: 1)
create situations where you and others can tell stories about the life
and the loss; and, 2) remember to touch base with those at the funeral
in the weeks and months to come. So often, folks see the funeral as
a ritual which allows the community to move beyond loss and grief, but grief doesn't end as you walk away from a grave; it is only beginning. It is wonderful to have friends and family around during those the first days and week after a loss, but it's more important to be there over the next weeks and months.
With your permission, I'd like to post your analysis on the class blog
along with my response, both because it is an excellent example of a
well done analysis and because it provides a teaching opportunity to
present how the genre of the eulogy works.
Steve
05 June 2008
Taking attendence, and rounding up the strays.
If you log onto your gmail and move to the google docs service, on the docs home page you'll see a new document entitled, "Class List, ENG 111, Summer 2008." This document will end up being a one stop shop for group contact information, figuring out how to email a single classmate, or how to share a google document with the whole class.
Since I am required to keep attendance, something which is difficult to do in an online class, I will also use this document to collect information to certify your "attendance" and continued participation in class. So...do enter your information.
If you have questions about how to access google docs, log in here:
docs.google.com
You log in using your google username and password.
Finally:
1) I'm asking those who have not found a group to enter their names and contact information, so I can use this information to fill out existing groups or to put together new ones.
2) As part of the information everyone will leave, I ask you to provide me with two of the grammar, usage, or writing problems on which you'd like to work.
As always, write with questions.
Steve
Since I am required to keep attendance, something which is difficult to do in an online class, I will also use this document to collect information to certify your "attendance" and continued participation in class. So...do enter your information.
If you have questions about how to access google docs, log in here:
docs.google.com
You log in using your google username and password.
Finally:
1) I'm asking those who have not found a group to enter their names and contact information, so I can use this information to fill out existing groups or to put together new ones.
2) As part of the information everyone will leave, I ask you to provide me with two of the grammar, usage, or writing problems on which you'd like to work.
As always, write with questions.
Steve
04 June 2008
How to handle giving and receiving criticism.
The single hardest thing to communicate in emails is the tone in which you want to be read. This is one reason the genre, that is, this kind or type of writing, has developed the little emoticons, like, ; ) or : (. These emoticons try to communicate how a message is to be read, something which is easier to do in spoken communication, but it is still difficult to capture the tone in which something is meant or taken. Emails tend to be written quickly, kept relatively short, and criticism is one of the most difficult things to do well using short, quick messages. Unfortunately, email is one of the best ways for students to interact in an online course.
The upshot? Always read your fellow students with charity. Remember they are new to the work they are doing and, usually, fairly new to working with others. Industry and the private sector value how well you work with others, but our early education system trains you to judge your performance on *your* work and *your* grade. Also remember: each student is doing their best in this difficult situation (which everyone in the class shares). Finally, remember that criticism is always just an opinion offered by an editor to an author. As long as the editor stays within the bounds of criticizing the message and not the author, the most valuable person an author knows is an editor who doesn't pull punches when offering a well reasoned opinion. This doesn't mean the editor is right in their opinion, but it does mean you can count on them to be honest, something you can't count on your parents to be, because they do pull punches. The author decides if the criticism is valid and if they are going to take the advice offered; and, the author should always remember that it is their writing being criticized--something they want to improve. This is one of the things which being an author entails, that is, making the final decisions about what is your best work and what changes you are willing and able to make given the limitations on your time and energy. If these decisions were easy, then we wouldn't pay editors or authors so well nor would you need a college class and a professor to teach you these skills.
Steve
The upshot? Always read your fellow students with charity. Remember they are new to the work they are doing and, usually, fairly new to working with others. Industry and the private sector value how well you work with others, but our early education system trains you to judge your performance on *your* work and *your* grade. Also remember: each student is doing their best in this difficult situation (which everyone in the class shares). Finally, remember that criticism is always just an opinion offered by an editor to an author. As long as the editor stays within the bounds of criticizing the message and not the author, the most valuable person an author knows is an editor who doesn't pull punches when offering a well reasoned opinion. This doesn't mean the editor is right in their opinion, but it does mean you can count on them to be honest, something you can't count on your parents to be, because they do pull punches. The author decides if the criticism is valid and if they are going to take the advice offered; and, the author should always remember that it is their writing being criticized--something they want to improve. This is one of the things which being an author entails, that is, making the final decisions about what is your best work and what changes you are willing and able to make given the limitations on your time and energy. If these decisions were easy, then we wouldn't pay editors or authors so well nor would you need a college class and a professor to teach you these skills.
Steve
What to do to get ahead.
It is taking longer for the groups to form than I had anticipated. It looks like they will all be in place by the end of the week (Sunday, 8 June), but I don't want to assign any additional work until then. So...
If you've formed your group and created a shared google document in which every group member has updated their contact information, you are caught up.
If you want to get ahead and do some of the work for next week (Monday, 9 June - Sunday, 15 June), here's how:
1) Each student should create a google document called "MyName, First Five Rhetorical Analysis, ENG 111, Summer 2008."
2) Copy all five of your rhetorical analysis into this document. These are the revised analysis you've already posted to the email list.
3) Share the document you create with your group members and me (prof.brandon@gmail.com).
4) Take some time to read through your group's analysis--either on the list or as they post the compiled version in their google doc--and try to figure out ideas and insights you can apply from their work to improve your own.
5) Make improvements on your analysis. (Steve's Law of Writing No. 1: "There is always something you can do to make a message more successful. The limiting factor is how much time your have and how much effort you want to put in.")
6) Wait for further instructions (which will have you practicing different proofreading techniques by editing your group's revised analysis).
Steve
If you've formed your group and created a shared google document in which every group member has updated their contact information, you are caught up.
If you want to get ahead and do some of the work for next week (Monday, 9 June - Sunday, 15 June), here's how:
1) Each student should create a google document called "MyName, First Five Rhetorical Analysis, ENG 111, Summer 2008."
2) Copy all five of your rhetorical analysis into this document. These are the revised analysis you've already posted to the email list.
3) Share the document you create with your group members and me (prof.brandon@gmail.com).
4) Take some time to read through your group's analysis--either on the list or as they post the compiled version in their google doc--and try to figure out ideas and insights you can apply from their work to improve your own.
5) Make improvements on your analysis. (Steve's Law of Writing No. 1: "There is always something you can do to make a message more successful. The limiting factor is how much time your have and how much effort you want to put in.")
6) Wait for further instructions (which will have you practicing different proofreading techniques by editing your group's revised analysis).
Steve
How do I know what my grade is?
A student wrote and asked a good question, namely, "How do I know if I am caught up in the course, and how do I know my grade?" Find my answer below.
"Every two or three weeks, double check the class blog to make sure you have done all the tasks assigned. Make sure to revise your work based on the recommendations of your group--once these are finished being set up. If I see you heading in a direction you shouldn't, and your group doesn't catch and correct your course, then I will intervene and let you know what revisions should be made."
"That's it. Your grade will be based on your class participation (40%)--that is, how well you work with your group, if you complete assignments, and if you revise and improve your assignments on a regular basis--and your final portfolio(60%), where you'll argue for your grade, show me what you have learned, and put together a collection of your work from the semester."
"As you'll soon discover, this class is all about learning and taking advantage of the opportunities to learn which are presented to you, and I value process over product, that is, follow the process, make the most of the opportunities to learn, and I don't care a whole lot about the success of any one or five products. After all, you are learning how to revise them and make them better."
For right now, the things you need to be worried about are joining a group, learning how to use google docs, and reading your classmate's rhetorical analysis to figure out how you can make improvements to your own. Oh, and asking very good questions like the one which prompted this response.
The upshot is only you can judge how much effort you are putting into the course and how much you are learning. I won't make a final judgment about your grade until I read your final portfolio. Up until then, you've got the opportunity to continue to improve your work, and *you* are learning to answer the questions: 1) "Is this piece of writing successful?"; and, 2) "Do I want to put any more work into figuring out how to improve this piece of writing and how?" Having said this, as I said during the orientation, students tend to receive high grades in my class, because they have the opportunity and time to do their best work. The students who receive low grades are those who don't take advantage of these opportunities, who try to squeeze all their work into too small a piece of time, or who don't do the work at all."
Steve
"Every two or three weeks, double check the class blog to make sure you have done all the tasks assigned. Make sure to revise your work based on the recommendations of your group--once these are finished being set up. If I see you heading in a direction you shouldn't, and your group doesn't catch and correct your course, then I will intervene and let you know what revisions should be made."
"That's it. Your grade will be based on your class participation (40%)--that is, how well you work with your group, if you complete assignments, and if you revise and improve your assignments on a regular basis--and your final portfolio(60%), where you'll argue for your grade, show me what you have learned, and put together a collection of your work from the semester."
"As you'll soon discover, this class is all about learning and taking advantage of the opportunities to learn which are presented to you, and I value process over product, that is, follow the process, make the most of the opportunities to learn, and I don't care a whole lot about the success of any one or five products. After all, you are learning how to revise them and make them better."
For right now, the things you need to be worried about are joining a group, learning how to use google docs, and reading your classmate's rhetorical analysis to figure out how you can make improvements to your own. Oh, and asking very good questions like the one which prompted this response.
The upshot is only you can judge how much effort you are putting into the course and how much you are learning. I won't make a final judgment about your grade until I read your final portfolio. Up until then, you've got the opportunity to continue to improve your work, and *you* are learning to answer the questions: 1) "Is this piece of writing successful?"; and, 2) "Do I want to put any more work into figuring out how to improve this piece of writing and how?" Having said this, as I said during the orientation, students tend to receive high grades in my class, because they have the opportunity and time to do their best work. The students who receive low grades are those who don't take advantage of these opportunities, who try to squeeze all their work into too small a piece of time, or who don't do the work at all."
Steve
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