Lezleigh Millhauser

Professor Haas
Writing 37; 11 a.m.
2/22/2015
Writing 37 Reflection

Going into Writing 37, I had a fair amount of knowledge about writing analytical essays
and had prior experience with narrative and more creative forms of writing. However, over the
past several weeks of being in the class and applying the lessons on rhetoric into essays, I have
realized that did not consider different types of appeals in all forms of writing before, and have
learned to cater my writing more to the audience I wish to convey my ideas to, in hopes of
adding more depth to my work in the future.
From prior schooling and classes I have taken, I am more accustomed to reading
narratives and short stories, which tend to be chronologically linear in their story progression and
for the most part easy to follow. The more factual, and expository text we read for Writing 37
require a different approach. Personally, to understand more scholarly text, I have to read over it
multiple times so that the information presented consolidates, unlike with narratives where I tend
to read through a story once and absorb the sequence of events and their pertinence to the plot.
Though this was a tad difficult at first, the text we were asked to read have helped me in my
comprehension of dissertations, essays, articles, documentaries, etc. Another aspect I found to be
challenging was reading We3 as our first literary work of the new quarter. To be quite honest, I
assumed that a graphic novel would be easier to comprehend than an article or essay, but We3
roved to have the same amount of depth as other mediums of writing. Similar to the other works

we read in class, I had to read over We3 multiple times to understand the plot and take time to
read each panel carefully to understand the themes and pertinent events in the story. For
example, in Issue 1 of We3, there is a sequence of panels when Dr. Berry is about to leave the
laboratory but instead sets the We3 animals free, and as she walks out of the lab, there are scenes
of people dying. At first it was hard to grasp the sequence of panels; each panel was different
and there were so many that it seemed to be jarring. But after carefully scanning over the
illustrated panels and looking at each picture, I finally realized the sequence of events during that
particular scene, and gained a deep appreciation for what Morrison and Quitely did to make that
scene so dynamic and unorthodox.
" Graphic novels are a medium of writing that conveys a narrative that differs greatly
from ordinary prose. The implementation of illustrations gives visual context for the tone of the
events in a story, or the emotions or motivation of a character, rather than these details being
written concretely with no room for a reader's variance in interpretation. We3 accomplishes this
style of conveyance; the drawings within the panels of the comic relay not only the machinations
of the story, but the dark nuances and the obscurity of morality that is essential to the narrative."
This passage is the introductory paragraph from my rhetorical analysis of We3. While this
paragraph seems to be composed, it lacks an introductory sentence that pulls the audience in and
is compelling enough to make the reader want to venture further in the essay. Both Professor
Haas and the other students in class who reviewed my essay commented on this, so I made it one
of my priorities to alter the first sentence to make it more eye-catching for the reader. I alter the
first sentence to: "The four-hundred eighteen million dollar graphic novel industry presents a
medium of writing that differs greatly from ordinary prose because of its implementation of

illustrations gives visual context for the tone of the events in a story, rather than these details
being written concretely with no room for a reader's variance in interpretation."
The implementation of a staggering statistic and synthesizing the first two sentences makes the
introductory sentence more explanatory and intriguing that what I had written prior. In my
opinion, it makes the beginning of the essay more engaging and interesting.
Peer-Reviewing was a foreign activity to me before Writing 37. Typically, I would write
essays, turn them in, and not look back at my work. However, having others look at my writing,
critiquing my work, and looking at my peers' essays has taught me the value within editing and
revising my work. This is not limited to listening to the critiques of my peers, but also analyzing
the aspects of their essays that are effective whilst reviewing them, and using that knowledge to
enhance my own writing in future essays. Peer Reviewing is a very effective way to not only edit
and revise your work, but learn from mistakes in your writing and using those alterations to
enhance your voice as a writer in the future.
Similarly, in previous classes, I was very aloof when it came to collaborative work. I
would either request to work on my own, or stay in a group I was assigned to and just bare the
entire work load on myself, not trusting others with parts of the project we work on. But in
Writing 37, I have encountered and worked with others who are more competent that I thought
they were to be, and effectively produced their part of the projects better than I expected. It has
made me trust my colleagues a bit more, and has helped me to understand that cooperation and
teamwork is a valuable asset. Even though I took a leadership role during the first collaborative
project, our class Wikis, my two other group members were very receptive to my ideas and
produced outstanding presentations. We all collaborated as a group regarding what topic we
wanted to tackle, and when dividing that topic into sub-groups, both Aubrianne and Caitlynn

were receptive and got to work immediately without hesitation. We openly discussed our
research, what problems or challenges we were having during the assignment, and worked well
together overall as a group.