Harrison

Caitlin Harrison
Professor Olivia Rines
UWRT-1101-002
8 April 2015
Final Reflection
One of our first assignments in this class was our Genre Analysis. After reading,
commenting on, and having class discussions about numerous articles related to the term genre,
Olivia had us each choose a genre of our own to analyze in order to further our understanding of

Talcott Nichols 4/13/2015 10:11 AM

Comment [1]: Perhaps add an
introduction paragraph before this. It
seemed to just jump right into things and
even though I may know what the paper is
about, who ever the audience is might not.

this topic. From what I have learned over the course of this semester, a genre comprises of a
class of communicative events, the members of which share some set of communicative
purposes. These purposes are recognized by the expert members of the parent discourse
community, and thereby constitute the rationale for the genre. This rationale shapes the
schematic structure of the discourse and influences and constrains choice of content and style.
(Swales, 53) While I do believe I have acquired much significant knowledge about the concept
of genres, this project in particular was the one I found myself struggling most with throughout
the semester.
For my genre analysis, I chose to analyze the genre of music videos. To be more
specific, I chose the three current, top trending music videos on YouTube. I had to
thoroughly break down each one, analyzing the different features and styles used throughout
the video. I then had to compare and contrast my findings relating each of the videos. The
process of breaking down each of the videos was very difficult for me. It was challenging to
analyze which features were contributing to the overall genre of music videos and which

Talcott Nichols 4/13/2015 10:14 AM

Comment [2]: For such a big quote, you
may want to do a block quote. It was hard to
see where it started and stopped.

Talcott Nichols 4/13/2015 10:13 AM

Comment [3]: I thought you did a great
job talking about what topic you chose for
the assignment as well as how you felt about
the different steps of the writing.

Harrison 2

were not. While I was pleased with my first draft, I still believe that I have much improving
that can be done.
The next project that we were assigned in our English class was our Microethonography. We read articles upon articles about the concept of discourse communities and
the criteria that are involved in deciphering whether or not a community could be classified as

Talcott Nichols 4/13/2015 10:16 AM

Comment [4]: Again I think you did a
great job describing the assignment. It
might be on the long side considering the
majority of your audience is Mrs. Rines and
the rest of us.

such. In the excerpt The Concept of a Discourse Community from the book Writing about
Writing by John Swales, the author addresses the idea of a discourse community and explains
characteristics as to how they are defined. Within the world of literacy there are numerous
definitions and understandings of the term discourse community. Because of this, Swales
attempts to clarify, for procedural purposes, what is to be understood by discourse community
and, perhaps in the present circumstances, it is better to offer a set of criteria sufficiently narrow
that will eliminate many of the marginal, blurred and controversial contenders (Swales, 218).
Throughout this chapter, Swales outlines six characteristics that should be used to define a
discourse community. Before reading this article, I was never aware of the prevalence of

Talcott Nichols 4/13/2015 10:18 AM

Comment [5]: The quotes from Swales
were an excellent addition. It was nice to see
quotes from him that were not The 5th
characteristic of a discourse community
was

discourse communities that are present all around us; and to be completely honest, I wasnt really
even aware of the term.
For my micro-ethnography, I analyzed a dance group from the University of North
Carolina at Chapel Hill called Carolina Vibe. In order to analyze this discourse community I
scheduled three observational experiences with the team and two interviews. For the
observations, I visited three of their dance classes in one week; each one was an hour long. The
majority of my learning about this discourse community came from this experience in particular.
I was quickly able to analyze what it was that sets them apart from many other dance groups.
Being held responsible for going out into the community in order to do observations and

Talcott Nichols 4/13/2015 10:21 AM

Comment [6]: I like the way you wrote
this paper so far, describing the assignments
and giving a brief opinion about how you
felt about them, then describing the topics
you wrote about and breaking them down
into parts you struggled with or enjoyed.

Harrison 3

interviews was a wonderful learning experience that I ended up enjoying much more than I had
originally anticipated. It is not often that you are required to look past your computer screen in
order to do research, so I was thoroughly excited for this experience.
When I consider which experience throughout the semester caused me to grow the most
as a writer, I would have to choose discussion forum posts. On about a weekly basis or so, Olivia
would post an article about a topic that we are learning about and have us comment on it in our
class discussion forum. We were required to write approximately 300-500 words in each post,

Talcott Nichols 4/13/2015 10:36 AM

Comment [7]: Could you talk about ways
the individual assignments helped you grow
as a writer? Maybe even talk about them at
the end of your assignment descriptions.

and correctly refer to the article as a source. The reason I found this experience the most
rewarding was because it required me to write often and consider the audience when doing so.
Previously, I had never put much thought into audience as far as my writing went, however,
when it came to these discussion posts, it was important for me to remember that my audience
was my classmates. I always ended up putting much more effort into these pieces knowing that
each of my classmates would be reading it. Sometimes, I think the knowledge that people will
actually be reading your writing puts a much greater stress on you as a writer, but always
improves the end result.
In addition to these class experiences, we were also required to create daybook entries
each day. Olivia would have someone choose a question for us to contemplate then write about

Talcott Nichols 4/13/2015 10:25 AM

Comment [8]: I think this is a fairly
accurate statement. It could probably even
do without the sometimes.

in our journals every day. I feel as though this exercise had a great impact on my ability as a
writer because it forced me to write on-the-spot. Normally, I would spend a full day or so
preparing my information before writing a draft on almost any topic, just so my thoughts would
get organized. For this however, we only had about 5 minutes to not only think about the topic,
but to write about it as well. This encouraged me to use creativity in responding to the questions
and pushed me to improve upon my writing skills on a daily basis.

Talcott Nichols 4/13/2015 10:27 AM

Comment [9]: This is a great statement
critically thinking how these assignments
helped you as a writer. I may have missed it,
but could you include something like this for
the Genre Analysis and Micro-Ethnography?

Harrison 4

Lastly, my in-class experience has also played a great role in my newly found ability as a
writer. We have had many class discussions throughout the semester about various topics. Each
discussion never failed to bring about a new understanding of whatever it was we were
discussing at the time for me. While I will admit, I did not always speak out and express my
opinion in each class discussion; this does not mean I did not grow from it. Throughout my
experience of being a student, I have never been one to raise my hand and answer a teachers
question. While many may look at this as a disadvantage, I feel as though I have actually learned
a great amount from absorbing everything around me. This being said, I am aware that my class
participation grade may be affected, but in my defense, as well as all of the other listeners out
there, never once did I feel I was not participating. I was always very interested in whatever was
being said at the time, but just felt as though I had nothing to add. As I progress through my
college career, I am aware that talking in class is essential. Eventually, I am sure I will learn to
enjoy doing so, but for now, I thoroughly enjoy being a listener.

Talcott Nichols 4/13/2015 10:31 AM

Comment [10]: Could you elaborate a
little on this? I know it may be hard to put in
words, but it would be interesting to see
what you (and others) have gained from
listening to others opinions.

-For myself it has been an eye opener that
there are infinite ways of thinking about
things.

Harrison 5

Works Cited
Swales, John. The Concept of Discourse Community. Genre Analysis: English in Academic
and Research Settings. Boston; Cambridge UP, 1990. 21-32. Print.

Your reflection has a great start. I think you did an excellent job describing the assignments
and talking about how you felt about each part of them. I would be careful about how much
detail you are putting into the descriptions of the assignments since our audience has such
a varied knowledge base. At the same time, I thought the Swales quotes were definitely a
good addition because they werent just a repeat of the same quotes weve seen. If you are
looking for more detail for each section, try looking back at the four questions on the
assignment sheet and try to answer them for each assignment. It seems like the only things
you are probably missing are possibly an introduction, as well as discussing portfolio
contents. As for the introduction, you could give your overall opinion of the class and the
assignments then transition it to your descriptions.

Talcott Nichols 4/13/2015 3:27 PM

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