What We're Reading

Journal Work Assigned this Week:

4 resources are assigned. Please click on all 3 tabs to access the Lecture and all the assigned Reading.

A Lecture
Part of a Chapter
Another Part of a Chapter
Review Your Ideas

A Lecture on Essay 1

The topic of this first essay should feel interesting to you and writing it should feel like your ideas are building on themselves, one paragraph at a time.

We are going to write about a song. You get to pick. And we are going to start by picking three songs. Why pick three if Essay 1 asks us to focus on only 1? Well, sometimes the first idea that comes to mind turns out to be too simple or way too complex. So, we're going to give ourselves options by exploring a variety first.

This exploration is part of a strong writing process. Set a goal for yourself in this first essay to think about and experiment with your own unique writing process. The more you explore and reflect, the stronger a foundation you will lay for the next projects in this class.

Watch curry explain the Essay 1 prompt

7 minute video | take notes in your Reading Journal

Questions to Consider

Remember, if you feel stuck writing about the songs you choose, use these questions to start any Reading Journal entry:

What do you know for certain about the reading and the ideas communicated?
What do you wish you knew more about?
What part should you reread, or what could you research/define, or ask about in a class discussion to deepen your understanding?
What do you like about how the paragraphs and sentences are written? What can you adopt as style in your own writing?
Finally, if you're totally stuck, peak ahead at the next Discussion prompt or the next Essay prompt, and use those questions to take notes while you read! That will ensure your Notes will be relevant to those larger assignments!

Read "How to Write a rough draft"

15 minutes | take notes that remind you of the Essay 1 assignment

Access this chapter directly

Questions to Consider

The hardest part about writing is...writing. How to start. How to keep going. How to finish a paragraph that feels stuck. How to include all those ideas and examples. How to not doubt yourself when you're simply not sure.

This part of Chapter 4 is packed with different ways to think about how to simply start writing and keep going. Probably not everything in this chapter is useful to you. But think about your process and different ways to structure your Essay 1 ideas as you read. Take Notes and jot down questions as you do.

Read "Arguments of Interpretation"

15 minutes | take notes that remind you of Monday's lecture

***copied from "Chapter 3 - Argument," Let's Get Writing

Arguments of Interpretation

Arguments of interpretation come mainly in the form of critical analysis writing. Scholars and students use critical analysis to understand a text more deeply; therefore, it is common in disciplines in which texts are the main objects of study—literature, philosophy, and history. However, we can also think of critical analysis as any analysis where someone takes raw data—from texts, from objects and images, from laboratory experiments, from surveys of people—and analyzes that data to come up with what they mean. The “what it all means” is an interpretation. The argument in critical analysis writing is the interpretation of the data. This must be a logical interpretation with the data also used to support the interpretation through reasoning and examples.

The guidelines for analyzing data are determined by the experts in those areas. Scholars of the life, earth, and physical sciences; the social sciences; and the humanities gather all sorts of different data. When writing up an interpretation of that data, writers and researchers should follow the models and standards provided by experts in those fields of study. In college, professors are important sources of these models and standards.

In the humanities, particularly in literature, there are generally four ways (or perspectives) for analyzing a text: writing from the perspective of a reader, writing as if the text were an object of study, writing about or from the perspective of an author, and writing about where a text fits into a particular context.

- Writing from the perspective of a reader: You seek to understand a text through your own experience, yet you also try to understand how others who may be different from you understand the same writing through their experience. This is characterized by noting down first impressions and lines or words that strike you in profound ways. This sort of analysis is common in journal or response paper assignments and can be a simple way to begin a discussion of a text.

- Writing about the text as an object of study: This is a perspective that highlights what makes up that text and what meaning we can find in it. Finding meaning relies on identifying the patterns, segments, and strategies (devices) in the writing you choose to analyze. This is one of the most common types of essay assignments in a literature class.

- Writing about the text’s author: Sometimes this provides another perspective with which to deepen an understanding of a piece of writing. Examining his or her life, thought processes, behaviors, and beliefs can help you to further understand an author’s work. This type of analysis can be the basis of a research paper on a work of history or literature.

- Writing about the text’s context: This approach usually has to do with how a text compares to other texts as well as how the text interacts with history and society. When historians analyze texts, studying context is crucial, but contextual analysis can also be the focus of a literature essay.

The process of critical analysis is dependent on close reading of the data or text and is an analytical process in which the writer moves from analyzing the details of the text to a broader conclusion that is logically based on those details. What can confuse a lot of students is that formal essay structure is must be framed by the conclusion, not the details: They must establish the main claim immediately, and then use the reasons for the claim to organize the details in each body paragraph. For more on close reading, see Chapter 1, “Critical Reading.”

Figure 3.8 “From Analysis to Argument”

Analyze a text: Step 1, closely read. Step 2, Take notes. Step 3, analyze details and observe patterns. Step 4, analyze patterns and observe meaning. Step 5 Formulate an argument based on analysis of details and patterns.

Questions to Consider

This week, we are building on our exploration of a reading and writing process by exploring the structures of writing: paragraphs, controlling ideas, and connections. This section in Chapter 3 provides a quick overview of interpretation, which is another way to describe the type of argument Essay 1 is asking you to develop.

Give this chapter a skim. Take notes whenever you are reminded of the lectures for this week or when you come across a definition or guidance that makes you think about how you might organize your Reading Journal Notes and share what you feel is important about the song you chose with someone else in this class. Let these observations and questions build over the course of this week, and rely on them as you create discussion posts and begin to outline and draft Essay 1.

Review Your Notes on 3 Songs

20 minutes to "reread" your Notes on songs | review and add to your Notes on each song

Photo by Andrea Piacquadio from Pexels

Review Your Notes

For each song

reread the lyrics
listen again to the song
consider what the music video (if there is one) adds to "what the song says"

Take me to my Reading Journal

Questions to Consider

Revisit your Reading Journal entries for the songs you choose. Consider which Notes offer the most interesting exploration of ideas--in the lyrics or sounds or visuals or voices. Start to prioritize these Notes in the order of what you feel would be the best to write about in Essay 1. Consider creating a new Reading Journal entry to explore a song--or two?--even further. A second reading almost always reveals more insight!

Upload Entries to Your Reading Journal

Complete the assigned reading and upload your entries to the Reading Journal space in Canvas by the end of the week.

Go to my Reading Journal

Citations

Devries, Kristen. "Chapter 3 - Argument." Let’s Get to Writing!: An English Composition Textbook . Edited by Ann Moser. Virginia Western Educational Foundation, Inc, 2018. PressbooksEDU, accessed Oct. 2020, https://vwcceng111.pressbooks.com .

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