Nightingale 1
Aaron Nightingale
Dominick Ashby
English 111
10 December 2009
Final Writers Memo
I expected English 111 to be a lot more on strict writing and very structured high quality work without flaw. This was not the case and I think I learned a lot more because it wasn’t. Since junior year in high school, I have been going over rhetoric appeals as far as: ethos, pathos, and logos. So to cover this early on in the class I was not surprised. The difference between my experience in high school, to this class, was the amount of practical use. I will take away knowledge of how to apply rhetoric appeals, whether it is in future speeches, business letters, or job interviews. Also, I will take away a new way to construct my papers.
With English 111, I learned how to apply rhetorical analysis, by making videos, writing essays, in class on-the-spot writing, and group projects. But one main thing I learned how to do is how to begin my essays. Ever since I can remember, I have always had trouble knowing how to start a paper. I would think that the first time I wrote everything, it had to be perfect; every sentence. Naturally, I never made any progress. It would take hours to write like this, but in this class, I was taught to approach it in a different way. For our rough draft, my professor asked just for a structured two pages of notes on our current topic. Since I started just writing notes, I would have much more ideas and my papers became easier and easier to write.
Now, for the two pieces, I chose to edit my very first piece, the ethnography. And for the second, I chose to remake my Wal-Mart video in the opposite light. I chose the ethnography
Nightingale 2
because it was my first piece and I felt as if it were the only piece I truly hadn’t completely finished. And I chose the Walmart video because the whole time I was making the original one, I was thinking about how it would look from the other side.
My original ethnography was about my current life and how looking at certain objects and scenes, would remind me of my past and how my past is what is making my present. With the new one I added about four pages and talked about the future and how I want to combine the past and present. I want to utilize all the sources that have been provided to me and trying to predict my future is not the key. It was a realization that I have to accept myself as I am and that I am striving to be all that I can be. I just wanted to play with the message I was sending and that if we live thinking about our futures, we will die from missing out on our lives. I think this piece improved drastically from the first because I am sending a very strong message and with the addition of future events, the piece now seems complete.
The original Wal-Mart video portrayed it as a good store that made everyone happy and jump for joy. I wanted to make this video about the oppression of Wal-Mart and how it is suppressing small business and other competitors. I wanted to exaggerate it and comically go about making them look extremely egotistical and snobby, but at the same time, keep a little truth behind it all. I believe this piece improved from the first because the first was very one sided and was all about joy. This time it is comical but at least sends a message.
