Also, I came in with a very vague knowledge of writing scholars and view points.  I was introduced to topics like free-writing, imitation, and I even dabbled in the art of memoir.  These things were all foreign to me, and I definitely needed them to move into the next era of my writing.  I have wanted to be a better writer for a long time, and I feel that I did not reach this until this semester.  When I look at a book, I look at a way that I can use some of that writing to improve my own.  I know how to break writer’s block, and I have been just writing, like a free write, for as long as I have been writing.  The memoir was a very difficult task for me, but when I finished, I felt a sense of accomplishment because I overcame my lack of creativity.  With all of these things, I feel that I can, and have, stepped into the nest tier of my own writing abilities.   

I am not that cocky, arrogant writer that was too good for edits, drafts, and ripping apart my essays.  I am not the uneducated, young writer that did not know left from right, free-writing from memoir, and the purpose of imitation.  When I write in the future, I will be more confident, and I will know what I am doing in a more educated perspective.  My creative writing skills will not flourish while I am in college, but I will be able to begin with a little more experience under my belt.  The experiences in English 319 have shaped me into a better writer, and I know that I am not the best.  I probably will not be the best, but I can and will always be looking for that next step on my writing journey.

Hillary uses her own insight as a base for her writing.  She will give her insight, than she will use facts and scholarly writing as proof for her position.  She is very specific in her personal stories and that is a very strong point in her writing.  She surely puts time and honesty in her writing, and that builds a genuine bond with the reader.

Jaime uses quotes and conversation more effectively than nearly anyone in the class.  She can insert them into any type of essay, and it is very efficient.  She will use a conversation, introduce some scholarly information, and bring the reader back to her perspective.  When Jaime uses these quotes, I feel like I am there, and I understand her background more than I could without.  She is a creative writer first and foremost.

Jessica thrives on information.  She is a very serious writer, and this can lead to her writing to being very dense.  She is very analytical, and I feel that her wanting to be a nurse originally is a direct correlation to that.  She uses information as her main source of the body of her essays.  Her analysis brings into perspective her point of view. 

Model: The real art that dealt with life directly was that of the first men who told their stories round the savage camp-fire.                                                                                                                                                Imitation: The monster that frightens men, women, and children alike is an idea that will change the world.

Model: If one must worship a bully, it is better that he should be a policeman than a gangster.                    Imitation: If one must choose an evil of sorts, it is better to be the lesser of these options.

Model: He went through the narrow alley of Temple Bar quickly, muttering to himself that they could all go to hell because he was going to have a good night of it.                                                                                      Variation: He was going to have a good night, he muttered after he went through the narrow alley of Temple Bar and began to himself that they all could go to hell.                                                                                  Expression: They all can go to hell because I’m going to have a good night was all that they heard as he quickly shuffled through the narrow alley of the Temple Bar.

Academic writing is a topic pursued by scholars, and has been for years.  There are many questions that are constantly struggled with by both sides of the debate.  Do we write for ourselves or for our audience?  What does our teacher do; are they there to become peers in the classroom or do they drill everything we need to know into our heads?  Academic writing-define it.  There are all of these questions, and they cannot be answered without introducing one, or both, schools of thought.

Elbow and Bartholomae are two leading members in this debate, and their opinions differ in regards writing, teaching, and the role of the teacher. 

Elbow introduced writing for personal gain, the free write, and the teacher less classroom.  He believes that when a student writes anything, they should be writing for themselves.  The writer should only write what they want to read.  Screw the reader.    When writing, you should just write to find a topic.  No stopping.  This helps the student address their fluency, transitions, and the volumes that they speak with personal voice.  Once the personal voice is established, the writer is successful.  In leading the reader to the path of success, there should be no teacher.  In the classroom, the teacher should lower themselves to the level of the student.  Elbow debates that the teacher should write and improve their writing as the student does.  This not only inspires confidence, but it creates competence.  The writer should be completely immersed in their writing.  Academia is difficult to handle.

Bartholomae will fight this with all of his scholarly intellect.  He wants teachers to guide academic writing.  They are the front runners in the educational process and should be the entire reason that students write.  The student should use learn academic writing, the teacher should lead the student, and the student should be mindful of their audience.  Academic writing is strictly business.  The academic writer does not use voice and is completely non-biased in their writing.  They should be able to pull themselves completely out of their writing and join the academic discourse community.  When they do this, the student has truly achieved.  In order to learn this ‘academic writing’ the teacher is strong in their role as the guide.  The teacher has certain things that they must impart upon their students, but their main job in Bartholomae’s eyes is to welcome the student into the discourse community.  Once they are welcomed into the community, the student must write like an academic for other academics.  They no longer own their writing.  The reader does. 

Both sides are true.  In their own ways, they both will help writers.  In order to become a successful writer, one needs to learn a method to write.  They need to write for someone, and they need to write in a certain way.  Once this is learned, the student becomes a writer.  The issue is that the writing is based on the discourse community that the student joined.  I, as a writer, currently am in many academic discourse communities: English, education, and science.  As I participate in each of these communities, I write for different reasons using each style of teaching. 

When I am an English student, I write for myself.  I enjoy writing for any reason, whether it is educational or personal.  Though early English classes guided me through what type of writing I would be doing, I wrote what I wanted.  I consider myself a fairly decent writer, so I would throw in personal voice and my topic would be something I would be interested in.  I have written about things ranging from Batman to the Vietnam War to an entire essay about football.  I rarely use outlines, rarely reread my essays, and rarely throw my essays into the hands of my peers for editing.  Mainly, I use Elbownian techniques, but I sway from some as well.  My Bartholomaen formatting has been drilled in me by teachers in high school and has stuck through all of my composition classes.  I am proud of my writing, and it is hard for me to take into account others’ ideas to change my writing.  I use syntax properly, follow grammatical rules, and use the techniques provided, but I will use a strong personal voice.  I have joined the English discourse community and incorporate both schools of writing.

In my education classes, I use more of Bartholomae’s techniques because that is the method used to teach elementary students.  My essays for education classes are not long, and they should be fairly structured.  They are the simple essays with light form and not necessarily the most dense material.  They are the typical page long essays that begin and end quickly and put my point out in the open.  I try to use my personal voice, but when space is limited, voice is the first thing that is cut out.  This becomes quickly Bartholomaen academic writing.  I try to pull myself out of my writing, and take my opinions out, but it is difficult to do because I am biased because of my experiences. 

Science leaves no room for any bias.  The science community is all about proving things wrong or right.  There is no in between.  When I write for my physics course, I do not use personal opinion.  I write in complete sentences for lab write-ups.  Science requires Bartholomaen teaching.  There cannot be biases because the data proves what the writer is questioning.  The writer writes for the scientific community, but the writer must use academic discourse to share their findings.  Elbow holds no place in scientific writing. 

With the discourse community comes the academic writing.  It is necessary for a writer to master each school of writing.  Bizzell discusses discourse communities as an important reason to master academic writing, and when it is mastered, the writer is welcomed into the community.  In order to find the information needed to master this academic writing, Bartholomae and Elbow are needed.  They debate both sides of writing and methods, but each is needed in certain circumstances to become welcomed into the writer’s discourse community.  When teaching writing, Bartholomae’s philosophy is a good start, but as the writer grows and evolves, Elbow’s introduction is important for future improvements.  These improvements lead to full inclusion into whatever discourse community(ies) the writer chooses to enter.

When I was a child, believe it or not, I was somewhat of a trouble maker, and my father came up with some rather obscure punishments.  One time, in order to be able to go out and do something, I had to write an essay.  An essay about what I did and why it was wrong.  I woke up early on a crisp winter Saturday, eager to do whatever it was I wanted to do and a little spiteful about the essay for my dad, and sat at the dining room table.  I sat, back to the wall, at the large wooden table, just after sunrise, in direct sight of my parents’ closed bedroom door, with my pride, a pencil, and a notebook.  For the next few hours, I grinded out and grumbled about and wanted to shout at this dumb essay.  That was the longest thing I had to write at that point in my life.  I remember wanting to repeat myself for all four pages, worrying if what I was writing was correct, and hating every word.  I wrote, and wrote, and wrote for what seemed days until I met the length requirement of my assignment.  Dad woke up to a frustrated son and a completed essay.

It was hard, but I figured it out.  This was my first experience in which I had to do anything like that.  Writing at length was a new thing.  I found words, language, and length.  These things all frustrated me.  These things all intrigued me.  These things led me down the road to the place that I am right now.  I wrote several papers after that, and all of them seemed to come a little easier to me than it was for most students.  I almost found enjoyment in writing essays, but it was school, and no one can enjoy that, right?  I am a writer, not a test-taker, and that’s what I do.  I have my own methods, no matter how standard or ‘unacademic’ they might be.

I don’t really know where this memoir will go or how this memoir will end.  This is the same for every time I put a pen to paper or a finger to a key.  I write, I don’t plan, I write. I start many of my papers or essays in this mindset, and that might be why the beginning of my writings sort of suck than pick up steam when I have my personal epiphanies in the process of writing my way through the River of Suck.  I feel I am a fairly decent writer and my final products are not as horrible as I portray the beginnings to be, but I do not know where it came from.  I have become an English emphasis and chosen to take writing classes.  I must have picked something up along the way to help me succeed, well, at least to get to where I am with somewhat ease.  I have never been confident in my narratives though.  Not my strong point.  How did all this come about?  What happened to make me willing and able to do what I am right now?

In seventh grade, I walked into my Language Arts class to meet a beautiful blonde, fresh from college, to be our teacher.  I was in love.  She taught me about commas, grammar, colons, usage, everything.  Towards the end of the year, we were given the opportunity to write a creative story.  I had been reading fiction books and was excited to get the chance to dig my teeth in.  I wrote a long story about flying monkeys.  I struggled through some of it, flew through some, and just plain didn’t even try on some.  After hours of writing and rewriting, I turned this in to the love of my life, expecting to get the best grade I have ever earned. After a week of waiting for my to-be-published-but-not-quite-published-yet story to be returned, the class filed into the classroom.  She was standing in the front to the room by the overhead projector.  One of our stories was “something that all of us could aspire to.” Oh, I knew it was mine!  She pulled the blinds, killed the lights, turned on the overhead.  There it was, The Guitar!  Wait.  I didn’t write that.  I was crushed.  It wasn’t my story.  Maybe she made a mistake, and she would figure it out when she returned mine.  She handed them back after fifteen minutes of pure agony.  I flipped to the last page, and . . . C+.  What?  A C+?  I read the comments, and that one part wasn’t confusing to me.  Oh, well, a comma can be optional here and there.  And semi-colons, who cares?  I was done with that story writing stuff… and Her.  I never got C’s.  That was a good story, but I was crushed.  That ruined my confidence.

I have not written any type of fiction since then and don’t plan to any time soon.  I honestly hope to write a children’s book someday, but I’m very timid to share any writing that is anywhere near creative.  Not my style.  That individual event was a very hard time for my writing confidence.  With that, I was happy to write academically, but not creatively.  Writing essays for history, writing research projects, and any academic writing became sort of a guilty pleasure in my life.  I would write papers until late into the night because I did not want to stop.  I write many things in one sitting because I do not want to stop.  I guess this has created the bad habit of writing the night before a paper is due.  I know that it can get done.  Also, I have the habit of not editing my papers before turning them in. 

In high school, I had many great experiences with writing.  I took upper level English courses, lower level English courses, and writing courses.  I always opted for an English course.  Over the four years I was self-deemed king of my high school, I took honors English, basic English, and Newspaper. 

I wrote essays for my honors courses.  I had current events, book summaries, and analysis essays.  I enjoyed some of them, and I did not enjoy others.  Either way, I got them done and earned the grade.  I did not try very hard, but it seemed like I did not have to.  I like slacking off; I admit it, and still do to this day.  However, I excelled at slacking in high school English courses.  I didn’t need to try, so I didn’t.  No matter the topic, length, or requirements, I would turn my computer on at nine or ten the night before. 

I met my match during my sophomore year.  Walking into Honors English, I did not get the A’s like I was used to.  I wrote a very good current event, in my mind, and turned it in.  I got a D.  Honestly to this day, I do not have any idea as to why I got a D.  I followed the guidelines, and I tried to write to the best of my abilities.  I approached the teacher, only to get shut down, and to be told that I was not a good writer.  This wasn’t true at all, and I was not the only one who thought this.  I talked to quite a few teachers, and not one of them said anything nearly as harsh as she had.  One thing led to another, and I ended up disagreeing with the teacher and quitting. 

I took the normal, basic English required for all tenth graders.  I rocked that class.  It was hard work, and I had to try, and I wanted to.  For some reason, I wanted to get an A in English 10.  By skipping out of the honors class, I think that I wanted to prove myself.  I wrote my essays the night before, but I edited them.  This was a big deal.  I wanted the almighty A.  I earned that almighty A, and this was our school’s most difficult teacher.  That was great.  I felt good.

I joined the newspaper team and wrote whatever I wanted.  I wrote sports, opinion, and news articles.  This was more fun than I had in any other class in high school.  This class made me come to college and contemplate journalism as my major.  I had to go out of my way to learn about what my writing topic was.  I had to go through the draft process.  I had to edit, not only my writing, but everyone else’s as an editor.  I got to pick my topic, and I chose to excel in that.  I loved the freedom. 

The entire high school English experience was good for me, from freshman honors, to junior basic, to newspaper.  I liked the challenges.  I liked the writing.  I enjoyed the openness to interpretation.  This time was a good prep time to begin college.  I wrote a lot, and I learned several tips and tricks for writing in college.  I wrote essays, I revised them a bit, and I hurried them.  And that’s what college is all about right?

I have been in college for two and a half years and have written essays anywhere from one to fifteen pages long.  I learned how in my primary and secondary schooling, and I applied that knowledge to my papers.  I have done a lot of this, and every time I hope to get better.  Though I have been through a few English classes and written multiple essays for each, I have not had too much fun writing.  I began to write things without the ambition that I had in the past.  I enjoyed an essay here and there, but, with risk of sounding like a kiss ass, I have enjoyed the essays in my English 319 class.  I have received the chance to write in a structured style, but I have also been given the opportunity to use many things that are uncalled for in many other classes.  I can have my own opinion, my own voice, and my own content. 

I feel like the evolution of my own writing is not complete, but it has brought me to where I am.  I do not plan my essays, I do not write my essays much before the due date, and I do not edit my essays very well.  I do write my essays as well as possible, doing things that I have grown accustomed to.  I started writing at a young age and took everything in.  I used what I wanted, and I threw out what did not work for me.  I still lack direction in my writing, and I still will write as often as I can.  I cannot say specifically what I have learned or when I learned it, but I can say that I have grown into who I am as a writer.  This is not only because of any individual event, but because of every time I was assigned a writing assignment.  I try to take something from everything.  Therefore, every time I write, I grow. Be it in my methods, content, or trial and error, I am always trying to grow as a writer.

Harry Frankfurt and Nancy Miller both have different perceptions of truth. Through their different thoughts of writing, they have discovered the most effective version of truth. Frankfurt feels that truth is a cumulative effort. The truth is used for the betterment of society and the whole of society determines what that truth is. Any fabrication is the epitome of irresponsible and horrible. A lie is the worst thing anyone can do. His writing is very academic. He is a scholar, and he will influence the thoughts of many readers, so his truth is very important. Miller’s truth is something more important to the individual. The individual writer is telling their story, and that is their truth. No one else can determine what is true and what is not in the personal memoir, and therefore, it is acceptable to fabricate some hazy details. With theses details, the truth comes alive through the entire story. Though each defines truth differently, both truths are the correct one. In both arenas of thought, that coordinating definition is applicable and appropriate.

When I was a child, believe it or not, I was somewhat of a trouble maker, and my father came up with some rather obscure punishments. One time, in order to be able to go out and do something, I had to write an essay. An essay about what I did and why it was wrong. I woke up early on a crisp winter Saturday, eager to do whatever it was I wanted to do and a little spiteful about the essay for my dad, and sat at the dining room table. I sat, back to the wall, at the large wooden table, just after sunrise, in direct sight of my parents’ closed bedroom door, with my pride, a pencil, and a notebook. For the preceding few hours, I grinded out and grumbled about and wanted to shout at this dumb essay. That was the longest thing I had to write at that point in my life. I remember wanting to repeat myself for all four pages, worrying if what I was writing was correct, and hating every word. I wrote, and wrote, and wrote for what seemed days until I met the length requirement of my assignment. Dad woke up to a frustrated son and a completed essay.

It was hard, but I figured it out. This was my first experience in which I had to do anything like that. Writing at length was a new thing. I found words, language, and length. These things all frustrated me. These things all intrigued me. These things led me down the road to the place that I am right now. I wrote several papers after that, and all of them seemed to come a little easier than it was for most students. I almost found enjoyment in writing these essays, but it was school, and no one can enjoy that. Right? I am a writer, and that’s what I do. I have my own methods, no matter how standard or ‘unacademic’ they might be.

I don’t really know where this memoir will go or how this memoir will end. That is the same for every time I put a pen to paper or a finger to a key. I write, I don’t plan, I write. I start many of my papers or essays in this mindset, and that might be why the beginning of my writings sort of suck than pick up steam when I have my personal epiphanies in the process of writing my way through the River of Suck. I feel I am a fairly decent writer and my final products are not as horrible as I portray the beginnings to be, but I do not know where it came from. I have become an English emphasis and chosen to take writing classes. I must have picked something up along the way to help me succeed, well, at least to get to where I am with somewhat ease. I have never been confident in my narratives though. Not my strong point. How did all this come about? What happened to make me willing and able to do what I am right now?

In seventh grade, I walked into my Language Arts class to meet this beautiful blonde, fresh from college, to be our teacher. I was in love. She taught me about commas, grammar, colons, usage, everything. Towards the end of the year, we were given the opportunity to write a creative story. I had been reading fiction books, and I was excited to get the chance to dig my teeth in. I wrote a long story about flying monkeys. I struggled through some, flew through some, and just plain didn’t even try on some. After hours of writing and rewriting, I turned this in to the love of my life, expecting to get the best grade I have ever earned. After a week of waiting for my to-be-published-but-not-quite-published-yet story to be returned, the class filed into the classroom. She was standing in the front to the room by the overhead projector. One of our stories was “something that all of us could aspire to.” Oh, I knew it was mine! She pulled the blinds and killed the lights and turned on the overhead. There it was, The Guitar! Wait. I didn’t write that. I was crushed. It wasn’t my story. Maybe she made a mistake, and she would figure it out when she returned mine. She handed them back after fifteen minutes of pure agony. I flipped to the last page, and . . . C+. What? A C+? I read the comments, and it wasn’t confusing to me. Oh well, a comma can be optional here and there. And semi-colons, who cares? I was done with that story writing stuff. And Her. I never got C’s. That was a good story, but I was crushed. That ruined my confidence.

I have not written any type of fiction since then, and I don’t plan to any time soon. I honestly hope to write a children’s book sometime, but I’m very timid to share any writing that is creative. Not my style. That individual event was a very hard time for my writing confidence. With that, I was happy to write academically, but not creatively. Writing essays for history, writing research projects, and any academic writing became sort of a guilty pleasure in my life. I would write papers until late into the night because I did not want to stop. I write many things in one sitting because I do not want to stop. I guess this has created the bad habit of writing the night before the paper is due. I know that I can get it done. I also have the habit of not editing my papers before I turn them in. In high school, I had a many great experiences with writing.

In high school, I took upper level English courses, lower level English courses, and writing courses. I always opted for an English course. Over the four years I was self-deemed king of my high school, I decided to take honors English, basic English, and Newspaper.
I wrote essays for my honors courses. I had current events, book summaries, and analysis essays. I enjoyed some of them, and I did not enjoy others. Either way, I got them done, and I earned the grade. I did not try very hard, but I seemed that I did not have to. I like slacking off, I admit it, and still do to this day. However, I excelled at slacking in high school English courses. I didn’t need to try, so I didn’t. No matter the topic, length, or requirements, I would turn my computer on at nine or ten the night before.
I met my match in my junior year. I walked into class, and I did not get the A’s like I was used to. I wrote a very good current event, in my mind, and turned it in. I got a D. I honestly to this day, do not have any idea as to why I got a D. I followed the guidelines, and I tried to write to the best of my abilities. I approached the teacher, only to get shut down, and to be told that I was not a good writer. This wasn’t true at all, and I was not the only one who thought this. I talked to a quite a few teachers, and not one of them said anything nearly as harsh as she had. One thing led to another, and I ended up hating the teacher and quitting.
I took the normal, basic English required for all eleventh graders. I rocked that class. It was hard work, and I had to try, and I wanted to. For some reason, I wanted to get an A in English 11. I skipped out of the honors class, so I think that I wanted to prove myself. I wrote my essays the night before, but I edited them. I wanted the almighty A. I earned that almighty A, and this was our school’s most difficult teacher. That was great. I felt good.
I joined the newspaper team, and I wrote whatever I wanted. I wrote sports, opinion, and news articles. I had more fun with this than I did any other class in high school. This class made me come to college and contemplate journalism as my major. I had to go out of my way to learn about what my writing topic was. I had to go through the draft process. I had to edit, not only my writing, but everyone else’s when I was the editor. I got to decide my topic, and I chose to excel in that. I loved the freedom.
The entire high school English experience was good for me, from freshman honors, to junior basic, to newspaper. I liked the challenges. I liked the writing. I enjoyed the openness to interpretation. This time was a good prep time to begin college. I wrote a lot, and I learned several tips and tricks for writing in college. I wrote essays, I revised them a bit, and I hurried them. And that’s what college is all about right?

I have been in college for two and a half years, and I have written essays anywhere from one to fifteen pages long. I learned how in my primary and secondary schooling, and I applied that knowledge to my papers. I have done a lot of this, and every time I get better. Though I have been through a few English classes and written multiple essays for each, I have not had too much fun writing. I began to write things without the ambition that I had in previous grades. I enjoyed an essay here and there, but, with risk of sounding like a kiss ass, I have enjoyed the essays in my English 319 class. I have received the chance to write in a structured style, but I have been given the opportunity to use many things that are uncalled for in many other classes. I can have my own opinion, my own voice, and my own content.

I feel like the evolution of my own writing is not complete, but it has brought me to where I am. I do not plan my essays, I do not write my essays much before the due date, and I do not edit my essays very well. I do write my essays as well as I can doing things that I have grown accustomed to. I started writing at a young age, and I took everything in. I used what I wanted, and I threw out what didn’t work for me. I still lack direction in my writing, and I still will write as much as I can. I cannot say specifically what I have learned when I learned it, but I can say that I have grown into who I am as a writer. This is not only because of these individual events, but because of every time I was assigned a writing assignment. I try to take something from everything. Therefore, every time I write, I grow. Be it in my methods, content, or trial and error, I am always trying to grow as a writer.

I don’t really know where or how this memoir will end. That is the same for every time I put a pen to paper or a finger to a key. I write, I don’t plan, I write. I start many of my papers or essays in the mindset, and that might be why the beginning of my writings sort of suck than pick up steam when I have my personal epiphanies in the process of writing my way through the River of Suck. I feel I am a fairly decent writer and my final products are not as horrible as I portray the beginnings of, but I do not know where it came from. I have become an English emphasis and chosen to take writing classes. I must have picked something up along the way to help me succeed, well, at least to get to where I am with somewhat ease. I have never been confident in my narratives though. Not my strong point. How did all this come about? What happened to make me willing and able to do what I am right now?

When I was a child, believe it or not, I was somewhat a trouble maker, and my father came up with some rather obscure punishments. One time, in order to be able to go somewhere (I do not remember where), I had to write an essay. An essay about what I did and why it was wrong. I woke up early on a crisp winter Saturday, eager to do whatever it was I wanted to do and a little spiteful about the essay for my dad, and sat at the dining room table. I sat, back to the wall, at the large wooden table, just after sunrise, in direct sight of my parents’ closed bedroom door, with my pride, a pencil, and a notebook. For the preceding few hours, I grinded out and grumbled about and wanted to shout at this dumb essay. That was the longest thing I had to write at that point. I remember wanting to repeat myself, worrying if what I was writing was correct, and hating every word. I wrote, and wrote, and wrote for what seemed days until I met the length requirement of my assignment. Dad woke up to a frustrated son and a completed essay.

Oh the lessons I learned from that obscure punishment! It was hard, but I figured it out. This was my first experience in which I had to do anything like that. Writing at length was a new thing. I found words, language, and length. These things all frustrated me. These things all intrigued me. These things led me down the road to the place that I am right now. I wrote several papers after that, and all of them seemed to come a little easier than most students. I almost found enjoyment in writing these essays, but it was school, and no one can enjoy that. Right?

In seventh grade, I walked into my Language Arts class to meet this beautiful blonde, fresh from college, to be our teacher. I was in love. She taught me about commas, grammar, colons, usage, everything. Towards the end of the year, we were given the opportunity to write a creative story. I had been reading fiction books, and I was excited to get the chance to dig my teeth in. I wrote a long story about flying monkeys. I struggled through some, flew through some, and just plain didn’t even try on some. After hours of writing and rewriting, I turned this in to the love of my life, expecting to get the best grade I have ever earned. After a week of waiting for my to-be-published-but-not-quite-published-yet story to be returned, the class filed into the classroom. She was standing in the front to the room by the overhead projector. One of our stories was “something that all of us could aspire to.” Oh, I knew it was mine! She pulled the blinds and killed the lights and turned on the overhead. There it was, The Guitar! Wait. I didn’t write that. I was crushed. It wasn’t my story. Maybe she made a mistake, and she would figure it out when she returned mine. She handed them back after fifteen minutes of pure agony. I flipped to the last page, and . . . C+. What? A C+? I read the comments, and it wasn’t confusing to me. Oh well, a comma can be optional here and there. And semi-colons, who cares? I was done with that story writing stuff. And Her. I never got C’s. That was a good story. But I was crushed.

That one story ruined my confidence. I have not written any type of fiction in since then, and I don’t plan to any time soon. I honestly hope to write a children’s book sometime, but I’m very timid to share any writing that is creative. Not my style. That individual event was a very hard time for my writing confidence. With that, I was happy to write academically, but not creatively. Writing essays for history, writing research projects, and any academic writing became sort of a guilty pleasure in my life. I would write papers until late into the night because I did not want to stop. I write many things in one sitting because I do not want to stop. I guess this has created the bad habit of writing the night before the paper is due. I know that I can get it done. I also have the habit of not editing my papers before I turn them in because of this. In high school, I had a many great experiences with writing.
I took upper level English courses, lower level English courses, and writing courses. I always opted for an English course. Over the four years I owned my high school, I decided to take honors English, basic English, and Newspaper.
I wrote essays for my honors course. I had current events, book summaries, and analysis essays. I enjoyed some of them, and I did not enjoy others. Either way, I got them done, and I earned the grade. I did not try very hard, but I seemed that I did not have to. I like slacking off, I admit it, and still do to this day. However, I excelled at slacking in high school English courses. I didn’t need to, so I didn’t. No matter the topic, length, or requirements, I would turn my computer on at nine or ten the night before. I met my match in my junior year. I walked into class, and I did not get the A’s like I was used to. One thing led to another, and I ended up hating the teacher and quitting.
I took the normal, basic English required for all eleventh graders. I rocked that class. It was hard work, and I had to try in that class. I really had to try in that class, and I wanted to. For some reason, I wanted to get an A in English 11. I dipped out of the honors class, so I think that I wanted to prove myself. I wrote my essays the night before, but I edited them. I wanted the almighty A. I earned that almighty A, and this was our school’s most difficult teacher. That was great. I felt good.
I joined the newspaper team, and I wrote whatever I wanted. I wrote sports, opinion, and news articles. I had more fun with this than I did any other class in high school. This class made me come to college and contemplate journalism as my major. I had to go out of my way to learn about what my writing topic was. I had to go through the draft process. I had to edit, not only my writing, but everyone else’s when I was the editor. I got to decide my topic, and I chose to excel on that. I loved the freedom.
The entire high school English experience was good for me. I liked the challenges. I liked the writing. I enjoyed the openness to the writing. This time was a good prep time to begin college. I wrote a lot, and I learned several tips and tricks for writing in college. I wrote essays, I revised them, and I hurried them. And that’s what college is all about right?

I have been in college for two and a half years, and I have written essays anywhere from one to fifteen pages long. I learned how in my primary and secondary schooling, and I applied that knowledge to my papers. I have done a lot of this, and every time I get better. Though I have been through a few English classes and written multiple essays for each, I have not had too much fun writing. I began to write things without the ambition that I had in previous grades. I enjoyed an essay here and there, but, with risk of sounding like a kiss ass, I have enjoyed the essays in English 319 class. I have received the chance to write in a structured style, but I have been given the opportunity to use many things that are uncalled for in many other classes. I can have my own opinion, my own voice, and my own content.

I feel like the evolution of my own writing is not complete, but it has brought me to where I am. I do not plan my essays, I do not write my essays much before the due date, and I do not edit my essays very well. I do write my essays as well as I can doing things that I have grown accustomed to. I started writing at a young age, and I took everything in. I used what I wanted, and I threw out what didn’t work for me. I still lack direction in my writing, and I still will write as much as I can. I cannot say specifically what I have learned when I learned it, but I can say that I have grown into who I am as a writer. This is not only because of these individual events, but because of every time I was assigned a writing assignment. I try to take something from everything. Therefore, every time I write, I grow. Be it in my methods, content, or trial and error, I am always trying to grow as a writer.

A duck goes into a bar. He asks the bartender if he has any grapes, to which the bartender replies, “no”.  The duck goes in several more times through the week and the same thing happens.  Finally, the duck asks the question again, and the bartender says, “no, and if you ask me again, I’ll nail your feet to the ground.”  The duck leaves, and returns the next day.  This time, he asks him if he has any nails.  The bartender tells him, he does not have any, and the duck asks again if he has any grapes.

Now with words inserted or changed and a little more direct voice, I tell this joke again: So, a duck waddles into a bar.  He asks the dirtiest bartender in the already shoddy establishment, “Do you have any grapes?” The bartender says smugly, “No, now get out of here.”  The duck turns around and leaves. The next day the duck does the same thing.  And once again, the bartender does not have any grapes, so he leaves once again.  The duck proceeds to visit the same bar and ask the same question to the same bartender and gets the same answer.  Each time though, the bartender becomes more and more angry.  After a few days of this, the bartender changes his reply, “No, I do not have any grapes, and if you ask again, I am going to nail your webbed feet to the ground!”  The next day, the duck waddles his little tail into the bar and asks the dirty bartender, “Got any nails?”  When the bartender explained he did not have any nails, and the duck’s immediate reply, “Well then, do ya got any grapes?”

The second joke is more personal and full of voice.  They both tell the same story, but the second puts a little more personality into it, and the biggest definition of personality in an English essay is personality.  It addresses the audience, and it brings them into the bar with the duck through the changes in commentary.  The joke makes you laugh and it makes you feel like you can see this ‘duck waddle’ and the ‘dirtiest bartender smugly replies’.  The audience (you) is a driving force for most writers, for without them, no one at all will listen.  These things are due my voice and strive to appease the audience’s expectations.  In this case, the audience expects the joke to be funny, naturally.  That is what I did with my voice. 

Voice is mainly shown when emphasis is put on different words or phrases, and adjectives are an effective method of doing this.  Voice is the style of how an idea is put on the page, because no idea is brand new and inventive.  There will always be an outside influence in someone’s writing.  That makes the ideas a compilation of those previous and not the writer’s individual voice. 

It does not matter whether the student is an undergraduate in college or an English scholar out in the world, their writing will contain some of their personal influence. Bartholomae has a pretty dry voice when trying to sound very scholarly, but he has it.  In his article Against the Grain, he states “I have learned to make allusions to ancient and modern texts to borrow authority for my beliefs.”  He appears to be both arrogant and intelligent, and he does show this through his writing.  Elbow rocks a little more personality when he teaches about free writing and finding a student’s own voice.  Elbow’s Being a Writer says, “But I insist them as reasonable goals for my teaching, because if I taught well and if all the conditions for learning were good, I believe all my students could achieve them.”  This shows his feelings, hopes, and opinions straight out without trying to avoid it at all. 

Every author will add their own flair (voice, twist, emotion) to the piece they are writing.  Without a firm, academic, voice-less structure there will always be, whether intentionally or unintentionally, a debatable and definable voice.

This voice can be debatable because there are two questions to address this: The first deals with intent on word placement; Did he put the word ‘success’ here instead of there for a reason?  The second addresses intentions of sentences; Is this meant to be sarcastic, or does she really mean that she is thankful for the dog chewing up the shoe?  The answer to these two questions solves what voice is.

            Word placement truly thrives in poetry, but it can make or break a scholarly article.  With every word in the correct place, the writer will be able to get their point across as effectively as possible.  If something is placed towards the beginning or end of a sentence, it can dramatically change the effect of a sentence.  [It can dramatically affect a sentence if something is placed towards the beginning or end of a sentence]  The writer decides each of these minute adjustments in every sentence to fine-tune and improve their writing for either their own happiness or the reader’s comprehension.  The placement of certain fragments or objects is vital to a writer’s voice.  If one of these things is off, their voice is altered just a little bit when the voice is assumed to be solely style.

            The submerged intentions bring to light a more direct voice.  In my essays, I tend to get bored with the straight, ‘no-voice’, monotone writing.  My writing flourishes when I use humor, witty remarks, or little tid-bits of sarcasm.  By adding these elements, the writer becomes more in conversation with their audience.  This is not only acknowledging the audience, it is bringing them into your writing.  It makes the reader laugh, cry, or become angry, not because of what you said, but because of how you said it.  The writer’s intentions are fully shown through their voice.  The more voice used, the more emotion invoked, no matter the emotion intended.  A story about homelessness would be emotion filling, but if the author is passionate and shows that, they will make the reader feel ten times more emotional about the subject.

Frankfurt’s On Truth his explanation and analysis of Portuguese-Dutch-Jewish philosopher, Baruch Spinoza’s understanding of love.  His voice is very dense and factual.  Mine is a little more upbeat and hopefully easier to read and interpret.  I agree with Frankfurt’s analysis, but in the following imitation, I hope to present it with my own voice.

WC: 1080

Part II:

Spinoza’s definition of love is something which brings joy to a person.  If an external object brings joy to a person, and someone realizes how much joy that object brings, they are in love with that object.  Love is extreme joy brought by someone or something.  This brings to the forefront the argument that one can love anything that ultimately brings them great joy.  This joy keeps them going and makes them who they are.  Spinoza is basically correct.  Many examples do follow this pattern; Something brings joy, someone loves it, they find themselves through that.  This keeps them on the path that they have set.

            Spinoza also says, “One who loves necessarily strives to have present and preserve the things he loves” (Ethics, part III, proposition 11, scholium).The things that he loves are most important to him.  His life, his joy, and his personal self depend on these.  Naturally, he will do anything to protect them and make sure that they are always there for him.

Part III:

            After imitating Frankfurt’s passage in On Truth, I realized that voice is not only how you say what you say, but voice is what you say as well.  This exercise led me to feel that one’s own opinions are just as important as the method in which one puts them on paper.

The issue I had with this before the imitation was that the ideas are never new.  They will be a combination of how things that you have learned, and all of these will be put onto paper generally the same by one scholar or another.  I was wrong.  Through writing my version of the passage, I did end up altering the meaning a little bit to put my own voice in there. 

Frankfurt writes “…people do tend to love what they feel helps them to “find themselves,” to discover “who they really are,” and to face life successfully without betraying or compromising their fundamental natures.”  My imitation reads, “…Something brings joy, someone loves it, they find themselves through that.”  As one can see, the meaning is lost in transition.  I did not show the emphasis of ‘finding themselves’ or facing life successfully, and my imitation does not define that neatly as well.  This was a weak point in my imitation.

My imitation straightforwardly states Spinoza’s definition of love, while Frankfurt originally makes the reader uncover that through the analysis.  This is where I feel that my imitation is easier to understand than Frankfurt’s, which changes the meaning through the variations of the two texts.

In different environments, a new voices emerge. When someone is writing a history essay, their voice comes through; When someone is writing an analytical essay, their voice can be heard; When another person is writing a newspaper story, their voice will be prominent.  Their voice has to be prominent.  The words on the page are vital to the method in which the author intended for the reader to interpret, and the feeling evoked is something that comes from the soul.  The ideas on the pages are important to the writer’s voices just as much.

The ideas tell the reader who they are listening to.  If the reader is learning the information presented, they are directly learning the writer’s opinion.  The writer’s opinion, whether right or wrong, fact based or biased, is what the reader will respond to.  They have to because there are as many ways to discuss a topic as there are writers.  An attack on Pearl Harbor is seen as an act of heroism by some Japanese people, but from many American’s opinions, it was an utter blood boiler.  From another Japanese stand point is the fact that they sneak attacked Hawaii, and they feel bad.  From the other American’s, we were being terrible and karma finally caught up.  The information depends on the writer’s history, culture, or projected point of view.

            The complications in defining voice, is that everything can be tweaked a little bit, and is tweaked a little bit through translation and interpretation of the facts.  The snide comments and weak jokes are more direct results of voice, but the information and the words on the paper are indirect voice because of the personal touch that every author addresses his pieces of writing.  There is no set way for presenting information, writing, or telling stories, so the person doing it at the time is the one setting the precedence.  Their basic opinion or information is not copied, but the next person will present the same bunch of information and use their own correlations to voice.  I write a million times differently from someone in the biology department due to style, and I write a little differently from someone in the English department due to the content that I present on the page. 

            This sets the standard for voice.  Though there is some discrepancy on how the term voice is defined, it also varies through discourses.  In an English classroom, my voice will be effective, but in the football locker room, my voice changes drastically.  I will write get ‘em or post some billboard material over what was written because I do not need to be well versed in the ways of English.  As I am writing an English paper however, I will try to be witty and articulate.  The different scenarios will change the differences in voice. 

            With the imitation exercise fresh in my mind and different discourses also, I feel that voice is everything about writing.  What you write and how you write will be integrated in the world soon enough, but the base line is that there is no baseline.  Without an example of a non-voice, every piece will have a certain impression of voice, making it impossible to define voice as either the substance of the paper or the style, but it will forever be combined into both.  Therefore, voice is not only style, as was the case I pleaded in Part I, it is content as well, for the information will be altered even the slightest bit with any different imitation or translation of an original piece of writing.

WC: 854

Part I:

Voice is one of the most difficult things to define in writing.  The debate rages between content and style, and both sides have strong arguments.  Anyone can scribe ideas spewed forth by their predecessors, and that is not their voice.  Their voice comes into play the way a student writes it.  No one can dictate how another writes or whether it has voice or not.  Every writing has voice. 

It does not matter whether the student is an undergraduate in college or an English scholar out in the world, their writing will contain some of their personal influence. Bartholomae has a pretty dry voice when trying to sound very scholarly, but he has it.  Elbow rocks a little more personality when he teaches about free writing and finding a student’s own voice.  Every author will add their own flair to the piece they are writing.  Without a base structure, this is what a piece without voice sounds like, there will always be, whether intentionally or unintentionally, a debatable voice.

This voice can be debatable because there can be two questions to address this: The first deals with intent on word placement; Did he put the word success here instead of there for a reason?  The second addresses intentions of sentences; Is this meant to be sarcastic, or does she really mean that she is thankful for the dog chewing up the shoe?  The answer to these two questions solves what voice is.

The word placement truly thrives in a poetic atmosphere, but it can make or break a scholarly article.  With every word in the correct place, the writer will be able to get their point across as effectively as possible.  If something is placed towards the beginning or end of sentence, it can dramatically change the effect of a sentence.  [It can dramatically affect a sentence if something is placed towards the beginning or end of a sentence]  The writer decides each of these minute adjustments every sentence to fine-tune and improve their writing for either their own happiness or the reader’s comprehension.  The placement of certain fragments or objects is vital to a writer’s voice.  If one of these things is off, their voice is altered just a little bit.

The submerged intentions bring to light a more direct voice.  In my essays, I tend to get bored with the straight, ‘no-voice’, monotone writing.  My writing flourishes when I use humor, witty remarks, or little tid-bits of sarcasm.  By adding these elements, the writer becomes more in conversation with their audience.  This is not only acknowledging the audience, it is bringing them into your writing.  It makes the reader laugh, cry, or become angry, not because of what you said, but because of how you said it. 

I’d like to tell a joke:  A duck walks into a bar. He asks the bartender if he has any grapes, to which the bartender replies, “no”.  The duck comes in several more times through the week and the same thing happens.  Finally, the duck asks the question again, and the bartender says, “no, and if you ask me again, I’ll nail your feet to the ground.”  The duck leaves, and returns the next say.  This time, he asks him if he has any nails.  The bartender tells him, he does not have any, and the duck asks again if he has any grapes.

Now with words inserted or changed and a little more direct voice: So, a duck waddles into a bar.  He asks the dirtiest bartender, “Do you have any grapes?” The bartender says smugly, “No, now get out of here.”  The duck turns around and leaves. The next day the duck does the same thing.  And once again, the bartender does not have any grapes, so he leaves.  The duck proceeds to visit the same bar and ask the same question to the same bartender and gets the same answer.  Each time though, the bartender becomes more and more angry.  After a few days of this, the bartender changes his reply, “No, I do not have any grapes, and if you ask again, I am going to nail your webbed feet to the ground!”  The next day, the duck waddles his little tail into the bar and asks the dirty bartender, “Got any nails?”  When the bartender explained he did not have any nails, the duck’s immediate reply was, “Well then, do ya got any grapes?”

The second joke is more personal and full of voice.  They both tell the same story, but the second puts a little more personality into it, and the biggest definition of personality in an English essay is personality.  The joke makes you laugh and it makes you feel like you can see this ‘duck waddle’ and the ‘dirtiest bartender smugly' reply.  These things are due my voice.  The more voice used, the more emotion invoked.  A story about homelessness would be emotion filling, but if the author is passionate and shows that, they will make the reader feel ten times more emotional about the subject.

Part II:

Spinoza’s definition of love is something which brings joy to a person.  Any external object that brings joy to a person, and someone realizes how much joy that object brings is in love with that object.  Love is extreme joy brought by someone or something.  This brings to the forefront, the argument that one can love anything that ultimately brings them great joy.  This joy keeps them going and makes them who they are.  Spinoza is basically correct.  Many examples do follow this pattern; Something brings joy, someone loves it, they find themselves through that.  This keeps them on the path that they have set.

Spinoza also says, “One who loves necessarily strives to have present and preserve the things he loves” (Ethics, part III, proposition 11, scholium).The things that he loves are most important to him.  His life, his joy, and his personal self depend on these.  Naturally, he will do anything to protect them and make sure that they are always there for him.

Part III:

After imitating Frankfurt’s passage in On Truth, I realized that voice is not only how you say what you say, but voice is what you say as well.  This exercise led me to feel that one’s own opinions are just as important as the method in which one puts them on paper.

The issue I had with this before the imitation was that the ideas are never new.  They will be a combination of how things that you have learned, and all of these will be put onto paper generally the same by one scholar or another.  I was wrong.  Through writing my version of the passage, I did end up altering the meaning a little bit to put my own voice in there.  Voice has always been something that is fun for me to test and play with, and I feel that everyone plays with voice in their writing.

When someone is writing a history essay, their voice comes through; When someone is writing an analytical essay, their voice can be heard; When another person is writing a newspaper story, their voice will be prominent.  Their voice has to be prominent.  The words on the page are vital to the method in which the author intended for the reader to interpret, and the feeling evoked is something that comes from the soul.  The ideas on the pages are important to the writer’s voices just as much.

The ideas tell the reader who they are listening to.  If the reader is learning the information presented, they are directly learning the writer’s opinion.  The writer’s opinion, whether right or wrong, fact based or biased, is what the reader will respond to.  They have to because there are as many ways to discuss a topic as there are writers.  An attack on Pearl Harbor is seen as an act of heroism by the Japanese, but from the American side, it was an utter blood boiler.  From another Japanese stand point is the fact that they sneak attacked Hawaii, and they feel bad.  From the other American’s, we were being terrible and karma finally caught up.  The information depends on the writer’s intent.

The complications in defining voice, is that everything can be tweaked a little bit, and is tweaked a little bit through translation and interpretation of the facts.  The snide comments and weak jokes are more direct results of voice, but the information and the words on the paper are indirect voice because of the personal touch that every author addresses his pieces of writing.  There is no set way for presenting information, writing, or telling stories, so the person doing it at the time is the one setting the precedence.  Their precedence is not followed by many, and the next person will present the same bunch of information and use their own correlations to voice.  I write a million times differently from someone in the biology department. 

This sets the standard for voice.  Though there is some discrepancy on how the term voice is defined, it also varies through discourses.  In an English classroom, my voice will be effective, but in the football locker room, my voice changes drastically.  I will write get ‘em or post some billboard material over what was written because I do not want to be well versed in the ways of English.  As I am writing an English paper, I will try to be witty and articulate.  The different scenarios will change the differences in voice. 

With the imitation exercise fresh in my mind and different discourses also, I feel that voice is everything about writing.  What you write and how you write will be integrated in the world soon enough, but the base line is that there is no baseline.  Without an example if a non-voice, every piece will have a certain connotation of voice, making it impossible to define voice as either the substance of the paper or the style, but it will forever be combined into both.