Reflection on the Course

I’ve always been a good student, but writing has been a weakness of mine.  I was hoping that by this point in my education I would acquire the reading and writing skills needed to be a successful college student.  Even though English is my toughest subject and this has been my first fully online course, I’ve really tried to focus on becoming a better writer during this class. 

In this class I’ve learned the importance of being a critical thinker while reading, analyzing the source, motive, and point of view expressed in the materials.  I’ve learned the difference between summary and analysis which will be very important moving forward in my education. 

            “The things they carried” stands out as a great example of how to write.  It seams that the author was always thinking ahead to how the material would be perceived and did a wonderful job making the reader perceive it the way he wanted them to.  I’ve never really considered how points that I make in my writings are considered by the reader.  I guess I’ve just assumed that the points were expressed as I meant them, but without considering the ways they could be misunderstood there was no way to be certain they were understood correctly.  This is something I plan to be better at in the future.

            My writing process has changed in a few ways as a result taking this course.  In the past, when writing an assigned paper, I’ve typically just started writing then went back and organized the thoughts.  This has resulted in short papers, barely meeting length requirements and not always the most clear in relation to the main thesis.  This has been a challenge of mine for quite some time.  Now, I plan an outline of what ideas will be covered in each paragraph and what sources I will be using for each idea.  Using this more organized approach has allowed me to have more material available and has resulted in more organized papers in all of my classes.

I will take what I’ve learned in this class and use it to help with my success in the rest of my education.

Here's a link to a news artcle that tells about the importance of writing for a business career.

Blog post #6 Anotated Bibliography

Burk, James. "The Military Obligation of Citizens since Vietnam." Parameters 31.2 (2001):   

48,48-60. ProQuest Research Library. Web. 18 July 2011.

I'm using this document in support of my argument that having soldiers that have been drafted fighting on foriegn soil is inefficient because they don't want to be there.  I use this source to provide a conversation between two soldiers while in Vietnam.  Their commnding officer is mad at them for wearing peace signs while in battle.  The two soliers state how they don't want to be there and how they are only there because they have to be.  This falls right in line with the section of O'Brien's "Rainy River" story, of how Tim was trying to find a way out of the draft and contemplated running away to Canada.

Varon, Jeremy. "Defying the Draft." Reviews in American History 32.4 (2004): 573,573-579.

             ProQuest Research Library. Web. 17 July 2011.

           

             I'm using this resource as proof that men burned thier draft cards in public in protest of the draft.  I only use one short line that shows how the anti-draft movement began.

"Vietnam War." Encyclopedia Britannica. Encyclopedia Britannica Online. Encyclopedia

            Britannica, 2011. Web. 17 Jul. 2011.

            http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/628478/Vietnam-War.

            This was my most useful resource.  From it I found out more than 3,000,000 people, including

 58,000 american were killed during vietnam.  More than half of them civilians. From this encyclopedia I

took a lot of new information about the war in vietnam and details of the military draft.  This one one of the most photographed wars and a lot of the photos have a negative message.   Here is a link to the conscription in the US wikipedia page.  It explains the process it took to eventually have the draft removed from practice.

Blog Post #5 close reading of a passage

Part of a dialoge between characters Dobbins and Kiowa when spending short time at a church with monks taking care of them...

"Well..I'm not the churchy type. When I was alittle kid, way back, I used to sit there on Sunday counting bricks on the wall. Church wasn't for me." Sais Dobbins.
Kiowa replied,"You're serious?"
"What's serious?" Dobbins said, "I was a kid. The thing is, I believed in God and all that, but it wasn't the religious part that interested me. Just being nice to people, that's all. Being decent."

This short dialoge from the story of these two soldiers camping out in a church and being treated well by the monks that were there was used by the author to give the reader a sense of respect for the characters.  They were staying in the church not really by choice but out of convenience.  They were only there for a short time and were able to form a bond with each other and the monks that took care of them even though they couldn't speak english. I can relate to the dobbins character as in church leaving a bad taste in my mouth overall but still desiring to do good things for others.  I think the author did a good job of drawing the reader into the short story of the church almost putting aside the idea that these were soldiers at war.  Not only did it seam as if the soldiers got a little break from the hectic life thought of when at war, but they had a few moments to think and talk about things that two guys, especially soldiers, aren't supposed to talk about.  I think that was the main goal  of the author here, to draw attention to each soldier as a person with thier own thoughts, goals, and feelings, etc.  It seems it's an attempt to take a break from all the bad things assiciated with war, even though the very next page begins with a graphic image of a war casualty.

Here is a link to a site that adresses current issues in vietnam regarding conflict of religious rights.

Poetry of witness blog post #3

I chose to look at the poem "immigrants in our own land". Also, I will be using this poem for essay #2.  The poem is about the life of a new inmate at a prison.  The speaker is an inmate himself.  He is describing the life within the jail with an optimistic tone that he expects to diminish.  He mostly describes the emotional and mental conditions within the prison with less effort in describing the physical prison itself.  I think the message is to inform the reader of these emotional and mental conditions of being in prison and how they change over time while in prison.  I try to put myself in the shoes of a prison inmate.  It most definitely would not be easy to stay optimistic while in prison.  This is what appealed to me most about this poem. The author served his sentence and left prison fully rehabilitated and ready to help others.  I'm always inspired by hearing of people that persevere through tough and challenging times.  Here is the link to Jimmy Santiago Baca's wikipedia page.  A very inspiring individual.

Summary vs Analysis

Summarizing is when you tell what the original writing contains.  Summarizing is generally needed in order to analyze the writing.  It can sometimes be easy to over summarize.  We want to look at the writing styles, information sources and other critical information within the writing during analysis.  This information is used to draw conclusions about the author and his or her motives in writing the material.  During analysis we can find symbols and hidden meanings behind the main plot of a story.  Once we’ve found some backup information for a conclusion we’ve drawn we can make an argument about the writing.  In analysis, we can detemine what kind of paper it is. Pursuasive paper, commentary, love novel, etc.  This will affect the ways in which we analyse the writing.  If its a pursuasive paper, we can study what kind of pursuation is being used.  If it's a love story, we can find and learn from the ways the writer is able to draw us in emotionally.

Here's a link decribing a good writer.

Blog post #1 "good readers and good writers"

In this short article Nabokov states that a good reader is more of a re-reader.  By saying this, he is suggesting that the effort it takes to actually read and understand the material takes away from the enjoyment of the story or topic of the writing.  He compares it to a painting.  You don't have to do anything but enjoy a painting, where reading takes work before you can enjoy.  I also liked the list of things that makes a good reader.  He said to pick at least 4 of the 10 things.  I don't really consider myself a good reader, or a good writer for that matter.  I guess thats why I'm in this class.  I'll probably refer to this list of things that makes one a good reader a number of times in the future.  I tend to lose interest when I read and I hope this list will help me in that area.

image from http://mhpbooks.com/mobylives/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/vladimir-nabokov-writing-in-bed.jpg

Here is a link to some quotes by Vladimir Nabokov