Journal 1:
- Imagine you could invite David Foster Wallace into the discussion in our classroom. What questions would you ask him about this essay?
- Use that experience to think about larger issues, specifically, what are the limits of a written discussion? How might you anticipate your audience’s questions when you write?
When thinking about a written discussion I understand that background and our personal thoughts have to be included. There is an extent to when to stop having background information. I feel as if when writing a written discussion there should be more points on our thoughts than the background information. I feel that writing a discussion that is meaningful to you and has your thoughts you would enjoy the feedback or questions your audience give.
If you could invite David Foster Wallace into the discussion in our classroom would ask him why was there so much background information before getting to our own point. I understand that background information is a good part of an essay but I feel as if the beginning dragged on because of all the facts about the lobster and the festival. I feel that if the background facts were shorter and the meaning of the essay had more about how you feel about the lobster being eaten it would be more meaningful.
Journal 2:
- In detail, describe your experiences drafting writing projects. and what about revision? What did it look like? What was your process? How did it work for you?
During high school, drafting was completely different than English 122. For high school, it was every structure with five paragraphs: an introduction, three bodies, and a conclusion. English 122 was more opened when it came to drafting and writing essays in general. English 122 drafting was using an endless conversation and having multiple paragraphs of your thoughts and the other persons. The revision was not really done in high school except for like grammar mistakes. English 122 we went into depth about revising each others essay. We gave insight on how we felt needed to be added and how sentences needed to be reworded. We went beyond just grammar mistakes. This process was something new to get used to but after a couple on tries, I began to understand the process.
Journal 3:
Something I found interesting while reading “The Art of Quoting” was on page 45, “given the evolving and messy nature of writing, you may sometimes think that you’ve found the perfect quotation to support your argument, only to discover later on, as your texts develops, that your focus has changed and the quotation no longer works”. I found this to be interesting because I honestly thought I was the only person to that while writing an essay.
Something I also found interesting was on page 50, “…when in doubt go for it. It is better to risk being overly explicit about what you take a quotation to mean than to leave the quotation dangling and your readers in doubt”. I found this interesting because I feel my high school teachers always said to make the quote not long and make it short at all costs. It’s also interesting because I glad a quote can never be “too late” so you don’t leave the reader hanging.
Journal 4:
In “The End of Food by Lizzie Widdicombe, something I found interesting was twenty-five year old, Rhinehart, looked at food in a different way. “Rhinehart, who is twenty-five, studied electrical engineering at Georgia Tech, and he began to consider food as an engineering problem”. Then he began to list the minerals and vitamins one needs to survive. I thought this interesting because usually, you don’t hear food being considered an engineering problem…like it’s not that complex.
Something that I thought was also interesting was that on the way to the Soylent headquarters they stopped at an expensive California juice bar and Rhinehart discussed how made it was for you. “‘It’s kind of archaic,’ he said and pointed out that it was mostly sugar. ‘Look at the design. It’s meant to be rustic and natural and comfortable’”. When really he was actually drinking something bad for you, like most things. It’s interesting how places can “trick” you because of the rustic feel and “fresh” fruits and vegetables.
On the other hand. Livestock is another important part of our society today. Something that was interesting in this article that stuck out to me was how much water and gas go toward agriculture. “And the food is a major part of the problem: livestock cause almost fifteen percent of all greenhouse-gas emissions. In California, which is suffering from its worst drought in a generation, about eighty percent of all water goes toward agriculture”. These percentages were actually mind-blowing to me and were kinda concerning.
Journal 5:
After reading Entering the conversation in They Say I Say, I enjoyed how it started off by comparing something you are good at to have writers feel about write. How not everything comes naturally but after practice and time, it’s like you know longer have to think about it, just do it. This reading was broken up into different sections to make the reading easier to understand and if you were to look back at it, easy to find what you’re looking for.
State your own ideas as a response to others: This is why the book is called They say, I say. An important template that should always be used is They say this but I say this. Being able to have a conversation off of others work.
“Why are you telling me this”: You need to be able to enter the conversation of others and have a logical standpoint of why you’re entering and what are you trying to add on or say. So tell their point and then say yours.
The as-opposed-to-what factor: This concept is to always ask what the other person is saying. Not just what you are thinking.
How it’s done: This section talks about who your works can work together with others. Like some others literally, write “They say this” but there are other ways this can be put into words.
Court controversy, but: This is when you don’t disagree entirely on what the author is saying but someone disagrees but also state why.
Disagreeing without being disagreeable: Criticize but do not over criticize. “I agree with this but I can not accept what she says about this”.
The template of templates: This shows the many ways to enter a conversation and respond to what the author is saying.
But it’s this plagiarism: It is not plagiarism if you ‘borrow’ the author’s words but somehow twist them into your own.
Ok- but templates: Using templates does not lose the creativity in us it just helps us understand the direction we need to go in.
Putting in your oar: Enters in on how to be a critical thinker and how to enter a conversation
Journal 6:
Journal 7:
- What global comments/suggestions did you find the best from your peers?
- When looking back on my essay there are a number of upgrades that needed to be fixed. Every time I look at my essay I realize I can improve more but I struggle with what needs to be improved. When looking back on what my peers said about my essay, I didn’t disagree. My concluding sentences to every paragraph needed to improve along with my transitioning sentences into the next paragraph. Another tweak that needed to be done was expanding more on my thoughts about what Rhinehart said about this product.
- What were the best global comments/suggestions you offered your peers?
- Something that I kept writing on my peer’s essays was to really develop the conversation feel of the essay. While their essays had the facts to what Rhinehart was saying about Soylent. They never went in depth about what they were thinking about that fact or idea. I feel my peers had the idea of the project was supposed to look like but when they began to write a lot of their own thoughts were left out because they got caught up in the facts and quotes.
- What important feedback/discussion points weren’t captured on the page that came up during your discussion? Be specific and reference your peers and their papers. You may benefit from looking back over the essays you peer reviewed.
- Important feedback points that came up while discussing that was not commented on their essays were explaining more about Soylent. Like what it is, the benefits from it and the outcomes of Rhinehart’s thoughts. We also discussed who each person was in the article. I believe every person said Rob Rhinehart and Winnicomb’s name but never explained their part in the essay.
- What did you wish had come up looking back over your peer review comments?
- Something that I wish was brought up is in my peer review comments would be a stronger concluding paragraph. When I sent my peer’s my essay I was struggling with my concluding paragraph and I did not know how to write what I wanted to say. When I sent them my essay I did not have a concluding paragraph at the time so they could not help me. I wish I did have something for my concluding paragraph when I sent it.
- How does this kind of peer review compare to peer review from high school?
- This kind of peer review is completely different from what I use to do in high school. I remember doing a “peer review” like once and all the person did was correct my grammar errors. In the long run that did not help me because I didn’t know if my essay actually needs improvement. Now in college peer review is different. We first send our essays to one another and give in detail comments on what needs to be improved. Then in the class meet with each other and talk about what we actually meant and why we said they needed that improvement. This helps with writing your essay because it shows what you need to improve a lot and what in just simple improvements.
Journal 8:
In “Starting With What Others Say” is about moving into a conversation. The other person’s ideas should come first and then you should either agree or disagree. But only disagree to an extent, you don’t have to trash their whole idea. That isn’t the point of getting involved in a conversation. Your ideas or thoughts should always follow after the other person’s ideas or thoughts. Templates show how to introduce what “they are saying”, “standard views”. Another template shows how to make what they say into something that you say. Something interesting is to always keep their view of what they think or say.
Journal 9:
When rereading my paper I spend most time just making little corrections like words that I could have forgotten. For example, a the, it. I think I forgot these simple words because I have looked over my paper so many times that while I’m reading it I think the words but they are not actually on the page. It this point in the paper I don’t think there is much I would change except for the way I write some of my sentences. Professor Drown and I did talk about this but I forgot what he talked it. Which is something we are going to work on. This drafting and revising process if different from the past because we get to make comments on each other’s essays but then come together next class and really talk about what we were saying or trying to say. Talking with the person that edits your paper is very helpful. When writing this paper it is exactly what I thought it to be like. I took English 122 with you last semester, there is more work added into this class but the essay style is still the same.
Journal 10:
Page two at the bottom of the last paragraph. It goes on to page three. The quote states “As with Julia, so with Julie: cooking saved her life, giving her a project and, eventually, a path to literary success”. I found this somewhat mind-blowing because I have never seen cooking as a pathway to success or giving someone an outlook on life. To me, cooking is not even close to a lifestyle or a path to life. Personally, I would never think of it like that. It’s interesting to see how a cooking show can be so helpful for the people watching it and knowing how much different it was back then.
On page four, the last paragraph talks about how Julia helped people no longer have a fear of cooking. Watching her show made it easier for moms to good a delicious meal. A quote that stuck out to me was “When I asked my mother recently what exactly endeared Julia Child to her, she explained that ‘for so many of us she took the fear out of cooking’ and, to illustrate the point, brought up the famous potato show, one of the episodes that Meryl Streep recreates brilliantly on screen”. Of course, when I was first reading this I did not understand how someone could take the fear away from cooking. The article explained that Julia made mistakes and showed her flaws so mothers at home didn’t feel embarrassed when they messed up too. Of course, this is now different from what we see on TV today.
Something I found very interesting and I did agree with was on page eight during the last paragraph. I believed for this to interesting because throughout the article it explained what cooking shows once were and how they are today. A quote that stuck out to me was “Whether in the Kitchen Stadium or on ‘Chopped’ or ‘The Next Food Network Star’ or, over on Bravo, ‘Top Chef’, cooking in prime time is a form of athletic competition, drawing its visual and even aural vocabulary from ‘Monday Night Football’. This was something that stuck out to me because I would never think of these cooking shows to be about athletic competition. You are making a meal not running down a 53-yard field, dodging other players and carrying a football. To me cooking can’t and isn’t a sport it’s a talent.
Journal 11:
Something that I find interesting and that stood out to me was on page 178. It states “The trick in reading for the conversation is to figure out what views the author is responding to and what the author’s own argument is– or, to put it in the terms used in this book, to determine the, “they say” and how the author responds to it. I found this interesting because when looking at others work I don’t think of it as what they are responding to. I think of it all of their ideas and thoughts being shown even though other people are in the conversation and background information. When I begin to write my papers I think of it as my arguments and ideas either going against or with. The other parts of this character are discussing when the “they say” is not clearly stated or when the “they say” has not been talked about before.
Journal 12:
This podcast is very different from what we have been talking about. Personally, I don’t think of when I’m going to die and how I am. I think at my age that is something crazy to think about. It’s interesting how she could laugh at herself when talking about this topic. Maybe it’s because she was uncomfortable. Personally, I laugh when I’m in an uncomfortable situation. Caitlin Doughty has been talking and working with dead bodies for a while so I don’t truly understand how she can laugh about it? Something that I found interested when Caitlin Doughty was talking is she wished the family was there during cremation. She says it’s “taking responsibility for that loved one.” That must be very hard for a family to go witness that though. I understand being a stranger and not having a connection with the person dead in front of you. But, personally, I wouldn’t want to see a person I am close to going through the cremation process. Something that was interesting was she was very honest throughout the whole podcast and really went into detail about how she feels and almost what it is like. As the podcast ended I was starting to think about what it must be like to be around dead bodies as a job and have the “honor” to send the bodies into cremation.
Journal 13:
After seeing how much a put into each source it will clear that Pollan obviously stood out the most. I believed it happened this way because Pollan’s essay was the “main” source to this essay. While the other three sources tied into his and my ideas or thoughts. While the three classmates essays were an important part of this writing I feel as if their quotes and thoughts really helped to understand what Pollan was getting at. How consumption is not taking over production and this was shown throughout everyone’s essay in a different way. Looking back over my paper and the process that went into it I’m happy with the outcome. After having peer review and totally restarting the essay really helped me focus on what the main topic was and how to go about saying that. While, Pollan’s piece was an important part of my essay, next essay I would like to develop more on the “smaller” sources and work them together. I like really like to get the conversation to follow into my essay more.
Journal 14:
Something I found to be interesting in “What The Crow Knows” is the whole thought of how a Jain view toward an animals life and their life. Their “highest commandment forbids violence not only against humans but also against animals.” I say I continued to read I kept this quote in the back of my mind because personally, I would think he would be hard to do. I later found out that Jains believe animals to be conscious. While this seemed hard to believe the essay showed different examples that supported an animal is conscious. Like the fishes feeling and the monkey having a special call to warn about lions. From this, a few questions arose like: do all animals having feelings? Why do we never take his into consideration when eating them? But, do we actually know an animal is conscious? They say a bird is not because of certain things. So I am kinda confused on the whole conscious thing.
Journal 15:
Herzog’s argument was shown in numerous different ways and they were very interesting. I believe his argument was how complex this moral universe we live in. There are plenty of factors that go into this like language, culture, and ethical judgment. So depending on where you are from is how you believe our relationships are with animals. Herzog believes that when we think about other species it defies logic and have of the time does not make sense. For example on page one, Judith Black believed a fish was not an animal. Why is that? When it comes to animals we have emotions for them, it usually being a pet but animals do mean something to us. When thinking about animals it becomes complicated because the emotions we have. In rare exceptions, we think logically about animals. There were multiple examples throughout the essay that showed people not thinking logically when it came to animals.
Journal 16:
After rereading “Consider of Lobster”, my views did change as I went through this a second time. While I will not change what I consume I do feel bad for the animals that I do consume. While reading all these essays about production and consumption. I am one to admit, that I say one thing but I do the other. Like before, I said I feel bad about the animal and how it has to suffer but it’s yummy. Throughout every essay we have read I think the pain was a huge part. Whether it be the lobster dying in a pot, cremation or the snake eating the cat. Pain is a large concept with multiple factors behind it. While there’s believe animals feel pain other’s do now. So how do you prove that to someone? Of course, we know humans have different types of pain we go through and we can compare our pain to what a lobster is feeling boiling in a pot but yet, we don’t. We push aside the fact of death and we move on. I guess that could be the same for people…a family member dies. Yes, of course, it’s hard at first but years go by and the pain slowly fades away. But how does that pain compare to a lobster?
Journal 17:
“Playing the Naysayer in Your Text” is when arguing about something in your text. Like a disagreement, someone things this but others say this. Different objective comes into place while reading this chapter. It is nameless and faceless. For example, “some readers” or “many may disagree”, these examples are not naming a specific group or category it’s very board. Another objective is categorizing. For example, “feminists” or “biologists” or “environmentalists”. All these examples have a specific group or name to what they either agree or disagree about. Naming is another objective. So saying the person’s name and then maybe following it with a quote. For example, “Kayla might disagree with that idea she states…”. The last one is informal objections. For example, “Yet is it really true that…”. These also can be done directly. This objection lets you cut directly to the specific voice itself.
Journal 18:
On page 3, the paragraph that begins with “Some of my happiest childhood memories…” has a lot of losses and gains for Foer for as he has given up meal again. Foer talks about his loss of his grandmother’s chicken and carrot meal and how the occasion was important but the food was just as important. Foer also brings up the loss in the taste of sushi, turkey and chicken and how those pleasurable eating experiences were also given up. But, it was not only the occasion and food that was given up but the cultural loss. Foer states “Changing what we eat and letting tastes fade from memory create a kind of cultural loss, a forgetting”(3). This was rather shocking to me and as though he is still in a troubling middle. While he knows what he is going to lose I don’t think he has quit except that yet. His gains for giving up meat is not exactly stated. I believe his gains are the new memories he has to what he is eating. How these new memories will be new ones to carry with him.
Foer presents a question, “While the cultural uses of meat can be replaced–”(5). I honestly don’t know how I would answer the question. I guess you could say my value system is very little and I am one that it is in the troubled middle. While, I say I feel bad for the animals and their pain, I wouldn’t stop eating them because they are yummy. Throughout these readings, I have really thought about what goes into my body and what I do eat. While I did think about this I couldn’t wrap my head around not eating animals. Maybe because I have never seen first hand what process these animals go through or I can’t feel the pain they have.
Journal 19:
My work for this project has been completely different from other projects. When I first began this project I did not know what other two readings I was going to pick from. When I discussed this with Professor Drown he gave me the idea to create a table to compare and contrast all the readings we can choose from. After this was done I was able to choose “What The Crow Knows” by Ross Anderson and “Against Meat” by Jonathan Foer. I picked these two because I wanted to focus on what’s hard to think about and what’s not. I usually do my work in a busy room with people always coming and out. I changed it up this time. I am now writing this paper in my best friends quiet and relaxing room with sad boy music on. I think my biggest challenge right now is putting words down onto the paper because I know what I want to say but I’m not sure what’s the best way to write it.
I feel as this last paper is more open to options and you can pick which path you want to take. This paper is more of your thoughts and your opinion. My process in the 1st and 2nd paper was nothing compared to this paper. The feel as though the other two papers have been more towards a direction while this one is very board. The first paper was based on Soylent and the second paper was based on our peer’s essays and Michael Pollan. While this paper my classmates are talking about all kinds of different views on the multiple essays.
Journal 20:
Journal 21:
I believe a lot of different thoughts went into doing different drafts. When I first began this project I didn’t know what sources to start with or how I was going to go about writing this essay. When I meet with Professor Drown we discussed not all of the paragraphs connected back to each other. We then made an outline on how each reading connected together and how sentence structure is important. I feel as with each draft there was a new obstacle to come over whether it be what move should be made next or concluding a paragraph. This essay really made me think about each reading individual by itself and how they all came together in some different way.
Journal 22- In class:
To Maggie,
I would have to agree that paper three was the hardest. I didn’t know where to begin or how. You also had a hard time picking sources just like I did. My first couple of drafts actually had four sources and I had to narrow it down in the end. While your ah-ha moment was with your peer review group mine was with Professor Drown. When I sat down and reread over my second draft after not looking at it for a week I soon realized there was no conversation through the essay. I then copied my essay and started over. I can agree that I do now know my connections throughout all the readings we read and which ones I want to use. Even though my last peer review wasn’t that helpful I would agree that peer review throughout this semester has really helped me with my writings. Like you, I thought peer review was a “waste” but now I see the value in why we have that much class time to meet with our peer review groups.
— Kayla Robinson
