This morning in class you will compose a short reflective essay that documents the processes of planning, drafting, and revising your analysis. In your reflection, you will include at least one relevant quotation from one of the sections of Writing Analytically listed below or from another section of the textbook.
Sample Works Cited Entries for Writing Analytically
Rosenwasser, David and Jill Stephen. “Late-Stage Editing and Revising: Some Tips.” Writing Analytically, 9th edition. Wadsworth/Cengage, 2024. pp. 151-52.
Rosenwasser, David and Jill Stephen. “On Keeping a Writer’s Notebook.” Writing Analytically, 9th edition. Wadsworth/Cengage, 2024. pp. 157-58.
Rosenwasser, David and Jill Stephen. “Putting X in Tension with Y.” Writing Analytically, 9th edition. Wadsworth/Cengage, 2024. pp. 248-49.
Rosenwasser, David and Jill Stephen. “The Thesis and the Writing Process.” Writing Analytically, 9th edition. Wadsworth/Cengage, 2024. pp. 237-38.
Questions to Consider in Your Reflection
What aspect of the writing seemed the most challenging? Choosing your topic? Deciding which text would serve as your subject? Determining your thesis? Identifying details to support your claims? Organizing the body of the essay? Composing the conclusion? Why did that aspect of the writing seem the most challenging?
Did the subject of your analysis change? If so, what was your original subject, and what did you change it to?
What do you consider the strongest element of your analysis?
At what point in the process did you decide on a title? Did you change the title during the writing process? If so, what was the original title?
What image that documents part of your writing process away from the screen did you include in your blog post? Why did you choose that particular image?
Next Up
Wordplay Day! To prepare for class, revisit the Dictionary and World Builder pages on the Scrabble website. Also review the blog posts devoted to Scrabble tips.
This morning in class you will read the sample student analysis “Wait Means Never” and collaboratively answer the questions that follow.
Does the writer present a summary of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail” before he presents his thesis?
The authors of Writing Analytically note that “a productive thesis statement usually contains tension, the balance of this against that” (Rosenwasser and Stephen 248). Reread the thesis and note whether it includes any instances of “this against that.”
What specific example stands as the writer’s most effective support for his thesis
Effective strategies for concluding analyses include (1) offering an insight about the text or an additional quotation from it, (2) revisiting the thesis without stating it verbatim, and (3) pointing to the broader implications of the analysis. Does the writer employ any of those strategies? If so, which one or ones?
After you answer the questions above, review the grade criteria on your analysis assignment handout, and assign a grade. If you cannot reach a consensus, write each recommended grade.
Next Up
In class on Wednesday, you will compose a reflective essay on your analysis.
Last week I published a blog post that listed the first twenty-two playable four-letter words with three vowels. Knowing those words, and others with multiple vowels, proves useful when you’re faced with a rack of mostly, or all, vowels. Here’s a list of the remaining fourteen playable four-letter words with three vowels:
naoi: ancient temples (pl. of naos)
obia: form of sorcery practiced in the Caribbean (also obeah)
odea: concert halls (pl. of odeum)
ogee: an S-shaped molding
ohia: a Polynesian tree with bright flowers (also lehua)
olea: corrosive solutions (pl. of oleum)
olio: a miscellaneous collection
ouzo: a Turkish anise-flavored liquor
raia: a non-Muslim Turk (also rayah)
roue: a lecherous old man
toea: a currency in Papua, New Guinea
unai: a two-toed sloth (pl. unai; an ai is a three-toed sloth)
zoea: the larvae of some crustaceans
Next Up
Wordplay Day! To prepare for class, revisit the Dictionary and World Builder pages on the Scrabble website. Also review the blog posts devoted to Scrabble tips.
What makes for an effective title? That’s an important question to consider since the title contains the first words of yours that a reader will encounter. First, it should be descriptive; it should evoke an image in the reader’s mind. It should also be relevant to your subject; it should convey something about the writing to follow. Lastly, it should be intriguing; it should create in the reader a desire to keep reading. With those traits in mind, review the titles of your classmates’ midterm reflections listed below. Which of these is most effective and why?
“Aspects Leading to Success”
“The Awakening of My Inner Writer”
“Becoming a Better Writer
“Becoming a Stronger Writer”
“Controlled Writing”
“Developing as a Writer”
“Developing Skills”
“The First Half”
“Growth as a Writer”
“Growth in Analyzing”
“Growth-Mindedness”
“Highlights of Working with Others”
“How a Board Game Changed My Writing”
“How I have Grown”
“Impact of a Class”
“Impact of Collaboration”
“Improvements in My Writing”
“The Key to Writing”
“My Personal Development”
“My Road to Success”
“Professionalism”
“A Semester of Improvement”
“Seven Tiles but a Lifetime of Knowledge”
“The Start of a New Beginning”
“Think before You Write”
“Thinking beyond What I Knew”
“Transition to College”
“Unforeseen Clarity”
“Ways of Learning”
Bonus-Point Opportunity
Directions:
Determine which of your classmates’ titles you deem most effective.
Compose a comment that includes the title enclosed in quotation marks and a brief explanation of its effectiveness.
Post your comment as a reply to this blog entry no later than 4 p.m. today, Thursday, October 3. (To post your comment, click on the post’s title, and scroll down to the bottom of the page. You will then see the image of an airmail envelope with a leave comment option.)
I will approve your responses (make your comments visible) after the 4 p.m. deadline on October 3. Commenters will receive five bonus points for their October 4 Scrabble assignment.
Postscript
Congratulations to Ryan Kelley and Annalise Lindsay (section 19) whose titles were chosen as the most effective. Nicole Edelman (section 19) chose Ryan’s title “Impact of a Class,” and Cristique Duvall (section 20) chose Annalise’s title “Seven Tiles but a Lifetime of Knowledge.” Nicole and Cristique will each receive five bonus points for their October 4 Scrabble assignment/score sheet.
Next Up
Wordplay Day! To prepare for class, revisit the Dictionary and World Builder pages on the Scrabble website. Also review the blog posts devoted to Scrabble.
This morning, I will return your drafts with my notes, and you will have the remainder of the class period to begin revising your analyses on your laptops. Because next week is fall break, you will have two additional weeks to continue your revision work before you submit the assignment to Blackboard and publish it as a WordPress blog entry. The due date is Wednesday, October 16 (before class). The hard deadline is Friday, October 18 (before class). Directions for submitting your analysis are included on your assignment sheet and on the Blackboard submission site.
As you continue to revise your analysis, consider visiting The Writing Center. If you do so, you will earn five bonus points for the assignment.
To schedule an appointment, visit https://highpoint.mywconline.com, email the Writing Center’s director, Professor Justin Cook, at jcook3@highpoint.edu, or scan the QR code below. To earn bonus points for your analysis, consult with a Writing Center tutor no later than Thursday, October 17.
Nearly all of you in section nineteen consulted a Writing Center tutor as you worked on your literacy narrative, while less than half of you in section twenty did so:
Section 19: 18 of 20 students, 90%
Section 20: 7 of 19 students, 36.8%
Please encourage your classmates to take advantage of the opportunity to have an additional reader for your analysis-in-progress–and earn five bonus points to boot.
Next Up
Wordplay Day! To prepare for class, revisit the Dictionary and World Builder pages on the Scrabble website and review the blog posts devoted to Scrabble.
Rosenwaser, David and Jill Stephen. Chapter 7: “Finding an Evolving a Thesis.” Writing Analytically, 9th edition. Wadsworth/Cengage, 2024. pp. 234-78.
As you prepare to begin revising your analysis, read the section of Writing Analytically devoted to composing thesis statements (247-52). Also review the opening paragraph of my analysis of Art Spiegelman’sMaus and my sample opening for a possible analysis of Donald Bartheleme’s “The School,” both of which follow.
In Chapter 4 of Art Spiegelman’s graphic memoir Maus, he depicts his father Vladek’s account of the hangings of four Jewish merchants in Sosnowiec, Poland. Vladek and his wife, Anja, learn from Anja’s father, Mr. Zylberberg, that the Nazis have arrested his friend Nahum Cohn and his son. With his head bowed in sorrow, Mr. Zylberberg says to Anja and Vladek, “The Germans intend to make an example of them!” (83). That image of Mr. Zylberberg speaking with Vladek and Anja overlays the larger panel that dominates the page, one that depicts the horror that Mr. Zylberberg anticipates: the murder of his friend Nahum Cohn, Cohn’s son, and two other Jewish merchants. That haunting panel and the smaller ones that frame it illustrate the complexity of Spiegelman’s seemingly simple composition. His rendering of the panels of the living in conjunction with the fragmented panels of the hanged merchants simultaneously conveys connection and separation: both the grieving survivors’ ties to the dead and the hanged men’s objectification at the hands of the Nazis.
The authors of Writing Analytically note that “a productive thesis statement usually contains tension, the balance of this against that” (Rosenwasser and Stephen 248). Reread the thesis above (in bold) and consider the instances of “this against that”: larger panel and smaller one, complexity and simplicity, connection and separation.
Now consider the “this against that” in the sample opening for a possible analysis of Donald Bartheleme’s “The School,”
Donald Barthelme’s short story “The School” recounts a series of classroom lessons that end with the death of plants and animals–deaths that serve as a prelude to the death of a Korean orphan, followed by the deaths of classmates and family members. With conversational narration, accumulation of detail, and a shift in fictional mode, Barthelme deftly depicts the reality of the fleeting nature of life, even as the story itself veers from reality.
The sample opening paragraph above lacks the detail of the first paragraph of my Maus analysis because it’s the draft of an introduction for a paper I haven’t written. Completing a draft would enable me to develop the introduction and refine my thesis statement. That said, the introduction already has an instance of “this against that”: the reality of life depicted and the veering from reality with the shift in fictional mode.
Citing Others’ Ideas
If your analysis includes any ideas drawn from my remarks, which I subsequently posted as class notes on my blog, you should cite the blog post as you would any other online source.
Example: Dr. Lucas notes, “For Junod, choosing not to divide the first paragraph creates an unbroken movement that parallels the unbroken flight of his subject” (par. 3).
Tomorrow I will return your drafts with my notes, and you will have the class period to begin revising on your laptops. Because next week is fall break, you will have two additional weeks to continue your revision work. The due date is Wednesday, October 16 (before class). The hard deadline is Friday, October 18.
Jane Lucas 