In Jame's E. Porter's article, "Intertextuality & the Discourse Community,"  he attempts to explain to students and writing teachers that all articles or writings contain traces from other texts.  He discusses that it is harder to decipher if the work is plagiarized or someone's personal work.  He compares to Thomas Jefferson and how as people may believe he is a very skilled writer, he was actually an effective borrower of the traces Porter talks about in his writing.  James Porter believes Thomas Jefferson would have been charged with plagiarism in a college environment if he would have submitted the Declaration of Independence.  He questions the fact of if creative writers were genius or just plagiarizers of their work.  Porter believes all of our writings come from ideas of other things we have read before. 

BEFORE YOU READ
     The difference between an author and a writer in my personal opinion, is that to be a writer you do not have to be a professional.  A writer can be someone who just keeps a simple journal every night before bed.  An author is someone who has published or writes articles on a particular fact or reason, because that is what they are assigned or they want to get their point across for outside opinions.  They are not just keeping the 'journal' of what they are writing to themselves, they are clearly showing it to over people.

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION
4) The way I thought writing should be evaluated before I read Porter's article was to figure out if the work was plagiarized.  If the work is plagiarized it should not be accepted, because it was not the writer's idea.  I do not so much feel this way not, because I see his point of saying almost everything is technically plagiarized.  Every writer or short story comes from an idea that has been sparked by something before the writing occurred.  My writing has been evaluated in the past on grammar, punctuation, and as I got older it also got checked to make sure the work was not plagiarized. 

APPLYING & EXPLORING IDEAS
1)  Lately, I have seen a few different beer commercials.  I have not noticed until this article the intertextuality.  It seems that no matter which commercial for a drink they are always competing about the most fresh, tasteful, or smooth drink.  I feel like all commercials compete with each other and steal words from one another and try to throw them all into one commercial at once, because they feel like this will make their product more wanted.  The cultural intertext is that most beer commercials, like we said in class have a girl modeling, posing, or drinking the beer, because the commercial is aimed mainly towards men.  I believe this has something to do with the gender area of cultural intertext.

META MOMENT
     Porter's article has changed my way of thinking on writers, but not so much in a negative way.  It just helped me to see that not even writers can make a whole article out of nothing, but their own thoughts.  They need to see or read other people's thought to base their writings off it and to create an argument.  Every writing has to have an argument to get a good point across. 

     This article was interesting to me, because it shows that articles written either by a writer or an author go through the same steps that students to when learning to write.  Their writings get checked on to make sure they are not plagiarized as well.  People even watch to find the mistakes in major author's articles or research papers.  I never realized how even big time writers have to watch their own back and make sure their sources are sited, and their ideas are made their own ideas and not someone else's thoughts.  The only thing I did not agree on was the fact that he believed that students are taught to imitate writings they have seen previously.  In high school if we were told to write a paper, our teacher had always shown us a printing of an author and explained their hard work and effort.  At the end of class thought, she would always tell us she does not want to see the same work, but something new and different brought to the topic we were given.

     In Peter Elbow's article, "Voice in Writing Again: Embracing Contraries," he explains that the voice is the true self and rhetorical power.  The goal of teaching writing is to develop the self.  Every student has their own voice of writing.  It is the way an individual writes from their own personal thoughts and how they understand ideas and facts.  There are always differences between people on what information they take away from an article or something they have read.  With this being said, he states that if a person wants to be heard they "sing the limited notes," but if you sing other notes you will not be heard.  I believe he is using this as an example of writing a research paper.  With practice people can learn to write papers that have "voice" or "sound like a person."  When a paper is constructed in this form, it is easier to grasp, because it is almost as if you are having a conversation with the writer. 

COMPARE TWO ARTICLES
     The reading I would compare to Peter Elbow's article would be John Berger's article, "Ways of Seeing."  I would put these both into the same category, because I feel like they both have the example of voices inside your head.  Peter Elbow has the voice of reason inside your head as you are writing.  John Berger talks about women consciously self surveying themselves.  Elbow talks about the writing out of note that nobody will listen, and the writing in the correct notes that people will listen.  Berger talks about if women keep a charismatic attitude and carry themselves well, men will pay attention, yet if women carry themselves poorly and do not treat themselves with worth, men will overlook them completely. 

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
1.) When I listen to a passage rather than reading it silently I can sometimes grasp it better.  It depends on the topic I am reading.  If the topic is something I am interested in then I will stay focused on listening.  If the topic is something I am not so interested in, than I will more than likely wonder off.  If I read something to myself silently it is easier for me to understand, because I am making a personal connection reading it to myself.  I am then forced to pay attention to whatever it is that I am reading at the time.  "Ear training" has effected me in the past from classes that involved lectures.  Like I said, if I am not interested in the lecture, then I will not be interested to pay attention.  There really is no advice that can be given for this, besides if you are not interested try to base the lecture on something more personal to yourself that way it fits in with your lifestyle and you will pay closer attention.

2.) I believe Peter Elbow is playing his own "doubting and believing" game, because I feel like he is questioning either the reader of his article or himself to bring more ideas out of his writing.  I think he is unsure of the two of which would be easier for a person to comprehend is by the "silent voice" or the "spoken voice."

      This article did not so much stand out to me as other articles I have read before.  I did think certain parts of it were interesting, and it did make me realize a few things.  After starting to read about the voice, I noticed in my head while I was reading it is almost like a voice explaining the words to me.  It is my own voice, but I almost read aloud what I am typing or reading to myself as I do it.  Everyone does this, and just does not realize when they are doing it.  If you take a second to start reading something, it is very odd to stop and re-read thinking of yourself reading it aloud.  You start to notice a voice in your head repeating the words to you as you scan across the paper.  This might not be the best way to explain, but it is a hard concept I just realized with myself.  Another point I did find interesting was when he tells the future writers if you do not write and stick to one point of your writing you will lose readers, yet if you stick to the writings you are supposed to you will keep the readers paying attention.

     Out of the three articles I read, I most enjoyed Steven King's article, "What Writing Is."  It is so easy for me to read, because he starts out talking to you about how his week is going, and what happened.  How his son came home early from college, yet his wife is sick with a virus.  It makes you feel like you are present to when he is reading.  The funny thing is he is writing this article in the winter of 1997.  He is trying to explain telepathy to the reader, and he does this very well.  He explains different things to the reader, a rabbit, cage, and a cloth, and the number eight.  He talks about other things and at the end he tells you that we basically all have the same image, even if it is twenty years later that we are all imagining the same thing.  The only difference might be the shade of the red cloth, or the fur of the rabbit, but no matter what we all remembered the same number eight.  It was not any other number, just the number eight, and that is because it is a specific number.  He went into detail of there being only one number eight.  He explains that writing is business, and if the person can not get down to business they should just leave the reading now, and amusingly tells us to try washing a car.

     In Sarah Allen's article, "The Inspired Writer vs. The Real Writer," she attempts to explain to writers that not does so, because they enjoy to write.  She explains to students how she would not consider writing for her a "like kind of thing," meaning it's more of an "antagonistic kind of thing."  She also says, she is not good at writing if it means the words come to her easy.  She explains that even real writers have trouble getting the words down onto paper.  Sarah tells readers that she believes that the natural talent of writing should always be available to us.  This sounds like a perfect world, because writing a paper does not come easy for many individuals.  Allen gives a piece of advice I found interesting.  She tells the readers that imitating other pieces of writing, not plagiarism, but the way other writers engage and explore their ideas and research.  She compares writing to being black squiggles on a page, and explains that no matter what, writing always gets a reaction from the reader.  Whether this be a smile, sigh, yawn, or even rolling eyes.  Allen concludes telling us that there is always more to write, and always another blank sheet of paper.

BEFORE YOU READ
     Before I begin to write a something, whether it be a research paper, rough draft of an essay, or even a to do list I have noticed I do in fact, have a few rituals.  I never noticed this, until this question was brought to my attention.  Before I sit down, I make sure to grab a drink to have close by, something that will not matter if it gets a little warm from sitting so long.  I also noticed, that I never start a paper or any source of writing by typing.  I always start my writings on an old notebook so I can go back and revise or add new ideas while I am typing.  I noticed it makes my papers longer, and also helps me to concentrate more, and catch errors in my punctuation and grammar the second time around. 

     In Carol Berkenkotter and Donald M. Murray's article, "Decisions and Revisions: The Planning Strategies of a Publishing Writer,"  they are actually corresponding pieces.  Donald is more of a response to what Carol is doing as her experiment.  Carol wanted to attempt to show the audience that an area difference can effect a professional writer.  Carol studied Donald in a new environment, giving him an hour to complete a writing.  He talks about feeling rushed, as his reasoning that the writing was not as best as usual.  When he was verbally doing the work he found this much easier since he is used to muttering under his breath.  Donald seemed surprised to see how long it took him to plan what he was going to do, before actually taking the time to do it.  He spent more time planning than he did editing and reading over his own paper.  The main point of this article was to show that when moved from an unusual environment to which you are not used to, is going to corrupt your thought process more than you realize.  That is why I believe many people do have "writing rituals."

DISCUSSION AND JOURNALING
     This article changed Carol Berkenkotter's understanding of the writing process, because she realized when a professional writer (Donald Murray) was placed in a different area he was more concerned on constructing or planning his writing than he was on actually editing and evaluating his work.  She comes to understand this could really clash with the final draft of the paper being written. 

APPLYING AND EXPLORING IDEAS
     I have realized after this article that I have many different writing habits.  Like I discussed in "Before You Read," I always need my bottle of water and old notebook, incase I miss a few extra points I wanted to make in my writing.  My writing experience is of course not close to being professional, but I will give myself some credit, because of the hard work I put into every paper I write.  Writing is not so much of a chore, and I actually enjoy it in the right environment.  No matter what, there is always room for improvement.  While I may be pleased with my work, there could always be more added or evaluated.  There are times when I could put a little more effort or an extra hour or two into my work just to improve on the little things. Little edits such as that, make a paper even better to read.

META MOMENT
     In reading this writing I have learned to stay in an area I feel comfortable to be for writing an important paper.  The slightest thing could throw you off track, and then the idea could be lost forever.  Writing needs to be handled with care, and takes much thought and time.  I have realized how important "writing rituals" are to myself, and probably many other amateur and professional writers.

     In my opinion, I thought the article was very amusing.  My favorite part of the article was to learn that even the best of writers could be put into a new place, and feel trapped or lost in their writing.  It makes me feel better to know that I am not the only one that can have this happen to myself.  I have found myself lost in thought in the library, where everything is very quiet.  I think this will be helpful to me in different areas as to understand that writing is not just about the editing and evaluating, but the research and exploring of your own thoughts and ideas to form the writing itself.  Although the article was interesting, I wish that I could see this experiment used on more modern day writers, such as Steven King, J.K. Rowling, or even Stephenie Myers.  I would love to see how a different climate, room, or setting would change their thought process, and how their work would turn out.

     Scott McCloud's cartoon on "Vocabulary of Comics," attempts to describe how the use of image and icons represent different things.  The audience is for the human mind, because this is something every person in the world does everyday.  Reality can alter the physical appearance of a man to be a cartoon face.  Cartooning is not only a way of drawing, but seeing.  That is why the article is so easy to understand, because McCloud uses his own icons and cartoon to explain his views.  I used "his views," because that is his own opinion of an easy way to explain cartoon and icon is by doing just that in his article.

     John Berger's article attempts to explain the images of gender, and how it could have changed overtime.  He talks about how the ideas or ideals become cultural norms thought repetition, reproduction, and circulating.  Advertising becomes the primary circulator.  Berger tells the way a woman treats herself is what men survey.  The way she dresses, acts, or talks shows her intelligence and attitude towards how she wants to be treated.  Women are watched by men, and become an object or a vision to the men.  He also describes how nudity can be perceived as dress.

SYNTHESIS 
     In Berger and McCloud's articles they both agree on the same issue, but in different forms.  McCloud discusses the human face being transformed into a cartoon.  He talks about how the mind can see a simple circle, two dots, and a line, connecting it to the image of a human face.  Berger discusses the image of woman, and the structure, for, and pose of their body in oil paintings and how it is surveyed.  Both articles show how the human mind depicts images from forms of painting, drawings, symbols, and icons.  I also believe, they agree to humans as being self-centered.  Scott McCloud makes this clear by explaining how humans make everything in their own image.  John Berger explains this through women self-surveying themselves to later be surveyed by a man.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
1.) McCloud uses the comic book to explain his idea because it explains the concept of image through cartoons.  He makes it clear that if he would have sketched more to his person narrating that he would have been looked at as a real person speaking.  The cartoon he drew was looked at as more of a concept.  His point would have suffered if it were through writing, because there would have been no image or icons to compare the writing.  His cartoon is writing in symbol/icon format.

2.) Berger assumes that women are treated by the way they display themselves by dressing, acting, and treating themselves.  He talks about God telling man indirectly that they are greater than women, and this could be why men are expressed through their strength and power.  The audience is always the surveyor(s).  These are different from the 1970's, because the demand for certain times and style is no longer the same, but in the end it is still the same concept.

3.) The articles share the same ideas, but are expressed in different terms.  The cartoon article speaks within itself, because it talks of image and symbol, the definition of cartoon.  Ads, books, pop culture, etc, are all forms of what Berger and McCloud's articles are based on, image.


     My point of view on Scott McCloud's cartoon were very positive.  He made many points very clear, and showed me that the human mind can see what it wants.  The fact that it was cartoon format made it interesting and almost exciting for me to read, because it was not in regular research style. 
      In John Berger's article, "Ways of Seeing," I found the most interesting.  I agree on women self-surveying themselves.  I as a female, display myself in a way that shows I take care of myself, I am intelligent, and appropriately dressed.  I feel that the way a person dresses gives you an idea of who they really are, and this is why men survey women.  If a man does not like what he sees he will just overlook it.  Some could argue that this is a stereotypical article.  I would see the view they are coming from, but would completely back Berger's article up based on fact.  The fact of the matter will always be, people will treat you however they know they can get away with.  If someone knows they can push you around, they will do this.  If you portray yourself as being a strong-minded person, people will look at you in this way, and also treat you as they see you.  It is good that women self-survey themselves, because if gives them a feeling of self-worth.
 

     The library tutorial helped me to know more about Alden Library and all the resources that could be used in the building.  I learned that the sixth and seventh floor are the best places for study, because they are kept very quiet.  I have done research in the library once before, and knew the basic layout.  I found it very useful to learn about the specific tables that are provided for math study.  They are tables, which you sign up for a half hour tutor group with a specific math class you may be having trouble with.  Personally, I am not the best at math, and may take up the offer if I need any extra help on the side of my regular math class this semester.  The videos on library services were very easy to follow along with, because they were interesting and funny.  I thought it was a good idea to have students involved in making the videos.  I will now be able to find easier ways to do research in the library.

     In Margaret Kantz article, "Helping Students Use Textual Sources Persuasively," she attempts to explain to teachers how to help students use texts such as encyclopedias or even dictionaries to issue the facts, and understand.  She argues that a student must not only read, but interpret the writing. 
     Kantz talks about a college sophomore named Shirley, and why she is having such a difficult time on writing a textual paper.  She had taken ideas from different authors and used all the ones with the same facts.  Margaret explains in the writing how Shirley's friend Alice tells her the difference of the two sources she used and why she should have mentioned and discussed the issues between the two books she read on the battle.  There was a French and a British.  Alice explains to Shirley how much their teacher would have loved to see Shirley compare and contrast the two books with opposing sides, and to come up with her own story or the opinions she had made reading the articles. 

SUMMARY BETWEEN TWO DIFFERENT WRITINGS
     John Swales' article and Margaret Kantz articles have almost the same idea.  Swales is trying to explain how to write the research papers, and Kantz is trying to help the students to learn to organize and interpret the ideas and facts received from reading the different versions. 

BEFORE YOU READ
How I define the terms;
fact - something that can be observed, or proven to be true.
claim - something you suggest to be accurate.
opinion - someone's ideas or thoughts on a certain topic
argument - a way to persuade a person to thinking you are correct

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION AND JOURNAL PG. 85
1) Margaret Kantz believes facts, opinions, and arguments are based off of ideas you make by reading textual sources.  You receive facts from the sources, construct your own personal ideas, and an argument within yourself and the reading.
2) She believes they misunderstand or don't comprehend, because they read the articles as stories, expect it to be the truth, and don't read source texts as arguments.  I agree that some students read texts as stories, but I believe it makes the textual sources easier to read as story based rather than factual.  Nobody thinks reading from a text book is exciting, but if you look at it in the story form it may become much easier to want to read and understand.

APPLYING AND EXPLORING IDEAS PG. 85
2) Kantz and my relationship between creativity and research are very much the same after reading her article.  She has persuaded me to agree on the idea that students misunderstand their readings and don't completely grasp the concept.  The only thing I have disagreed on her article is the way she feels about writing information that has been gathered is not the same as persuasive writing.  I believe as long as you clearly get your point across whether fact or opinion it could become very persuasive. 

META MOMENT
Kantz is trying to explain how students might have had difficulties gathering and interpreting information.  She encourages for teachers to read rhetorically to better understand between the authors and readers. 


     Margaret Kantz article was a huge eye-opener.  She made me realize my own faults in writing from two different authors, but not discussing the actual argument at hand.  When I write a paper, I will now look for the argument I could construct between two different points of view.  Not only will I compose the argument from other authors, but I will include my own argument and chose what I agree with more, and explain the reason of why I would side with one side over another. 

PROPOSAL TOPIC

     I have decided to write my first paper on why students in an essay or research paper are expected not to use first or second person.  I find this very interesting, because I have been known to use both first and second person in many essays and research papers throughout high school.  I have gotten dropped letter grades on essays because of this idea.  I am going to explain my side as to why I believe students should be allowed to use the first and second person in their own papers.