Reflection.

English 112 was one of my favorite classes of the semester. As an English major with a specialization in creative writing, I enjoy writing a lot. It's something that I've done since I was a little girl, because telling a story always came natural to me as breathing. However, I was not (and still not) perfect. My writing is human like myself. I have trouble spots. This class has helped me improve on things such as writing a thesis, and improving my writing. Through the peer reviews, I learned how to read others works, and learn how they perceived mine. Overall, this class has taught me how to improve my writing to prepare me for what's ahead. 
Out of the many classes that I've taken this semester, I looked forward to this one everyday. This class helped improve my writing in many ways, in my opinion. For one thing, I really had no idea how to write a thesis. In my critical thinking class, my teacher said that it was okay to write 'this paper would be about...." In this class, I quickly learned that it was not the way that things worked. My ability to write a thesis is something that improved. Another thing that this class helped to improve was the fact that I really hated to write the conclusions. This class helped improve that because Professor Guarino helped me realize that the conclusion is something that leaves your reader with something to think about. I plan to take those lessons, in addition to all of the other ones with me to my future writing and english classes. 
An assignment that literally taught me the most was that Rhetoric Argument essay. It was by far the hardest essay in my opinion, because I've never written anything like that in my life. I tackled the assignment with great excitement. By reading through examples of others, and meeting with the professor, I was able to do a halfway decent job. I also believe I learned the most from this essay, because when you're exposed to something new, you learn from it. Since I didn't know what I was doing, I can safely say that this essay was something I learned A LOT from. 
Going into this class, I can say that I've done a lot of writing. I've written tons of blog entries, poems, and fictional pieces. Writing was always my strong suit. Exiting this class, I've changed the way I look at writing. I now attack pieces in drafts. Then, I go back, and edit like crazy. I never did that before, because I assumed that since I was a decent writer that it was a fairly decent piece. 
Leaving this class would not be easy. I've made some awesome friends who I hope to remain in contact with. I've had a great teacher, who really put herself out there for her students to be sure that they did things to the best of their ability. Most of all, I leave a better writer with more experience to lead me to my next English class. 

Peer Review Questions

Sorry these were a tad bit later then planned. Here's my questions!

1. Do my details help prove my thesis?
2. What are the things that you think I could improve on to make this essay a better one?
3. What are some things that you liked/disliked about my essay?
4. Can the transition sentences be improved?
 5. Grammar errors?
6. Additional feedback?

Essay 3 Rough Draft

One of the hot topics nowadays is gay rights. Gay rights has become an important issue. Most people can say that we’ve come a long way since our parents generation of being in the closet. However, there are still remains of homophobia, and there are people out there who think that homosexual people should not marry. One of the main reasons why people think this is because they claim that the Bible doesn’t condemn gay marriage. In a recent New York Times Article, titled “Reading God’s Mind”, Frank Bruni writes about these issues. His thesis was “Against God’s wishes. That notion — that argument — is probably the most stubborn barrier to the full acceptance of gay and lesbian Americans, a last bastion and engine of bigotry. It’s what many preachers still thunder. It’s what some politicians still maintain.” He showcases a homosexual male named Jeff Chu whose life has consisted of hiding who he truly is because of the religion that he’s grown up with did not agree with homosexuality. In the article, he discusses his struggles with accepting himself for who he truly is, in addition to his parents struggling with who their son really is. The argument that he makes, although its a good one about the subject relies too much on pathos, therefore becoming untrustworthy because it has a narrow scope with very little factual appeal.

I noticed that Bruni only mentions the South Baptist religion.  We all know that there is more than one sole religion in the world. Other than the multiple branches of Christianity, there is Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Muslims. Some Americans don't even believe in a single God, they believe in Gods or a Buddha. Therefore, this article doesn't give them justice because the homosexuals that have those sorts of beliefs can not relate to the talk of having one single God. If Bruni had talked about these other religions, then he would have presented a more valid point. However, since there is no information about these religions, this question is being raised. It would show that the topic is more personal, than a hot issue. However, since he made it solely about the Southern Baptists, it leaves the reader wondering, “what about the other religions?” The article is an example of hasty generalization, because it’s an argument that is made based on solely one person’s experiences. “And his parents, strict Southern Baptists, have always deemed such a love sinful, and against God’s wishes.” After this quote, one can say that it would be good to add some additional information about the other religions about there. This makes it lack credibility because if he had added more experiences of homosexual men and women of different religions, it would have been a more holistic approach. If a more hollistic approach was used for this piece, it would answer the audience's questions about what goes on in the other religions such as Judasim and the various other religions that are out there in today's modern world. With addressing the audience's questions about this particular issue the argument presented leaves the audience with out wonder. Meaning, that they have all of their questions answered by the time they reach the last sentence.

The piece has more emotional appeals than factual appeals which makes it biased because it has a narrow scope. While reading the article, one can say that it’s a very personal article. Some may even argue this is more of an testimonial piece then an editorial piece. This piece talks about Jeff Chu’s closeted experience with the church which didn’t approve his homosexual feelings. It was very personal, and you can tell that it was biased. “Jeff Chu was married last September, on the lawn of a house on Cape Cod, against the backdrop of an ivy-covered fence. About 80 people came. His mother and father weren’t among them”. This quote is a good example of pathos because Bruni is playing on the emotional heartstrings on the readers. You can’t help feeling sorry for someone whose parents don’t approve of their marriage, or the person that they want to get married too. Marriage appeals to the pathos of love, which is something that many audiences would like to read about. After all, everyone likes to read a good love story about people that are supposed to be together. The author probably clearly knew that the audience would go for a love story where the lover were meant to be together, so that could be a reason why he played so heavily on this part of the piece. More logos would have approved this article. It would have showed more credibly. Some good examples of logos that could have been used in this piece is statistics with gay couples and their parent's approvals of their union. With the usage of too much pathos, we tend to wonder if the person actually knows what they were talking about. Then, we roll our eyes, because there's a certain point when there is too much. Bruni has reached that point. Emotional appeals can be good to strengthen arguments. However with too much emotional appeals it can be over the top and weakens the argument altogether.

The argument presented is an issue that I do agree with. I do agree with Bruni and his views on homosexual marriage and the way religions perceive it as being against God’s word. However, Bruni could have done a better job presenting it because he plays on the heartstrings on his readers, in addition to providing a tunnel vision of solely the Southern Baptist religion. With presenting more logos, he would have been able to present the argument better, in addition to making the tunnel vision wider. Then, he would have had an even better article on his hands.

Reflection:

This essay thus far has been a huge improvement from the original essay. I have made quite a bit of changes, which I am proud. I have added more details to the piece, so it further proves my argument. The pieces that I have added and changed have made the essay sound better, in addition to making my argument be proven in a better format. There's still bits and pieces that I have to change, but I believe this to be a good start.

First, I had added more information about logos and the effects that the essay would have, in addition to how much better the article would be if there was more logos used instead of the overwelming amount of pathos that appeared in the article. With more logos, there's more proof of his fact. This way he can back up the information that he has presented from the very beginning.

Second, I also bought up the point that not all Americans believe in one single God. This brings up the question of what to the Americans who have a Buddha or believes in more then one God. What is their limits of love? Do they believe that love has a specific gender, such as being between a man or a woman, or do they allow homosexual couples to have a fighting chance to be happy.

Overall, this essay has more details about than my original essay that I've written for the class. There is still work to be done, mind you, but this is a huge improvement. 

Essay Plans.

After carefully reviewing both of my previously written essays that I've written for this class, I picked the Rhetorical Analysis essay is the one that can be taken a step further, because there is so much more that could have been done with the essay. I chose this essay because I felt this essay needs the most work out of the two. I could do many things with this essay. I plan to enhance the essay to discuss more about my thesis, perhaps even making my original thesis better. For example, in my first essay I lacked to include the benefits of a holistic approach of the subject that he had presented. In this essay, I plan to go back and use examples of diverse content on the subject to show the reader that having this sort of format can present the topic in a more reliable manner.
I have many aspirations for this upcoming essay. As I said earlier, I plan to talk more about the topic being presented in different ways. I also plan to go back and add a lot more about the effect of author's usage of pathos and lack of logos through out the entire article. After all, too much pathos can make the reader either get annoyed or bored, and without logos it lacks effect. Finally, I plan to take more quotes from Bruni's article and analyze them on whether or not it actually supports his own thesis. In my original essay, I forgot to do that, so it's going to make my essay a whole lot stronger.
This essay out of the two that I've written in this class is by far my weaker one. However, out of my two essays, I also figured out that it was the one that I could discuss more about using way more detail then I did previously to add meat to my body paragraphs. I have my work cut out for me, but at the end of the day I should have a bigger and better analysis.