Edwar Hernandez

Writing 2

TA: Zack de Piero

Due: February 9th, 2015

Moves

Writing Project #2: Project Builder 2B

The moves that are adopted by writers overtime demonstrate the works of authors that have inspired them. By combining the sets of moves that have been compiled overtime a writer can create a set of moves unique to them. Therefore, recognizing moves and their effects on an argument is important for any writer that is attempting to better his skill. Moves are present in any writer’s work, as can be seen in the articles Navigating Genres by Kerry Dirk and Murder! (Rhetorically Speaking) by Janet Boyd. Both authors utilize different moves in their writing to make their work clearer and more interesting for an audience that may not find English to be a very interesting subject. Both Dirk and Boyd have compiled their own set of moves which they have compiled into their articles.

Boyd and Dirk both begin their essays by relating to their audience, a use of ethos, thus establishing a relation. They do so through different means, though, as Boyd uses a personal story to gain the audience’s trust,”The college where I first started teaching writing called its freshman composition course ‘Logic and Rhetoric’ “, and Kirk simply utilizes a joke, “Q: What do you get when you rewind a country song? A: You get your wife back, your job back, your dog back”. Both have chosen to begin their articles by relating to an audience that may otherwise believe english to be just some college credit. Because the audience may not feel invested in learning english it is their job to gain the attention of the audience as fast as they can. If attention is lost, then the author’s risk being thrown into the black nexus of “boring uppity college articles” college students dislike so much. By beginning with a joke or personal experience the authors distance themselves from those college articles and make it slightly more interesting for those that may have to use their essays as a tool for some assignment.

Both authors realize their audience is a very particular one, worried about other subjects and classes, therefore reading the articles may be done in a rushed manner. In order to facilitate the reading for the audience, especially when the audience has to come back and search for something they once read, they both use different methods to save the audience some time. Boyd, because of his use of different examples throughout his essay, uses small headlines throughout his work,”Getting in touch with your inner detective...cultivating your inner coroner, etc”. This creates an easy reference for those that may need to look back and find the text they are looking for. Dirk, on the other hand, utilizes bullet points and examples which are kept separate from the body paragraphs. By doing so he summarizes points that may have otherwise become lost in the sea of body paragraphs. Also, by keeping it separate from the rest of the paragraphs, it becomes a marker for the reader that may recall that those bullets are tied in with something, thus serving a similar purpose like Boyd’s headlines. They both facilitate the essay for their readers in a manner that allows them to read and come back and find what they are looking for quickly. Both authors realize the importance of not making this too wordy, too formal, and too academic.

While both essays offer literary insight into the world of english by using similar means they do fail in some respects to argue for their subject. In the article Murder (Rhetorically Speaking) by Janet Boyd, the author does a great job of giving examples. So much so that she waters down her entire essay with four examples that weren't all that necessary. While her objective is to make the essay funny and relatable, by the second paragraph the reader has a clear grasp on what she is trying to explain and how. This is not particularly be poor English, but it does demonstrate a failure to recognize when to stop. Still, it can be argued that the other examples are used to solidify the ideas in the readers mind, something that is actually a good thing. Therefore, the number of examples is not actually completely bad and in fact is subject to reader bias, it is subjective.

Both essays offer insight into English, its struggles, its strengths, and genre. Both have a strong grasp on what they talk about and demonstrate their knowledge through the moves they use to the advantage of the argument. The use of an suthors moves and their effectiveness are often subjectective as not every person will learn the same. As a writer, that just happens to write in English, it is beneficial to argue, internally at least, whether or not a move used by an author was effective. Sorting the effective approaches allows an aspiring writer, or just the recreational writer, to become more effective in the use of language. The adoption of “moves” is not plagiarism, it is a manner of maturing one’s language.