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Kavanaugh Durboraw

Emily Litle

ENG121001

29 April 2022

English Reflection

This semester of English has been wonderful practice for my writing skills. I had already

learned the concepts of rhetoric in an AP rhetoric course I took in high school, but that was quite

a long time ago, and I have not been in an academic setting in years. This class gave me the

opportunity to brush up on the information I learned in high school, but it also introduced me to

new writing strategies that will make invaluable additions to my writing skills as I continue to

more advanced writing courses here at Otero. I plan to continue taking writing courses for as

long as they can contribute to my degree plan, and I’m glad I took this course as the first.

My first portfolio artifact is my introduction paragraph for paper one. I would have

written it very differently if I were to write another profile on Chelsea Manning. Paper one

challenged me by asking me to write in a genre I have not spent much time writing in, profile

pieces. I also struggled to connect the extreme topic I chose with my audience made up of the

rest of the class. The introduction I wrote is attention-grabbing, but when I look back on it now,

it doesn’t draw the reader’s attention to the right place, which is the life of Chelsea Manning, not

the horrible things she witnessed. Some of these ideas may have been better for a later paragraph,

but not in the introduction.

My second portfolio artifact is the second to last paragraph of paper two. Paper two is

when we started focusing on the principles of rhetoric, and as I mentioned before, I had already
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had a leg up in this area. I had misremembered the function of ethos strategies though, and I

thought it had something to do with morality because of the word “ethics.” I think ethos should

instead be called “auctoritas”, which is what google translate says is Latin for “authority.”

Thanks to this course however, I was able to correct that mistake and analyze the ethos strategies

Gary Chambers used in his campaign ad. I don’t think I would have changed any of the

substance of this analysis, but I think after practicing so much my tone has improved, and I think

it would read better if I wrote it again now.

My third portfolio artifact is my introduction for paper three. The anecdote I start the

paper with about Nixon’s aide admitting to the nefarious motivations for the drug war is true,

and I could have sourced it and included in my final paper. I didn’t because I thought the dubious

origin of the drug war wouldn’t matter to my argument except to say that the drug war wasn’t a

response to actual societal problems. I just didn’t think that argument was strong enough to

include in my final paper because it doesn’t get to the heart of whether drug prohibition is

beneficial to society. I really like the way this paragraph introduces the reader to the political

factors at play, but my fourth paper went on to include no mention of Nixon, and I think that’s

fine.

My fourth portfolio artifact is my conclusion for paper four. Looking back at all my work

for the class, paper four is, I think, the strongest piece of writing I submitted to the class, and I

think my conclusion does a great job demonstrating my growth as a writer. I think it leaves the

reader right where I want them at the end of my essay. It summed up the topic well without

sounding forceful, and I found a satisfying way to call back to my D.A.R.E. anecdote from the

introduction. I like urging the reader to form their own ideas and I think I did a good job
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avoiding obvious bias which is something I think everyone struggles with to one degree or

another.

My final portfolio artifact is the concluding paragraph of my entry for journal eight.

BoJack Horseman is a work of genius, and I strongly recommend it to anyone in the mood for a

mature animated comedy. The first few episodes of season one are among the show’s weakest,

and I urge viewers to continue the show until it hits its stride. I wrote journal eight about a quote

from an unnamed character from the show who encourages BoJack to keep progressing at

something every day if he wants to get better at something, noting that diligence is the hardest

element of progress. I compared the quote to my guitar playing in the journal, but the parallel

extends easily to writing as well. I plan to continue improving my writing skills, and considering

some of my hobbies, such as tabletop roleplaying games, I do have a chance to improve my

writing a little every day.

In this English course, I’ve had many interesting and varied assignments upon which to

hone my rhetorical and compositional skills. I’m confident both in my performance in the class

and the skills I’ll be able to take from it into the rest of my college experience. Looking back to

my earliest work in the class, my own progress is clear to me, and my tone seems more

comfortable and effective to me now. I plan to take creative writing classes in the future, and I

would love to take a literary analysis class as well. I’m confident that the skill I’ve learned over

the last semester will be very helpful in either case.