Strukel 1

Bina Strukel

J. Zisa

WRIT 2A

19 October 2022

Reflective Letter

Within my portfolio I have crafted essay’s and genre translations that express their own

ideas but also express my knowledge as a writer. In my Wp1 I was tasked to translate an

academic article to a genre of my choosing , to which I chose a magazine cover. Here I learned a

lot about the audience but also the topic at hand being Cell Phone dependency. Attached to the

translation was an analytical essay where I was able to refresh my writing skills and explain my

thought process for the translation. Then for Wp2 it focused more on writing, i begged the

question what makes writing good along with how it is taught. This is a question I was happy to

explore as from the beginning of the course I wondered how I myself could improve my writing.

Since taking this course my mindset around writing has changed and I think any

misconceptions I’ve had. After reflecting on my Pb’s I could see that in the beginning my

mindset in writing was almost narrow minded. I think alike to many I thought writing had a large

focus on structure and syntax and the actual content came second. Now I have come to see that it

is not that black and white, what makes good writing is multifactorial and may vary depending

on the context. Within this course we did weekly readings to be completed before each class,

these were my primary source of information about writing and gave me lots of exposure to

different takes on writing. Following these readings, the activities in class involving groups also

taught me a lot . They not only reaffirmed the ideas in the text to me but made sure I interpreted
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it the right way. Say I found an article from the reading that confused the group activities and

gave me an opportunity to be enlightened by a fellow student in a casual setting.

The course reading that I found notably helpful was Bunn’s “How to Read Like a

Writer”. This article was really helpful to read early on as I would continue to do a lot of reading

on top of writing in this course. An early on assignment we analyzed his text, found the passage

“There was a Red Coat stationed on each of the theater’s four floors, and we all passed the time

by sitting quietly in the back, reading books with tiny flashlights. “(Bunn 71). “The Reading like

a Writer” text opens with a sort of context. I found this opening more engaging than a normal

formal and informative guide as it almost gave the author some credibility but also humanized

him to a reader. It was an effective way to begin the work and ultimately made me more

interested in what the author had to say next. Additionally he later referenced this passage later

in his own work and used it as an example of how to read like a writer providing questions that

may be raised or inference on purpose from doing this.

Concerning the rhetorical awareness I have collected from this course, I think it will

improve my writing in the future. I have a newfound emphasis on the context of writing,

meaning being able to write for different situations. I understand that my writing for a text to my

friend will greatly differ and use different conventions than an essay I’m writing for an English

class. Already seen in my genre translations after I identify my audience the work changes

greatly. For my Wp1 my genre changed form an academic article to a magazine cover

subsequently the audience broadened as well and became less formal. I saw a similar tactic of

broadening the audience of original work in one of our class readings A Feminist Take on a

Three-Course Meal by Eva Reyman. Reyman used a recipe format enabling her to write more

simply than her original text by, “avoid(ing) using advanced heavy words and too many
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sentences in a row”, and remaining informative (Reyman). I was not only able to use this for my

WP1 cover but also my WP2 poster.

As a writer I would say my skills have improved within this class. When I think of my

strength concerning writing I think I have good ideas, and if I put the time into revising and

editing drafts I can communicate pretty well. Specifically when looking at tasks in this course i

find myself most confident in the work that has more visual aspects than textual. For my WP1 I

am proud of my translation of the attached essay. SImilarly, I found my poster for Wp2 easier as

it was solely a poster aspect. Based on this I think my weaknesses may be in the revision process.

I will get the work done to turn in but I struggle as a writer to set time aside to take another look

at my work and think I could improve my mindset to include revision as part of the writing

process. Though in this class I have worked to improve this and set aside more time for revision.

If I had more time I would still edit my essay for my Wp1 As I think it would be the work of

mine that would benefit the most from more time. I will make notes of another reading in class

that emphasizes revisions, Downs “Revision is Central to Developing Writing”. Downs

emphasizes the necessity of revision to produce a clear cohesive and purposeful work, without this

process we are only left with our first draft which is bound and subject to be confusing, flawed and may

only make sense to the one who it was written by (Downs). With this information I will be sure to revise

my work indepthly. I will focus on reading the work as I am the possible audience and look to see if I'm

able to not just comprehend it but find what is shared useful.

Works Cited

Bunn, Mike. “How to Read Like a Writer.” Gauchospace.ucsb.edu, Writing Spaces, 2010,

https://gauchospace.ucsb.edu/courses/.

Reyman, Eva. “A Feminist Take on a Three Course Meal.” Starting Lines, 21st ed., UCSB

Writing Program, 2022, pp. 81–89. Accessed 15 October 2022.

Downs, Dough. “Revision Is Central to Developing Writing.” Gauchospace.ucsb.edu, https:/

/gauchospace.ucsb.edu/courses/.