Within the past several months, I was able to develop a variety of skill sets that allowed me to enhance my writing style and analyzation tactics. As exhibited in my portfolio, these skills were developed throughout the course. My portfolio exhibits a variety of different assignments, peer reviews, rough drafts, and so forth, to show the progression of my writing and the significance of each document that played into that development of my writing. I was able to delve deep into a plethora of genres and rhetorical situations, establish plans for how I read, drafted, collaborated, revised, and edited, and got to practice rhetorical devices such as situation, purpose, and so forth. Throughout the class, my peers and I engaged in collaborative situations when creating peer reviews for one another and working in groups to discuss the work each one of us had produced. I was able to use technology to accurately reach the audiences I had wanted, depending on the context of my work, by researching on my topic. This research allowed me to learn how to cite properly in what I wanted my stance and purpose to be. Throughout the entirety of the course, I successfully achieved all of the course learning outcomes, and in the process of doing so, was able to develop a better sense and style of writing that will help me in my academic and professional future.

My portfolio proves as evidence as to how the genres and rhetorical situations fluctuated as the course progressed. For instance, my literacy narrative’s rhetorical devices are entirely different from my researched critical essay. The genres of these two papers are different, one being a literacy narrative, where I discuss a significant point in my life that made an impact in the way that I viewed and carried myself. The researched critical analysis, however, is entirely different in the sense that I assess the theme of the ‘otherness’ and it’s intersectionality in Albert Camus’ The Stranger. These papers have entirely different genres, one being written at the beginning, and the other at the end. The other rhetorical situations were also entirely different. For instance, in my literacy narrative, the rhetorical situation was firstly to convince people of the beauty of Buddhism, which my paper centered around. Hence, my stance and purpose concluded on the idea that Buddhism changed my life. This made me want to influence people through my writing and encourage the audience, which stemmed to everyone, to further read into the philosophy of Buddhism. My exigency in writing this was to return to my roots of becoming a Buddhist, and hopefully, to show people the beauty that it entails through further readings and preaching’s of it. My researched critical analysis, on the other hand, took a complete turn into the thorough analysis of The Stranger’s dynamics and philosophies of the main character, Meursault. The rhetorical situation was also to convince readers on how Meursault is the ‘other’ within the context of his confines, but is also just like everyone else when his philosophy of absurdism fails him. This is clearly my argument in purpose and stance. The audience in this paper stemmed to more educated people, those particularly with an interest in literature. The exigence was to show my argument and convince others on how I viewed the novel through those several factors. The media’s and designs for both of these papers stayed the same. Although it was difficult at times to explain each device and make sure they were clearly stated in each piece of work, I believe that I was successful in stating and enhancing each one depending on the context. Hence, the rhetorical situations and genres had very different roles in the way they were discussed in each assignment.

My development for each paper underwent a variety of changes. The drafting process is what I usually struggled with the most. This is because I had so many ideas, but could not figure out the placement, analyzation, and elaboration of each. My drafting process began with nothingness, and progressed into detailed drafts enlisting all of the quotes I was going to use, the requirements I had to fulfill, main ideas and bullet points, a thesis statement, and potential body paragraphs with a conclusion. Although it was difficult at first, the change I made in how I was going to approach these papers made a large difference in the development and organization of my papers. Additionally, working with my peers made a significant difference, because it allowed me to seek different perspectives on my writing and change things that required further clarification. I was also able to do this for my fellow classmates to help them improve their work. This form of collaboration really helped because different perspectives allowed me to gain more insight in the things I needed to adjust. Hence, drafting and peer collaboration truly helped me in altering my work for the better.

When it came time to doing research, I found a new struggle I didn’t previously know I had. Particularly in the final paper, it was really difficult to find research that matched my argument and would support it. Even more so, finding a counter-argument was practically impossible for the specificity of my statements. However, after looking into several resources in the library’s database and Google Scholar, I was able to eventually find several good resources that would help my argument, rebuttal the counterargument, and further elaborate on the intersectionality of the situation. Due to this experience, I learned that research is a patient process and takes an amplitude of time. Implementation of that research also takes time, because finding the right quotes and pieces of information that will easily flow into my argument was a difficult task. Another important note was to check the accuracy, credibility, timeliness and bias of the sources, which involved further clarification and research to be able to truly use them.

Upon finding these resources, I had to integrate them into my paper, where I used my drafts and outlines. After checking the credibility and so forth, it came time to understand how to integrate my research so that I could support my argument and further rebuttals. The method I mostly used was elaborating on the quotes that I integrated, and connecting them to my argument. In short, I used critical analysis and argumentation with my research to produce my researched critical analysis paper. The last step in this process were citations. Citations were what I struggled highly with when it came to writing papers. Because there is abundance of rules on how to cite, I found myself getting confused on what I actually had to do. Works Cited pages were something I eventually learned how to accurately do in MLA format, but in-text citations is what I needed help with. After consistently practicing, and going on websites that gave examples of how to properly in-text cite, I was able to improve how I was citing and give credit where it was due. All of these research elements came together to truly exhibit a well-thought out research paper.

Towards the conclusion of this course, I believe I gathered enough knowledge and experience to achieve all of the course learning outcomes. Throughout each struggle, I was able to better learn and understand how to correctly do something within my writing. When analyzing the rhetorical devices, I was able to keep in mind what and how I was trying to portray in my writing. Collaborating, drafting, revising, research, and editing helped me accomplish my message and tone of work. I believe that I achieved all of my goals in the course learning outcomes, allowing me to be more conscious of exactly what I’m trying to say, and better my writing for the future.

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