Thanks to the COM352 students for contributing a bunch of new pages! I'll be moving these pages into the main area of the wiki soon.

From UMassWiki

[edit] my writing

[edit] final reflection

Over the course of this semester, I have had many new experiences related to my writing. Never before has my writing been questioned or challenged as much as it has, and never has it been posted in so many different places. The questioning and challenging, I believe, has led to a significant improvement in my writing. My writing being posted online, as well as in a magazine has made me think more carefully about my writing. My writing being posted on the wiki, and in the magazine, however, did not change my writing very much. I have always been very open about myself and unafraid of people learning personal things about me. I am happy that my writing is being published in a magazine, because I believe that it gives an accurate impression of my personality. The format of the magazine by unit, helps it also provide a more appropriate view of the class. Knowing I was going to put my pieces online or in a magazine helped me learn about myself as a writer greatly. I came into this class annoyed I had to take it figuring I was already a good enough writer to make it through college. I am leaving this class now knowing that my writing wasn't as good as i thought it was in the beginning of the semester, and also that my skill as a writer can still be improved. My writing is better, but it still has it's ups and downs. Thanks to this class, I know how to deal with these ups and downs, and continue to progress as a writer.

In my first reflection letter I was still more focused on being annoyed that I had to take the calss than thinking I would actually learn something from it. I focused on the fact that I had gotten good grades in all papers besides this class, and the I was a confident writer. My tone was one of “why the hell arent you giving me an A?” and it wasn't helping me that much. (Carbaugh 1) I liked my first paper, but since I only received a B on it, I did not see it as a success, and I had not begun learning from this class yet. My second reflection put into words the beginning of the process of learning about myself as a writer in this class. I was finally able to swallow my ego and admit that I was, in fact, not perfect, and that I did indeed have problems. Once I was able to realize I had a problem, I was able to work on fixing it. I stated that “The organization of the paper wasn't it's best, and I was once again too wordy.” (Carbaugh2 par. 2) While I was not optimistic about fixing wordiness, I was hopeful about getting better at organizing, and I was actually able to get better in both regards by the end of the semester. Since I had such a problem writing it, significantly improving from my first to second to third drafts of the paper helped me realize that I could indeed improve my writing skills. The 2nd paper was the one I disliked writing the most, but it certainly helped me become a better writer. The improvement was just beginning.

My third paper provided me with a perfect situation to improve my writing. I was writing a research paper, my least favorite types of papers, but I was also writing about something I cared about. Since I was writing about something I cared about, I wanted it to be a good paper, so I had to challenge myself. In my second reflection I pondered whether my writing was actually improving my writing since my first drafts of unit three seemed mediocre, and my second paper hadn't been anything special. (Carbaugh2 par. 4) However, I was able to organize the content in the end, and focus a lot on cleaning up grammar issues, and the result was my first paper to get an A in the class thus far. What was key was that even thogh I was glad I got an A, I wasn't back under the impression that I was an amazing writer....yet. The third reflection letter forced me to write out the problems I was still having, which was a very good thing to do. I discussed organization and grammar, mentioning classmates experiencing similar problems as mine. (Carbaugh3 par. 1) The fact that I was able to fix up these problems I had been struggling with in my third paper was key. Problems with organization, wordiness, and grammar seemed now ones that I could overcome. This all led to my final paper, where everything seemed to click. With only 500 words I was forced to be concise, and the shorter paper made it easier to organize. I was also back to my favorite form of writing; writing about myself. It's not that I'm conceited, I just know myself better than anyone else, so it makes me easier to write about. The good organization, and conciseness with little grammar distractions in my fourth paper really helped me realize the improvements I had made in this class. The fact that I really enjoyed writing the paper made it a fun realization. This rediscovered confidence with my writing helped me be more comfortable with it being posted publicly.

I had an interesting relationship with wiki. By interesting I mean I hated it until it got colorful pictures added to it, then I just disliked it. It was different than anything I'd done before, and provided an interesting forum for the class. The wiki shows that the class is very interactive. There are many things posted on the wiki which are interactions among students, and students interacting with the teacher. Many discussions on the wiki were loosely related to current issues, so the wiki shows as a class we care about the world around us, and aren't afraid to incite change. Posting the unit three paper on the wiki helps orchestrate that this class is one that is critiquing current societies, and ready to change the problems in it. These papers make the class wiki much more relevant to the rest of the world. For me personally the wiki probably just shows that I'm less technologically savvy than anyone else. It took me a long time to figure out how to post things correctly, and make links, etc. The informal style of my reflection letters may have made me come off as a casual person, which I am. My paper's hopefully make me also come off as a decent writer with an interesting life. My unit three paper may cause me to come off as a non-conformist and a rebel, which I'm not really, but it was the point of the paper to come off that way, so it's fine. I believe the wiki gave people a reasonably correct view of who I am.

A more effective way of showing my personality through writing, however, was the class magazine. One does not have to click links, and find different pages to see my writing in the magazine, merely search for my name in the table of contents. It is a bit more of a narrow view of me since only three of my papers are in it, as opposed to all of them, but I believe the format of the magazine is more effective. One thing that angered me about the class magazine, however, was that the title of my unit four paper was changed. Everything clicked when I was writing my unit four paper, and I loved it. I didn't want to see anything appear differently in the magazine, but the title was. My title was a lyric from a song by The Who entitled “We're not Gonna Take It” which was “Listening to you, I get the music.” It may have been a copyright issue, but I had the song referenced in the bibliography, and used different song lyrics in my paper which were still in the magazine title. The title was changed to “Listening to you...” which was very frustrating to me. Without the second half of the title, it makes absolutely no sense as a title for a paper about listening to music. This may cause confusion for the readers, and definitely obscured the overall vision for my paper. I'm glad the content was unchanged, but the change of the title did irk me. Even with this problem, I believe the magazine shows what the class truly was better than the wiki, because of it's format.

I believe the magazine gave an accurate impression of myself because even though not all my writing was in it, the most personal one's were. My Listening To You piece is a perfect way to show my light-hearted and easy going personality. My letter to the Umass police chief provides readers information about my politics and moral values, and my second reflection letter effectively showed the struggles I was still going through as a writer. I believe my reflection letters give a solid impression of me because steph was able to point out what I was going through, and what I meant quite effectively in responding to my third reflection letter. Steph especially hit the nail on the head when she stated that “The conflict between his desire to stay casual (informal, personal) and the drive to improve his clarity and rhetorical effectiveness suggests that Andy is still trying to decide if his writing is more for himself (as a means of expression), than for his audience (for them to enjoy).” (Steph par. 2) What she suggests is indeed a problem I am going through. I do write to express myself, but I have also always cared about my audience. I could be that I'm a bit conceited and want my audience to know how cool a person I am, and this leaves me somewhere in the middle between writing for myself and writing for an audience. While this class did solve a lot of problems in my writing, that is one that I guess will have to wait.

This class started and ended with a paper I enjoyed writing. The last one, however, was significantly better than the first, which was a result of the struggle I went through in the middle two papers. Doing two rewrites of one and three of the other really helped me fine tune my organization, grammar, and conciseness. These rewrites really helped everything click for my fourth paper, when I was finally back to writing in a style that I enjoyed. While all of this writing can be seen on the wiki, finding it all would be a bit of a hassle, and the format of the writing might be a bit distracting. With one of the papers I struggled with, along with my last paper in the class magazine, I believe that provides readers with a reasonable impression of the person I am. I might come off as a bit of an alcoholic, since I mention drinking and one, and go into great depths arguing about how college kids should be able to drink in the other, but I can deal with that. With students choosing the papers that meant that most to them to put in the magazine, I believe that that gives the magazine a better indicator of what the class was truly like. It's organization by unit instead of by author is also better. My writing went through it's ups and downs throughout this class, but at the end was far better than at the beginning. Knowing other people would be reading it, either online, or in a magazine, helped the improvement along greatly.

"unit 3 reflection"

[edit] unit 4

For long you live and high you fly, smiles you give and tears you'll cry. All you touch and all you see is all your life will ever be. I believe that statement, and I believe in the fact that psychadelic-sounding instruments go along in the background to it. I believe in music. Shakespeare can have the east with Juliet as his sun, but I'd rather have John Lennon informing me that the sun is coming. Life comes at you fast, and it never stops. I believe you need something to help you through it's ups and downs, and I believe for me listening to music is what keeps life coming at me.

Music keeps me sane. The cute girl down the hall didn't want to go on a date with me, and I was pretty bummed. Open up my itunes and I've got about five hundred artists to either comiserate with my loneliness, cheer me up, or depress me even more. My music can help me justify every emotion I've ever felt, no matter how irrational it may really be, and help me move on. I'm liable to be down for a few days without a little pick me up from my itunes. A few songs about heartbreak, a couple about moving on, and maybe one about how the bitch doesn't deserve me, and I'm back on my feet in under a half hour. I'm writing this paper even though I would rather be out having drinks with my friends, but hey, at least Ben Folds is keeping me company.

Music is important because it functions as the best friend I could possibly have. It's always there no matter what, to help me with whatever I need. It can keep me company wherever I am, and help me live out any dreams I may have. If I want to go to space I can go with Ziggy Stardust, if I'm ever wondering what a typical day of a ghetto cowboy would be like, Bone Thugs can tell me. I can be the sensitive guy that can get any girl, then the badass motherfucker who will cap you if you step out of line in a seven minute span. Music is always there for me. It lets me walk from class to class with a rhythym. It lets me study for tests without getting too stressed about them. It lets me do anything I don't want to be doing while also doing something I truly love, and that's priceless.

Music guides me through my life while letting me escape it whenever I want to. It keeps me company, it keeps me focused, and it soothes my emotions. I believe in music, and I believe I would be lost without it. If you don't believe me, just remember that we can work it out, we can work it out, because life is very short, and there's no time for fussing and fighting, my friend.

Songs Referenced/Quoted: Breathe-Pink Floyd, Here Comes the Sun-The Beatles, Ziggy Stardust-David Bowie, Ghetto Cowboy-Bone Thugz n Harmony, We can work it out-The Beatles.

[edit] unit 3

To the UMass Chief of Police,

I must begin by stating that I am in no way questioning whether or not your force on campus is a positive or negative thing. Clearly, as this campus has been deemed the most violent in America the past two years, a police force is necessary and essential for the safety of the students. In fact, after the recent tragedy that occurred at Virginia Tech University, it is positively reassuring to know a fairly extensive police force is keeping us safe. I am merely to question aspects of campus security, your newly extended police force is focusing on, and whether or not this is making the campus a truly safer place.

For years your staff has been arguing to the state that you are indeed a police force, not merely a security force. (Palpini, Gazette) Through all of the violent occurences that have happenned on this campus in recent years, I would say you definitely deserve all of the bonuses, and injury-pay that municipal cops have. I support your campaign against the state for more benefits, but I urge you to not take out your frustrations on the students. (Palpini, Gazette) Your most important job as a police force is to keep these students safe. Your website states that your job is to “ensuring that the Amherst campus is a safe environment for studying, teaching, researching, recreating, and living.” (http://www.umass.edu/umpd/About_UMPD/) Your officers retain the right to arrest all people committing illegal acts in Amherst and Hadley, and collaborate with local and state police forces, and is as active as any local police force 24 hours a day and seven days a week. (http://www.umass.edu/umpd/jeanneclerycampussafetyact/campuslawenforcementpersonnel/) This job description allows a greater understanding of how these officers can create a better relationship with the students.

There have been no cases of murder or negligent manslaughter since before 2003, and the cases of robberies has been less than five per year since 2003. (Umass PD Clery Act statistics) With the increase of members of UMass Police on campus in the last few years, cases of aggravated assualt have gone down somewhat, along with cases of arsen. Clearly, a statistic the police department must be proud of is the decrease of forcible sex offenses by 75% in the last three years. Cases of burglary, however, have gone up. (Umass PD Clery Act statistics) With a decreasing rate for these major crimes, I believe you are doing an admirable job making sure that the campus of Umass-Amherst is a safe place.

My concern is with the vast increase in arrests for minor offenses such as alcohol and drugs. Since 2003, arrests for liquor law, and drug violations have nearly tripled. I do not believe that this is a positive thing for this campus. (Umass PD Clery Act statistics) The campus police began its increase in 2002 after a string of violent crimes. These crimes included three rapes and five armed robberies. (“In Our Opinion: Student Safety at Umass” Daily Hampshire Gazette) This increase in police force has contributed much more to increasing arrests for drugs and alsohol than decreasing cases of armed robbery and rape. Since the '60s and '70s UMass has been considered a “party school,” and the number of cops on campus has not quelled this stereotype. The label as a “party school,” may I add, has also not stopped this school from remaining academically one of the top state schools in the northeast. Drinking and drugs remains prominent. It does not appear that the increased number of arrests for alcohol has decreased student drinking, merely the number of students caught for it.

Instead this increase in arrests for alcohol and drugs has produced a growing sense of animosity between UMass students and the UMass police. More and more students are being arrested for something that they believe that they should not have been arrested for. This leads to a greater distrust of authority, and more of a desire to speak out. An impact of this increased animosity may have been the riots after the Umass Champtionship football game this previous fall. There are many published articles that show the frustration students were having with the police force in the fall preceding the riots. Though there were more noise complaints in September of 2005 than September of 2006, there were sixty-nine more arrests for excessive noise in September of 2006. (Grabbe, Daily Hampshire Gazette) Umass students were no more rowdy than they have been in the past, they were merely getting into more trouble.

The key force, this fall, driving a wedge between the officers of the UMass police force and the students of umass, was the newfound presence of cops in umass dorms. This presence of police is said by police to increase community policing, however, the head of the Student Cannibis reform coalition disagrees. He stated that “They want to create community policing where cops are friendly with students and staff, but they're creating the exact opposite, hey're creating a sense of paranoia among students. We should feel protected by the police, but it's impossible if they're continually arresting people. They're mostly going after...[people who]...don't present harm to the community when it's the big-time users they should focus on.” Cops patrolling dorm hallways in street clothes in undeniably legal, however, it may be creating more problems than solutions on this campus. (Boonjakuakul, Daily Hampshire Gazette)

This animosity was an underlying cause of the riots that occurred in December of 2006. For the past years, students were seeing cops more often at more places, and interfering in more places in their lives. The night after the championship football game was a perfect oppurtunity for disgruntled students to show their frustration with the excessive interference of the campus police. The “riot” was clearly far from an organized protest, but the causes of it must be considered before knowing how to move on positively. The reaction the police would take from the riots was presented merely weeks later. The night of the Super Bowl, security measures were beefed up considerably for no real reason besides the fact that it was a major sporting event. A safe haven for students was set aside at the Curry Hicks Cage, and no non-students were allowed in campus dorms. There were no arrests that night, though I am not inclined to believe the increase in security had anything to do with this, (Palpini II, Daily Hampshire Gazette) this increase in security was a waste in energy and resources, and the police would have been better served instead to interact with the students about their role on campus.

Instead of further increasing the security force after the riot, I believe questioning students as to the reasons for these riots could have happenned first before taking action. I propose an open question and answer for the students with you, sir. I believe students can learn greatly from what you believe your role is on campus, along with you learning from what the students believe would be more constructive tasks for the police force to be focusing on. Whether you take suggestions from students seriously or not, a greater understanding of each other's side from mine as well as yours is needed to quell the tension between students and the police. A desire by you to understand the students' point of view would do greatly to improve the police's image among the students, whether any policy is actually changed or not. While I, along with many other Umass students, would love to see some changes made in the role of police on campus, a mere meeting would be a fine start. The tension between the police and the students can be eased, and understanding is the key.

Bibliography Palpini, Kristin. “After precautions, campus peaceful after Super Bowl.” The Daily Hampshire Gazette, February 6th, 2007. Gave me information about the police's reaction to the riots due to their excessive security precautions on the night of the super bowl. Palpini, Kristin. “UMass Police: 'We're not Security.'” The Daily Hampshire Gazette January 22, 2007. Was important in emphasizing the duties of the police, and their frustrations with the state which may have led to the rise in arrests on campus. “In Our Opinion: Student Safety at UMass” The Daily Hampshire Gazette, December 13, 2006. Provided quote by Cannabis Reform Coalition leader, was important in helping me articulate the point of view of the student's point of view. Boonjakuakul, Nicole. “Students Challenge Dorm Patrols” The Daily Hampshire Gazette, December 11, 2006. Gave basic information on why and how the cops were patrolling the dorms, along with information on why the students were angry about it. Grabbe, Nick. “By the Numbers: More Noise, More Arrests this Fall.” The Daily Hampshire Gazette, September 30, 2006. Gave me statistice on Noise related arrests in september of 2006, which helped back my argument that more arrests were being made, even if behavior was not worse. The University Of Massachusetts Clery Act Statistics. 2005. http://www.umass.edu/umpd/statistics/2005%20stats.pdf This page of statistics gave my my statistics on large crimes like murder as well as the statistics on drug and alcohol related arrests. These statistics provided me with the foundation for my argument. “About UMPD.” Umass Amherst Police Department. 2005. http://www.umass.edu/umpd/About_UMPD/ Gave me a quote on the duties of the umass police officers, along with their job description, which made me more apt to argue why their present duties are going beyond or against their duties. “UMPD Law Enforcement Personell.” Umass Amherst Police Department. 2005. http://www.umass.edu/umpd/jeanneclerycampussafetyact/campuslawenforcementpersonnel/ Gave me more information on the jobs and duties of umass police officers.

[edit] sources for unit three

I would like to write a letter to the Umass Police department about their increase in numbers over the past few years. I would like to find statistics on things such as student deaths, and student felonies, or other serious crimes, and compare them from before the increase in police numbers, and after. Hopefully these numbers will support the fact that excessive use of police patrolling dorms, and the roads is not really making the campus that much of a safer place, and is instead creating an atmosphere where students have a growing dislike of all umass police and authority. This dislike of police among students ma have been what led to the riots this past fall more than anything else.

http://www.umass.edu/umpd/ all information I need on Umass Police of current day I can find here.

http://www.umass.edu/umpd/jeanneclerycampussafetyact/dailycrimelog/ Knowing current crimes will help me, since I can arrange them into ones that kids should've been arrested for, and maybe some that seem unfair.

http://umassmed.edu/publicsafety/gen_info/statistics.aspx I need statistics to prove that the excessive police force is not necessarily making the campus safer.

http://umassmed.edu/publicsafety/crimeprevention/index.aspx This is information on why the crim prevention is there, I need to be able to argue against some of this to make my paper effective.

http://www.umass.edu/umpd/Residence_Hall_Security/ Need to know general information on this so I can argue against it.

http://www.umass.edu/umpd/jeanneclerycampussafetyact/crimestatistics/ Statistics are essential. I still need to find statistics in past years at umass before police numbers went up as well.

[edit] The Color of Crime by Jonathan Fuller

The essay in the text-wrestling book that seems to be most related to my proposed topic for unit three is the student essay The Color of Crime by Jonathan Fuller. I wish to write a letter to the umass police regarding their excessive patrol of dorms, and increase of numbers in general in recent years. This article is not directly related to my topic, but also discusses problems with policemen, and them misusing their power, which are both issues that I wish to discuss in my essay. He also discusses the hassle a person must go through if he is arrested, even if he is innocent, which I also would like to touch on. The Color of Crime by Jonathan Fuller was an enlightening peace on racial profiling, and helped me get an idea of the way I wished to write my paper.

[edit] One Mountaintop, Multiple Peaks

The warm summer breeze was blowing across my face as I looked around at one of the most beautiful sights I had ever seen. Looking in one direction I saw pine green forests in a valley below me that turned into snow patches on bare rock on the peaks of the near but distant mountains. I turned around to see something that seemed to be from a fantasy world. I was looking at not one but three lakes whose water was a deep teardrop blue that seemed almost unreal. These lakes appeared to be stepping stairs as they were each adjacent to each other with one a little bit higher than the other. I had been tired from the long walk up this rocky mountain to get to where I was, but I now felt exhilerated. It was well worth the three hours of switchbacks through buggy forests to get to this point. I had been atop many different mountains throughout my childhood, but had never appreciated the beauty of the nature that stretched out below me like I did on that day. It was this setting that also led to a priceless moment of understanding in my own life. This moment which had seemed very powerful to me at that time I now see as not a peak of personal understanding, but merely another step along my own life, though perhaps a more prominent one. Most people seem to think of identity as a definitive thing inside you that makes you, you, and keeps you different from anyone else. I disagree with this as I believe personal identity is not a measurable thing but a process. My identity at that moment atop that mountaintop was not the same identity that I had climbing mountains at the age of thirteen, nor will be the same identity that I have when I climb mountains at the age of thirty. While I may have thought at the time that I had truly discovered who I was for the first time, I now know that your thoughts and feelings are in no way permanent. To me, your identity is how your memories of past experiences impact your decisions in the present. With each decision you make, your identity will alter slightly as you now have this experience to influence yourself in the future. Each decision you make and experience you have will have a different amount of impact on yourself. I believe that how unique the experience is is key in determining how much it will effect your mind for years to come. While anticipating the future can affect your thoughts and feelings, it is not till you have had a true experience of something until it can truly affect your identity. Anticipation is merely a guessing game, you cannot truly know how something will happen until it happens. Identity is a process, as your mind creates new memories through your experiences, your identity will continue to change. The top of the mountain on which I first pondered my own identity was in Glacier National Park, which I had been to with my family many times throughout my childhood. We had always hiked often whether it was on our trips west or in the white mountains of Vermont and New Hampshire. As I had grown from a young child to more of an adolescent these hikes had become more of annoyances than adventures. While on the top of a mountain seeing what very few people on the world are able to see I was, however, not thinking about that fact that few people had seen what I was looking at now. My mind instead strayed to what I could have been doing with my friends at that moment, or what pop culture I was missing out on while being isolated in the disconnected-from-real-society mountains. I had grown tired of spending so much time with my parents, and tired of all the activities that were their idea's of “fun.” At eighteen years old looking down across the lakes and forests from that specific mountain peak it seemed very easy to finally understand why my parents had taken me on so many hikes, however, it had taken my entire childhood to reach this point of comprehension. While gazing at the water flowing down the mountain I reflected upon not only the hiking, but all the aspects of my childhood. The more I thought about it, the more I realized that the things my parents had made me do that seemed weird and uncommon, thus, an annoyance, as a child, would be the things that I valued from my childhood more than anything. These unique experiences included tripe to Europe to live for six months, trips across the country, and also these hikes. These experiences were what shaped me as a person, and what made me unique. These experiences seemed to have much more of an impact on me than trips to the movies with my friends. My only memories of being four and five years old involve seeing a bald eagle up close in Montana, and skiing across a frozen lake in April in the arctic circle. Thoughts of the past, as they sometimes do, led to pondering what the future might hold. I was about to be entering college at the beginning of the next fall. I was reaching an understanding the positivite aspects of having a childhood with uncommon experiences as it happenned to be ending. After sitting on that peak analyzing my own past and future for quite some time, I was finally brought back to the present, and began to descend, The trail down from the peak of the mountain was alongside the three stepping-stair lakes that had seemed from a fantasy world looking at them from the summit. From up close they still appeared majestic. They had a deep blue color that made them seem clean enough to drink out of, and had beautiful waterfalls flowing from one to the other. As day faded to evening we got closer and closer to the end of our adventure for the day. By dusk my legs were sore, and I was dying of thirst, having run out of water much earlier, but we had finally reached the end of our expedition for the day. Appropriately, right next to the road was a huge, and amazing waterfall, which many less brave tourists were taking pictures of. While the waterfall was quite a sight to see, something about the rumbling of car engines in the background took away from it's mystique. I, however, was quite contented with sitting with a just-purchased bottle of water, and watching the water flow. My thoughts continued to race as fast as the water speeding down the waterfall towards the pool below. As an adolescent, I had promised myself that I would never force my own children to go on hikes with me, or control them any more than I absolutely had too. I could see now that this was probably not going to be the case. In today's times where understanding the beauty of nature, and land untouched by man is supremely undervalued, I believed that showing this beauty to my kids is the least I can do to help them. These hikes, like the one I just finished, no longer were a hassle of a day I had to spend with my parents. They were a portion of important memories which helped define my identity. When I entered college in the fall, while comparing childhoods with my new friends, I would often talk about my friends from home and the good times that we had. Surprisingly often, however, I would also figure out a way to work in my yearly trips across the country, and the various well known peaks I had climbed in my childhood, from Mt. Washington to the Grand Teton. As a teenager these aspects of my life I had considered embarassing, but now I was bragging about them. I had had quite a change in attitude on the activities my parents had at one day forced me into. Sure enough, my new college friends were quite impressed with these stories, and didn't laugh at me, which my thirteen year old self would have been afraid of. Experiences like these brought me to the reality that I was, in fact, maturing and growing up. This only confirmed my previous realization that my own identity was indeed a process. While I will always be conscience of myself, and my point of view, as time goes by I will always look at things in a slightly different way. Perhaps eighteen years old is a little late for this realization, but I wouldn't change the time and place of my own experience for anything, except maybe a million dollars. While sitting atop a mountain and coming to understand deeper meanings of life, my mind also strayed to some self-congratulatory thoughts. Being at such a secluded place, pondering life seemed to me at the time to be somewhat similar to where great intellectuals would be thinking about ways to prove the existence of god or something similar. While it was fun to entertain this thought at that moment basking in the summer sun, it is quite obvious that this moment really had almost nothing to do with me, and was mainly about the influence of others. Thinking about what my life really meant was well timed for my mind to finally put two and two together, but I only have my parents and the rest of my family for the beautiful location of this moment. It was this location that brought the realization of getting older much more powerful. At that time I had felt confident that I had truly gotten to know myself for the first time, and that I would always be able to make fair decisions for myself in the future. A bit idealistic on my part. Since then I have made many decisions I went on to regret, and often times wondered how I could do things that in heinsight seemed very stupid. This is what leads to my belief that your identity is a process that is directly related to your experiences and decisions. If I were to walk up that mountain tomorrow and gaze down upon the world, I might laugh at myself for thinking what I had the last time I was up there. However, I will never forget, or regret the thoughts that I had had at that time. With one stage of my life ending and an unknown stage yet to begin, it was easier for me to put my entire life in perspective, and understand it. After I graduate from college, I may feel a similar understanding to the one I did then. The point I now know, however, is that it will be a similar understanding, and not the same understanding. Your identity is the process of knowing yourself. While on that day on that mountain, and some time in the future I may think I know myself completely, there will be times when I feel I don't know myself at all. I am satisfied with this, because the knowledge that another point of true comprehension and satisfaction, or another point of confusion and loss is coming keeps life exciting. If you knew what you would do in every situation before it happenned, life wouldn't be very much fun, would it?

[edit] Unit 1 Reflection Letter

When I first began this course I was unsure as to how it would be any different from the english and writing classes I had had in high school. The assignments seemed a little bit more complex, but nothing that I couldn't handle. Throughout high school I had always struggled with structured papers like analyzations of books, more than creative and unstructured pieces, anyways. However, upon receiving back my first paper, I realized there was more expected of me in a college class than in a high school one. While I had always breezed through papers in high school without much effort, I learned that this class would be different. I would have to focus much more on the intricacies of my papers than the bigger picture, which was what I had been used to. This first paper taught me that while may writing may have a good start, there is plenty of room for improvement, which I believe I will be able to do. I've always enjoyed creative writing a lot. I really enjoyed writing this first piece because it allowed me to use my thinking and my own structure, which I enjoy much more than having a laid out structure, or having a piece to analyze. My main problem with writing in the past had been a very colloquial vocabulary. When I am writing for fun, I always employ a very personable, informal, style, which at times I have a very hard time getting out of. Like, seriously, I tottally do, not even kidding. Word. In this paper I did think I overcame that barrier and turned in a very good paper. What I learned about writing on a college level the most in this paper was that merely setting up an argument and providing points is not enough to write an excellent paper. You need also to support your arguments clearly, and make sure your paper has a good flow to it, and is easy to understand. I did think that I had the flow down, but I do need work on making sure my arguments are clear and concise, and that perhaps my transitions aren't quite as good as I think they are. A poem I wrote my senior year would've won the poetry slam of my high school, had it not taken too long for me to perform on stage at the slam. This is what turned me from an uneasy writer to a perhaps over-confident writer. I had always gotten good grades in English classes without trying very hard, but had never actually thought about how good, or not good, my writing was. No english class in high school challenged me, and I wasn't very interested in challenging myself. When I wrote that poem, however, it transformed me into not someone who turned in a paper without contemplating what grade I was going to receive, but someone who expected to get an A on everything I turned in, whether I put any effort into it or not. This expectation had, surprisingly, been reached throughout not only the remainder of high school, but also through the three papers I wrote the first semester of college. It was this paper on Identity in which I received an A that made me question for the first time, ever, what I could do to improve my writing, and what I had been doing wrong. It served as not only a challenge to be faced, but also a reality-check. I had decided that I was a really good writer on a whim with no real base behind it, and I had relied on my ability to make things sound official, more than substance, on defending my ideas. This is why I think I have an equal amount of creative genius as Shakespeare. While I had never thought about it before, it makes sense that a class that focused only on writing would have higher expectations than others in your writing material. While I had previously figured I could write on the college level due to the papers I had written in the previous semester, I realized that if I wanted to make a career out of writing, which I might, I still had work to do. I may not be at the college level of writing yet, but I believe that I'm improving, slowly and surely. I'm sure that this class will help me a lot in future papers that I write in college or graduate school. Hopefully for creative writing also, which is what I would do if I were to write for a living, though I am unsure if that has helped me along at all yet. Through this first unit I changed from a writer who thought he had peaked already in writing ability, to knowing that there was still a portion of the mountain to climb. I also probably need to work on my use of metaphors.

[edit] Identity According to Appetite

In the article If you are what you eat, then what am I? by Geeta Kothari, the author explores her own issues of personal identity which is a result of her lack of relation with the culture she lives in in America, and also the culture of her parents from India. The author could have probably used many different aspects of any culture to write about her struggle, but the thing she chooses to focus on is the eating habits of the two cultures, and how she falls somewhere in between. In her childhood she is unable to eat many “American” foods such as hot dogs, because as an Indian she finds it disgusting, but she is also unable to find identity in Indian food. As a child merely trying to fit in with her schoolmates, she wishes that she could just eat normal American food, and blames her parents for this. She states that “Although she had never been able to tolerate the smell of fish, my mother buys tuna, hoping to satisfy my longing for American food. Indians, of course, do not eat such things.” This is Kothari's introduction to her struggle with identity through the food she eats. Though she is frustrated with her mother as a child, her relationship and feelings towards her mother changes and becomes more complicated throughout her life, and this becomes the most important part of her life to help define her identity. Throughout this article the author sets up her point and article through well-described experiences of her own life. She is able to tie in specific events with shifts in her own identity, or lack of one, quite efficiently. Her hook to the audience to get them to relate to her own struggle is her constant use of food as a metaphor. This is a simple strategy, but put into affect very well, since everybody on the Earth eats. Everyone has not, however, considered how what they eat relates to their identity, but it is easy to relate too. The use of such a basic thing as food for protraying her struggles with identity gets the audience into the story, because it protrays her struggles very well. The reader begins to think that if she cannot even eat without considering who she is, and struggling with it, she must indeed be having quite a stressful search for identity. Her own personal struggle is between her Indian heritage, her parents immigrated directly from India, and the life she has in America. This may seem very uninteresting for many American readers, but the food metaphor is what keeps the readers interested, and what related the author to her audience. From the first sentence to the last, the presence of food is apparent as a use of pathos by Geeta Kothari. From “The first time my mother and I open a can of tuna, I am nine years old.” to “I want to believe that recipes never change.” This is an effective use of pathos since all readers can relate to eating food, and most know what it is like to crinkle their nose at foreign food. For American readers, they are sure to empathize with her struggle to find an identity as an American, for how can she be American if she is unable to eat a hotdog? From her fear of not being accepted by her childhood friends because of the food she eats, to her fear that her husband will leave her for a “meat-eater,” she is using food as her rhetorical strategy of pathos. To prove that she is, in fact, having this struggle with defining herself as either an American or and Indian, or both, she provides life experiences as examples to prove both sides of her identity. Her ethos is her descriptions of the experiences she has had throughout her entire life, either with British schoolmates, or her family in India. Since she breaks up the article into many different sections of a few paragraphs, it is easier for her to switch off between experiences she had with her Indian parents and family, and her American friends and husband. A description of life in India, “We drink boiled water only, no ice. No sweets except for jalebi, thin fried twists of dough in dripping hot sugar syrup.” is followed directly by “In New York, at the first Indian restaurant in our neighborhood, my father orders with confidence, and my sister and I play with the silverware until the steaming plates of lamb briyani arrive.” With her format of many small sections, she is able to put her experiences of Indian and American life right next to each other. This effectively proves her inner conflict within herself between the two cultures. The information she has to put into the article that the reader may not know about is mainly her Indian culture, since it seems that she is writing to a primarily American audience. She provides us with vocabulary of the Indian language, along with the eating habits of Indians. Basic information about her family and house in America is also present to help paint the portrait of the life she is living, but the category with the most informational value is when she writes about the culture of India. Many readers could have guessed the layout of her middle class apartment in the city may have looked like, but not many could tell you that the Indian word for hot is “garam.” She cleverly works in Indian culture in relation to American culture in this passage, to keep the reader interested. “I am in my twenties, moving to a city far away from my parents, before it occurs to me that jeera, the spice my sister aviods, must have an English name. I have to learn that haldi=turmeric, methi=fenugreek.” The most interesting issue of this paper within the constant metaphor of food to culture to identity, however, is the relationship she describes with her mother and father throughout the article. Though she is constantly comparing her identity to the food she is able or unable to eat, her mother is always there in the background. Just as with almost anyone else on this world, the people you know and love are more important than the types of food you eat. Though the title of the piece is If you are what you eat, then what am I?, her feelings about her parents are what truly defines her identity throughout the paper. In the beginning when she is describing the “normal” American food her mother is unwilling or unable to make, she is frustrated and annoyed with her mother. These are the feelings that every child experiences of wanting to fit in with the rest of their schoolmates and friends. The lack of American food is what is keeping her from fitting in, and she is upset by this. When she is in India she is also unable to fit in with her cousins, because she is unable to stomach true Indian food, which also upsets her. While her mother is trying to comfort her, she describes her mother's lack of understanding of her struggle. “I cry over the frustration of being singled out, not from the pain my mother assumes I'm feeling as she holds my hair back from my face.” As she grows older, however, Kothari comes to see that her mother does not need to understand her, Kothari needs to understand her relationship with her mother. As she grows up she no longer wants to fit in with the crowd, but preserve her Indian heritage. She worries that since she is unable to cook Indian food exactly like her mother used to, she will be unable to keep her memories of her childhood, and her identity as an Indian. As she is attempting to begin cooking Indian food, her mother has shifted to cooking more and more non-Indian food, including pasta , and serving brie cheese. She at first worries about her lack of Indain-ness, but as she talks more and more to her mother about her childhood, and her future, she comes to the conclusion that while she is neither Indian or American, she is indeed her mother's daughter. While she may never be able to cook the same Indian recipe's that her mother did, and may be able to eat meat on occasion, her most important traits will be the ones that were passed down to her by her parents. “I am my parents' daughter. Like them, I expect knowledge to pass from me to my husband without one word of explanation or translation. I want him to know what I know, see what I see, without having to tell him exactly what it is. I want to believe that recipes never change.” While Kothari does make one last relation to food in the last sentence, it is no longer the focus or the point of the paragraph. The food she ate and how it related to her culture may have been what she thought was important in her youth, but her relationship with her family was always what was most important in making her the woman she is today. While she probably only believed that what she ate was really important as a child, she continued to discuss food as a metaphor for her identity throughout the later portions of her paper as well. While this provides a good tool for keeping the reader interested and able to relate to her struggles, it had become merely the surface of what she was truly dealing with in her life at that point. The last five short sections of the article deal with her relationship with her parents, primarily her mother, almost as much as it does with food. First she is worried she will be unable to replicate her mother's indian recipes. Once she sees her mother making more and more non-Indian meals, however, she comes to the conclusion that being Indian or not may not be the key issue of her own personal identity. In the last section she is reflecting upon her life, and her mother. After thinking about how her mother saw American life, and how she had already affected her in a huge way, even if she could not copy her recipes. Her final conclusion is that she is indeed her parents' daughter, and nothing else. While her parents weren't always the prominent subject of the article, they were always the key to her discovering her identity.