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Jaelee Edmond
Megan Keaton
ENC2135 007
13 July 2015
Building Blocks of My Genre Ecology
Do you remember the first Lego set you ever received from your mom? A box of colorful
blocks, sturdy, a little misshaped, but you knew they held potential, freedom to create an object
of total personalization. Days of building, piece by piece you and your friends assemble what
started as a box of meaningless blocks but now transformed into an effective solid object. Like
ach Lego, each genre in the genre ecology of my writing composition. While creating a project,
theres a process of complete innovation, as well as utilizing resources to differentiate interactive
genres composing a genre ecology. With that in mind conventions like mediums and the five
modes play a significant role in rhetorical situations while indirectly affecting the genres in my
piece.
Ultimately, in literature, genres assist the composing process in order to formulate a
project in its entirety. Each genre must have a primary contingency with three factors; audience,
purpose, and context. As well as each situational feature decentralizing the text as a whole
creating a fluent genre ecology. In fact, its actually personal perspective that makes a situational
outcome prevalent. Like Amy Devitt said it is genre that determines situation as well as
situation that determines genre (qtd. in Devitt 579). That statement is also proven when yet
another literary authority Deborah Dean states, The connections between what writers do to

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create texts and the success of those texts in accomplishing their purposes in specific situations
show the value of the choices made during the writing process. (qtd. in Dean 4).
First and foremost, my arrangement was a Hydrologic water cycle power point
presentation for a previous Advanced Placement Environmental Science course (APES). I used
several genres that contributed a large sum into myself as a composer and the writing process I
chose. While Genres construct and respond to situation; they are actions (qtd by Devitt 7)
genres and resources make up the compositions ecology. Throughout my journey creating my
APES Hydrologic group power point I kept in mind the audience I was appealing to. It was a
power point presentation one of which I had to teach the class, as well as my professor Mr.
Coats. He was a stickler for professionalism, so in an academic environment I chose to make my
project formal and informative.
Before this essay assignment I had a misconceived notion of what a true genre was. All
this time Ive been a master composer, a literary genius on the subject and never knew it. In
simplistic terminology a genre helps build a piece, it is what you would call a collective
interaction between sources. No wonder why teachers always use to tell you to utilize your
resources; whether it be an article, source, document, annotation, or communication. For starters,
I had to use some type of web formatting to best suit my project style. So since my teacher was a
traditional scientist I used Microsoft PowerPoint to make my hydrologic cycle layout, with a
little help from a resourceful laptop. While my laptop not only functioned as the tool to create
my piece, it also located a plethora of informative and useful documentation that helped further
in my research. The internet is an amazing source of knowledge, thanks to technological
advancements I was able to use Google as a search engine, a Dictionary for vocabulary

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clarification, and a Thesaurus at the click of a mouse. All while formatting my PowerPoint, you
can see how complex and interrelated these resources may become viable.
Now a days, our primary resource is technology while the secondary source becomes our
written information, like notes and a polished hard copy. Take the class textbook I used for my
power point presentation, Living in the Environment: Principles, Connections, and Solutions,
16th Edition, for example, almost all data I found online was in the textbook, except for few very
particular details explained in my notes. These genres help to better validate the information I
was able to find in my research. As well as pulling direct material provided by my professor Mr.
Coats. This helps to better communicate and relay the information not only as a student but when
giving a power point presentation I was very much a teacher too, knowing that all my fellow
peers have heard it in previous class studies and lectures. Stability within the material given by
my professor and myself helped the class better understand the subject I used for my project.
While keeping resourceful text, documents, and authors in mind on the topic of
Hydrologic and its water cycle, I also had to meet up with my fellow classmates to confer
research, since it was in fact a group assignment. That being said I utilized a set of more
communicative genres, for example my cell phone and email, using these resources I was able to
send copies of our information and converse on the subject. We talked through how we would
combine material and make the project as fluent and understanding as possible. The genres I
used helped make the project more applicable when discussing how to finalize the design of our
power point. A huge part of the composing process is building upon differentiating sources,
while keeping a steady decentralized theme.
With the complexity of my composing process I also used a few genres that helped keep
my focus and attention. I listened to my favorite band Needtobreathe while doing endless

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research (as I am right now), in hopes that a little spark of inspiration will come from the lyrics.
Its an effective tactic for a restless student such as I, and it adds a little personality to my
writing. A genre such as music isnt of primary, or even secondary importance but it does entitle
a positive indirect effect on the piece.
When creating any literary work of art, I must ask myself what I want my final objective
to be. For example with my PowerPoint I had been presented a motive to give a formal lesson on
the Hydrologic water cycle, and ultimately, when you break it down it takes a lot more than just
one idea or source to compose a master piece. It takes time and dedication with research from
sources that are all so different, but work harmonically towards the final objective. That right
there is the beauty in any composition and the divine process it takes to get there. As any morally
intellectual composer might say, its not just the complete piece thats the important part here but
rather the knowledge you have obtained while creating it. In the composition process of my
hydrologic power point, the inclusive characteristics the genres obtain from the technological
primary sources I used from the internet source, email, texting. To the secondary form of paper
resources like textbooks, and notes. Even down to the personal aspects of music that keeps me
going as a composer all so symphonically work together. Without all these genres working in a
genre ecology of my composition the power point simply wouldnt have been a success. Like
Devitt says, Genre entails purposes, participants, and themes, so understanding genre entails
understanding a rhetorical and semiotic situation and a social context (qtd. Devitt 4). Genres
hold the piece together, keep stability, contingency, and fluency in my writing. The basic
building blocks of any composition must include those pieces or else youre looking words with
no meaning.

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That word, meaning, strikes an emphasized culmination. Throughout the entirety of this
paper Ive been constructing myself as a meaningful composer. Looking at the composition as a
whole you can prominently tell the categorization I highlight through genres. But isnt that what
they are, genres are only separated by small differentiating conventions that curve slightly on its
definite purpose. As a writer I view myself and clearly represented through my genre ecology
outline take a careful devout process when writing any literary composition. I take personal pride
in my work and organization is an expectation. When looking at the rubric I make a checklist to
exemplify having finished all necessary objectives. But the real catch is the ultimate lesson I as a
writer have learned while composing. That all knowledge will never be completely prevalent,
that ignorance is not bliss and education is the greatest gift. If it werent for this assignment I
would still have thought the genres exemplified categorizations between a horror, romance, and
action piece of literacy.
All in all, a genre is a division of complex interrelated sources that help to take an idea
and produce a masterpiece of genre ecology. Like in my Hydrologic PowerPoint, given little to
no prior knowledge I was able to use my genres effectively to teach an entire class. So the next
time you as a writer attempt to take a dive into the literary pool, remember those little Lego
blocks your mom gave you, take it piece by piece, and build your own kind of creation.

Word Count: 1539

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Works Cited
Dean, Deborah. Genre Theory: Teaching, Writing and Being. Illinois: NCTE, 2008. Print.
Devitt, Amy. Generalizing About Genre: New Conceptions of an Old Concept. Print. CCC
44.4 (Dec. 1939): 576