Mullen 1

Conner Mullen

Professor Gregory McClure

Writing 39B

22 March 2017

Writing 39B: A Final Reflection

While in Writing 39B, there is objectives that seem typical and even simple at first

glance, but it is rather the complete opposite when actually writing. With a genre so enticing, it

seemed even easier, especially when the first and major text throughout the first five weeks was

the foundation for my favorite movie, I Am Legend. Without practice in actual rhetoric, I quickly

realized I was not answering the courses objectives and had to adjust if I wanted to succeed in

the class. The most common mistake in my experience throughout Writing 39B was determining

that it is not what is written in the plot, rather why is it written, and what message is it trying to

convey in alignment with the rest of the text. Furthermore, it involved direct word-by-word

analysis, a depth I never saw plausible. Another key idea of this class was the initial drafting. The

process to complete the first two pages as the rough draft illustrated already the level our draft

was and what needed to be revised. I learned it is common what is written in the first two pages

will usually consist of how you are writing and what common errors can easily improve the

essay throughout. It was difficult to have a strong rough draft in the early weeks, such as the RA,

due to only just recently learning real rhetorical analysis. For the actual revision, we were given

exact areas to revise and to care for those mistakes when finishing the writing. Peers would

review those short drafts and determine exact areas to revise as well as compliments for already

decent parts. The professors highlighted areas of the draft and comments were most essential in

revision due to professional recommendation being mandatory in order to improve the quality of
 Mullen 2

the text. Finally, the transfer out of this class that would be most probable to my later writing

courses and eventual career in computer science would be expectation, specifically audience and

genre. To know the audience and predict their expectations is essential to providing solid

information that they would appreciate and possibly be persuaded by. Similarly, when building a

user interface, it will be essential to know what the audience expects and the simplicity they

desire to easily navigate within it. Genre is simply a list of expectations that differentiate it from

another genre. These expectations could be the technique of how it is written, the portrayal of

information, and even the information that is contained within. By utilizing these when knowing

what genre to write about, you can have a set of guidelines to follow. Overall, I learned many

helpful suggestions when writing an effective text, recording a film, or presenting valuable

information to others from Writing 39B.

My overall view of the class is generally positive, and it sparked an interest for me to

write about horror. It really is intriguing to continuously write about horror, and how the

audiences expectations are constantly subverted to help build the genres purpose, fear. Due to

writing not being necessarily one of my personal favorites, my own expectation was subverted

when I realized it actually is a purposeful and interesting course. I was excited that my required

reading would be I Am Legend, and I figured the reading would be identical to the film, but they

were not. The plots were different and I found the reading to be better written as we notice the

self-conflicts that Robert Neville constantly has, whereas the movie does not tend to this subject.

In addition, writing about these self-conflicts as it pertained to the author, Richard Matheson,

allowed our professor to demonstrate the connection to his current lifetime within the Cold War,

and justify the purpose it has in the text. This is further explained in Vampire Apocalypse by

Mathias Clasen, where he explicitly explains Mathesons life in relation to the book. The level as
 Mullen 3

to what I Am Legend reaches is superb and without help, I would have never realized the actual

purpose of the novel. Through this help, it became easier to discuss the purpose of the text rather

than just explain a plots reasoning. This is one of the crucial steps of developing my writing

skills to a more proficient level and breaking the current form of writing that I have learned

previously, where we discuss the plot chronologically. An example from before would be when I

had the rough draft of my RA, where I completely explained the plot without textual analysis,

and my corrections all had to do with discussing the text, not plot. The final draft was clearly a

major improvement, as I quoted specific lines and explained the emotion, specific word use, and

other analytical devices. Another improvement in my writing from the overall experience of the

class was topic sentence structuring. This is major as we learned that everything discussed within

the paragraph has to be represented in the topic sentence. Essentially, this became a tool for

deciding whether or not to split a paragraph into multiple, as I now can see if I introduce another

idea outside the topic sentence. In the Reznor / Cash Responses, it was evident I did not even

structure my topic sentence correctly as my peer reviewer easily caught on. In the revision

process, I took my reviewers advice and made the topic sentences accurately represent the

paragraph; this was major help towards developing my topic sentences for the RA. In general,

each individual assignment was done in order to learn the correct process of writing before the

RA, where we were assessed on our topic sentences and even had reviews of the topic sentences

alone by peers.

Initial drafting was probably the most difficult without learning complete correctness and

worrying about how incorrect it may be. As mentioned before, we were introduced to idea of a

rough draft just being the first two pages, rather than completing the entire essay and making

small revisions. Rather than rushing through a six page essay, the professor and peer reviewers
 Mullen 4

could spend valuable time to slowly analyze our writing style based on our first two pages, as our

style is usually consistent throughout the essay. There were many errors in the drafts of my

assignments, with majority being the RA. It was clear that I had not known the proper form of a

rhetorical analysis essay. For the original draft, my thought process involved looking at the plot

and figuring why the author, Matheson, chose to write the plot that way. For example, I

consistently described the vampires as Mathesons symbolic reference to fear, but did not include

a quote from the text to portray his fear represented through the character Robert Neville. This is

an incorrect form of rhetorical analysis, to which I was unaware at the time. After week five, my

drafting improved. The RIP rough draft considerably demonstrated my proficiency in topic

sentence writing, rhetorical analysis, and other aspects. The topic sentences smoothly fit together

as one paragraph and I focused more on exact quotes from the script and describing camera

angles, a level that my earlier drafts were not meeting. This is due partly to an important method

that Writing 39B taught me, which constantly asking why? This broke the barrier to just

explaining the plot, as I questioned why the plot is organized that way. Also, I would question the

length of my topic sentences and whether or not I should be splitting them up. In summation, the

initial drafting was rather poor near the beginning of Writing 39B, but towards the end, I could

focus more on specific errors rather than my essay not containing actual analysis.

Revision was definitely the centerpoint of most learning. Through repeated exposure of

your own mistakes, you will eventually develop the right skillset. Early revisions such as the

Reznor / Cash Response Revisions assignment showed the ability to reform our topic sentences

and what to include in the body paragraphs. Although there were many revision assignments, the

RA is the most crucial learning step for most in Writing 39B, including myself. Through multiple

peer reviews and a review from the professor, they were able to discuss what needed correction.
 Mullen 5

When I received my rough draft back, it was completely full of missing analysis comments.

Through this I learned going a step deeper and answering the why of every plot point I described,

which helped pick specific points from the text and analyze those. Each word in the quote, the

quote as a whole, the punctuation, and repetition of words are a few examples of what I thought

to consider when describing these quotes. For the purpose of our RIP project, the video was

constantly revised as the script changed, we recorded scenes multiple times, and cut parts that

were unnecessary. This was done in looking at the video from the audiences perspective and

what they might expect from the scene, only to revert for the purpose of the genre. In essence,

the sole purpose of revision is to increase the quality of the essay, but also to learn the correct

form and focus on more detailed problems such as the phrasing of a sentence.

As a result from this class, I can transfer the importance of expectation in writing. This

includes the audience expectations as well as the genre expectation. Audience is one of the most

important factors in determining the structure of your essay. The objective is to build your

credibility to them and meet their expectations. Through sourcing your essays as done in the RA

and RIP, or just simply acknowledging what your audience might be can be major pieces in

determining how to write. For our essays, a scholarly audience is intended and not much beyond

that, so we are limited to professionalism and education. As seen in the essays, they neither

contain improper grammar nor unprofessional wording. It is transparently known that audience

expectation can drive most objectives we have later in careers, for example computer science.

For the business half, it is majorly consumed by what visitors of the website need and how easily

accessible. As in the website for this portfolio, it is designed to be easily navigable for any

audience seeking Writing 39Bs objectives and how well they are met. Genre has expectations of

its own that have to be fulfilled, as for example horror. Throughout the RA, I discussed the
 Mullen 6

importance of art-horror by Nol Carroll. Therefore, I was able to validate that Robert Neville

was the true monster of the novel and continue with the rest of the RA.

In conclusion, the fundamentals of Writing 39B are met through each assignment and

tested and revised at major assignments, such as the RA and RIP. Through these two processes, I

have learned the process of initial drafting and revision, along with what to transfer outside of

this class and further beyond. The evidence of progress is clearly defined from the first

assignment until the last, as each continuously built upon the other. Through outside sources as

credibility, audience and genre expectation, clear rhetorical analysis, and topic sentence

structuring I am able to confidently write structurally advanced essays. As a result, I can keep

those in mind as I go into my next writing class and eventually computer science.
 Mullen 7

Works Cited

Carroll, Nol. The Nature of Horror, The American Society for Aesthetics, Vol. 46, No. 1, 1987,

http://www.jstor.org/stable/431308. Accessed 17 February 2017.

Clasen, Mathias. Vampire Apocalypse: A Biocultural Critique of Richard Matheson's I Am

Legend. Philosophy and Literature, The Johns Hopkins University Press, Oct. 2010,

https://canvas.eee.uci.edu/courses/4245/files/1262040/download?wrap=1. Accessed 15

February 2017.

Matheson, Richard. I Am Legend. Gold Medal Books, 1954,

http://www.juliojeha.pro.br/course43amg_pg/I-Am-Legend.pdf. Accessed 14 February

2017.