First thoughts - Peer reviewing

I am peer reviewing a colleague's draft of Project 3, and my first reaction is that as a reader, it is pretty clear that the author feels two ways about this place, and why.  The paragraph opens up with a metaphor, and then goes on to describing the negative feelings the author has about this place.  But the last line explains that is precisely because of these "negative" aspects that she loves this place so much.  Maybe I am biased because I share her position, but I think that this paradox really delivers the message she wants to convey.

First thoughts

I've been thinking about my own draft for Project 3, and I have to tell you that it is not finished.  I did not write a conclusion for it, nor did I revise it thoroughly.  Though it was hard to get started, once I remembered why I chose Pompeii as the place I wanted to write about, the ideas started flowing with more ease.  I don't know if that situation translated on to the paper because I was working up until very late on it, but I hope that I managed to at least convey some of the emotions or feelings I had in my head while writing this paper.

A sentence starts out like...

A sentence starts out like an onstage performance. Before the curtain even lifts, before the spotlight hits the stage, there has been an incredible amount of planning behind it.  After deciding on the piece to be performed, the producers or makers need to start the casting process. In the case of a sentence, once a topic has been chosen, we need to pick which ideas we will select to support it.  But it is only after months and months of rehearsals, or many rewrites later, that the play (or sentence) is ready to finally be presented to an audience.

If these walls could talk...

The message Wesch is trying to send with this powerful video is that technology cannot really help us solve the universal problems that we, as a society, as college students, as human beings, are facing.  To do so, he chooses to set the video in a classroom. I think this is an interesting rhetorical move, since the disposition of the classroom we saw responds to the conventions of the early academic environments: a big, seminar-life distribution, when all the students seat at the same level to be able to see the professor, situated at the front, the only real source of knowledge.  Students were supposed to just be passive listeners, since all the information came from the professor's podium.

He does this for two main reasons.  First, it is a way to maintain a link to the past and older technology.  Second, by having his students, part of the audience, give the viewers the information he plays on the former conception of the student-professor relationship, making the message, a critique to the educational system,  even stronger.

A magazine is an iPad that doesn't work

The video found here shows us an infant apparently frustrated with the magazines she finds.  Although her frustration might be real, this toddler's reaction works as a device to convey the message the maker of the video wants to express, which is the relevance of Steve Jobbs and his work.  Even though we only see this message displayed at the end of the video, the baby's reactions are a powerful image that can reach the viewers better than, for example, simple text could.

What is your relationship with your reader?

Our relationship is a very complicated one at times. It's like being in a marriage, and every once in a while, one has to compromise their own will and desires to please the other one to just try and maintain a peaceful environment.  I normally produce text to be read on an electronic platform, so before I push the publish or post button, I think twice.  Is this a topic that will interest my reader? What if it's something that will not agree with his or her convictions? Will they still continue to read the text I produce if they don't see their believes reflected on my text? Sometimes, posts that may be somewhat controversial never see the light, and stay eternally in my draft folder.  But sometimes, I just feel like I need to communicate a certain message, without really considering whether my potencial readers agree with it or not.  If our 'marriage' can't get over these issues, then we weren't in a healthy relationship to begin with.

Pompeii may be like...

Pompeii may be like a silent witness. The city itself has not changed much since the eruption in 79 A.D., but it was forced to be quiet for so long, buried under a thick layer of magma and ashes.  The buildings were kept quiet for centuries under dirt and waste, but now they are eager to tell everyone their story. And what a story they are willing to share!