Simple is best.

Based on facts and data.

composers of infographics need to conduct research and present correct information.

Composers of infographics know that their readers want information in a concise, easy-to read format.

Infographics, like charts, are visual representations of information.

hat makes this particular position and organization appealing to me?

How can I establish myself as reliable and responsible?

I need to remember that the main purpose of my cover letter is to persuade the reader to schedule an interview with me.

RELATED EXPERIENCE

ACCOMPLISHMENTS

Adobe Creative Suite 5 and 6 (Dreamweaver, Photoshop, InDesign, and Bridge) * Working knowledge of HTML * Practiced photographer (Nikon D5100, EOS Rebel) and published video editor (Final Cut Pro X, iMovie °11)

* London—literature, film, political science and theater (Fall 2011) * Athens—art history, Greek language and literature (Summer 2010) * Caen—contemporary and conversational French (Winter 2010)

Use standard spacing and plenty of white space.

Elizabeth received a cover letter and resume from someone who wanted to work in the writing center she directs on campus. One sentence in the cover letter read, “I kept my death clean.” The word death was probably a simple typo, but Elizabeth could not bring herself to schedule an interview with the writer.

exceeded sales goals by 15 percent at the Limited”) than by generalizations (“I am a good salesperson”). Resumes should be precise.

“A degree was eamed in history from XYZ University” could be written in the active voice this way: eamed a degree in history from XYZ University.”

Request an interview,

ake connections between the cover letter and resume and between different personal experiences. In their cover letters, applicants refer to the specific experiences listed in their resumes. They draw connections between those experiences and the qualifications that the employer has noted in the job listing.

Organize content so it’s persuasive and reader friendly.

When you are interested in a job, do you research it before applying for it?

Explain why the job and organization are appealing.

Refer specifically to the position they're applying to.

Writers need to establish ethos by conveying their ethics and professionalism, noting related past successes, experiences, and aptitudes that qualify them for the job, and showing that they're genuinely interested in working for the organization, perhaps by mentioning something specific about it that they especially like. Writers also need to appeal to readers’ sense of logos by making logical connections between their resume and the organization’s values and the requirements of the position.

Resumes. When composing a resume, writers need to keep the same factors in mind as when they write a cover letter (see above). Their readers are busy and want a quick and clear case for how fit the applicant is for the position.

Get to the point. Writers should keep in mind that their potential employers usually read cover letters in addition to their usual workload. That means readers are moving fast; they want to get an immediate sense of whether the applicant may be a good fit.

Communicate a strong work ethic. Readers want to know: Will this person do his or her share of the work?

Convey personality. Readers want to get a sense of the person they may work with. They'll want to know: Will he or she be interesting as a colleague?

Cover letters, Writers need to take into account several potential readers: the person who will supervise the new hire, a human resources employee, and members of a screening committee made up of supervisors and employees at the hiring organization. Successful cover letters:

Purpose

his letter is not only another tool for being persuasive — it’s a great opportunity to ask any questions you wish you'd asked when you were face-to-face with your interviewer.

A good practice is to limit your resume to one page until you have at least ten years of experience in the field in which you're applying for a job.

When you're applying for a job, always send your resume — the document that outlines your skills, education, and experience — with a cover letter tailored to the job you're interested in.

your main goal is to persuade readers to invite you in for an interview.

Framing.

Pacing.

Emotional content.

Appoint of view.

Acentral, dramatic question.

Pathos is also cental in a digital story, since ros digital stories have an emotional layer to help the audience connect with the experience.

Audience Digital storytellers offen compose fora wide audience, However, some might imagine that ‘their audience will be someone who has shared a similar experience.

Purpose

n the 1990s, digital stories began to be integrated into academia.

These finished stories are often shared on the Intemet, hosted on such sites as YouTube or Vimeo, or published on digital storytelling sites such as StoryCenter.

They usually include a combination of digital images, recorded narration, video clips text, and/or music.

Digital stories are short narratives composed with digital tools.

What tone will I take in my writing? Will my literacy narrative be serious or funny? Academic or down-to-earth? What kind of language will I use? How much detail will I include?

I'm writing about my own life: How will I keep my writing true and accurate? How much will I disclose about myself (and others) in my literacy memoir? Will I write in the first person? What anecdotes will I use to tell the story of myself as a reader or writer, and why? Also, what literary elements might I use?

Rhetorical appeals.

Purpose.

Writers of literacy narratives use direct language and real details from their lives to establish credibility (ethos). They also make logical connections (logos) between their narratives and the larger issues of literacy; often these authors write to emphasize and argue about the importance of literacy which makes the use of logos especially important,

Instructors assign this genre to help students understand what influences their speaking, reading, and writing.

People write literacy narratives because their formative experiences with reading and writing are important to them; they want to share their stories with others, especially if their literacy histories involve obstacles or challenges. Some may also want to make an argument about the importance of literacy

The writers of literacy narratives tell a story specifically about how they leamed to read and/or write

Like memoirists, when the writers of literacy narratives tell their own stories, they relate events and also analyze how these events have shaped their identities.

RHETORICAL SITUATION & CHOICES 0 Purpose. What is my central evaluative claim I want to make? What is it that I want to understand about the piece I'm analyzing? Ci Audience. What do I hope my audience leams from this piece? Have I described the piece enough for an audience that is unfamiliar with what I'm analyzing? Oi Rhetorical appeals. Have I established my ethos so that my reader trusts my judgments? Have I used terminology that shows I'm familiar with the genre I'm analyzing? Is my logos evident? Have I used enough evidence to build my case? 1 Modes & media. Is text the only way to present my analysis? How would it be strengthened by including any audio? Visuals? Are there advantages to presenting this digitally? Print? GENRE CONVENTIONS 1 Elements of the genre. Have I properly introduced the work being analyzed? Have I provided a brief summary? Have I examined the writer/composer’s central claim? Have I presented my own clear evaluative claim? D Style. Does my title indicate the position I'm taking? Am I using language throughout that indicates how I feel about the work I'm evaluating? 1 Design. Have I formatted this to meet the assignment? Have I used proper essay structure? Do I have a clear introductory and concluding paragraph? 0 Sources. Have | included enough evidence from the work to support my claims? Have I properly cited my information? Have I included a Works Cited page for any of the sources used?

RHETORICAL SITUATION & CHOICES 1, Purpose. What stance does Yoshida take regarding the advertisement? Is his claim evaluative? Why or why not? 2. Purpose. How does Yoshida provide his audience with a deeper understanding of how the advertisement is constructed and its effectiveness? 3. Audience. Even though this piece was written for a class assignment, and thus his audience are his teacher and peers, this analysis might have other audiences. Who might they be? Why? 4. Rhetorical appeals. How does Yoshida establish his ethos? Do you find him to be a credible writer? Why or why not? Modes & media. How would the piece be stronger if Yoshida had included visuals of the ad throughout? Which visuals might he have included?

Sources

Critical analysis papers are formatted like most other academic papers: as text-based essays or researched arguments that follow a specific documentation style, such as MLA, APA, or Chicago Manual of Style.

Critical analyses are most often published as text.

Since a critical analysis is essentially an argument, writers must first establish ethos to gain the reader's trust.

Writers of critical analyses rely on ethos and logos to make their points.

The ultimate purpose of a critical analysis is to evaluate and understand how another writer/artist/composer created meaning.

he writer then explains the composer's central points and provides her own evaluation of whether the composer's argument was or was not successful

Acritical analysis is an evaluation of a particular work.

Backing up your ideas and claims with correct information. gathered from reliable sources, will make your argument stronger.

hey generally include real people or made-up characters, a setting, a conflict, and action.

Pathos — your appeal to your readers’ emotions — is generally not a priority when you're writing to inform. On the other hand, if you want to inform but also persuade your readers, you can appeal to their emotions by using humor, for example. Generally humor is appropriate for less formal informational genres, but you also have to consider your specific purposes and audiences.

Rhetorical appeals: How do we use them to inform?

Could the brochure creators also be trying to convince you to whiten your teeth?

An author of a scientific report, for example, may present facts, but as a way to influence you to share an opinion or take an action.

o author is purely objective.

You do a quick search on YouTube and turn up a video by a guy in a gas mask who lives ina desert bunker. His instructions seem to have some merit but overall are rambling and confusing. Though the video may be riveting, it is a poor source of information because the author lacks credibility (or ethos) and logic (logos).

In daily life, you draw on a variety of sources for information.

The trick is to (1) figure out which sources of information are the best, and (2) analyze, use, and share that information according to your needs as a reader or writer.

INFORMING Purpose: Why share information? Audience: How do we inform others? Rhetorical appeals: How do we use them to inform? TELLING STORIES Purpose: Why tell stories? Audience: How do we connect through stories? Rhetorical appeals: How do we use them to tell stories? PERSUADING Purpose: Why write to persuade? Audience: How do we persuade others? Rhetorical appeals: How do we use them to persuade?

With the rise in social media use and the proliferation of digital devices, participatory or citizen journalism has become a major player when it comes to activism and change.

When considering the concept of genres used for activism, perhaps you first think of protests — people carrying signs with their messages. Maybe you think about famous speeches, such as Martin Luther King Jr.’s 1963 “I Have a Dream” speech delivered at the National March on Washington. Have you ever received a phone call from an organization encouraging you to vote a particular way? Perhaps you’ve been greeted on the street by a person with a clipboard, asking you to sign your name to bring a particular issue to the ballot.

activism.

When you post on Facebook, for example, you might consider yourself to be writing for your friends, but if you don’t have your privacy settings configured to keep strangers from seeing your posts, you are actually composing for everyone on Facebook, over a hundred million readers. I

Public Genres

The types of genres chosen are usually dictated by the situation, the task, and the audience.

Workplace writing usually responds to a need that someone has.

Workplace writing is any kind of writing or composing you do in a business or professional setting.

Some typical genres for reflective writing are portfolio cover letters, in which you describe and reflect on items in a portfolio of writing or artwork; progress reports, in which you describe and analyze the progress you’ve made toward achieving a particular task or outcome; and self-evaluations, in which you discuss some of your successes and challenges on the job.

Reflective genres also respond to a rhetorical situation. For example, if you have to write a reflective essay to accompany a visual argument you created, your purpose might be to help your professor (your audience) understand why you made particular choices in composing the visual and what overall effect you want the visual to have on its audience.

However, the stand-alone reflection is usually only seen in academia or the workplace.

What are some of the reflective genres you might encounter in college? Your professor might ask you to write a reflection on your writing process and turn in it alongside a research report, or you might be asked to write a reflection on a field experience for your geology class.

An academic genre that has a somewhat different rhetorical situation is the personal statement. A personal statement is an essay you write when you apply for a scholarship or to graduate school in which you explain to a funder or graduate program (your audience) why you deserve the scholarship or admittance to the graduate program you are applying for.

Most of this writing is done “on demand,” meaning you are not writing because the muse inspired you, but rather because your professor told you to.

one of the best ways to do this is through freewriting.

Whether you are in the classroom beginning an assignment, sitting at work staring at a request from your supervisor, or anticipating standing on the street corner giving a speech at a rally, you need a way to figure out what you want to say and how you want to say it.

In this chapter, we will briefly describe some of the types of writing you might expect to do in college and beyond and the types of rhetorical situations you might find yourself in.

How you write about a topic or issue will always depend on the rhetorical situation you find yourself in.

The first draft is the child’s draft, where you let it all pour out and then let it romp all over the place, knowing that no one is going to see it and that you can shape it later.

For me and most of the other writers I know, writing is not rapturous. In fact, the only way I can get anything written at all is to write really, really shitty first drafts.

They do not type a few stiff warm-up sentences and then find themselves bounding along like huskies across the snow.

Philosopher Alan Watts suggests that the education system’s emphasis on grade completion causes us to not pay attention to the journey, which to his mind, is the inspiration.

Sometimes creators even wonder if they will ever be able to create again.

Writers call it Writer’s Block, which is defined as the inability to write.

Perhaps you recall a time when you awoke from a dream, knew your dream had a fantastic story line, and sat down at your computer and furiously typed out a rough plot for a short story. Or maybe you went to the farmers’ market, purchased a wide assortment of vegetables, and then went home and invented a new dish with many of them, delighted in the new taste combinations you had created.

fhat does it mean to be “creative”? While we often associate creativity with artsy types, anyone who creates anything new can be said to be creative.

The most persuasive authors discuss the sources that informed their composing process.

Authors’/Artists’ Statements can often look like an academic essay, with indented paragraphs and little or no decoration except for subheadings that offer structure and organization. However, a writer might choose to design a Statement to reflect the genre of the composition. For example, the Statement might take the form of a letter written to a professor, a Director’s Statement, or a one-page Artist’s Statement.

Write in a tone that builds ethos. In their Statements, authors use critical, analytical language to make their points. They choose words related to their subject of inquiry to establish themselves as experts. When you write such a Statement, even though you're writing in the first person (J), use a serious, straightforward tone to emphasize that you have made deliberate, thoughtful choices.

On the other hand, don’t hesitate to mention places where you could improve your work editorially or technically. Doing your best, reflecting on what you did well, and talking about what you'd like to improve adds to your ethos as a composer and to the persuasiveness of your work.

Writers use Authors’ Statements as an opportunity to look back at a composition and evaluate the extent of their achievement; they might also note what they would have done differently or better.

Explain their choice of genre and how they worked with its conventions.

ddress readers directly. Writers use the “I” construction, which allows them to speak plainly to readers about their choices. They also refer to the works they’re discussing in the Statement as “my essay” (or “my painting,” “my photograph,” etc.), indicating their ownership of the composition and the choices they made.

Answer the question “why.”

Your purpose or main point in creating a collage on the relationship between body art and identity — and what the relationship is » Why you chose specific central images, how they contribute to your message, and how you hope your viewers will read them and relate to the overall collage » How you wanted to connect with your viewers through pathos, logos, and ethos (for example, your arrangement of images might appeal to their logic or emotions) » Why you decided to create the collage, say, in a digital format

iscuss their specific rhetorical situation and related choices. The Author’s/Artist’s Statement gives you, as a composer, an opportunity to explain to audiences: » Your purpose: why you composed the work on that specific topic, in that specific way » Your audience and use of rhetorical appeals: what you understand about your readers and how you connected with them through choices regarding ethos, pathos, and logos » Your mode and medium: why you chose them and how they benefit your work overall

f you're writing an Author's Statement in an academic setting, your main purpose is to inform and persuade readers — your peers, your instructor, your audience — of the critical and creative thought you put into your composition.

By writing an accompanying Author’s/Artist’s Statement, you can persuade your readers to see your finished piece in a particular way.

Purpose The purpose of an Author’s/Artist’s Statement is for an author (or artist or other composer) to discuss the decisions and choices he or she made in composing a specific text or other work.

Cook’ Illustrated readers are serious foodies who don’t mind spending hours on a recipe and they want to understand every decision the chef made so they can learn from the chef's mistakes or maybe even use the recipe as inspiration for their own creation.

In this way, the statement helps readers understand the invisible logic behind the finished product, the recipe.

The liner notes that come with a CD, the program you receive at the theater or symphony, the Director’s Statement on a DVD, the Artist’s Statement pinned to the wall at an art gallery — these are all forms of Authors’ or Artists’ Statements.

Composers and artists of all sorts often write a statement for their audience that explains their inspirations, intentions, and choices in their creative and critical processes.

Gwen evaluates her second draft and comes up with a list of items to focus on for her third and final draft Gwen observes the following.

Revise a little more.

Make a list of what you want to work on when you revise. Base your list on what you've determined in steps 2-7.

Step 5. Look at how you use rhetorical appeals. Look at your draft and the sample genre piece you're consulting. To what extent does the other author use ethos, pathos, and/or logos? How effective is his or her approach, and what might you want to adapt for your own work?

Step 2. Evaluate your use of experience & evidence.

Composing Your Genre Piece

Step 9. Zero in on how you’ll use your experience & evidence.

Step 8. Look at examples of the three genres you’re interested in. There are many features to consider when looking at genre: « Is point of view important for your purpose and audience? For example, if you need your piece to be first person so that it includes your perspective, make sure you choose a genre that accommodates this point of view. ¢ What type of connection do you want to establish with your audience? If you want to remain at a critical distance, consider choosing a genre that emphasizes ethos in its rhetorical appeal. To make a closer connection by appealing to readers’ emotions regarding your topic, consider choosing a genre that emphasizes pathos. © What tone do you want to use in order to achieve your purpose? If you want your piece to have a certain level of formality (or informality), be sure to choose a genre that demonstrates that.

Step 7. Narrow your choices down to three possible genres.

Step 6. Consider your mode & medium.

Step 5. Strategize on how you'll use rhetorical appeals.

Step 4. Really think about your audience.

Step 3. Focus on your purpose.

Step 2. Revisit your rhetorical situation.

Step 1. Revisit your topic & central idea.

Experiment by making yourself write nonstop for ten to thirty minutes.

At this stage, if you're putting pressure on yourself to write flawless, beautiful prose, remind yourself of the term freewrite. Take a little more pressure off by thinking of Anne Lamott’s phrase “shitty first draft.”

Write until you have five thousand words or you run out of time.

definitely no stopping to check Facebook.

Imagine an artist beginning a painting.

Advice for Freewriting As you begin your rough or exploratory draft, remember that it is just for you. No one else ever needs to see it. Think of your draft not as an organized, perfect piece of writing with a clear purpose, but as a messy opportunity for creativity and experimentation.

As you keep your fingers moving, don't worry about making sense or about readers being confused or impressed. No one is going to read this document but you. When you take away the pressure of producing smooth prose, you may be surprised to see the ideas you generate. We like to refer to this as a “shitty first draft.”

The goal is to get your ideas written down without judging what you're writing, or editing yourself, or trying to write beautifully.

From your initial list, force yourself to double or triple the size of the list.

Make a brainstorm list. What do you care most about? Begin by making a list of things you are passionate about, your pet peeves, things you are curious about, things you don’t understand, or things you'd like to change about the world.

alk to people. Discuss your topic ideas and questions with classmates, friends, family, and coworkers to find out what others have to say about the topic you're considering. Often, explaining why you're interested in a topic can help you focus. When others ask you to clarify your ideas, you will often discover what you really want to say.

The Index of Themes, page T-1, organizes every reading in the text by topic, and the Index of Genres, page G-1, will help you see the relationship between topic choice and genre choice.

It’s a good idea to annotate an assignment to make sure you understand it and to help you think through the different steps.)

Remember that genre is a social response to a rhetorical situation.

CHECKLIST | Understanding How Rhetorical Situations and Genres Work Together ‘When you compose, you can refer to the checklist below as well as the blank guided reading grid provided on Sample Grid. RHETORICAL SITUATION & CHOICES O Purpose. Is my purpose to tell a story, inform, or persuade? Do I have several purposes, and if so, which is my primary purpose? C Audience. How would I describe my primary audience? Whose attention do I want most? Who are the people I want to persuade? Do I have another, secondary audience? How will I entice this audience? O Rhetorical appeals. How will I establish my credibility (ethos)? Will appealing to my audience’s emotions help me persuade them (pathos)? How might logic (logos) help me convince others? 1 Modes & media. Do I want to work with written words? Will I present my ideas in person, orally? Will I use visuals? How about audio? Does my idea lend itself to video? Do I want my piece to be available digitally or in print? Will I use some combination of these modes and media? GENRE CONVENTIONS C Elements of the genre. How will I structure my composition? What is the best way to combine elements to convey my purpose — and make my case to my audience? 0 Style. Whatever form my composition takes (visual, verbal, etc.), what is the best tone to use to reach my audience? What voice will I use? How present will I be in my composition? What kind of language will I use? What level of detail will I need to convey my purpose? 0 Design. How do I want my composition to look? How will the layout help me achieve my purpose? O Sources. What sources will I draw on for my composition? Do I need to conduct interviews? Do I need to research online or in the library? How will I attribute my sources?

Purpose. Reread Henderson’s press release and Hurley’s blog post. What are the writers’ purposes? How can you tell? How do these purposes differ? How might they overlap? 2. Audience. Who do you imagine is the primary reader for Henderson's press release? For Hurley's blog post? Explai 3. Rhetorical appeals. How effective are Henderson and Hurley in using ethos, pathos, or logos to reach their audiences? Which appeals do they rely on most effectively, and why? 4. Rhetorical appeals. Consider how hyperlinks, photos, and other information can contribute to a composer’s ethos. Why do you think Hurley used the National Park Service as a source for information and images? How did this choice affect his ethos? 5. Modes & media. Both Henderson and Hurley use a combination of text and visuals. If you were to add audio or video to either piece, what would you add? What meaning or information would the audio or video add?

Shaan Hurley, The Wall Arch Collapses in Arches National Park

RHETORICAL APPEALS

As you'll see, Henderson and Hurley provide much of the same information about the arch collapse, but they write in different genres and with different purposes and audiences in mind. The notes in the margins of each piece explain their rhetorical situations and how they work within the conventions of the press release and the blog post.

While we might not note all the elements, we do describe the key ones associated with an advertisement (such as it being an argument, having a headline, and having particular ad copy).

Left: rhetorical situation & choices.

Consider your purpose, and as you compose, ask yourself if that purpose will be evident to your reader. Pay close attention to the genre conventions.

Memes often parody or poke fun at something or someone. They take many forms but often feature an image and a brief caption written in informal language (elements and style). ¢ Often an image is prominent, and the words — typically what the subject of the meme is saying or thinking — are presented in a large display font (design). « Memes draw on current topics and popular culture (sources).

he composers are providing a commentary (purpose). ¢ They are communicating to like-minded readers on the Internet (audience). ¢ They are using humor and satire to connect with their audience (drawing on the rhetorical appeal. pathos). ¢ They are working with both text and imagery (mode) and delivering the composition digitally, online (medium).

The rhetorical situation that the original blogger and Elizabeth and Amy are all responding to is simple: They all have pets that they think are just adorable and find their pets’ reactions to being anthropomorphized hilarious. They are participating in a long tradition of pet owners sharing the silliness of their own pets (purpose) with other pet owners (audience)

If we examine a particular event, we can see that there are numerous ways someone might choose to respond. After the Orlando shooting in the Pulse nightclub on June 12, 2016, people chose to respond in a variety of ways. Former President Barack Obama responded by releasing a press statement that included, “Our thoughts and prayers are with the families and loved ones of the victims.” Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau tweeted, “We grieve with our friends in the US & stand in solidarity with the LGBTQ2 community after today’s terror attack.” Samantha Bee, a comedic television talk show host, used her show Full Frontal to issue her response:

The genre is chosen based on the rhetorical situation.

That means the writer considers the purpose of her piece, whom she wants to reach, how best to appeal to her reader, and what sources and evidence to use, along with other considerations mentioned in Chapter

Sources. What sources does the author draw on? How do you know? How does the author incorporate and give credit to sources? Is there documentation? Hyperlinking?

Design. What does the composition look (sound, feel, smell) like? How do words and visuals and other media work together in the genre, physically? How would you describe the format of the composition? Would the format change if the mode were changed? For example, if a newspaper editorial moves from a print medium to an online medium, what changes occur in the genre?

Style. What is the author’s tone? How would you describe the language of the piece? How much detail does the author use?

Common elements. What do you know about this genre already? What are some of the typical features of this genre? How is the content organized? How does the author use words, images, or other media to convey a purpose and reach an audience?

To compose in different genres, you first should be able to identify them, see how other writers use them to achieve purposes and reach audiences, and learn some of the basic features so you can experiment.

Sources referred to in a research essay aimed at academic readers should be documented because readers will want to know where ideas and information came from: the purposes of song lyrics are different, though. Listeners of a song aren’t listening for information, so the sources of information are less important.

In other cases, such as novels, comics, and music lyrics, while you’ve read and used sources, you’re not required to document them formally.

Sources Sources are the people, conversations, documents, books, journal articles, movies, and other works that we refer to for facts, perspectives, and models as we compose.

Take a look at how Gilad uses images in his blog. Maps show readers exactly where this traveler is, the timeline indicates the duration of his trip, and the photos of Gilad help readers connect with him personally.

Design is aesthetic but also functional.

Design describes the visual features of a composition, including the use of headings, format, color, and illustration.

For example, the writer and traveler we mentioned in Chapter 1, Gilad Hizkiyahu, uses a particular style on his blog. Because he is interested in attracting “accidental surfers” to his blog — that is, people who stumble upon his blog accidentally — he takes a casual and funny approach to his travels rather than a serious, scholarly tone. A serious, scholarly tone would probably appeal to an audience interested in the economics or politics of his travels, but because Gilad’s purpose is to share his quirky, funny adventures, his casual, humorous style makes more sense.

The trick is to make sure that the style you’re using is appropriate to your purpose and accessible and persuasive to your audience.

We look at how much detail writers include and how precise that detail is. We listen for tone (seriousness, humor, etc.) and voice (the presence of the author) and analyze how these qualities affect the overall composition. How a writer uses sources is part of style as well.

For instance, most press release writers try to be as brief and objective as possible and to aim at answering the questions who? what? why? where? and when? For those reasons, we consider brevity, objectivity, and thoroughness to be elements of the press release genre.

we ask you to pay attention to the main features of a given genre: the specific elements that are common to most examples of the genre.

Keep an open mind as you choose genres to compose in. Consider collaborating with classmates who have more detailed knowledge of the genres that you’re less familiar with.

perhaps have one example in mind as a model.

Let’s say you want to tell a story and convey it graphically. You don’t need to be McCloud or Picasso or Art Spiegelman, but you do need to understand how artists, graphic novelists, and memoirists work with visuals and text to tell stories.

you need to know something about the genre you’re composing in: you need to know its basic qualities and agreed-upon conventions, and you need to be familiar with some examples.

In her memoir, Burton wrote in the first person, portrayed real people, described settings, conveyed conflict, and told stories from her own life. These elements are features of the memoir genre and of any autobiography.

So, Burton chose her genre — the memoir — as a social response to her rhetorical situation. If she had been trained in music, she would have written a ballad or an opera, or if she had been bor a little later, she might have told her story as a documentary film.

she must have noticed that a very popular genre of the day was memoir.

Her audience might have also included literate former slaves, most likely in the North because her book was published in Boston.

Thus one purpose of the memoir was to give readers “comfort and courage to do what God commands them to do.” Another purpose might have been to help women readers understand what it was like to be a woman. and a slave.

The Memoir as a Social Response

Your choice of genre also depends on your own skills and interests, as well as the materials available to you.

As a student, you write research papers and presentations; these are two examples of academic genres.

All of this also helps her develop ethos and come across as a credible source.

I have an undergraduate degree in biology and a grad degree in entomology. I don’t know whether that makes me seem any more reliable or trustworthy to my readers or not, but there it is. I study aquatic insects, especially behavior and respiration in giant water bugs and dragonflies.

Iam NOT a taxonomiust, so I wi// get the occasional identification wrong. If you happen to notice a mistake, please let me know (use that Contact Me button above). It’s frustrating enough to read all the misinformation about insects online without being part of the problem.

Christine Goforth, from her blog The Dragonfly Woman

I cover a variety of topics, but everything is at least tangentially related to insects. I had originally intended for this blog to be purely educational, but it’s evolved into more of a celebration of insects, scientifically, culturally, and personally. I like it better this way.

here is everything you ever wanted to know about me or my blog condensed down into a few bullet points.

If you arrived here, you probably wanted to learn a little more about the crazy woman who tells strange stories and goes on and on about aquatic insect respiration on this blog.

Blogs changed because the people using them, both composers and audiences, realized that blogs could be interactive, could be shared, could be multimodal, and more.

Because genres are responses to social situations, they are dynamic, changing over time as people and their needs change over time.

We wrote this book to acknowledge that in college and beyond there are many more genres available to us besides the five-paragraph essay or the traditional term paper.

Reading Academic Texts