Author: jdixson1

Introduction: I didn’t change much in my introduction paragraph.  I kept the basis of it the same in my final draft, with some minor tweaks.  I added a few better transitions in between my introduction sentences of the text.  I kept my opening sentence as I felt it was a satisfactory hook.  I also didn’t make any changes to my thesis as I believed it was portrayed exactly as I initially intended.

Evidence and Explanations: Besides adding a new paragraph, I kept the same quotations from my first draft to my final draft.  Through revision, I felt that my evidence was sufficient in what I was trying to portray to the reader.  In terms of my explanations, I added more in various sections of my paper.  I went back and added a deeper analysis to some quotes and tried to make new connections that may have not been there in my first draft.  I tried to add more “I Say” as opposed to parts where I may have had too much “they say”.

Reorganization:  I did not move any specific sentences or statements around in my paper.  However, I changed the order of my paragraphs.  In my first draft, I believe I had my shortest body paragraph  ordered last, right before to the conclusion.  Through revision, I believed that this was a bad way to leave the reader off at the end of the paper, so I switched that paragraph with a much stronger one.

New Paragraphs: One of my paragraphs in my first draft was a paragraph I had written for a homework assignment that I felt fit in with my paper.  Through revision, I realized that this paragraph did not fit in very well to my paper.  I wrote a new paragraph comparing the “abstract” section of a paper and Gee’s “significance” building task together.  I felt that this paragraph was much stronger than the original paragraph I had in its place.  I think this move improved my paper.

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1.  I believe I work well with Gee’s concepts throughout my whole paper.  I talk about Gee’s seven building tasks of language often throughout my paper, and I even connect Gee’s idea of Discourse to Haas’ study of Eliza.  However, I can still add more analysis and explanation to the connections I make with Gee’s ideas and the other texts, along with the general discourse of science as a whole.  I will be adding another paragraph to my paper that connects Gee’s “significance” building task to the abstract section of the IMRAD format.
2. I do a good job at using a certain language throughout my paper.  I use similar language phrases and words to make it as easy as possible for my readers to understand the information I am conveying to them.  It works well in my paper as shown by my peer review comments.  My peer group gave good feedback in terms of how easy it was for them to understand the points I make in my paper and it was not too difficult for them to understand the connections I make as well.
3. In my second paragraph, I talk about the “practices” section of the building tasks of language.  I make only simply connections and give a simple analysis, so I need to revisit this paragraph in revision and tune it up.  I can make deeper analysis and connections to ensure the reader will be hooked after my first body paragraph and want to keep reading my paper.
4. My analysis of science discourse reveals to the reader that by using the IMRAD format and keeping Gee’s seven building tasks of language in mind, you will have the best opportunity possible at writing a good research paper that will convey information to the reader in the best way possible.  Using Haas’ journal as a reference since she follows both of these guidelines, I prove to the reader it is not very difficult to be a part of the discourse of science.

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–  Literacy can be defined in numerous different ways of context, but has a specific meaning when it comes to Discourse.

-This mastery allows the person to be an active member of the Discourse and they can implement this Discourse into their values, beliefs, and actions.

– In her first two years of school, she simply read text to retain information but she was able to teach herself new reading techniques and strategies as the years went on.

These are compound sentences because I take two independent clauses that share similar ideas, and I connect them using connecting words such as “and” and “but”.  I connect these independent clauses together to emphasize the connections and information they share, and to make my sentences more fluid for the reader to understand.  

 

-However, the results section is the core of the paper because it presents the reader with new knowledge.

-Although it is not often valued as largely as the other aspects of IMRAD, the identity of the author is vital for the reader’s relationship with the paper.

These are complex sentences because of the subordinating conjunctions I use such as “although” and “because”.  In the first sentence, I use “because” to explain the first clause in the sentence using the second clause. In the second sentence, I use “although” to emphasize a change in tone.  The sentence prior to this one states information, and I use “although” to indicate to the reader that this sentence will contain information that relates to the prior sentence, but may state different information.   

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Original Paragraph:

According to Gee, it is difficult to achieve full literacy of a new Discourse.  Literacy can be defined in numerous different ways of context, but has a specific meaning when it comes to Discourse.  Gee explains, “Thus, I define “literacy” as the mastery of or fluent control over a secondary Discourse” (Gee 9). Using Gee’s logic, full literacy of a Discourse means a person has mastered the specific Discourse in which they are attempting to acquire.  This mastery allows the person to be an active member of the Discourse and they can implement this Discourse into their values, beliefs, and actions. In the work of Christina Haas, there is a study she presented that takes place over the four year college career of a student named Eliza.  Haas kept track of Eliza’s literacy and understanding of college level text and how she interacted with the text. In her first two years of school, she simply read text to retain information but she was able to teach herself new reading techniques and strategies as the years went on. Haas states, “By her senior year she often viewed texts as multiply connected-to authors and scientists, to other readers, and to historical circumstances-and even demonstrated some understanding of her own connections both to scientific texts (and, by implication, to their authors) and to the objects of her own research” (Haas 69).  Eliza was able to achieve full literacy in the Discourse of college level understanding of text after four years in school. It was a gradual progression to reach this level in her academic career, but through perseverance and hard work, she was able to achieve it. She proves Gee’s idea of the difficulty of achieving literacy in a Discourse wrong as she prospered her senior year.

Revised Paragraph:

Every person conforms to Discourses which define how he or she acts in certain social institutions.  According to Gee, it is difficult to achieve full literacy of a new Discourse.  Literacy can be defined in numerous different ways of context, but has a specific meaning when it comes to Discourse.  Gee explains, “Thus, I define “literacy” as the mastery of or fluent control over a secondary Discourse” (9). Using Gee’s logic, full literacy of a Discourse means a person has mastered the specific Discourse in which they are attempting to acquire.  This mastery allows the person to be an active member of the Discourse and they can implement this Discourse into their values, beliefs, and actions. In the work of Christina Haas, there is a study she presented that takes place over the four year college career of a student named Eliza.  Haas kept track of Eliza’s literacy and understanding of college level text using the method of observation and how she interacted with the text. In her first two years of school, she simply read text to retain information but she was able to teach herself new reading techniques and strategies as the years went on as stated by Haas, “By her senior year she often viewed texts as multiply connected-to authors and scientists, to other readers, and to historical circumstances-and even demonstrated some understanding of her own connections both to scientific texts (and, by implication, to their authors) and to the objects of her own research” (69).  Eliza was able to achieve full literacy in the Discourse of college level understanding of text after four years in school. It was a gradual progression to reach this level in her academic career, but through perseverance and hard work, she was able to achieve it. She proves Gee’s idea of the difficulty of achieving literacy in a Discourse wrong as she prospered her senior year.

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Gee talks about the “seven building tasks of language”, with one of these building tasks being the act of “practices” (activities).  There is a difference between one saying something and actually doing it, and this is how Gee describes the difference between simply informing someone of something, and showing them how something is done.  Gee states, “By a “practice” I mean a socially recognized and institutionally or culturally supported endeavor that usually involves sequencing or combining actions in certain specified ways” (Gee 32). Using Gee’s logic, the act of practices is the most relevant when it comes to the science discourse.  In science, without proof from tests and activities there is no solution to solving a hypothesis. These experiment results are vital to the research of scientists and the validation of their work. Similarly, in the work of Nair and Nair, they present to us the IMRAD format as means for the organization of a research paper.  Using the formula, explaining results of the test, experiment, etc. is the most vital part of a paper. Nair and Nair explain, “Thus, the value of the paper depends on what is contained in this (Results) section, and it must be presented in an absolutely clear manner in just the right number of words, neither more nor less” (Nair and Nair 20).  As Nair and Nair explain, this section of the paper presents new knowledge to the reader and is based off the results of the activity or practice the author preforms. The author must use a practice as stated by Gee to achieve these results. The practice used can be an experiment or test, leading to the description of the results to the reader.  

 

According to Gee, it is difficult to achieve full literacy of a new Discourse.  Literacy can be defined in numerous different ways of context, but has a specific meaning when it comes to Discourse.  Gee explains, “Thus, I define “literacy” as the mastery of or fluent control over a secondary Discourse” (Gee 9). Using Gee’s logic, full literacy of a Discourse means a person has mastered the specific Discourse in which they are attempting to acquire.  This mastery allows the person to be an active member of the Discourse and they can implement this Discourse into their values, beliefs, and actions. In the work of Christina Haas, there is a study she presented that takes place over the four year college career of a student named Eliza.  Haas kept track of Eliza’s literacy and understanding of college level text and how she interacted with the text. In her first two years of school, she simply read text to retain information but she was able to teach herself new reading techniques and strategies as the years went on. Haas states, “By her senior year she often viewed texts as multiply connected-to authors and scientists, to other readers, and to historical circumstances-and even demonstrated some understanding of her own connections both to scientific texts (and, by implication, to their authors) and to the objects of her own research” (Haas 69).  Eliza was able to achieve full literacy in the Discourse of college level understanding of text after four years in school. It was a gradual progression to reach this level in her academic career, but through perseverance and hard work, she was able to achieve it. She proves Gee’s idea of the difficulty of achieving literacy in a Discourse wrong as she prospered her senior year.

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Gee’s Building Tasks for Discourse Analysis

Building Evidence for an Analysis of Science Discourse

 

For each of these seven building tasks, Cripps has modeled one example of a passage and brief explanation. Find your own quotes and do your own explaining.  You are not required/expected to have an example in each of the seven building tasks.

 

Significance

“Once you select a journal to which you wish to submit your manuscript, please FOLLOW THE JOURNAL’S INSTRUCTIONS TO AUTHORS, which can usually be found in each volume of the journal… or easily accessed from the journal’s webpage” (Nair and Nair 13).

 

The author uses all capital letters in a phrase in this sentence to show its significance to the reader.  This phrase instantly stands out to the reader and will likely stick with them due to how much it sticks out on the page.  

 

Practices (activities)

“This article, then, provides an initial exploration of one’s student’s developing rhetorical understanding of texts.  It details a longitudinal study, an extended 4-year examination of one student as she progressed during college, focusing primarily on how student’s views of, and interactions with, disciplinary texts changed through her postsecondary education” (Haas 46).  

 

Instead of simply giving facts to the reader, Haas gives us a study that she partook in.  This study provides the reader with real world evidence that involved Haas working closely with a student named Eliza for her four years in college.

 

Identities

“Have defined the components of “scientific literacy” as not only the mastery of scientific facts and concepts, but an understanding of “the evolving contributions of individual scientists and groups of scientists,… the social communities and historical settings in which scientists work” (Haas 45).  

 

By defining what scientific literacy is and her choice of grammar and words, Haas attempts to build an identity for herself to the reader.  She wants the reader to believe she is qualified to be giving the information that she is giving and the reader should take everything she says serious.   

 

Relationships

“In addition, other studies have suggested that scientists adjust the strength of their claims depending on the audience: Texts meant for scientific insiders hedge qualify claims, while texts for lay persons and other outsiders strip out such qualifiers, making claims seem more certain and less open to question” (Haas 44-45).

 

In this passage, Haas describes that scientists word their claims differently after taking into account who their audience is.  They may use more common language when addressing a wider, public audience while they may use more scientific language when addressing their peers in the field of science.  

 

Politics

“Lack of such insight is evident when authors simply state-often repeat- the results, and make superficial statements such as “this work agrees with the work of author X (some unknown author’s work, published several years earlier)” as though the objective of research was to see if the results agreed with some other author’s (obscure) work published 20 or more years earlier” (Nair and Nair 21).  

 

When the author is using examples of different author’s methods of stating the results for as they are, he does so in a polite manner.  He does not name who the authors are and does not slander their work in the process.

 

Connections

“The section pulls everything together and shows the importance and value of the work and is therefore the most innovative and difficult part of the paper to write” (Nair and Nair 21).  

 

In a scientific paper, one of the most important aspects is the Discussion section where the author will have to interpret their results and reiterate to the reader why they should want to know the information.  The author will have to make numerous connections to show the importance of their work.

Sign Systems & Knowledge

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1.  Hass’ opening statement of her article states that in order to become fully literate in terms of college level reading, a person must learn not only how to just retain information from the text but also understand the context of the text and author.  In her article, Haas talks about a study she conducted on a student over the course of four years.  Over the four years she kept track of the students reading and writing habits.  Haas states, ” Although Eliza (a pseudonym) may have tacitly subscribed to the doctrine of autonomous texts early in her college career, by the time she left college she had come to a greater awareness of the rhetorical, contingent nature of both the activities and discourses she participated in within her chosen field, biology” ( Haas 46).  After conducting her study, Haas comes to the conclusion that throughout her college career, Eliza gradually came to a better understanding of notions of text and how to fully retain everything from a text.  Eliza learns how to make better connections within the text and also how to connect different pieces of text.
2. Early in her article, Haas mentions a myth that pertains to one’s understanding of text after reading it.  She states, ” In general, the belief in autonomous text views written academic texts as discrete, highly explicit, even “timeless” entities functioning without contextual support from author, reader, or culture” (Haas 45).  An autonomous text is independent text that stands by itself.  Haas calls this a myth because it is simply an idea and not a scientific fact yet until proven.  This makes sense to me as I am guilty of simply reading text simply to retain information and not thinking about the deeper context that comes with the text. 
3. Haas’ study of Eliza helps the reader understand that as a college student gradually progresses through their four years, their reading strategies and comprehensions will improve throughout every year.  The major a student chooses to pursue also affects how they interpret text as shown by Eliza.  Haas states, “By her senior year she often viewed texts as multiply connected-to authors and scientists, to other readers, and to historical circumstances-and even demonstrated some understanding of her own connections both to scientific texts (and, by standing of her own connections both to scientific texts (and, by implication, to their authors) and to the objects of her own research” (Haas 69).  Eliza was a Biology major, and during her junior and senior years, she came to a deeper understanding of the text she was reading by thinking about the context behind the text and also of the author.  She was able to make connections in between different texts and also connect them to her own research.  
4. A rhetorical frame is a framework that consists of the three theories that are concerned with how individuals participate in different social acts.  Haas describes this when she explains, “Elements of the rhetorical frame include participants, their relationships and motives, and several layers of context.  For instance, when readers approach a discourse situation, they presumably have some knowledge or representation of the participants, including the identity, knowledge, and background of author and intended readers” (Haas 48).  Using the logic of Haas, a reader usually has some background knowledge on the text he or she is reading and the purpose of it.  The rhetorical frame helps readers understand the motive of the text they are reading.
5. The idea of Discourses as explained by James Gee and rhetorical reading by Christina Haas share many similarities.  When explaining the idea of a rhetorical frame, Haas delves deeper into this concept and its relevance to all readers.  Haas states, “Elements of the rhetorical frame include participants, their relationships and motives, and several layers of context.  For instance, when readers approach a discourse situation, they presumably have some knowledge or representation of the participants, including the identity, knowledge, and background of author and intended readers” (Haas 48).  Using Haas’ logic, we can assume that most readers have a simple, general understanding of the text they read before reading it.  This relates to Gee’s idea of the use of meta-knowledge.  Gee explains, “Metaknowledge is liberation and power, because it leads to the ability to manipulate, to analyze, to resist while advancing” (Gee 13).  A reader can use meta-knowledge that they already have on a text, and use it to fully understand the text they are reading to the best of their knowledge.  The knowledge of the text they have prior can help them in their attempt to fully comprehend the text they are reading.  

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Introduction: In my introduction paragraph, I did not change the opening statement.  I felt like it was strong enough to keep as it was.  Before, I only introduced who James Gee was to the reader but after revision, I added the Cuddy intro in there too.  It was previously on page five, and I feel it benefits my paper by adding it to the introduction.  Overall, I also thought how I presented my points in the introduction was effective thus making me decide to keep them how they were.  

Evidence and Explanations: I did not end up adding any new evidence from the text into my paper during revision.  I felt that my quote choice was strong and effectively supported my points and arguments.  I added more “I Say” into a few of my body paragraphs, stating whether I agree or disagree with the Cuddy or Gee quotes I would mention.  I also shortened my explanations to the reader on what a primary Discourses and secondary Discourses were so I could spend more of my paper taking about my views.  

Reorganization: I did not move full paragraphs around during revision of my paper.  However, I did move around certain aspects of paragraph.  As stated earlier, I moved my Cuddy intro from page 5 to the introduction paragraph.  I was satisfied with my paragraph order, and thought they transition together smoothly in building my argument for the reader throughout the course of the whole paper.  

New Paragraphs: In total, my final draft was actually around 40 words shorter than my first draft.  I did not add new paragraphs to the final draft.  I actually wrote two additional paragraphs during revision I was considering adding, but they would have made the paper too repetitive and may have made the reader lose interest.  During revision, I went through my paper paragraph by paragraph and made the changes that I saw fit.  The paragraphs I already had do a good job in supporting my argument, and I did not have a need to make dire changes after also receiving positive feedback from my peers.