Practices - Question 1
"In your own experiences writing in L1 and L2 (L3,...) what CR and/or IR issues have arisen for you? Where do your own problems with writing come from? Have you been consciously aware of the factors that influence your rhetorical decisions? Where does your awareness of these factors come from?"
Back in Brazil, I used to teach Composition for students at the high school level. Because of this background, I am very aware of "good writing" in Portuguese, hence it has been a constant struggle when writing in English due to transference. For instance, in Portuguese we tend to write very long sentences with many dependent clauses. Many pieces of my very limited academic writing in USA have been commented on as confusing because of the length of my sentences. I have also received comments such as "it is not grammatically incorrect, but we do not write it this way," and "you write as you speak". When I was applying for jobs, I had to prepare a job talk in English. Even though I was the one who wrote it, after the editor comments, it felt as a completely different piece of writing. They were my ideas, but not my words. This feeling of foreignness is something that I experience everyday in my writing. As I write this blog post I am wondering if I should write "my writing" or just find a way to be more impersonal. I believe that because of my background as a composition teacher, I am very self conscious of my writing struggles, and I think that part of my writing problems in English are due to the lack of formal instruction on the mechanics of English writing/rhetoric. To conclude this post, I would like to comment on the awareness of my rhetorical decisions. I believe that at the moment they are not as conscious as in the past because I am more used to write in English. In the past, however, I used to look for models online for almost everything. For example, if I were to write an email to a student about his/her absences, I would search on Google for examples on how to address the issue. Now, I already have a template that I use therefore I do not think as much about my rhetorical decisions as in the past for this specific example. If I were to write, however, the minutes of a meeting (a type of writing that I have not done before), I would probably look into examples, and try to mimic them as much as possible.
Back in Brazil, I used to teach Composition for students at the high school level. Because of this background, I am very aware of "good writing" in Portuguese, hence it has been a constant struggle when writing in English due to transference. For instance, in Portuguese we tend to write very long sentences with many dependent clauses. Many pieces of my very limited academic writing in USA have been commented on as confusing because of the length of my sentences. I have also received comments such as "it is not grammatically incorrect, but we do not write it this way," and "you write as you speak". When I was applying for jobs, I had to prepare a job talk in English. Even though I was the one who wrote it, after the editor comments, it felt as a completely different piece of writing. They were my ideas, but not my words. This feeling of foreignness is something that I experience everyday in my writing. As I write this blog post I am wondering if I should write "my writing" or just find a way to be more impersonal. I believe that because of my background as a composition teacher, I am very self conscious of my writing struggles, and I think that part of my writing problems in English are due to the lack of formal instruction on the mechanics of English writing/rhetoric. To conclude this post, I would like to comment on the awareness of my rhetorical decisions. I believe that at the moment they are not as conscious as in the past because I am more used to write in English. In the past, however, I used to look for models online for almost everything. For example, if I were to write an email to a student about his/her absences, I would search on Google for examples on how to address the issue. Now, I already have a template that I use therefore I do not think as much about my rhetorical decisions as in the past for this specific example. If I were to write, however, the minutes of a meeting (a type of writing that I have not done before), I would probably look into examples, and try to mimic them as much as possible.
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