Bullock's writing on rhetorical situations is divided into 5 main points regarding any type of writing: purpose, audience, genre, stance, and media/design. These 5 components are all intertwined; a piece of writing isn't complete without all of them present.
Every piece of documented writing, whether it be a persuasive speech, an editorial, or commentary, has a specific purpose. Before starting, any writer should identify his or her purpose. A writer should be constantly keeping in mind of the audience- what do you want the audience to think or feel when they read your piece of writing? I found this very helpful, because a lot of times when I'm writing a long paper, I tend to lose track of what my original purpose was.
Identifying a certain genre is also vital, and goes along with who your intended audience is. For instance, if you are writing an article for a town newspaper, you would want to appeal to an average, middle-aged citizen. But if that newspaper was a college campus newspaper, you would want to address to young adults.
The fourth component is stance- having an attitude and opinion on the topic you are writing about. A writer must be clear and concise so that his or her stance is obvious to the reader.
I found the last point, media and design, very interesting. Bullock refers to medium as "a way for information to be conveyed from one person to another", such as verbal or nonverbal.
The media you choose for your piece of writing depends on how you're going to convey it. You could choose to write it in print, give a speech, or post it on the internet, just to name a few.
Design is also very important because, as humans, our initial opinions depend on how something looks. If your writing is in some sort of crazy font, for example, it would be hard for the reader to focus on the point you're trying to make.
Bullock's helpful information regarding rhetorical situations gives any writer the basic principles for any piece of writing.
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Clubhouse Blog: Brainstorming Ideas
Just like anyone else here, obviously, I have a ton of interests. Though it's hard to narrow them down and choose just the right ones, I think I've got some pretty solid ideas for what topic I want my clubhouse blog to center on. I browsed Technorati and found a lot of good inspiration.
Independent/"Indie" music
Indie music is pretty hard to identify, just because there are so many different sub genres of independent music. I like to listen to anything from acoustic to a more rock with a little 60's vibe, like The Black Keys. If I did a clubhouse blog on indie music I would post a Song of the Day, and talk about a band, how long they've been around, and where they're headed in the music industry. This would be a great topic for me because I could talk and listen (ha) to music for hours.
Desserts
I have the biggest sweet tooth. I'm not even kidding... I think I'm addicted to chocolate. Sometimes I just eat sweets until I'm in a chocolate coma when I can't even move. So naturally, doing a blog about desserts would be very easy! I would post mostly pictures. I'm not the best baker, but I would also like to incorporate recipes, or some great ice cream shops into my blog as well.
90's movies
A good amount of my favorite movies were made in between the years 1990 and 1999, and I think this topic would be really interesting to blog about. Similar to the music blog, I would post a Movie of the Day, give a plot summary, and a rating of said movie.
Tattoos
It's kind of ironic that I love tattoos because I don't even have one myself... mostly because I'm broke. Regardless, I have such an appreciation for clever tattoos of great quality. It would be cool if I could include a story behind each picture of a tattoo I post, but I'm not quite sure how I'd go about finding tattoo stories. Possibly finding another blog source?
Spongebob Squarepants
Not to brag or anything, but I know just about every line from seasons 1-3 of Spongebob. Ask anyone and they'll tell you that I will recite the most obscure quotes at any given moment.
People overlook the deeper meaning behind each character and theme of each confound, educational episode.
...Just kidding. It's just a freaking hilarious show and I'd love to blog about it.
Independent/"Indie" music
Indie music is pretty hard to identify, just because there are so many different sub genres of independent music. I like to listen to anything from acoustic to a more rock with a little 60's vibe, like The Black Keys. If I did a clubhouse blog on indie music I would post a Song of the Day, and talk about a band, how long they've been around, and where they're headed in the music industry. This would be a great topic for me because I could talk and listen (ha) to music for hours.
Desserts
I have the biggest sweet tooth. I'm not even kidding... I think I'm addicted to chocolate. Sometimes I just eat sweets until I'm in a chocolate coma when I can't even move. So naturally, doing a blog about desserts would be very easy! I would post mostly pictures. I'm not the best baker, but I would also like to incorporate recipes, or some great ice cream shops into my blog as well.
90's movies
A good amount of my favorite movies were made in between the years 1990 and 1999, and I think this topic would be really interesting to blog about. Similar to the music blog, I would post a Movie of the Day, give a plot summary, and a rating of said movie.
Tattoos
It's kind of ironic that I love tattoos because I don't even have one myself... mostly because I'm broke. Regardless, I have such an appreciation for clever tattoos of great quality. It would be cool if I could include a story behind each picture of a tattoo I post, but I'm not quite sure how I'd go about finding tattoo stories. Possibly finding another blog source?
Spongebob Squarepants
Not to brag or anything, but I know just about every line from seasons 1-3 of Spongebob. Ask anyone and they'll tell you that I will recite the most obscure quotes at any given moment.
People overlook the deeper meaning behind each character and theme of each confound, educational episode.
...Just kidding. It's just a freaking hilarious show and I'd love to blog about it.
Sunday, January 29, 2012
Thoughts on Blogger
I never thought I'd be into Blogger. In fact, the day I set up my account I was pretty intimidated by it; it just seemed too confusing for me. But after tinkering around with the site I've actually come to find that it's very user-friendly. Although I wish there were more options with designing your own background, layout, and color schemes, I do love the feel of Blogger. It might sound strange, but it feels accomplishing learning the basics of a whole new website. Expanding my horizons outside of what I already know (the only blogging site I've used before this was Tumblr, which I've had for a little over 2 years now) is refreshing.
It makes me realize how much the internet really has to offer. It sounds lame, but it's true... because I also just learned that Google has a search engine made specifically for blogs called Google Blog Search. Just type in any band, food, topic, culture, anything, and it gives you every blog associated with it. It's a perfect tool for inspiration right now, because I'm still trying to figure out what to do for my Clubhouse Blog. Hopefully something will come to me!
It makes me realize how much the internet really has to offer. It sounds lame, but it's true... because I also just learned that Google has a search engine made specifically for blogs called Google Blog Search. Just type in any band, food, topic, culture, anything, and it gives you every blog associated with it. It's a perfect tool for inspiration right now, because I'm still trying to figure out what to do for my Clubhouse Blog. Hopefully something will come to me!
Blogs as Clubhouses
by Suzanna Stefanac
In this excerpt, Suzanna Stefanac illustrated key tips for new bloggers who aren't familiar with clubhouse blogs, or who are unsure of what one topic to blog about in the first place. These tips ranged from engaging your audience to posting regularly and keeping consistent, ensuring that readers can always get their "fix", per say.
She highlighted that the most important thing is to showcase your personality- this was probably my favorite bit of advice, and I could tell it was one that Stefanac follows herself. Sometimes I think that individuality (ironically) is not a trait shared by everyone, which is why I am always attracted to anything unique and off-beat. Blogs as Clubhouses definitely reassured me that a good clubhouse blog is one that is memorable to readers and wants them returning for more.
Stefanac also mentioned examples of blogs, one of which is one of my favorites. The Sartorialist is a site by photographer Scott Schuman, who walks the streets of Manhattan and photographs real-life street fashion, capturing trends and inspirational pieces, and posts the results. Another blog she mentioned but one I was not familiar with was Flame Effects- an art blog by ex-engineer Mikey Sklar who takes pictures of fire. (side note: I checked out Flame Effects for myself, and I never thought I was a pyro until now... the pictures were absolutely beautiful!)
Suzanna Stefanac's piece on blogging was extremely helpful. She convinced me that you don't have to be a diehard fan of something to make a clubhouse blog- you just need to be truly passionate about it.
In this excerpt, Suzanna Stefanac illustrated key tips for new bloggers who aren't familiar with clubhouse blogs, or who are unsure of what one topic to blog about in the first place. These tips ranged from engaging your audience to posting regularly and keeping consistent, ensuring that readers can always get their "fix", per say.
She highlighted that the most important thing is to showcase your personality- this was probably my favorite bit of advice, and I could tell it was one that Stefanac follows herself. Sometimes I think that individuality (ironically) is not a trait shared by everyone, which is why I am always attracted to anything unique and off-beat. Blogs as Clubhouses definitely reassured me that a good clubhouse blog is one that is memorable to readers and wants them returning for more.
Stefanac also mentioned examples of blogs, one of which is one of my favorites. The Sartorialist is a site by photographer Scott Schuman, who walks the streets of Manhattan and photographs real-life street fashion, capturing trends and inspirational pieces, and posts the results. Another blog she mentioned but one I was not familiar with was Flame Effects- an art blog by ex-engineer Mikey Sklar who takes pictures of fire. (side note: I checked out Flame Effects for myself, and I never thought I was a pyro until now... the pictures were absolutely beautiful!)
Suzanna Stefanac's piece on blogging was extremely helpful. She convinced me that you don't have to be a diehard fan of something to make a clubhouse blog- you just need to be truly passionate about it.
"An intelligent human being filters through the mass of information packaged daily for our consumption and picks out the interesting, the important, the overlooked, and the unexpected..."
Rebecca Blood's Weblogs: A History and Perspective
It's strange to think that I was only 6 years old in 1999, when only 23 internet blogs existed. It's even stranger to think that it didn't even take a few years for that number to skyrocket. As I began reading noted blogger Rebecca Blood's article on the subject itself, I was automatically intrigued by her way of relating the history of blogs and the way they quickly rose in popularity with seeing blogs as an outlet to be an artist rather than constantly being referred to as the "consumer" by the media.
One line stood out to me- "as advertisements creep onto banana peels, attach themselves to paper cup sleeves, and interrupt our ATM transactions, we urgently need to cultivate forms of self-expression in order to counteract our self-defensive numbness and remember what it is to be human... I sternly believe in the power of weblogs to transform both writers and readers from 'audience' to 'public' and from 'consumer' to 'creator'." Blood is absolutely right. I think blogs are a great outlet for one to express not just feelings but a voice. Yes, one can speak an opinion by word of mouth to friends, family, and peers, but with such a blank canvas like a personal website made specifically to write really anything at all and the huge possibilities of the internet as an art museum, so to speak, writers have the power to express without restrictions. We don't always have to play the role of the audience.
Blood notes that Blogger (also known as Blogspot) was the first blogging website that did not have a structured template for its users. Instead of being restricted to a certain number of characters or needing some sort of previous HTML knowledge like the community site Metafilter, Blogger makes it simple. Although I have only been on Blogger for a few days now, I already love the fact that you are free to write commentary, personal stories, journal entires, etcetera, without any limits.
I enjoyed reading this article- although I have been acquainted with the concept of weblogs and blogging sites, I did learn a lot more about their history, and I found myself identifying with Blood's opinions on self-expression.
It's strange to think that I was only 6 years old in 1999, when only 23 internet blogs existed. It's even stranger to think that it didn't even take a few years for that number to skyrocket. As I began reading noted blogger Rebecca Blood's article on the subject itself, I was automatically intrigued by her way of relating the history of blogs and the way they quickly rose in popularity with seeing blogs as an outlet to be an artist rather than constantly being referred to as the "consumer" by the media.
One line stood out to me- "as advertisements creep onto banana peels, attach themselves to paper cup sleeves, and interrupt our ATM transactions, we urgently need to cultivate forms of self-expression in order to counteract our self-defensive numbness and remember what it is to be human... I sternly believe in the power of weblogs to transform both writers and readers from 'audience' to 'public' and from 'consumer' to 'creator'." Blood is absolutely right. I think blogs are a great outlet for one to express not just feelings but a voice. Yes, one can speak an opinion by word of mouth to friends, family, and peers, but with such a blank canvas like a personal website made specifically to write really anything at all and the huge possibilities of the internet as an art museum, so to speak, writers have the power to express without restrictions. We don't always have to play the role of the audience.
Blood notes that Blogger (also known as Blogspot) was the first blogging website that did not have a structured template for its users. Instead of being restricted to a certain number of characters or needing some sort of previous HTML knowledge like the community site Metafilter, Blogger makes it simple. Although I have only been on Blogger for a few days now, I already love the fact that you are free to write commentary, personal stories, journal entires, etcetera, without any limits.
I enjoyed reading this article- although I have been acquainted with the concept of weblogs and blogging sites, I did learn a lot more about their history, and I found myself identifying with Blood's opinions on self-expression.
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