Reflection on Project II Draft

Below, I answer a series of questions found on page 197 of the Student's Guide in regards to my Project II Draft. I reviewed drafts made by Kyle and Carter.

Unknown. "Good Day's Work" 1943
Public Domain

1. Do you have an identifiable thesis? Does it point to the specific rhetorical strategies you analyze in your essay?

• When it come to my thesis, I believe that I present points and claims that are clear and identifiable. Of course, work needs to be done of each point/claim so that they don't cover too broad of rhetorical strategies used by the article's author. I now know that I should have avoided the terms "ethos", "pathos", and "logos" as they are those broad rhetorical strategies. 

2. How have you decided to organize your essay? Does each paragraph have a central point that is supported with evidence and and analysis?

• I organized my essay based on the template I learned in high school. This template stated that there should exist an introduction, three body paragraphs, and a conclusion that made an overview of the information presented in the body paragraphs. In terms of rhetorical analysis, I focused more on the logical and ethical appeals made by the author, since my audience I am writing for are primarily medical students. One of my peer editors found that this system limits my ability to analyze the entire article, so I may add a emotional appeals analysis to the body as well. 

3. Did you clearly identify and analyze several important elements of the text's rhetorical situation and/or structure?

• In my essay, I primarily discussed the audience, the author's credibility, the statistics used, quotes/ opinions presented, and context of the article. After stating a claim regarding one of these elements, I used textual evidence from the article to state the rhetorical strategy and provide specific quotations that proved my claim. 

4. Did you explain how and why certain rhetorical strategies were employed? Did you discuss what effects these strategies have on the intended audience and the overall effectiveness of the text?

• I analyzed the effectiveness of each of the elements I used in my essay, which where stated above. Any time when I brought up each element, I structured the sentence to where I had to explain why my author used it in her article. Plus, I related each strategy to the audience and its overall affect on their opinions/attitude towards the issue. This strategy was usually used at the end of each of my paragraphs as it culminated the author's impact on the audience at that particular point in the article. 

5. Are you thoughtfully using evidence in each paragraph? Do you mention specific examples from the text and explain why they are relevant?

• In terms of evidence, I primarily used direct quotes from the article. This strategy was used in each of my paragraphs. Whenever I used a quote, I would then provide commentary on the quote's purpose and then infer its affect on the audience's perception on the issue. I tended to explain each quote as well since the terminology Hanson used was deep into gene medicine- occasionally offering other forms of reading to make the issue more comprehensible. 

6. Do you leave your reader wanting more? Do you answer the "so what" question in your conclusion?

• Well I think that my paper covered the more important strategies of the article, and gave detailed explanations of the context/impact of the rhetorical strategies in regards to Hanson's audience. I repeated my thesis in the conclusion in order to make a overview of the issues/points made in the body, but I didn't want to ends the piece with an obvious question since I found it cliche. So I made a dramatic monologue and posed the question on whether Hanson's potions will bring about negative impact on the medical world or fuel a rapid growth in tech.