Rhetoric has always been a difficult concept for me to understand and grasp. The assigned reading “Backpacks vs. Briefcases” really helped me get a clearer idea of how to identify rhetoric in an organized and procedural manner. The questions provided in the text were the most useful to me. I like having this reference to use when I am analyzing pieces in the future.
Before I begin actually analyzing in our writing project, I feel as though the activity we have been doing in class about identifying conventions within genres will help tremendously in breaking down the actual rhetoric. I had done a previous rhetorical analysis, in the beginning, I just dove into the “rhetorical situation, purpose and argument. I did not stop and separate the elements of the piece I was analyzing if I would have stopped to think about the “what’s” first then the “why’s” and “how’s” it would have been a lot easier to write the essay.
In class when we shared our knowledge of textual genres, person #7 explained the conventions of a romance novel. While reading their answer I found myself agreeing with their conventions and believed they had accurately labeled the genre of a romance novel. After reading “Backpacks vs. Briefcase” and having reviewed their answers again, I realized I was analyzing WHY these were the conventions used in romance novels.
When I looked back at my responses it was more difficult for me to identify why certain conventions were used in the genre I picked. It made me what to do two things. First, was to go back through my list of conventions and test them to an actual piece. I wanted to do this because I wanted to make sure my list was correct. I know that a convention may not always fit into an example of that genre, but I wanted to see if for the most part my ideas fit into this genre. Two, I wanted to research why some of these conventions were used since I could not figure some of them out for myself.
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