Between the Lindemanm
and Crowley articles, I’ve found a vast assortment of ideas toward the topic of
rhetoric and writing. Both presented great ideas, and I’m sure to use them in
my future argumentative paper. Much of this feels knew to me, but some feels
familiar at the same time. I see some reoccurring themes between this class,
and communications 103. I’m eager to have the ability to rhetorically persuade
in my writing, rather than through my speech. Moving forward, I’ll first talk
about Lindemann’s article and how she approached her topics.
I noticed that Lindemann talked about: prewriting techniques, brainstorming, free
writing, journals, heuristics (Who? What? When? Where? How?), and models. The author finds importance in brainstorming,
whether it may be in the act of freewriting, asking questions, or imitating “noteworthy
essays, aphorism, fables, speeches, and excerpts from works by great writers”(Lindemann
126). Through freewriting, Lindemann
wants the student to put the thought process on a sheet of paper in a nonjudgmental
way. This will allow a student to practice writing and articulate thoughts that
might be swimming around their brain. Clearly, Lindemann wants the student to
fire up their brain before stating the final product. Crowley comes at this with a different
approach.
Sharon Crowley
looks toward the past for writing in the future. She write that invention is, “…the
division of rhetoric that investigates the possible means by which proofs can
be discovered: it supplies speakers and writers with sets of instructions that
help them find and compose proofs appropriate for any rhetorical situation”(Crowley
30). By this, Crowley wants the writer to think of ways to reach the audience,
and much of this is done through asking the audience the right questions; also
known as the “Stasis Theory”. With this theory Crowley tells us that it is crucial
to implement a point of stasis in any rhetorical argument. By taking a stand,
it allows the audience’s disagreements be known and hopefully rhetorically
changed throughout the process.
As far as
similarities go, I see that the heuristic approach and the stasis theory both
want the writer to ask questions during the composing process. I’ve used the heuristic approach before, but
never knew the terminology. Regardless, I plan on using both approaches for our
upcoming paper.
This is a lovely sentence: "Sharon Crowley looks toward the past for writing in the future." Because you can compose sentences that use such lovely figurative approaches, Stuart, I think you are particularly going to enjoy the "style" section of class.
ReplyDeleteIt also looks as though you understand how to approach writing using some of the inventional strategies Lindemann and Crowley describe; I hope the readings and our class discussions and activities gave you a richer sense of the history and possibilities of these approaches.
I am also happy that you see how Lindemann shapes her approaches to emphasize an individual thinking alone and -- she hopes -- enjoying it while finding ideas to write about, while Crowley is about helping writers situate their writing within larger discourse communities. Lindemann's work leans in that direction, but certainly puts the emphasis on an individual thinking.
Based on what you have written here, Stuart, I think you are going to find useful approaches in our class. So I hope...!