Journal 5

This project was very different from any project I have done in the past. It was not your standard essay, but I still felt like I was able to do a good amount of writing and composing in it. I would consider writing or composing to be the act of using written words in any context to create meaning. I feel writing has more to do with the technical aspects of actually producing words for the project, while composing has more to do with the ideas behind the written words. When the two are put together they enable me to accurately, sometimes creatively express my ideas.

My prior experiences with writing and composing have been somewhat limited to a more traditional essay format of writing. Before this project I would have said the traditional essay format of writing was in my opinion, the most effective. My perspective has changed since finishing the last project. The typical essay format of writing does not lend itself to as much creativity as a multimodal design like project one. I believe that multimodal and traditional essay projects share value and should be used in conjunction with each other.

When writing or composing I think of many different key terms, but if I were to narrow down the amount I would say the most important terms are, rhetoric, situation, audience, exigence, ecology, mode, genre, and knowledge. These eight terms define what I have learned about writing in this class, and what I hope to think about before I do any assignment that involves writing in the future. I believe rhetoric is an important term because it encompasses the whole of what writing is, and audience is important because it shows why and for whom people write. Knowledge is necessary in writing because a small portion of it is needed to write over any subject effectively. Situation and exigence go into the conditions and context of writing and why it was necessary in the first place. Ecology, mode, and genre all have to do with the style and impact the writing will have on the audience. For these reasons, the eight key terms above are important.