“Good enough: Getting the writing written and letting it go”

1) In this article I learned that sometimes it is just better to send something rather than not sending anything. Even if your text wouldn't be excellent it is always better to send something. If you don't say anything your voice is never recognized.

2) It was interesting to read the part in which Heidi was discussing the difficulties to start writing. I can relate to that and I felt the same way she was writing. It is not that bad to write when you get started but sometimes it may be really hard to start your writing. Never letting you do "shitty first draft" at first. Always trying to do it well from the beginning and it takes lots of effort to start.

3) I learned that sometimes it is just better to let it go. For example if you are struggling with one paragraph, you don't have to make it perfect but just try to write something and move on. Maybe after a while you have different aspect and you do have better ideas now.

This chapter kind of relates to my own research paper. I want to do it well and I think about every sentences I am writing that if they sound good and are they in a logical order. Every time when I get started with this research paper I am doing a lot and it is not that bad to write it. But sometimes it is just really hard to begin your work.

“Living Sources: Interviews and Surveys”

In this article I learned how to be a good interviewer and how to manage a good survey.
1) First of all, it is really important that you will interview person whose situation relates to your issue. You have to have specific questions for conducting a good interview and you have to be well prepared. The questions should be put in the way that the person you are interviewing could reply in sentences, not only "yes or no".

2) In the survey, you have to organize it well, so you are able to achieve goals you want to receive from your survey. You also have to think carefully who are you making to do the survey.

3) I also learned that it is possible to have "an email interview". In this method you are possible to get an interview with the people all around the world pretty easily. Only thing is that you have to find some "field expert's" name and try to look up for his email address. Then you are able to send him an email and probably get as good answer as you were having live interview.

In my project, I will conduct couple interviews here in ISU with few international students who come from Europe, Asia & Australia. I think I will also send couple emails to my friends who are also international students. I think I could get lot of data from my interviews and this part of project should be more fun.

Learnign from the 1st draft of a Literature review

1) I learned that you can find lot of different aspects on 1 exact issue. There are so many different perspectives, which all have little different view. I learned that it is very important to organize your text properly and it turned out to be quite difficult to put all of my sources together.

2) I think it is important because this part of project brings lot of information about the topic and I can already find some really important thoughts about it. This is the part where you combine your own thoughts together with sources and you can agree/disagree/compare with these resources.

3) My research fits well to my current knowledge. I felt I already knew lots of important issues related to my project before I even started it.

Quoting Activity

Graff(2011) They say I say.


This book shows the ways how to produce an effective argument. It requires not only to summarize what "they say" but by quoting their exact words. While using others' text, you must make sure they are strongly related to your topic. Like Graff states "Be careful not to select quotations just for the sake of demonstrating that you've read the author's work; you need to make sure they support your own argument"(pp. 42). Graff's point is that people should always pay attention if the text you are quoting is appropriate to your own argument. It's unnecessary to quote text which is not supporting your own topic.

Graff is also arguing "Finding relevant quotations is only part of your job; you also need to present them in a way that makes their relevance and meaning clear to your readers"(pp. 44). This statement seems to be important whenever writing a research. It's important that readers see why you are showing this quotation and why is it relevant to your topic. For example if you didn't present the quotations, readers would get confused what is the purpose of these.

"They Say I Say"

While I was reading these two distinct chapters, I realized that these issues are strongly related to my project. These chapters gave me some idea how and when I should use quotations. In chapter 3 "As He Himself Puts It" (1) I learned the idea how make a good argument in the project. It requires  quoting others view of issue in exact words and after it present it in your own words.

(2) Quotations you bring into your text, should support your own argument. So it doesn't leave any unclear thoughts. (3) Quality of quotations is also very important so it makes their relevance and meaning clear to the readers. (4) I learned that good academic writing requires you to put yourself into dialogue with others.

(5) It is extremely important that readers are able to tell when your quotation begins and when it ends. (6) Also readers should be able to tell when you are expressing your own thoughts. That makes good a good academic writing.

Evaluation of Research Questions

My research questions are strongly related to my situation and they really interest me. I want to know more about other international student's life and learn more about it. These topic fascinates me because I am in the same situation and I had lot of difficulties in my beginning. All the questions I raised are directly relevant to my discipline and I feel strong about topic. I have lot of knowledge about issue and I feel that I can make a good research. This topic should offer lot of data and it should be pretty easy to get information.


I m writing from international students and I m trying to find out how they are succeed in U.S. college. I also want to see if they were having some sort of difficulties and if they did I want to see what kind of difficulties? This writing is made for all the people who are interested about international students and their education progress. I want that my readers would learn more about their difficulties  therefore they could be more helpful for the upcoming students. I hope I am going to find some common problem what all the international students are going through and how they are going through it. What are the best ways to get through it. I m going to interview few people who are just beginning their studies as international student and also people who are just about graduate. I also try to get lot of information from library and try to collect some journals and books. 

College Life in ISU

I decided to do my researching project about international students. Few questions about this issue could be

-What difficulties they may have?

- How are they succeed?

- How do they feel while studying abroad?

"Researching One in Six Million " & "How I Fell in Love with Post Its"

        Researching one in six millions was interesting article to read. However it was pretty confusion to understand why author wanted to know so much about her grandmother. The article proved that if you don't have great amount of details about individual, you still are able to do great researching. Sometimes it may be really difficult to find any useful details about someone but if you have trust in yourself and put lot of effort you may have some luck. You also have to be patient according to Hilary Selznick text.

      How I fell in love with post its taught some important ways how to begin researching. The text was really metaphoral and it was interesting to read. I think I got couple really useful points from Susana's text and I am probably going to use them in my own researching project.

   these both articles described, how difficult it may be to start researching. The articles taught me, I have to be patient and try to get lot of information from all sort of aspects. It is also important to know, that the project may take lot of time and have to begin it in a good time. I think it was good to read these articles to do better in our own projects.

Linguistic Landscape Project

        In my project, I would create a poster. In the poster, I would take a stance on some really important issue for me. For instance, how important is it to do well in school and how does it benefit people in their future life. Poster would be perfect for this project because it is lot easier to display posters in a college area than some formal papers. Posters transmit the main points easier and they are easy to hand out. It is also much faster to read short posters than long formal papers. Especially if the posters are handed out within the college area. My topic 'importance of school' is pointed for young adults who are just going college at the time. College students should pay attention for the poster because it is really pointed for them.

Visual Texts Analyses

           The graffiti on the left, speaks out about the rich versus the poor. In the graffiti there is a couple who is enjoying their lives, sitting on a rickshaw ran by a poor little boy. In this picture the boy is refered to be a poor, who has to do extremely rough duties to survive from his weekdays.
         It is sad to see in this picture how some people may just enjoy themsel, while one is suffering. Like in this graffiti, the couple has dressed up in nice clothes and the man has expensive phone in use, whereas little boy has      barely any property.
        Graffiti's social function is to make people consider, how rough life may be in some areas in the world. Some people are suffering every day, whereas some other are just wasting their money for some unnecessary stuff. Like in this picture, the man has expensive phone in his use, while the kid has barely anything. Impact on this picture is to understand, that people should respect things they have and be happy about their life. There are always people whose life isn't self-evidence.

       












                This second graffiti "Because I'm worthless" takes a stance on how some people are treated like trush in community. As in the picture, there is drawn a rat and it refers how some people think they are treated. They may think they are as worthless as rats in the community because of the text above the rat. Its political view is to indicate to people that there is poverty in the community and it has problems in offering good life for everyone. People in that community may feel unhappiness and think they don't have any good reason to live because of the circumstances.
              It looks like, that the graffiti has being painted onto public wall and therefore its audience is all of its passers-by. Especially the young adults, who understand gratti's context. Impact on this graffiti is to make people think how much poverty is in the community. People who really start to think graffiti's function may consider if there is anything to do for it. 


These two different genres are basically considering the same issue, poor circumstances. Only the context is different. In the first graffiti, where the couple enjoys for the ride, it takes a stance more on world's poverty. While the second graffiti, is more about one specific community. One big difference between these two graffities, is that the second picture has being painted onto wall, whereas the first one has only drawn as an indoor picture.



 

Max's interview

         I interviewed Max couple of minutes and I found out he lives near by this town. He lives in town called Glen Ellyn and the place is two hours driving from Bloomington. He thinks his accent doesn't differ from the accents what are spoken in Illinois but it differs from the accents spoken for example in New York.
       People who are from different states, think Max has Chicago accent. He thinks people in Illinois are mostly speaking with a same accent. His parents are speaking in the same way as Max. In school he tries to be more formal but between friends and family he speaks like he wants to.

Critiquing and Changing Genres

    After I read the article I don't think I learned lot of new stuff but I got way more knowledge about genres. One thing I learned was how genres can be used to critique and change depending how do they behave within different scenes. Even if there are two same genre written about something, it can be written so differently by choosing distinct sentences. Within the same patterns writers have to follow same kind of genre but the texts always separate in some way.

    Genres don't always work for everyone within certain scenes. For example jurors may have problems following jury instructions given by judge because the language is written by lawyers and judges and it mostly serves only them. So some genres may fail to be effective for everyone. Critiquing genres reveals how well do certain genres serve people. It reveals the strenghts and weaknesses. Genres may also be changed because of new information, attitudes and knowledge about issue. For instance genre may evolve from experimental report to really informative report.

   M. Irene Taylor's article "Getting Personal" gave advice for writing a personal essay. In her opinion, the personal essay comes from your thoughts and you must be willing to commit yourself completely. You have to take a risk, tell your own thoughts about issue and also have to trust yourself. Those are the principles to write a personal essay. Essay isn't a personal if you are unable to explore it in depth. Aftering reading a personal essay, one should feel it was worth it to read the text.

Background of My Language

                         
                             In my family we speak Finnish and it is completely different to English. Here in United States I m trying to learn better English all the time. Here in college, my accent is being noticed. Usually people tell me according the first words, that I have an accent. I think the accent comes from my country because I can hear many Finnish people pronouncing words in same way. I also understand Finnish people's English easier and I feel more confident when it is spoken.

                At this moment I am not trying to code-switch my accent because even easy talking is a quite challenge for me. It is pretty important for me to communicate with bunch of different people and try to learn something from them. That is the only way to get better in English. 

"from Outside, In"

I read Barbara Mellix's text titled "From Outside, In". The text was pretty interesting because Mellix's described her feelings widely about her journey to get better in "standard english". It influenced my motivation about studying English because I just got in United States and I have never learned proper English. So now I got motivated because I know it is possible to improve in a pretty short time if you just work hard.


Question 1.

"From Outside, In" tells a story about a black girl who is speaking "black English" and trying to develop her "proper English". In her journey she goes through many processes while getting better in standard English. So the title means that in her home, people are speaking in a different way and she tries to improve herself so she could also use proper English. In few situations she had to think carefully what she was saying to white people because she only knew "black english".


Question 2.

Mellix was using her Black English when she was talking to her family and friends. For the white people in her community who were "proper people" she was trying to use Standard English". She was supposed to use Standar English as well when her family's relatives came for a visit. When Mellix had to use Standard English, she felt that she had to think a moment before answering to anyone. That is because she didn't want to use Black English around her relatives. At the end of text when she learned more about "Standard English", she felt she was betraying her culture and blackness.

My Mum's Impact On Me

My mum has had lot of impact on me. She has always tried to show me the way. I think my mother has made me a person I am now. She has always told me what is wrong and what is right. So she has taught me how to live my life. I am in a really close relationship with my mum and I m still speaking with her everyday. She is probably the most important person in my life because without her huge help I wouldn't be the person I am now.

If I describe my mum I would say she is maybe the most kind of person. She never thinks anything bad about anyone and she is always trying to make everyone happy. She is social active person and she really likes to communicate with people. My mum always gets along with all kind of people. She is really friendly and she always tries to help person who is having some sort of trouble.

"Why and When We Speak Spanish in Public"

I liked to read Myriam Marquez's article because in her article there were many points where I was thinking in the same way as she. For me it was easy to relate to the text because I also recognize myself as a bilingual. I felt like I am nearly in the same situation as an author. That's why I liked the text so lot.

Question 1.

Marquez explains the reason why they haven't adopted english as their official family language because she thinks it is the matter of respect for her parents and comfort in her cultural roots. So she thinks it's good to maintain spanish in their official family language between the family. It also much more comfort to speak spanish between her family and it is more natural for them.
If I were standing next to these three people and they were speaking in Spanish, I would feel little lonely there. Especially if those three people were your friends, then it would be rude. I wouldn't mind at all if I didn't know them and they were speaking in Spanish because it's their option to choose what language they are speaking. If you don't know those three people that doesn't even belong to you what they are talking about.

Question 2.

I suppose U.S. government has seen diversity in the U.S. and they think it is very important for the country itself to have it. So if there was an official language it could be much more difficult for people from different country to come to the U.S. if they cannot speak their own language. Especially if there are families whose origin is for example in Finland so it is lot easier for the family to speak Finnish to each other. Also it is much more comfort and they are maintaining their culture. Of course if there are one or more people in the house who don't understand the language then it is rude to speak their own language. I think there is no need for such legislation now because then the U.S. would lose their diversity.

In my opinion the writing feature what makes that piece of writing so powerful is that Myriam has lot of experience about situation. She also has lot of knowledge about it and she wants to make it clear for readers what she thinks. So everyone could understand her thoughts.

This type of genre really makes you think how is life from different view.

Comparing 3 genres, newspapers, facebook, school books

Usually when I am reading news which are not so interesting for me, I just browse them quickly and not so carefully. But if some news really interests me, I am reading it carefully from the beginning till the end and sometimes I am even trying to get more information about it.

When I go to Facebook to read some new status updates or anything what is there, I go really fast from the beginning till the end and sometimes I don't even see interesting updates so I just go through it and I am done. Sometimes when some of my friend has posted something I usually check it carefully and try to comment something funny.

School books are quite different genre for me. I try to understand everything what are in it. If there is something what I can't understand I try to ask some help and try to get it. So I am trying to understand them, not just browse them.

My Picture Analysis

   

 This picture is taken from somewhere where it’s snowing a lot in winterns. In this image all the landscape is surronded by trees and snow. The snow is all over this picture and it has landed on the trees too. The picture has been taken pretty late because the sun is setting down. The sky in this picture is truly beautiful because of the sunset. In this picture the landscape’s lights are quite pale except the little part where you can see the sunset. There must be extremely cold in the place where picture has been taken because there is so much snow out there and it looks like it has been there for long time.

 The importance of this picture is that everyone would understand there is places where circumnstances are not probably so comfortable. Especially when there is so much snow as in this picture there must be really difficult to walk from place to place. Especially if you are going to workplace or somewhere you are supposed to go. The importance of this picture is to understand that the life is not a truism and some people have to work really hard for their living. For example it is such a punishment to work outside if it’s as cold as in this picture.

Reasons I chose this picture are simple. First of all my home country is Finland and we indeed have weather like that in winterns. So I wanted to take this picture because I had to show in what kind of circumstances am I living sometimes. It may not be familiar landscape for this class so that’s second reason I wanted to bring this picture. Third reason is that I really think this landscape is extremely beautiful and it is part of me because I am living there. 

Here it starts

Hello. I love to be in United States. I am living my dream.