What Not to Wear

            I write this blog concerned for the happiness of my tutors.  I definitely believe that if there is one thing that we must do as tutors, besides help them become better writers, is to make them feel comfortable when doing that.  And I don’t mean that we must all be “fake nice” or even forcibly sweet and cordial, I believe that we must be compassionate, easy-going, and visibly relaxed.

            Imagine: if a writer comes in, stressed already, and finds her tutor guzzling down a large Redeye, pants dirty and shirt on inside out, what does this say about this person, and sadly, on the writing center in general?  Besides the necessity to be calm, understanding, and helpful, there is so much more to the overall presentation of the tutor.  In Leigh Ryan and Lisa Zimmerelli’s book The Bedford Guide for Writing Tutors, they discuss the importance of the right kind of clothing: “be aware that your body language and clothing also express unspoken messages” (18).  If a tutor were to wear sloppy clothing, the student would not take the tutor seriously.  Alternatively, if the tutor were wearing a nice dress with pearls or a suit, the student could be overwhelmed, feel insecure of their clothing choice, and not focus on their own paper out of sheer discomfort.

            I express my belief that a tutor should be conscientious about what they’re wearing.  Of course I don’t want you to go out and buy a whole new wardrobe of simple tees and basic jeans with the want to “dress casually and comfortably,” but I would think to myself “how would this student perceive me?” while changing in the morning.

            It is the little things that make the student more comfortable, and why not focus on them?  The ending result is that the student leaves the writing center happy and motivated.  

The Editing Process: A Black Hole to Originality?

       Whenever a teacher, a tutor or a peer helps a writer strengthen their paper, is the act ever untainted by opinions from the editor? I believe that no matter what, if anyone looks at a paper and critiques it, the editor’s comments will never leave the mind of the writer, and thus ultimately effect the paper—but is there a way to allow the writer to originally fill in the gaps illuminated by the editor? Is the writer doomed with the task of writing a paper, giving it to the teacher, and changing the paper to accommodate the needs of the professor? I’d like the think that the writing center may avoid this: because the tutor is not the teacher, the consultation allows the writer to maintain most of his of her own independence in the paper.
       In Richard Straub’s article, “A Concept of Control in Teacher Response: Defining the Varieties of ‘Directive’ and ‘Facilitative’ Commentary’,” he speaks of the fine line that teachers face when editing papers. Straub suggests that teachers should edit the papers as if they were the “common reader” (Straub, 224). Also, each teacher must remind him or herself “not (to) take over” (Straub, 224). I see the validity in his statements; teachers should not overcome the reader’s opinions but rather help the student become a better reader. But I ask you: how far can we really believe this? Each teacher, just as each person, has his or her own opinion and bias; it is impossible not to pass these onto the paper when edited.
       No matter if the editor is “directive” (Straub, 234) or not, the writer will no doubt change a piece of their writing; the writing will no longer be simply the writer’s work, it will be tainted (not necessarily good or bad) by someone else’s pen. I agree that there are levels to the editor’s impression on the writer, as some may be specific changes and some broad general critiques. Once the red pen goes to paper, however, the piece is no longer the original writer’s piece and thus any form of editing serves a similar role. A teacher must decide how much they wish to change that original writer’s words, which is truly a hard decision to make.

My First Shadowing Experience

                Last week I was able to observe my first writing tutoring experience.  It was interesting to be on the outside, and quite a bit less stressful I would imagine.  But what I found, from this one experience, is that I do not need to stress as much as I first thought.  The girl asking for help was incredibly nice, bright, and talkative.  We spoke to each other even before the writing consultant came and she explained that she needed him to review her application for an internship this summer abroad.

                As soon as the writing tutor entered the room, he was casual but still professional.  He greeted her, asked what she needed, and then sat down to work with her.  The entire conversation lasted about twenty minutes, in which he read her article and then offered ideas to better convey her enthusiasm for the project.  Interestingly, one of the things that he spoke of was to delve right into the information; by stating upfront what she wanted to do with this programs, she would be bringing the reader in and not holding him or her at a distance.

                Richard Lanham, a professor at UCLA, speaks about the importance of making language “clear and concise.”  His fourth point in his “Paramedic Method” is to draw the reader in immediately, telling them clearly what is going on.  I believe he makes a great point here—even if it may take a while to accomplish this smoothly and is easier said than done. 

                The point here is that the writing consultant helped out the writer; he pointed to places that needed strength, that needed the dramatic pulling in of the reader, to set her application apart from the others on the table.  The writer left happy, refreshed, and able to set to work on her paper, one written by herself, and not by the writing tutor.

Where Did I Put That Assignment Sheet?

            I cannot emphasize enough the importance of the assignment sheet.  Everyone knows what happens when the teacher passes out the assignment sheet: it is usually a month before the essay is due and so we put it in the back of our binders, make a little note in our assignment books, and presently forget about it.  It remains there, out of sight, and out of mind, so that when we look to write our essay, we often start without reading the sheet, relying on mere memory or guessing.

            Not only is this tragic, but we seem to be shooting ourselves in the foot here: the assignment sheet is the easiest part of the assignment, as it tells us exactly what to do.  I must ask: why do we often neglect it?  It still confuses me, as I begin essays and then ask myself “Wait—what am I even trying to answer?”

            Anna Kendall writes in “The Assignment Sheet Mystery” that students often ignore the assignment and write their own versions “because they ‘like it better that way’. And it is often these same students who explain that ‘the teacher doesn’t get’ their writing” (Kendall, 5).  This statement infuriates me; yes, I am an advocate of originality, but it is often never the case in this situation.  These students that stress their “originality” often are simply lazy, unwilling to cooperate with the teacher or follow the rules.

            I have had an experience with this just last month when helping a child on his essay.  I made the mistake of letting him write three body paragraphs without looking at the assignment sheet.  When I read through the three body paragraphs and found that none of them connected and did not reach any sort of point, I asked him for the essay question.  After a hesitation, we spent ten minutes in search for the missing assignment sheet.  Stuck in the back of a binder, I found that in no way did the boy answer the question that was asked.  We sat down and he began to outline a new essay, working what he already had into a new form.

            That simple ten minutes we spent looking for the essay question was incredibly worth it; without the question, his teacher would have no doubt scored him much lower.  And even more so, because of the assignment sheet, we were able to work together to create a clearer thesis and a clearer body.  The assignment sheet was able to answer many of our questions and hopefully earn him a better grade.

Talking to a Wall May Not be So Bad After All…

            We all can agree that in high school our teachers would say the same things: “Never start a sentence with ‘but’,” “Never use passive voice,” “SHOW me, not TELL me,”— and we all listened, pulling and tweaking our writing to guarantee an “A.”  But what Keith Hjortshoj tells us, in his article “Rules and Errors” in his book The Transition to College Writing, is that these rules are broken, and should not always be applied.  He voices: “I can easily find examples from respectable published writing that contradict these rules” (89).  What we need to find, rather is out own set of rules.

            Proofreading, or rather, finding errors, is not based upon a set of rules, like the ones mentioned above.  I believe, rather, that each writer must find a set of rules that he or she abides by and believes in.

            Many people do multiple drafts, and some make one outline and then produce a paper; both are different means for writing a paper, and both unique to the individual.  As for me, I always write multiple drafts and often spend time reassessing topic sentences.  But most importantly, I always read aloud my work after each draft.  Something as silly as “The girl and the boy, who were a couple for many years, bought a dog,” if read aloud, can be corrected to something like “The girl and boy, who had been a couple for many years, decided to buy a dog.”

            Easily, the sentence becomes much stronger and to put it bluntly, less awkward sounding.  Hjortshoj agrees with this technique: “Your ear for language is also more reliable than your eye” (85).  Reading your paper to a friend, or even to your computer screen is necessary to catch those little errors (And even after I write this blog, I will be reading it aloud to check for errors).  So next time you need some advice, read your paper aloud to the wall; it may not answer you, but you will find some answers on your own.

I May Shit, But Do I Bullshit?

       In a direct response to the essay “A Kind Word for Bullshit: The Problem of Academic Writing?” by Philip Eubanks and John D. Schaeffer, I ask myself this question: do I bullshit?  I myself am an English major and so I relate myself to the Academia and look forward to a future surrounded in this.  But is this future one of total bullshit?  My immediate response to this accusation is to naturally refute and refuse it completely.  How could I agree that what I base my life around, pay 50,000 dollars a year to learn at college, and waste precious hours studying, is all bullshit?  No, no, of course I reject it—it would be mad to agree to this.  However, I know what we do in English, and how writers twist words, is sometimes stretching the truth.  Could it be true: are we all just bullshitters?

       Now, I feel that the term “bullshit” is harsh, and was probably chosen to grab greater attention from the reader.  And while at first I chuckled, as the pages went on, I grew more and more uncomfortable.  Was it because the term is crude or because I was realizing the falsity of English academia?  Well, I cannot be sure exactly, but I feel like it was a bit of both.  The term “bullshit” seems to pull out a greater reaction from the reader, but also seems a bit outlandish.  When the authors bring up Dave Barry’s accusation of the “bullshit” of Moby Dick and the similarities the whale has to the Republic of Ireland, he seems to criticize writers: “If you can regularly come up with lunatic interpretations of simple stories, you should major in English” (373).

       But that seems to be part of the beauty in English; there is no exact answer to each piece of writing.  There are words and lines, but no exact meanings of readings.  Scholars thus write to explain, criticize, or argue points and speak amongst each other.  In one piece of this article, he states: “Their goal is to sell the product, yet they are required to present themselves as benefactors of their potential customers, as persons with only the good of the client at heart” (378).  So in a ways, that makes the writer a salesperson—but can you claim that they are a “bullshitter?”  What if they truly believe in their position (which hopefully they do, putting so much passion and work into a piece)?  They would not claim themselves as a “bullshitter,” and that is no doubt another reason why scholars take great offense to this claim.

       All too often, non-scholars place critical writing in the “bullshit” pile, simply because they do not understand this way of writing.  “For many non-academics, academic writing is not just bullshit but bullshit of the worst kind” (381).  It is not that they are misunderstanding the writing of academia that bothers scholars, but the fact that they toss out this hard work and claim it to be “bullshit.”  I believe that one quote speaks incredibly true of the thoughts of those outside the English academia; the normal reader would read something on, let’s say, Wuthering Heights and recount that: “Such jargon seems to contribute nothing to the reader except confusion” (381).  To them, and some academia, this essay would be bullshit.  It makes no sense, and seems far-fetched and insignificant.  But does that make it bullshit?  Does the author believe it to be bullshit?

       While the article does well in grabbing its reader in with the term “bullshit”, I feel that these authors overuse the term.  And while it is insulting to authors who spend their lives in this business, I feel like it is too negative towards the practice of writing.  Authors work incredibly hard to add essays into discussion, and while their point may be far-fetched and “bullshitted," those of the English Academia are not the only people supposedly “bullshitting."  I would classify most people to be guilty of bullshitting in their life—lawyers, business men and women, actors, salesmen, waiters, doctors, and I could list many more.