As a person, who is more math oriented I would like to say that I hate writing. I think it takes up a lot of time that I don’t have. When I am writing, especially for a long period of time, it hurts my hand. A lot of the writing in my life has been in the form of schoolwork whether through essays for projects or essays for exams. These time restraint settings just added fuel to the fire of hate I hate for writing. It requires a level of thinking and brain power that I don’t have the capacity for. This was my mindset before I took this writing class. I was under the notion that it would be like English classes I had taken beforehand, where I was given a question to answer and I had to write an essay. However, it was nothing like that. Instead, I had to decide what I wanted to write about and the only thing that was given to me was what the essay had to include about my topic. All the writing that I have done has led me to the conclusion that no matter what you are writing about, you have to have some kind of personal connection to it.

Before my first college English class I didn’t have a theory of writing. Writing had always been force fed to me like trying to get a young child to eat broccoli. In both circumstances, neither I nor the child like it. However, we do it because we were promised ice cream for dessert or in my case a good grade. The last time that I wrote for fun was in elementary school. I had become enamored with the story of J.K. Rowling and how she was able to keep her gender a secret while writing her magical books that would become a staple in the decade. She inspired me to do the same. I started writing my own series in the extra black and white composition notebook that I had. The plot was along the lines of how supernatural creatures were attacking a school and the protagonist was trying to stop them. I stopped writing it because to the disapproval of my parents, writers didn’t make as much money as doctors. That dream was officially shut down. However, it would have happened sooner or later because in middle school I was introduced to the format of an essay. It started the journey of my hatred towards them and my love for math. Math came easy to me and required one answer. It was something I could practice getting better at. Writing requires a level of brain power that I don’t have. All throughout middle school and high school my theory of writing would have been that everyone secretly hates writing so we don’t need it.

Coming into this class with all this in mind it really affected my process of writing. I was more concerned with the audience of the teacher making sure that they would like my essay. It made peer review irrelevant for me because my partner wasn’t the audience that I was trying to please. I loved the one on one conferences because I can get an idea of what the teacher wanted which helped in my revision. It wasn’t until during peer review that my partner had pointed out that I could make my purpose clearer that I realized how important they were because making my points clear was something that I always struggled with while writing my essays. It came from previously always putting fluff in my essays to make me as the author seem more knowledgeable than I need to be. When I was writing about things that I cared about, I didn’t need the fluff because my ideas and analyses were enough. That’s why I chose the rhetorical situation of African Americans in Education because it was something that meant a lot to me and a cause that I was truly interested in finding more information about. For my source-based essay, the most important part of my writing process was picking the sources. I tended to go more for sources whose author was educated, used formal language, a minority, and had a more pro stance on my rhetorical situation. Since I had a personal connection, with the rhetorical situation it made writing the essay much easier and since it was source based, I couldn’t inject my opinion on the situation itself, but more on the analysis of each source. This was very different from the inquiry-based essay where I was actively finding answers to the question of whether diversity was hurting HBCUs or not. I had gone in with the intention of being more informative and not persuasive because I didn’t want to give off a biased tone or attitude towards the situation. I would try to take the article for what it was and analyze it through a neutral person’s eyes. That soon changed when I was analyzing the counterargument. The purpose of the counter source made it seem like the white population that were entering these universities were doing the HBCUs a favor. It didn’t come across in such a harsh tone, but it presented the information in such a factual standpoint that as an African American reader it left me feeling like something was missing. I was missing the emotional side of it. The article didn’t really dive into a white person’s intention of going to an HBCU, but more about how history has affected the diversity of the area so white people just had to go to an HBCU.

Reading articles that took different stances on my rhetorical situation and used language to project facts to help that stance had a great influence on me when figuring out my composition in two genres. I felt what was missing in these articles was actual human emotion and feelings toward the situation. Since I had such a personal connection with the situation, I wanted to make sure that my genres reflected that and were not so much about facts but trying to see how a person in my situation feels about it. That’s why the reason I chose my genres was because I wanted to be as relatable as possible since my audience was the young student population who is involved in different stages of the college process. I wanted to get my message of what negative effects could happen with the diversity of these schools, but also in a lighthearted tone so the audience didn’t think I had any malicious intent with what I was saying. That’s why my genres were a rap verses and a comic. I think that introduces the complexity of my theory of writing. Any type of writing that has a personal connection to it is going to come with some bias. However, I believe the passion you have for that subject far outweighs any fear you have for bias showing because it fuels your purpose and stance on the subject. Once I realized that it made my writing process so much easier and every sentence, I typed meant something. Even in the source-based essay, when I was not injecting any type of opinions into the essay, that connection can be seen in the articles that I decided to choose for my essay. I could identify with the African American writers or the stance that African Americans have always been the inferior in education because of past prejudice and how our language when discussing it affects them. That’s what so important in writing for me. No matter what the topic is, if you want to have the most authentic tone, the clearest stance, the great passion, or grasp the right audience there needs to be some personal connection to it.

With my theory of writing in mind, some may not see it relating with the essays I had to do in school. How can I have a personal connection with the essay I have to write about the Ming Dynasty for an AP World History exam. Of course, I have no relation to the people or the time, but I can have a personal connection with their policies and how that would affect a person like me in that time period. There always lies a personal connection somewhere whether the author intended it, or you somehow find it. This year, I was also tasked with writing play reviews for my theater class. I had no connection with some of the plays. For example, there was one play I had to go see about two lovers whose parents act like they forbid their relationship when in all honesty they want them together. I have no love life so I couldn’t relate to that aspect, but I did have a personal connection with the plot line of getting something you always wanted and it not turning out how you thought it would be. That was a question the director probably wanted the audience to ask which became my personal connection with it.

My theory of writing is that you must have some type of connection with whatever you are writing because it gives you a better idea of your purpose, stance, and you can write more on your rhetorical situation. Before entering this English class, I was filled with thoughts of how annoying it would be to write essays on things that I had no interest in. When I was given the choice to choose my topic it was a spin on my past experiences that I was looking forward to. It brought out a side of my writing that I didn’t know existed and it made me analyze the writings I had done before. Even though a lot of it was rooted in my thoughts and feelings on books, essays, or history that had no relation to me. When I had the task of writing about them, I was able to meet the quota. It was because I found the personal connection it had me with me which made the words flow out of my head and onto the paper. I will take this theory with me as I move on to any future pieces I write. Even with my math orientated self, I try to incorporate writing into other aspects of my life. For example, any ideas I have for the next big innovation/invention. A great mash of the world I love and the world I don’t hate as much as I did before.