Theodora JohnsonComposition TheoryWriting StyleDr. Earnest Cox

My Writing Process: From Old to New As noted in the text Cross Talk in Comp Theory, edited by Victor Villanueva and Kristin L. Arola, the following statement that writing is a process sounds pretty obviousthere is a process in getting from mind to page (Villanueva 1) rings true. There has to be a systematic way to get what we think, what weve read and analyzed, or what we feel from our minds onto paper. It takes processing to take the thoughts or understandings that we have and to put them into words that incorporate the right diction, the right tone, and the right style to fit the purpose and the audience to whom it is directed. Much of the first portion of the text is made up of theories about the writing process. Theorists such as Sondra Perl, Donald Murray, Linda Flower and John R. Hayes, and Mina P. Shaughnessy share their thoughts about the process of writing, about product, and about audience in the early portions of out text. As we look into their viewpoints, Ill also share views about my thoughts of the writing process as it applies to my own, well, writing. When it comes to my writing process, I am a conundrum. I teach writing, or should say, taught it one way but practice the craft in a different way. The main approach I use when composing depends on what Im writing, and why Im writing it. For example, while starting this paper, I am sitting in front of the computer and typing my thoughts as they come to mind and pertain to this topic. There is some processing going on as I decide what theories I want to incorporate into the overall product and how I want to word what I have to say. Other processes Im noting involves the practice Im using to put this paper together. As I sit here, my fingers fly across the keys as fast as the thoughts come into my mind and pretty soon, four lines of thought have appeared already. This has not always been my process for composing papers, however. How I write, now, is another stage in my evolution as a writerfrom a student writer and creative writer to a writing teacher, back to being a student writer who is becoming a writing specialist. With the help of some experts in the field, we will explore some of these stages.I am pleased with how my process has changed and grown through the years. Even though Im battling writers block to put this paper together, I can see a marked change in how I write. When I came back to school as an interim post-baccalaureate student, I tended to use the same processes I had learned as a high school student and had taught students to use while I was a high school English teacher. Once the instructor gave the writing assignment, I pulled these items from my classroom file: a plan page, an outline form, an introduction page form, and paper to write my rough draft. I would sit and walk through this process: First, the plan page:TopicSubject area 1. ______________________________Subject area 2. ______________________________Subject area 3._______________________________Thesis Statement: ______________________________________________ Introduction:

I would fill in these components to make sure I would have adequate content to produce a substantial product and to make sure all the content was aligned with the topic. After completing the plan page, I would move on the second step, the outline:OUTLINEIDEOLOGY OF HAIR AND BLACK WOMEN FROM THE VIEW OF GOOD HAIRI. INTRODUCTION: Actor/comedian Chris Rock set off a time-release bomb of rhetoric in communities across America and other parts of the world with his movie/documentary Good Hair. He probably never considered himself to be seen as a rhetorician, but through this movie, he has brought a worldwide view to one of the most controversial ideologies of this country and our culture, and his audience is talking about it. The very title of the movie was enough to raise the proverbial kitchens of many a black womans hairs on the back of her neck. Commentaries about the movies subject matter that started with an innocent questionDaddy, why dont I have good hair? from his teary-eyed daughterare showing up in magazines, blogs, Facebook statuses, in hair salons and barber shops. People are talking about good hair. What is good hair? Where did the concept of good hair come from? Why is this golden fleece such an obsessive quest for so many African-American women? How did it rise to its hegemonic status in the Black community? In his quest to find the answer to these questions, Mr. Rock has stirred up a hornets nest, but in the midst of all the buzz, did he find an answer for his daughter and the other daughters of the Diaspora?II. THE IDEOLOGY DISPLAYED TO SELL THE IMAGEIII. THE QUEST FOR GOOD HAIR(weave, lace-front wigs)IV. THE THEORY OF SELF HATREDV. STRAIGHT HAIR VS. NATURAL(NAPPY) HAIRVI. THE BARBIE IMAGEVII. THE INDIAN HAIR CRAZEVIII. IX. TESSAS DILEMMAX. ROCKS DISCOVERY

The next steps, as I said earlier, would be the rough draft, the revision stage, then the final draft. Although this process was in line with what Donald Murray says, that the writing process itself can be divided into three stages: prewriting, writing, and rewriting (Villanueva 4), after going through my old process for a semester, I moved on and incorporated some new strategies that are more conducive with my limited time frame. I still write using the three stages, they are just not so time consuming and rigid. During the prewriting stage now, I just write; I bypass the plan page and the outline stages and start with the drafting stage. While drafting, I dump all the thoughts and research on the page, then I backtrack after each paragraph and read it aloud to make sure it is coherent, stylistic, and grammatically correct. When I have reached a stage of completion of the first/rough draft, I print off the paper and read the entire document with my editors eye then I ask a peer to edit it also to get a second opinion. After thats done, I re-type my final draft.Graduating into the digital age is an entity that also has helped restructure my writing process. Although I am a digital immigrant, being able to sit in front of the screen and type the words makes the process so much smoother. Word processing allows me or any writer the opportunity to copy, cut, paste, store not only the document but also any data or research that needs to be embedded into the document. Using this digital resource allows me to dump all my thoughts on paper and then weed out what I want to keep and embed what I want to add. Having these options available allows me to understand what Linda Flower and John Hayes ask in their article A Cognitive Process Theory of Writing: What guides the decisions writers make as they write? How do writers actually go about choosing diction, syntactic and organizational patterns, and content? Kinneavy claims that ones purposeinforming, persuading, expressing, or manipulating language for its own sakeguides these choices(Villanova 253).

After dumping words on the page, I go through this cognitive process. While I read through each paragraph in the revision stage, I am guided by the purpose of the document when determining my word choices, syntactic structure, and content. As far as organizational structure, thats guided by the purpose of the document as well. For a persuasive paper, I would start with my strongest selling claim, add supporting arguments, and end with a strong closing statement; for a narrative, I would organize the story based on the five Ws and H and check for the correct sequence. If it is business communication, I would be cognizant in making sure I use the RTAA Format. The purpose for the document would also guide my word choices and languagewhether to use formal language and heightened-style diction or whether to use more casual style in the document. All these fixes would occur in the reviewing and revision process of my composing.Writing processes evolve over time as the writer evolves. My process has definitely evolved, and I feel that Im a better writer for it. I dont feel as overwhelmed and bogged down when I write using this new process that Donald Murray talks about. I still write with a finished product in mind, but the streamlined process I now use makes composing a sweeter race.

BibliographyVillanueva, Victor and Kristin L. Arola, Ed. Cross Talk In Comp Theory. Urbana, Illinois: National Council of Teachers of English, 2011.