Rules, Rules, RulesProf. Myrna Monllor

BWP

Rules of Writing

Errors are rhetorical; that is, they are a matter of the writer’s authority and purpose, the readers’ expectations, and the context in which the piece is written and read.

Gallagher, Chris W. and Amy Lee. Teaching Writing that Matters: Tools and Projects that Motivate Adolescent Writers. Scholastic, 2008.

p. 32

Intruder in the Dust by William Faulkner

• For every Southern boy fourteen years old, not once but whenever he wants it, there is the instant when it's still not yet two oclock on that July afternoon in 1863, the brigades are in position behind the rail fence, the guns are laid and ready in the woods and the furled flags are already loosened to break out and Pickett himself with his long oiled ringlets and his hat in one hand probably and his sword in the other looking up the hill waiting for Longstreet to give the word and it's all in the balance, it hasn't happened yet, it hasn't even begun yet, it not only hasn't begun yet but there is still time for it not to begin against that position and those circumstances which made more men than Garnett and Kemper and Armstead and Wilcox look grave yet it's going to begin, we all know that, we have come too far with too much at stake and that moment doesn't need even a fourteen-year-old boy to think This time. Maybe this time with all this much to lose and all this much to gain: Pennsylvania, Maryland, the world, the golden dome of Washington itself to crown with desperate and unbelievable victory the desperate gamble, the cast made two years ago....

a pretty a day by e e cummings

a pretty a day(and every fades)is here and away(but born are maidsto flower an hourin all, all)

o yes to floweruntil so blithea doer a wooersome limber and lithesome very fine mowera tall; tall

some jerry so very(and nellie and fan)some handsomest harry(and sally and nanthey tremble and cowerso pale:pale)

for betty was bornto never say naybut lucy could learnand lily could prayand fewer were shyerthan doll. doll

Still I Rise by Maya Angelou

You may write me down in history With your bitter, twisted lies,You may trod me in the very dirt But still, like dust, I'll rise.

Does my sassiness upset youWhy are you beset with Gloom? 'Cause I walk like I've got oil wells Pumping in my living room.

Just like moons and like suns,With the certainty of tides, Just like hopes springing high, Still I'll rise.

Did you want to see me broken?Bowed head and lowered eyes?Shoulders falling down liketeardrops,Weakened by my soulful cries?

Girl Interrupted by Susana Kaysen

Push by Sapphire

Rhetorical AwarenessActivity 1

Write 3 different 200 word descriptions of yourself:

1. To introduce yourself to the class

2. For a journal that is publishing one of your articles

3. For a Facebook or other social network page

Re-Visioning Possibilities

• Change the point of view of the text

• Change the genre of the text

• Change the audience.• Change from narration

to dialogue or description

Response Strategies

• Summarize or restate• Glossing (selecting words or phrases from the

text that condense its meaning)• Respond• Point (What seems most important here is…What is missing is…)• Extend/Add (You can also apply this to…)

Response Strategies

• Encourage• Suggest ( You should move this to …)• Solicit (Could you add details about…

information …)• Connect (This relates to …)• Evaluate• Argue (Another way to look at this is)• Question

The role of a writer is not to say what we all can say, but what we are unable to say. Anaïs Nin

I would hurl words into this darkness and wait for an echo, and if an echo sounded, no matter how faintly, I would send other words to tell, to march, to fight, to create a sense of hunger for life that gnaws in us all. Richard Wright, American Hunger, 1977