Through My Eyes

• Throughout phases one, two, and three of this Writing Composition course, I have gained much more insight into specific topics, such as linguistic discrimination, power systems, and different language narratives and dialects (AAVE), which I was not thoroughly familiar with before this class. Language is what makes up an essential part of an individual’s identity, something we use to communicate with each other and something we use to understand one another and achieve our hopes and dreams. English is one of the most widely articulated languages in the world and can be spoken in many different ways in particular settings with formality and informality. That can be seen in our classrooms, where students from many distinct countries come together as one, despite their language or accent distinctions, and learn about one another. Living in one of the most populated cities in the world has further inclined us, as human beings, to take the time to communicate effectively and understand one another, even with language differences, so that everyone can gain insights about other people’s cultures and have an increased range of knowledge about different languages. In this course, I have gained a lot of knowledge about AAVE, Appalachian accents, and bilingualism. By informing myself about these linguistic aspects, I can apply that information in the real world, such as in school, my workplace, or when I am out with friends.
• The assignments that were assigned during this semester, such as the Language and Literacy Narrative and the Research Essay, made me look into personal events in my life that involved language and how that impacted my learning and comprehension. During these assignments, I was able to do numbers two, four, five, six, and eight of the learning course outcomes, which are “Develop strategies for reading, drafting, collaborating, revising, and editing.” (CLO 2), “Engage in the collaborative and social aspects of writing processes.”(CLO 4), “Understand and use print and digital technologies to address a range of audiences” (CLO 5), “Locate research sources (including academic journal articles, magazines, and newspaper articles) in the library databases or archives and on the Internet and evaluate them for credibility, accuracy, timeliness, and bias” (CLO 6), and lastly, “Practice systematic application of citation conventions” (CLO 8). I recognized rhetorical terms and strategies when engaged with texts such as Kevin Abroads and Karen Leungs because I had to describe the purpose of their story and how they used ethos, pathos, and logos to engage their audience. I also recognized these terms in the discussion posts about ways to write a summary and what rhetorically accurate verbs we can use to state our thoughts. I was able to understand and use digital technologies to address a range of audiences by accessing the library, learning to use and find different sites and stories, and practicing systematic application of citation conventions in a class by using a website that generates the MLA format for the Research assignment.
• I had studied, in writing and reading, multiple rhetorical situations in phases one and two, such as the narratives of Kevin Abroads and Karen Leungs, Stanley Fish’s, and my own language and literacy narrative, when I thought about a specific time language impacted a part of my life. I think both assignments made me realize that language is more than just how we speak. In my literacy narrative, I explained how the words of the Quran impacted my comprehension because of how it is articulated and how the verses made me feel. While I did my Research Essay about how COVID had increased language barriers, I learned about various phrases that stemmed from the pandemic, what they mean, and how those phrases make language political because of the metaphorical meaning behind them or the way it is directed towards a specific group of people. Additionally, the individual narratives I viewed in FIQWS 10003, such as Kevin Abroad and Karen Leung’s, added a personal link by describing their experience and explaining what a situation may look like being bilingual and how others may perceive a particular language or identity. In phase three, I learned about power systems and aspects of language that might make it political in Stanley Fish’s essays. I thought of all this as a wake-up call or a reminder that linguistic discrimination is an actual, significant matter, even if many people do not know about it, and that it can hurt the person or how they perceive themselves.
• Reading and examining their experiences helped to learn course outcomes one, three, and seven, which are “Explore and analyze, in writing and reading, a variety of genres and rhetorical situations” (CLO 1), “Recognize and practice key rhetorical terms and strategies when engaged in writing situations” (CLO 3), and “Compose texts that integrate your stance with appropriate sources using strategies such as summary, critical analysis, interpretation, synthesis, and argumentation” (CLO 7). Overall, the course learning objectives how I can apply them in my writing, and how they help me to achieve my goals for my essay. These learning course outcomes helped me better understand what linguistic discrimination is, analyze different points of view, and learn to take the time to understand and be patient with those who speak a different language or dialect.