Fall Semester Recap

Throughout this semester, I gained a ton of useful knowledge that will benefit me in my future academic career. Through each phase we went through, we were able to achieve a variety of the course’s learning objectives. In Phase 1, we were required to draw back onto a moment in our life that had an impact on our literacy development and connect it to American Musicals. We had both a written portion and a presentation. For my presentation, the main goal was to appeal to my audience, and make it as interesting as possible. Whether it be the font, the colors, the images, everything played a huge role in attracting the audience. As this was the first assignment that was being presented to a big group, it was the first step in understanding how to “Recognize the role of language attitudes and standards in empowering, oppressing, and hierarchizing languages and their users, and be open to communicating across different languages and cultures.” This will be an extremely useful skill in the future as appealing to the audience is necessary in school and the real world, whether it be to persuade or educate someone.

Moving forward, Phase 2 required me to locate sources for a musical and issue I was interested in, and annotating each one. When coming across each source, the topic would be the same but each point of view was often different. This required me to further assess each source by breaking it down and looking for specific components to determine its usefulness. In doing so, I was able to “Gather, interpret, and assess information from a variety of sources and points of view.” The next learning objective also utilized during this phase is to “Locate research sources (including academic journal articles, magazine and newspaper articles) in the library’s databases or archives and on the Internet and evaluate them for credibility, accuracy, timeliness, and bias.” This is one of the learning objectives I feel I experienced a lot of growth in. I always had difficulty choosing the right sources and whether they would be useful or not. I feel that the library session really helped when it came to locating sources as we were introduced to advanced search, key words, and a bunch of other techniques. As for evaluating the sources, I feel that doing this alot during phase 2 and 3 made the process much easier as I was finally starting to look at the right things such as credibility, accuracy, timeliness, and bias. The worksheets and discussion board questions were extremely helpful in fully understanding this learning objective. This will be an extremely useful skill as in future papers I would be required to search/gather for sources efficiently, and be able to assess the usefulness. Here is an example of one of the sources I annotated in Phase 2, where I evaluate credibility, accuracy, timeliness, and bias.

While we are moving onto Phase 3, this objective also correlates with Phase 2. These phases worked hand in hand with another to achieve the objective, “Explore and analyze, in writing and reading, a variety of genres and rhetorical situations.” When it came to analyzing each source, we were required to break each reading down to understand the rhetorical situations. Professor Matias was extremely helpful when it came to this as she provided tons of worksheets that allowed me to practice a specific format called rhetorical precis, that highlighted the main rhetorical elements, the author’s credibility, understanding his or her purpose and message, rhetorical strategies, their tone, and audience in a matter of four sentences. This was extremely useful in my research essay, as it helped get the context and argument out in a smooth manner. I definitely see myself using this in the future as it made understanding each source easier, and helped the essay flow extremely smoothly. Here is an example of the rhetorical precis format of two different texts.

During phase 3, in our research essay we were required to use a number of sources that related to our topic and stance, and had to use a wide variety of strategies when incorporating them into our essay. Each text would have its own arguments and key points, but they all tied back to the main idea of the paper, so we often had to synthesize the sources with one another and determine if it supported, extended, complicated or challenged another. Before the synthesizing, we would follow the format of the rhetorical precis which included summary, analysis, and interpretation of the source. I used to always have trouble doing this as I always felt I included unnecessary information, so these strategies really helped me limit myself. Doing this made it easier for me to successfully “Compose texts that integrate your stance with appropriate sources using strategies such as summary, critical analysis, interpretation, synthesis, and argumentation.” Continuing on from Phase 3, the goal of our assignment was to focus on a specific musical and the significance the musical holds on a prevailing issue. Throughout the semester we watched multiple musicals, and learned to see that they are a form of entertainment for people while also bringing light to major issues that exist in society today. Such as racism, gentrification, social class and much more: “Hairspray shines light to the racism and racial segregation of African Americans during the 1960s. This issue is shown through The Corny Collins Show, In the High School, and within the characters in the musical itself.” As we watched more and more musicals, I realized I was able to successfully “Analyze how arts from diverse cultures of the past serve as a foundation for those of the present, as well as describe the significance of works of art in the societies that created them” and “Articulate how meaning is created in the arts or communications and how experience is interpreted and conveyed”. This will be extremely useful in the future as it teaches me that in all art, there is a much deeper meaning we must search for.

Now looking back at all four phases, I’ve realized I learned a lot about the field exploring creative expression. In each phase we were introduced to a different concept relating to creative expression, and would expand it onto the next. Whether it be through our studies on different musicals, readings of different theater criticisms, and communications through discussion boards, all were valuable components in making up this course . Through all four phases, I was able to “Identify and apply the fundamental concepts and methods of a discipline or interdisciplinary field exploring creative expression, including, but not limited to, arts, communications, creative writing, media arts, music, and theater.” I will utilize this learning objective in my future career as when it comes to one topic, it’s great to branch out and identify the different subtopics that surround it and make it whole. In doing so, I will be able to learn much more through the concepts and methods of a disciplinary or interdisciplinary field.