HW for 3/2

Slowing down to make sure we get to read enough of the works to come up with our ideas, the thesis and topic sentence are delayed, delayed, delayed. No Blackboard assignment is due for Essay 2 on Wednesday.

Instead, we will start focusing on landays on Wednesday.  Make sure to review the previous blog post that serves as the introduction to the article.

HW for 2/29: Landays

1. Read pages 1-99 [!!!] of Eliza Griswold's "Landays: Poetry of Afghan Women." The reading, found under Unit 2, includes many pictures and an EXTRA LARGE FONT.

• You need to spend at least two hours reading this and be at minimum 2/3 of the way through by Monday's class.

• Record in your course notebook three to four sentences that help you understand why/how a contemporary Pashtun woman uses landays. Make sure to record the page numbers with each quote.

• Define these words used in the article in your course notebook:  
• licentiousness
• poppy
• refugee camp
• burqa
• paradox

HW for 2/26

Actively read chapter 2 of Citizen

• How is the point of view different in chapter 2? 
• Does the narration change?
• Does the topic or subject matter change--and, if so, define that change?

HW for 2/24

Read chapter 1 of Citizen.

• What point of view does Rankine use in this piece? 
• What strikes you about the language and form of this piece?
• What do the pictures do?

Unit 2: Analyzing Subversive Texts

Subversion

• critique/rebellion against an established majority culture, an oppressive government, persons of authority

• literature that undermines authority

Let's start by reading the poem "Rape Joke," by Patricia Lockwood, together. 

• literary techniques:
• satirical tone 
• anaphora
• imagery
• symbol
• narration/ point of view 
• characterization

Questions inspired by the reading

• What makes a joke funny? (There are multiple types of humor, so let's try to classify some types of humor 

• What makes this poem subversive?

From Lumosity

How Reading Stimulates  Your Brain

What is the value of an English literature class — could you read on your own time and experience the same benefits? In a recent interdisciplinary collaboration between Stanford neurobiologists and assistant English professor Natalie Phillips, researchers used the Jane Austen classic Mansfield Park to investigate how the type of critical reading taught in most English classes may alter brain activation patterns.

Casual versus critical reading

As a longtime literary scholar, Phillips had always been interested in how reading literature could shape how people viewed the world. From anecdotal evidence, at least, it seemed as if the type of critical textual analysis taught in classrooms heightened attention when compared to casual reading.  To test this theory, Phillips and researchers from the Stanford Center for Cognitive and Neurobiological Imaging used an fMRI machine to scan the brains of 18 participants as they read a chapter from Austen’s Mansfield Park. First, the participants were asked to read the chapter casually, as they would for fun. Then they were asked to switch to close reading, a common term for the type of scrutiny to detail and form required to analyze text in a literary course. To ensure that participants could successfully switch between these two modes of reading, all participants were PhD candidates pursuing literary degrees.  Researchers observed a significant shift in brain activity patterns as the PhD students went from casual to critical modes. Critical reading increased bloodflow across the brain in general, and specifically to the prefrontal cortex.

Executive function and the brain

The prefrontal cortex is known to play a role in executive function, which refers to a set of higher-order cognitive processes that manage how you divide your attention and coordinate complex activities. Phillips and her team posit that executive function may help explain the observed changes in participants’ brains.  This field of “literary neuroscience” is a new one, and Phillips hopes that these preliminary results will lead to further research on how reading can shape and shift cognition. Though it’s still too early to understand exactly what the future of this new branch of research holds, Phillips suggests that critical reading could one day be seen as a valuable tool in “teaching us to modulate our concentration.”

HW for 2/22: Essay 1 due

Print and bring in your completed Essay 1 draft, which is for a grade.

• We will start Unit 2 by reading Citizen chapters in class together. I want you to focus this weekend on making your essay the best it can be, so put all of your focus into the writing.

• Make sure to be on time for class (check Late Policy), as anyone not in the room with essay by 10:00am is late.

• Don't be "Stuck on an Escalator" with your reasons for your work...find solutions rather than thinking your professors will solve them. 

Let's Get Ready to Ruuuuuuuuuuuumblllllllllllllllllle (Introductions)

General Essay Introduction Structure: 

1. Hook: opening sentence(s) of essay that sets up your topic==>something thematically connected 

2. Put the hook in context for thesis subject matter: transition from topic to specific subject matter

• Provides bridge of needed background information on thesis subject(s)

• Name  subject matter and other basic qualities of them relevant to essay

• Contextualize the subject matter based on essay prompt's purpose & your own essay theme of ideas

• use synonymous language from prompt (instead of "hero," use definition techniques to define heroism as it relates to essay; instead of "antihero," use techniques to outline 

• Essay 1: What are you going to break down with regard to these characters (your subject people)?  What do you learn

3. If you don't use the context to lay out subtopics, then explicitly lay out the body of essay in a succinct way 

• The most effective writing can combine #2's behaviors with #3
• Rather than thinking you need to fully state all of your ideas in full sentences, try to make a 1-2 sentence outline of subtopics. How?  Key words.

4. Finish off with the thesis statement.  

• Your thesis is another place where some of you like to include the subtopics within them. If so, okay. 

• Remember: the key is to know that when you write the subtopics into the thesis itself, it iss a rhetorical strategy, an option, and not as a "requirement."

\          Hook          /  \    Context        /    \  Subtopics   /     |  Thesis        |    /     Point 1     \  /  Reasoning     \/  Example            \

Peer or Self-Workshop Questions for Essay 1 Intro: 

• Some of these are basic questions about basic form 
• Some of these are rhetorical questions about basic content
• Some of these are rhetorical questions about upping language of content
• And the final one's are quirky questions to get you to think about where form meets content meets language meets theme

Read these questions. Then, read the draft. Then re-read these questions and start answering the questions:

1. Does intro have the basics?: 1. hook, 2. contextual details on subject, 3. subtopic introductions, and 4. thesis? On the lefthand side of draft, bracket each part and label 1, 2, 3, or 4.

2. What more do you want out of the hook and its language? Does the hook closely connect to the subject person and the subject points?

3. What type of character traits does the writer show or tell? What type of heroic quality are they writing about with regard to the other person and/or his or her self? Circle some key character trait phrases, images, etc.

4. What language do they have that is unmicrowaveable--not cliche or formulaic or unsurprising? Praise them for creativity phrases. Ask questions about stale language.

5. Pitch this essay based on the introduction. What are its themes and characters, and what makes the essay stand out as a story worth telling? What section would you find this essay at on a bookshelf at Barnes & Nobles or your library?

6. What would be the theme music to this essay? Artist, song, and perhaps a key lyric.

7. What are your feelings about the type of hero is in the essay? If it is a famous person, discuss them specifically. If his or her hero is a family member, focus on that person as a symbol of the family member they are (like younger brother).

HW for 2/19

Bring in a printed draft of your Essay 1 introductions for class activity.

HW for 2/17

Thanks to Monday's college closing, we missed an opportunity to discuss the Dillard essay in depth. Please read the blog post prior to this one. Our goal for Wednesday's class:

• Work on Essay 1 in class--using the time in the computer classroom to craft the essay while I go around to provide suggestions and answer questions. Make sure you bring your essay in progress.

Dillard's Views on The Essay

Balance

• the imaginative with the practical
• metaphor with rhetorical structure
• history and the individual

The Form/Structure

"You get to make up your own structure every time, a structure that arises from the materials and best contains them" (Dillard).

• We discussed this--what rhetorical structures will help? 
• organizational patterns
• transitional phrases
• ___________?

HW for 2/15

1. Continue writing your entire Essay 1 draft. Bring in an electronic file (e-mail it to yourself or have on USB) for in-class writing time/revision ideas.

2. Read the following (focus on the Dillard piece) to prepare for Monday's discussion:

Annie Dillard is considered one of the great narrative essayists. She meditates on the meaning of what has happened. Although I disagree with her generalization in the interview that "Poetry seems to have priced itself out of a job; sadly, it often handles few materials of significance and addresses a tiny audience" (Popova),  her words on the narrative essay are insightful, engaging, and inspiring. 
Therefore, read "Annie Dillard on the Art of the Essay and Narrative Nonfiction vs. Poetry and Short Stories" and take mental and written notes.

Then, here are two links to different collegiate sources that define and/or give  brief advice on writing narrative definition essays:

• Brookdale CC's definition 

• OWL's considerations  

Relevance and Theme: choosing hooks is a crafty choice...

Today, I wanted to use music lyrics as an example of what late American novelist Henry James commands: "Try to be one of those on whom nothing is lost." Music is an art form that many more people enjoy than, say, literature. If I had a dime for every time a student has told me they don't read, but....  (I'd be able to pay the tuition on this class with dimes.)

Plus, lyrics hook us, right? Song lyrics slink around our brains as ear-worms. For hooks, they remind us of two things we want to discuss with choosing the right hook for an essay, and what those words mean:

Relevance

• topical (larger essay prompt)
• subject matter (specific thesis subject)
• tone/point of view
• narrative arc
• message in the words
• playfulness with idea

Theme

• vocabulary
• imagery
• figures of speech
• outcome/message

Don't lift your heroes up so high 

that you can't touch 

Don't let your innocence go dry 

before the flood. 

There will always be another Harold Bloom

...

If your heart was as big as your mouth, you'd be real, 

but it's not...

... 

There goes my hero, watch him as he goes...

I can't be everything you want me to be. 

Finally, I can see the light through the leaves.

HW for 2/12: Introduction Hooks

General Hooks (p.26 in RR) The purpose of a hook is to draw your reader in to what you have to say. You don't want the hook to sound too broad and anonymous. You want to one of the general hooks below in a creative, but thesis-connected way: 

1. Relevant quote

• From the subject of your essay (the 'anti-hero'), or
• Something said about your subject that relates to your idea, or
• Something you said (real or imagined) about the person

2. Personal anecdote with relevance to thesis

• Perhaps, you can use one you can come back to?
• Perhaps, something about you that illustrates how much you needed a hero
• Or, something about you that illustrates how you've moved on from the person because of your realization

3. Provocative and relevant question

• Something asked about the negative behavior of the anti-hero
• Something asked about a certain (you define it in the easy) kind of hero

4. Specific Example that fit your subject (perhaps one you will actually bring back and expand on later in your body)

• Perhaps a fact (#5) about the subject person. Why people love him or her, or why people started to think twice about him or her....

5. Relevant fact: particularly one that sets the tone and allows you to explore the fact specifically as it relates to your thesis.

• State (and even provide your stance on) what the person did to garner a high or low status
• State something about the time/setting and how it relates to the person's importance as a subject

Drafting an Introduction

1. Have your thesis and subtopics at least drafted and outlined; these ideas are your map directions!

2. Decide which type of hook most interests you. Do some brainstorming that helps you (including, looking on the Internet for a relevant quote or fact to help you out)

3. Once you have the type of hook you want and have some content to work with, start drafting your introduction paragraph (

• Aim for around 8-12 solid sentences, or
• 1/2 to 3/4 at most of first page for 750 word essays

Once I find my hook, I can draft my introduction

• When using a quote or a fact, it is good to start your hook off with a phrase that introduces where that quote/fact is coming from:

• (subject of essay/author source) once said, "..."

• According to ________, ...

• Or...try out your own introductory phrase that gives context to the quote/hook!

T

HW for 2/10: Narrative Techniques: Characterization, Image, Hooks

Please note: the next Blackboard assignment, scheduled for Wednesday, will not be due until Friday. 


Creating Characters | Using Characterization 

• Appearance – how you physically describe them; what you emphasize about their looks
• Language – how they talk and what they talk about; accent, dialect, references they make, length of sentences …
• Behavior – define by actions, how they interact with other characters; how they treat themselves  
• Internal & External Thoughts – providing a character’s rationale for actions help shape the reader’s view

Evocative, Developed Images/Action

• Sensory language – allow reader to taste, smell, hear, feel, and see the place through images that radiate those senses!

• Naming things. Be scientific; show your knowledge.  (A bird? No, a cerulean warbler!) Clear images come from focused word choice)

• Show Action! Show your hero and you as the writer speaking, moving, thinking.

• Context – place and time (setting), and its impact on you, the writer
• those moments that they became people we admired and then people we no longer admired, and perhaps, the moment that person was redeemed...or similar moments

Starting to think ahead to Introductions

The First Line – Baiting Your Audience  

• Hook the reader with some surprising language 
• A stark image (use sensory language)
• Make an "odd" statement
• (We will have a lesson on writing introductions on Friday)

Reasons

What has lead your change in perspective of the person? (reading about Columbus inspires this question--why?)

Where does this reasoning belong in your essay? (Applying relevance to your critical thinking for school work?)

How do you think the world of today will be portrayed in 20, 30 years? How does Columbus chapter change how you think about America's views of Islam-- your own view? (Applying knowledge to your social life?)

Personalizing ideas more, & writing a paragraph

From the prompt:  Who is a person that you admired, that you saw as a hero, only to have their actions (including their words) or to have time (maturity?) change your point of view to now seeing them as an anti-hero, a regular ol' Joe, or something else less flattering. In your narrative, what has your changing view taught you—please, please, please: avoid clichés and platitudes. 

• Use I, my, mine, me. 
• Ignore everyone else, and focus on you.

More in depth--how to tell a story with a point:

• *If one of your topic sentences was a fact of what made the person important to everyone--rephrase that to be about what made him or her heroic to you. Attach some fact about them to what that did to make you think: this person is my hero, man. 

• Make sure you write about this subject person as they first 'existed' in your life.
• Fictionalize what you need--tell the partial truth of your own memory.
• *If you already wrote the "this is why they are my hero paragraph," then do the rest of the draft of a body paragraph about the moment you stopped seeing the person as a hero. 

• To do so, draft a personal anecdote that includes a memory that involves your essay subject (your hero turned anti-hero)

• Craft one figure of speech that describes the person in an odd and original way. State your past affinity for this person in a way that is fresh and individual. Avoid cliches. Your job is to not use a cliche figure of speech, but to craft your own. 

• Craft one characteristic that defines this person as heroic to you. To you.

• Use a strong verb, past tense, followed by the characteristic that they exhibited:

• ____ portrayed _______ , _______ exemplifies _____ , ... characterizes, illustrates, symbolizes...
• In your paragraph that includes the above, also answer this critical thinking question from the essay handout:

•  What questions and what things would you have for this person if they sat down at your dinner table?

HW for 2/8

1. Read chapter 2 of Lies My Teacher Told Me

2. Review PRE

3. Revise your main idea sentences

4. Start body paragraphs for essays

PRE: just do it

Read the following lecture to learn about the organizational technique of PRE. On Monday, you may:

• Ask questions you have about the technique, and 
• Answer my questions about the technique (in other words: I will discuss the technique, but I need to know what get from the technique and what you'd like to know more about). 

http://home.europa.com/~bence/pre/

The above picture is Steve Prefontaine, a world-class runner who died too young. His nickname is Pre. Look at how focused his eyes are in this picture and remember those eyes when you remember our unity technique, PRE, defined below.

http://www.justrunners.com/Steve%20Prefontaine%20Poster.htm

PRE, besides being a famous runner, is a mnemonic device: each letter represents what type of content needs to show up in a unified, developed paragraph. P(oint)R(eason)E(xample/explanation). 

PRE teaches us that to be the best one must put their best effort into all that they do. PRE can also teach us, again, how to write a unified body paragraph. 

Point: start each paragraph off with a sentence (we call it that Topic Sentence) that states who/what the paragraph is about--your subject--and what you have to say about that subject in that paragraph.

Reason: follow up your Topic Sentence with some logical reasons for why you believe your point is true.

Example: follow up your reasons with specific examples that support your point and reasons. You can also add a second E to Example, and that would be Explain! Make sure that when you illustrate your example that you also make sure to explain how it connects back to your Topic Sentence.

How to apply PRE:  

1. Read your text/generate topic sentences. For our example, read article, "In the Beginning."

2. Develop a larger point about the source text. For our example, the body paragraphs below make basic summary points about "how Prefontaine learned to be successful, according to the article." (We will discuss the different structure of Introductions and Conclusions over the coming semesters.)

3. After making a Point, incorporate your Reasons and some Example facts from the article and the quotes above.

Note that all Points are green, all Reasons are yellow, and the Examples/Explanatory sentences are all gray/black. I color-coded it so that you can see the different types of content and see the order/structure being repeated in each paragraph. 

           Steve Prefontaine, who held many American records in distance running, is a great example of how much effort plays a role in having success in life--even during high school years. Prefontaine started off as one of the weaker runners on his high school team before setting goals to become a national record holder by his senior year. In the article "In the Beginning," Michael Musca discusses how Prefontaine could not break five minutes in the mile his freshman year of high school, and as a sophomore failed to qualify for state. However, by his junior year in 1968, he went undefeated and won the Oregon state cross country meet in. Musca writes that "From this point forward, the winter of 1968, young Pre embarked on McClure’s 30-week program, which he hoped would yield the time goals and a state championship in the two-mile" (Musca). Prefontaine would run four to eight miles a day while working multiple jobs. His setting goals and following them is what lead to his success during those years.

      Those high school years are a small example of showing how setting goals matters; Prefontaine also had the work ethic and mindset to accomplish his goals. Steve Prefontaine is widely known as the ultimate competitor. He fulfilled his goals by training extremely hard and by maintaining an aggressive mindset that he would maintain for the rest of his life. There is no better evidence than Pre's own words: "To give anything less than your best is to sacrifice the gift" (Just Runners). These are the words of a competitor, someone who does not settle for finishing a task. Another quote of Prefontaine is "I'm going to work so that it's a pure guts race at the end, and if it is, then I am the only one who can win it" (NKFU). He confidently believes that nobody can beat him if he works as hard as he can.

        Prefontaine's successes came from also following a clear plan of actions to take to accomplish his goals. Pre's high school coach, Walt McClure, helped lay out a training program so that Prefontaine could set the records and live up to his goals. McClure set Pre up on a 30-week training regiment in the winter of 1968 that  helped Pre win state in the two-miler that Spring. Prefontaine continued to run at least four miles a day during that following summer, even as he worked multiple jobs to help his struggling family (Musca). Prefontaine won the two miler his senior year in a national record of 8:41.5 (Musca), which shows how much one can improve in something if they are really dedicated to their own success. 

       Prefontaine was never known as a fast runner, but his effort on those days off helped propel him towards national success at an early age.  ...

Revising Major Idea Sentences With Flair

(http://www.baconsports.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/ric-flair-woo.jpg)


Keep It Simple, Silly

• Why is it important to come back to the thesis and topic sentences? 

• Easy: your essay is nothing without clear points. Even on your trillionth draft, make sure each paragraph makes a clear point, and that your essay goes paragraph to paragraph in the most engaging way possible. 

• Second easy: placement. The thesis ends the introduction paragraph. The topic sentences start the body paragraphs. Their placement in the paragraph puts emphasis on them. Like the moment you meet someone for the first time, or the last time you hear from them--these moments are memorable. 

• What should I do to revise the sentences? Where do I look for help?

• Purpose of essay
• Content
• Theme
• Definition as an organization pattern  
• Accuracy/precision  | denotes/connotes
• Individuality--

• Try to stand out (in the best way)

• Try to, in a personal essay, be creative. How you write it is just as important as what you write. 

1. Look for phrases that can be replaced with few words, even just one word

2. Look for places to add some descriptive modifiers (adjectives, adverbs)

3. Look for places to add dependent clauses that further define your subject or object...or both

4. Look for places to use a figure of speech that fits the essay's theme (oh, yeah, and try to look at your language like its a movie with themes)

My Language Means Well

How Can We Begin to Write Narrative Definitions

One fundamental aspect of writing that you will come back to repeatedly in drafting your essays is your word choice. Here are a few ideas on word choice that you need to consider while you write:

A Word Means In Two Basic Ways

1. Denotation: the dictionary meaning a word holds; its surface meaning.

2. Connotation: extra meaning a word carries, or “suggests”; the meaning may be cultural, thematically related to rest of poem’s content. Also, a word or phrase may depend on a reader understanding alternate meanings in dictionary, sound-relations to other words (insure/ensure), context of usage, & other credible connections of the words to the rest of the text.

• Writers use figures of speech to create connotations
• Metaphors
• Similes
• Allusions
• Hyperbole
• Idioms and regionalisms
• & many more

A Writer Must Understand the Difference Between Precision and Accuracy

1. Accuracy: the word choice has correct denotative meaning
2. Precision: the word choice has connotations that meet the action/situation, including tone.

• Examples of precision: The scalpel slices. The ax hacks.
• Examples of imprecision:  The scalpel hacks!

• If a word/phrase doesn’t seem to fit the situation in a published piece, reflect upon why the author may have used an imprecise word/phrase.

In short, creative writers (including essayists) seek out the best synonyms. They select the right verb or noun or clause based on its precision, not just its accuracy. Therefore, a writer at his or her desk will often ask themselves such things as: Why this word--this phrase? What does it change?

• What verb do I want to use? Said, screamed, whispered, mumbled?

• What noun do I want to use? Bird  or parrot? Blue bunting, red bunting, or Eastern bluebird?

• What adjectives; what adverbs?

• What may my new figure of speech do that a more literal phrase or older figure of speech will not? What tone does my image create?
• For example: the imagistic phrase "a cow is lodged in the throat"  is tonally different than the cliche, "He is choking on his own words." There is some weight, some sense of immensity added to the newer, first phrase. 

HW for 2/5

 Post your topic sentences to Blackboard. Your topic sentences should develop the thesis point further (you may understand and approach these topic sentences as developed points/reasons for your thesis statement)

• Upload your assignment as a Word file (.doc or .docx), rather than post it in the comment section. I can provide clearer feedback, this way.

• 3-4 topic sentences for 3-4 body paragraphs

Organizational Patterns: Definition

Synonym – what are words or things that mean or do the same thing?

• When we say that ____=blank, the equivalent basic sentence structure then becomes: “________ is _________.”  However, you can revise such a basic structure to sound more creative.

• Think beyond the standard idea of synonyms to provide qualities that you believe are similar that others may not necessarily have or understand until you provide them! 
• For example: “A smart person learns from mistakes.” 

• Reflect on this: What are things your subject does? Actions that exemplify it?

• Creatively, figuratively: you could use metaphors, similes, and other figures of speech to create synonyms (this also falls under "illustration"):

• For aggressive behavior: Brady's a shark when it comes to selling things. (metaphor)
• For annoying.   Kelly chews his food like a weedwacker. (simile)
• For fear: The drill sergeant's screams ripped my heart into a thousand tiny pieces the first week of bootcamp. (hyperbole and metaphor)

Negation – what is your word or thing not?

•  Defining a word by examples of things or ideas that you do not find are part of your definition can be a good thing, especially if you are negating an idea that others believe.

• For example: “A celebrity is not a hero simply because they are famous. A hero does not have to be famous.”

• Negation is also really good for providing, obviously, nice contrasting images/senses.  

• For example: "A weak man does not cry; he does not care about what happens to others." 

• Such a comment gives some tonal understanding to your audience when used effectively.

• Again, you can also use figures of speech to show the opposite behavior (which can be fun to attempt). 

  
Classify – what is a category that your word can fit into? (Yes, it's both it's own and part of defining)

• Putting your word into a category of things that you find it relates to often helps illustrate your definition to readers.

• For example: “I see two types of evil people in the world: the first is a person who is intentionally cruel, and the second is a person who does not know that their actions are destroying others.”

 Illustration/Example 

• "Story with a point"

• Ask yourself: What's an example that allows us to see the word being put to use in daily life/history/?

• Describe physical action or characteristics

• Detail, detail, detail. Who does what where and when and why and how is it relevant to the meaning of the word/subject matter?

• Language that attempts to show/help reader visualize
• literal picture
• figurative picture

HW for 2/3

1. Post to Blackboard for a grade: Essay 1 thesis statement
 

2.  Read Rules for Writers Chapter 4 (especially p. 61-66)

Essay 1 prompt (file on Blackboard)

Worth: 150 points (15% of course grade)

Process Dates:

·       Wednesday, 2/3: Post thesis statement (one to two sentences MAX) draft to Blackboard

·       Friday, 2/5: Post topic sentences (3 to 5) to Blackboard

·       Wed., 2/10: Post first body paragraph to Blackboard

·       Friday, 2/19: Essay 1 due, typed and brought to class on time.

Requirements:

·       750 – 1000 effective words, which approximates to 3 to 4 pages (a full 3 minimum).

·       MLA Format: double-spaced paragraphs; 12-point Times New Roman or Cambria font

·       Include MLA in-text citation and a Work Cited page (not included in minimum page count)

·       Single space header on left side:

Student name

ENGL 101

Essay 1

Title (Centered)

Essay Topic/Purpose:

Christopher Columbus. Lance Armstrong. Bill Cosby. The Duggars. … Who is a person that you admired, that you saw as a hero, only to have their actions (including their words) or to have time (maturity?) change your point of view to now seeing them as an anti-hero, a regular ol' Joe, or something else less flattering. In your narrative, what has your changing view taught you—please, please, please: avoid clichés and platitudes. Use fresh language to express your views, balancing the creative individuality of who you are with the formality expected within academia.                                                                                                                                                                                

Critical Thinking on Topic:

·       Is there anybody famous that you used to admire?

·       Is there anybody who wasn’t famous but whom you admired?

·       What was it about the person that you felt made them a hero?

o   What is your definition of hero!?!

o   How has your definition evolved over time?

·       What questions and what things would you have for this person if they sat down at your dinner table?

·       Grammatically, this paper asks me to think about past and present—how does that help me think about sentence verb tense?

Essay 1: Defining An Anti-Hero

ENGL101