a commonplace book
The first two chapters of my dissertation focus on place as a topos for invention studies; basically, I think that place has been a crucial organizing feature of the ways we've approached rhetorical invention theories and strategies in Comp/Rhet. We think of invention as occurring in or out--of the writer's mind, of generic conventions, of... Continue Reading →
Chapter two has become my "quick and dirty history to invention" chapter. It's weird to think about this as a book, with chapters that should connect and all. I'm not sure how an introduction to a second chapter that really is a continuation of the first chapter should look: do I need to "hook" to... Continue Reading →
I'm starting to wonder if keeping a blog as part of my dissertation was a bad idea. I have lazy tendencies when it comes to writing regularly. I thought keeping a blog might help counteract that fact; instead, my Catholic guilt bubbles over in multiple writing sites. . . My husband and I saw Julie... Continue Reading →
It's odd to me now: I'm married, and I chose to move to Oklahoma to be with my husband while I finish writing my dissertation. I know we all have different roles we fulfill every day, but suddenly things have shifted. I'm no longer a teaching associate graduate student from Kentucky who happens to be... Continue Reading →
When Young, Becker, and Pike suggest that provisional writing might be more persuasive to readers than dogmatic writing, they say provisional writing "focuses on the process of inquiry itself and acknowledges the tentative nature of conclusions" (Rhetoric: Discovery and Change, 207). That sounds awful essayistic to me. . .process as a topos anybody? Just sayin'.
Moving hath begun. . .t-minus 7 days until we load up the truck and I am off to Oklahoma. Scared to death.
Something I've learned today: hyperbaton=figure of speech which involves separating words that naturally belong together for emphasis. metalepsis=figure of speech which chains together references from other figures of speech or references a part of a figure of speech to make a point. catachresis= can be either intentional or unintentional use of word that is radically different... Continue Reading →
is it so hard for me to get this chapter done?????
A quote from James Miller's "Everyman with a Blue Guitar: Imagination, Creativity, Language": "There is an intractable, impenetrable, flowing, and infinite world of reality that presses in on the senses, which the imagination then shapes into a tractable, penetrable, comprehensible reality structured by the strumming on the blue guitar-that is, in art, in language. This... Continue Reading →
I was unfamiliar with Wallace Stevens' poem "Man with the Blue Guitar" until I read James Miller's article "Everyman with a Blue Guitar: Imagination, Creativity, Language" in Landmark Essays in Rhetorical Invention in Writing. Interesting. I'll just post a link and leave it at that.
essaying the plains 