My Self-Assessment:
Looking back at my written assignments for this semester in my FIQWS Individual & Society Composition class, I was able to develop a good understanding of how throughout various sources of media (including films, news articles, and journal entries) the authors are able to utilize rhetorical strategies in their pieces. Second takeaway from this class was that I was able to have a better understanding of how the MLA format really works, especially in being able to cite my information which is something that I have not really put thought into before this class when it comes to writing papers. As I look back into my first paper being the Summary & Response paper, I cannot just look at all the flaws but instead look at the pros in my first paper of this class. This paper gave me the chance to connect more with my professors to learn more about the basics on writing a paper in MLA Format. From properly citing all of my resources I had to learn from scratch to having a better understanding of the rhetorical devices (Pathos, Logos, and Ethos) and how the authors use these devices into their works with the goal of being able to convince the reader with their points/opinions over a specific subject. Before even taking this class, with the help of the professors and these articles, I had to immediately think about how my actions are harming the environment and incorporate what we learn in the real world.
When it came to writing this second paper (The Comparative Analysis Paper) was that this assignment was going to be relatively easier compared to the first, but I later found out that this wasn’t the case. In the Comparative Analysis paper, the class had to compare two films being “Don’t Look Up” directed by Adam McKay, and “Princess Mononoke” directed by Hayao Miyazaki with the task of proving which of the two films is more effective in showing the audience the dangers of climate change. The comparative analysis paper had to be written in MLA format and I had a pretty good understanding of the format thanks to the past assignment but now we were dealing with films instead of articles. From a rapid shift from reading Articles to analyzing films, now one strategy that I had to work on was being able to successfully interpret what the directors have produced in their films and make a connection as to how their works relate with the rise of climate change. The main issue that I ran into was deciding which one out of the two options was more effective because both films did a good job while holding some strong key points that made me begin to doubt who to choose as my final decision. Despite choosing Princess Mononoke as the more effective film in this subject, I was really aiming towards talking about Adam McKay’s Don’t Look Up for its realism. Don’t Look Up is filmed as a live-action setting with no animation, immediately targeting a more mature audience, and each of the characters involved in the film represent how the people in current-society act. Even though the ending and some aspects of the film are unrealistic such as how some people would travel to another planet, the script and acting really brought up the amazing implementation of Pathos by the director. However, what ultimately decided to choose Princess Mononoke over the more “realistic” Don’t Look Up was the presence of another rhetorical strategy used by the director Hayao Miyazaki being the combination of pathos and ethos. This presence of Ethos makes the audience relate to the fictional characters and appear as not just a drawn persona but more as a good representation of how people do actually tend to react towards more realistic subjects.
Finally for my third paper being the Research Paper, the purpose of my research paper is to not simply go along with my thesis statement, but to convince educators to take more time in developing a better method of communication with their community. Better communication among both sides will most likely have a desired outcome after releasing collected data from the rise of climate change instead of seeing no results after releasing informative data with no despair. The better the approach to slowing down the rapid rise of climate change, educators will have to reach a specific audience based on their knowledge on the subject. This is one point even I have to admit that I was in the same situation because sometimes one has to understand that despite all the problems happening around the world, as an individual with all the things we all deal with in life sometimes we don’t always follow everything going around us. Thus, resulting in us having different levels of knowledge towards this issue. These levels of recognition can range from having no clue to having a decent amount of recognition as to what is going on. After being educated on the origins of our land (including water), the public will have to change their view on the poorly designed infrastructure that society has been accustomed to and immediately make changes on their behavior with their surroundings to prevent further issues. In one of my sources, Princess Mononoke, despite being an animated film, would show a side of the world that is being ignored by many others that proceed to go on with their personal lives and show how nature is being negatively impacted by industrialization. Once again, looking back at my papers as a whole I was able to incorporate various rhetorical strategies and organize my papers well in the aspect of citing my information properly with the help of my peers and professor.
