Major Assignment #1, Draft #2

“Writers make all kinds of choices and judgments; they select a  genre in which to compose, they aim to reach a particular audience, and they write with a particular purpose in mind, among other choices.”  There are a lot of examples of it but now we are going to focus in the work of 3 different authors,each one with a different style.Those authors and writing pieces are Billy Collins with his “Commencement Address”, Gloria Anzula with “How to Tame a Wild Tongue” and Martin Luther King Jr  with “Letter from Birmingham Jail”. In this analysis the focus is going to be on 3 key terms; *Genre:The type of writing or the category or how can we describe the writing. *Purpose:This is what the wring is trying to do or the message that it wants to deliver. *Audience:For whom the writing is intended in other words the public of the writing piece.

Let’s begin with Billy Collins and his commencement address,the genre of his work can be described as a commencement speech since he says that at a graduation ceremony like he said  “ This is not the first commencement address I have ever given. But the task of dispensing advice to a group of young strangers, and, worse, the job of reassuring them about the future does not get any easier with time or practice.”(Collins). He is a person that really understands what he is doing and his purpose which is to motivate the recent graduates as when he  describes the future using two different ways, one the poetic and the other the pragmatic, “The Pragmatic tend to think of the past as a body of tradition to be preserved and/or a reservoir of errors and miscalculations that we can learn from and apply to the Future. For the Poetic, the past is simply a source of nostalgia and regret”(Collins). He said that to show the recent graduates that life is not only black or white it depends on how you look at it.Also he does pretty well connecting with his audience which is a group of college students he does not do that  by only telling some jokes on his speech,the last part of his speech also was intended to connected with the audience by giving them the message of being proud of who they are and what the have done  “One final wish: Salvador Dali once said that “Every morning when I waken, I experience a supreme pleasure: that of being Salvador Dali.” May you graduates waken every morning to experience the supreme pleasure of being yourselves.”(Collins). And that is how we can describe the work of Billy Collins based on the three key terms.

Now it’s the turn of Gloria Anzula with, How to Tame a Wild Tongue, this is a very important writing because of the theme that is involved. Her work is a criticism against those who discriminate chicano people,the writing piece can be called as an autobiography because she used many things that happened to her to support her arguments like when she used a personal experience. One time when she had used a personal experience is when she said  “I remember being sent to the comer of the classroom for “talking back” to the Anglo teacher when all I was trying to do was tell her how to pronounce my name. “If you want to be American, speak ‘American.’ If you don’t like it, go back to Mexico where you belong.” (Anzula). With this piece we can assume that the audience she is trying to reach are those people who are being or feeling oppressed by linguistic domination,this also is shown when she said “a country where students in high schools and colleges are encouraged to take French classes because French is considered more ‘cultured’.”(Anzula)  Now let’s describe what her purpose is with this writing. Her purpose is to persuade and inform her audience why language freedom is a very important need as when she said  “Chicano Spanish sprang out of the Chicanos’ need to identify ourselves as a distinct people. We needed a language with which we could communicate with ourselves, a secret language.”(Anzula). In this quote she explains why chicano people needed a new language, one that is neither Spanish or English in order to not feel discriminated by both cultures.

Last but not least, we have Martin Luther King Jr with his Letter from Birmingham Jail. This is a writing that really makes you think of how the situation was and if we really end with it.The genre of writing can be classified as a letter because it is more than just a comment but less formal than an essay, it is like a talk person to person about a critique/reflection of the way people act or behave. Since he started the letter saying   “While confined here in the Birmingham City Jail, I came across your recent statement calling our present activities ‘unwise and untimely’”(King Jr). This is a critic because he is talking about how  people see his nonviolent actions as something wrong, while his only purpose is to get rid of all the aggression against people of color. He even provides information on the why of his actions by letting the reader of the letter know that “Birmingham is probably the most thoroughly segregated city in the United States. Its ugly record of police brutality is known in every section of the country. Its unjust treatment of Negroes in the courts is a notorious reality.”(King Jr)  As he explains the place where he was got the highest record in injustices against black people.With this letter there was a specific audience and that was the 8 clergymen people that were racist and see him as something bad.The idea of these people being his audiences is show in this quote “when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate-filled policemen curse, kick, brutalize, and even kill your black brothers and sisters with impunity; when you see the vast majority of your 20 million Negro brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society; when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six-year-old daughter why she can’t go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television.”(King Jr)  He is using the word “when” pretty often so the people who read it can think of it as a personal experience or put herself/himself into that situation and make them think deeply about it,and they may try to find a way to stop it. His purpose was to persuade his audience to see all the evil they were causing and thus stop doing it. One quote that show his purpose is this one “fellow clergyman and a Christian brother. Let us all hope that the dark clouds of racial prejudice will soon pass away and the deep fog of misunderstanding will be lifted from our fear-drenched communities and in some not too distant tomorrow the radiant stars of love and brotherhood will shine over our great nation with all of their scintillating beauty.”(King Jr). We can see that the actions of King Jr were noble and all he wanted was peace between the people of color and white people after year of segregation and discrimination.

As we can see each author use different writing strategies. They use their own genre according to their purpose and know exactly what audience they want to reach. Knowing these 3 key terms is very important because if you know your purpose in other words your message/advice you can deliver it to a  specific group and use the genre that they may find more interesting according to their age or beliefs. The use of the three key term genre,purpose and audience as a whole is a very important part for a writer. Since they establish the base of what the person is going to talk about or describe.Also they serve as a guide to not ramble on what is being said.

*Work Cited

• Anzula,Gloria “How to Tame a Wild Tongue” http://www.everettsd.org/cms/lib07/WA01920133/Centricity/Domain/965/Anzaldua-Wild-Tongue.pdf
• Collins,Billy “Commencement Address” http://www.graduationwisdom.com/speeches/0135-Billy-Collins-Gives-Brilliant-Witty-Commencement-Speech-Address-At-Colorado-College-2008.htm

• King Jr,Martin Luther “Letter from Birmingham Jail”

http://okra.stanford.edu/transcription/document_images/undecided/630416-019.pdf

*Post Write.

This assignment was not similar to anything I have done before since normally I just had one or two sources to write about but not like this,and for this one I got three different ones and i needed to analyze them not just read them and take out information.But the structure of it is very similar to the essays I have to write in High School.

Compared with other assignments I have done in the past this one was very different,because this one asked me to analize 3 different writing pieces and describe their genre,audience and purpose.While the other ones normally were a comparison and contrast between 2 things or answer to a question using the given information.

To write this draft I used the writing skill I have learned in the past like where to use commas,period, and quotes. I base my answer in the book definition for the key terms genre,purpose and audience,but I also use my own definition of those words. 

To do this draft I start with reading all the sources and then take out quotes that I thought would be useful based on what I understood. And then try to put it all together in a way that the information is clear and easy to understand.

Questions for the reader of this:

Is this easy to understand?  

Do I make my point clear? 

What can be improved?