I feel I started this unit with a good grasp on rhetorical choice. The research I did prior to this unit and the research I did in this unit gave me a lot to think about and respond to. When it comes to rhetorical choice, we can either choose to take the information to heart and really care about a subject, or we can merely just talk about it. I feel I was at an advantage with this project because I found I really cared about what was being said and done and how it affected people in our world. I found myself feeling very opinionated about health care and how it pertained to immigrants. I practiced my argument by talking to friends and co-workers about what I have learned so far, I say “so far” because there are many sides to the issues related to health care for immigrants, and I focused on one side.
In the beginning I had no qualms about sharing the information on health care with others in a media based format. I did find it difficult to address specifically the audience I intended on addressing. I wanted to reach an audience that was without the knowledge I also started out this project without. I wanted to address an audience that is against health care for immigrants and who felt that immigrants were a drain on our society for various reasons. I feel I researched a topic that many feel passionately about, often against rights for immigrants. The biggest problem I found, however, was creating a web site that people counter to my thoughts and research would be interested in even looking at. The end result of my web site was not what I was hoping for. It was difficult to format it in a way that appealed to that persuasion. How do you appeal to an audience that your information is opposed too? I did not find the magic for that one.
There is a contradiction I feel that happens doing this project, in Petersons “writing for a Web Audience, he says that you cannot have too much text, you need to keep it shorter and simpler as too not bore your audience. My question is, how can 2000 words not bore someone? It is one thing if it’s an article from a journal or a book you find on the internet written by someone who is a scholar on the subject. But making a website that contains 1,750-2000 words and has 4 pages is going to be overwhelming and people are going to skip over it according to Peterson’s ideas. Jeremy was asked in class last week why we are required to do so much work for this class, and why a website? His response was something close to, “To give you experience communicating with others in the community in a more real world situation.” I am paraphrasing there, but you can get the idea. I agree with this idea in a lot of ways, but, I have been endlessly frustrated with the experience of building a website. I also believe I got more “real world” experience talking about the subject to those around me face to face. I was able to have a real conversation, not an imaginary conversation on the internet with a website no one is going to look at except my teacher. I have also had great conversations with my group mates on the separate research we have done. I had a phenomenal discussion with one of the teachers from the HEP Program on Friday that tested my knowledge on what I have been researching. I was able to pull statistics out of my hat and include them in the conversation and ask educated questions. Overall, making a website seemed like a lot of busy work that did not give me an outlet to have a different conversation than I did in any of the experiences mentioned previously.
I had so many technical difficulties with designing my website, I got off track from what my vision was because of the difficulties. I copied and pasted pictures repeatedly to different pages on the website, even though I only wanted to put those specific pictures on that page it would change the pictures on all of the pages! Ugh, I was so frustrated and gave up and was going to just accept a crappy website. That night, I woke up from a dead sleep and realized what the answer was! I turned to look at the clock to decide if it was reasonable to get out of bed to fix the problem. It was 1:49am, I decided to wait until morning. It was the first thing I did when I woke up, able to start my day with a sense of accomplishment. Overall, still not that impressed with the end result, but the research I've done and the people I have talked to regarding the research has made it plenty worth it. www.wealldeservecare.weebly.com
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