phrasing. try:

I chose to revise my second paper, which I'd written on the film Life is Beautiful. Although it didn't represent my best work, I selected Paper 2 because I assumed it would be easy to improve. Turns out, addressing the issues raised by my instructor and adding a handful of new writing techniques was harder than I'd anticipated.

whoa. okay, we need to talk about paragraphing.

but what, exactly, made it enjoyable? the collaboration between you and your teacher?

new paragraph

new paragraph

use a dash or colon rather than a hyphen

comma

comma

personal statement

cut

cut

cut

cut

because what you're presenting best meets the criteria the employer(s) are looking for, right? so it's all about positioning. you positioned yourself as an experienced person and, rhetorically, as someone unafraid to display personality. the question is, did it work?

misused word

you made this clear in sentence 1

what's a cookie cutter student?

have started

take aways:

--organization: i would encourage you to take a simpler approach in a piece such as this (here, you've got effectively two introductions, a meta paragraph on the current piece, a 2-paragraph return to writing assignments mentioned in paragraph two; and a conclusion that aims to wrap everything up in a tidy bow.

--audience and collaboration: given the impact others can have on your writing (the writing guru, for instance), I'm not sure you car metaphor holds up. that gist of the picture you're painting is that writing is a solitary practice (like driving), but your description of the practice of writing seem for your interactive and, to a degree, dependent.

--phrasing: i think you'll benefit from our work on word economy, meta-discourse, etc.

perhaps. but this is much easier said than done.

awkward phrasing. you can say within but not under this context.

Good. Show as well as tell.

term misused. people don't resonate with things like arguments; rather, arguments resonate with them.

e.g., The lyrics of this song resonate with me because they remind me of my childhood.

these opening paragraphs seem like different versions of an introductory paragraph

this is two things

New paragraph

New paragraph

the thesis of the piece? or are you talking about a separate project?

new paragraph

maybe use a colon instead

word choice: maybe "reacting"?

do you mean the writing you produced in different contexts?

you keep saying we -- were you working as a group?

okay, good. what you're talking about here is the discursive context that you engaged with and entered into. what are the contours of that existing conversation (conventional wisdom, major points of disagreement, etc)?

phrasing. let's revise:

The assignment itself was compelled by a professor to be written given that it was required, the topic however was chosen independently

was it given or did you create it?

take-aways:

--organization is a MAJOR issue you'll want to address this semester: learn to construct focused paragraphs (on a single point, item, issue) and arrange them logically

--spend more time considering the conventions of the genre you're working in

--phrasing: you'll want to take advantage of our lessons on word economy, metadiscourse, and so on

here's an example of an organizational issue that affects meaning: before unpacking your statement about academic writing, you move on to a new focus

how do you know?

comma splice: One course asked me to do one on someone famous, I picked Drew Barrymore.

new paragraph?

new paragraph?

what might that look like?

phrasing. it seems like your saying "music in a Chicago format"

for what?

what's this?

argumentative what?

new paragraph?

how? can you show rather than merely tell?

new paragraph?

what sentiment was that?

new paragraph?

aim for greater language precision: it refers to research. did the research act as supportive evidence, or did the sources you found do that?

agreement issue: assignments (plural); it (singular)

whoa. okay, we need to talk about writing paragraphs!

how did you come to choose these films, specifically?

ISSUE: surely a extant conversation preceded your intervention, otherwise we probably would have terms like "neo noir." What are the contours of that conversation? what's the conventional wisdom about the similarities, contrasts, and so on between noir and neo-noir?

examples? we're back to telling rather than showing

so it's not about a moment in time, but rather a mood, or techniques applied to produce a mood

do you see a difference between noir and the detective story? must a detective story be noir? or vice versa?

yes -- showing. very good.

take-aways:

--thoughtful presentation: reasonable paragraph length, good pacing, plain language (high readability)

--a tendency to tell rather than show

--a bit deficient in terms of unpacking your discovery: the need to cultivate a writing mindset

this is the sort of thing you want to develop further. rather than simply telling your reader -- at the end of your piece -- can you also show? where do you set up at doheny? how do you go about "engaging in a dialogue" with sources?

is this why you were engaging with texts from (more like the middle of) the 20th century?

... the development of a new skill, writing script coverage.

are you still talking about film classes? why were the sources from the early 20th century?

add comma

like what? remember to show as well as tell.

such as? can you provide an example?

great. but what's the specific discourse in which you were engaged? the conversation about gaga's video? were you pointing out the the homage to parajanov? were you building on the interpretation(s) of others? what was the purpose of your intervention within a specific discourse?

your article, or gaga's video? or parajanov's film?

canon and category are not the same

ah, okay. this helps makes sense of the column section in the previous section. the one issue i have here: the assignment specifies that you should avoid discussing in part 2 any writing you examined in part 1.

what was the thinking that led you to writing the majority of this piece in the third person? and what convinced you to shift to first person at the end?

word choice?

ugh, what a request ...

on what? the lady gaga video?

and it is? an interest in journalism? or art criticism?

ack. even at it's best process writing has move the college essay away from the 5-paragraph monstrosity with its three randomly construed body paragraphs!

nice set up (first two paragraphs)

use a dash rather than a hyphen

keep verb tense consistent:

If life is a sentence, the milestone moments are punctuation marks.

or ...

If life were (subjunctive) a sentence, the milestone moments would be (modal conditional) punctuation marks.

Good. But how would you describe the landscape of the conversation before you entered it? What led you to select the piece of real estate you settled on?

Excellent. Showing as well as telling!

Didn't you talk about this in Part 1?

What would you say is the take away? Why did you choose these pieces to discuss? What do they have in common? What do they show you about your writing?

Or perhaps you had simply gotten better after all that practice.

cut

cut (implied)

Reading the piece now, I can identify the conditions in which I wrote it by contrasting the well-organized opening pages with the more disorganized ones that appear later.

Surveying the lay of the land and identifying a space for yourself (situating yourself within the discourse)

Are these different issues, though? One concerning power imbalance and the other indifference?

one of your more successful transitions

... on ...

confusing. try:

Much of the writing I’ve done at USC has been involuntary. And while the topical limitations, deadlines, and so on that accompany involuntary writing inevitably weighed on me, most of the pressure I've felt to complete assignments has come from within. My desire to satisfy myself, to produce "good writing," has typically eclipsed my concerns about assignment expectations.

medians?

Maybe because control and clear purpose are qualities you've imposed onto it. Are these characteristics really intrinsic to writing?

maybe use a colon instead

Ironic given writing's social aims. It's all about identifying a discourse (populated by the ideas of others) and selecting a space for yourself within that discourse, not to bring it to a close, but to contribute to its growth.

Cool. Perhaps the lessons learned here are applicable to the problems described in part 1. You started with a discourse. You studied not just the game, but the contours of the debate surrounding the game. You enabled yourself to make a fresh intervention by casting yourself (if only indirectly) in opposition to critics and naysayers, using elements of the game to rebut critical claims emerging from part of the fandom. You studied the lay of the land, and identified a piece of real estate for yourself.

Good. Showing as well as telling!

... I appear focused on ...

That is, until I reviewed TLOU2 or the GDC competition.

attracted?

Say a lot about a little, rather than a little about a lot.

Was that because the relationship between music and narrative in film has been written about before? Did you engage with sources examining this relationship? Did you examine existing analyses of Toimkin and Morricone? Did you formulate responses in the form of new assertions?

One could argue that process theory conditions writers to think in this terms: brainstorm, develop a thesis, identify supporting points, seek out sources to back up your points.

awkward phrasing. try:

I have faced extensive competition when applying for internships. So much so that, at this point, I'm largely unsure what companies look for in internship candidates.

take-aways (parts 1 and 2):

• organization: paragraphs should focus on a single idea

• genre: autobiographical reflection requires ruminating on an event or series of events in one's like and from that rumination producing a message, observation, moral, or idea. also, it should tonally accommodate casual readers, in this case, other undergraduates

• phrasing: match tone to audience, and take care to select and arrange words to maximize readers uptake

TA = teaching assistant Awkward phrasing: keep sentence elements parallel

Try: The teaching assistant gave me individualized feedback, clarified concepts, and shared writing strategies and techniques.

Try: Earlier in my college career, I took a journalism course in which the professor required students to complete an assignment reporting on a topic of our choosing.

Or: In COMM 202, which I took during my second year, I was required to write about a topic of my choosing.

redundant

new paragraph?

new paragraph?

new paragraph?

new paragraph?

new paragraph?

What's this?

Abrupt start

new paragraph?

This piece describes how you went about writing your stump speech, but doesn't quite clarify how or where the resulting work is situated within the discourse where it resides. What are the issues surrounding the race and what stances do you take in your piece? What political ideas does your speech echo? What figures?

take-aways: * Ample description of various collaborative circumstances; some discussion, too, of how feeling connected to the subject matter yields better outcomes. * Organizational issues overall and within individual paragraphs. * Absence of a through line (what should readers, especially college students a few years behind you) glean from this piece?

cut

... USC, but also my favorite.

OR

...USC -- it was my favorite.

connection to subject matter

How? Can you show as well as tell?

More collaboration -- this time as a preparatory endeavor.

What do your recollections of collaboration (with a prof, with a classmate, with a group of classmates) reveal to you about writing (specifically your own)?

Back to collaboration?

Can you identify any connection between this paper and the ones you just discussed? The previous paragraph seems to focus, thematically, on collaboration. Do you mean to continue that theme here? What about the fact that this collaboration took place remotely due to the pandemic?

for whom?

maybe consider a different modifier?

new paragraph

awkward phrasing: the opening phrase sets up the expectation that the main clause will be about you.

New paragraph

use the past tense: I responded

awkward phrasing. it seems like you're saying you once had partial control, which you subsequently lost.

Try: Our written conversation took control of the process partially out of my hands.

New paragraph

Word economy:

My first foray into college writing was WRIT 150 with Professor Jim Clements.

Ah, okay. It would help to know this detail from the outset. You were provide two articles in conversation with one another. Your job, effectively, was to join that conversation and an intervention of your own.

so, an audience comprised of readers interested in how media (whatever one specifically means by that term) affects culture and vice versa?

Neither article states ...

Okay, but what was the conversation about prior to your entering it? What do your comments on "media as vernacular" contribute to that conversation? How did you situate your argument? In alignment with what/whom, in opposition to what/whom?

modernity and modernism usually aren't thought of as being the same thing. what do you mean by "modernism"?

is this paper, what do you mean by "media"? what do you mean by "modernism"?

Why write about yourself using passive voice?

use quotation marks for articles and essays and italics for books, magazines, films, and newpapers

Wordy. Try:

As I read this paper from last semester, I definitely noticed that my writing had matured.

I'm reminded of the five paragraph essay because your examples seem randomly selected. It's unclear why you chose these examples, specifically; it's also unclear how these samples converge to tell a cogent story. Why these readings? Why discussed in this order? How do they fit together? What's the message?

maybe say a few words about research. is it something you dislike doing? why? what about in the context of screenwriting?

replace with "regarding how"

cut (unnecessary)

no comma needed

cut

use a dash rather than a hyphen

Awkward phrasing: Word economy/awkward phrasing. Try:

In "Ignoring Ethics by Lying," the first piece I wrote for critical reading and writing, I reflected on a class reading about the ways people avoid ethical decision making and discussed how the content related to my life.

Can you say more about this format that you had to follow? All genres have conventions, and some of those conventions involve structure. What makes the structure(s) you've had to follow in college so challenging?

Your papers? Arguments being made in your papers would be your arguments, right? Do you mean the arguments made in class readings?

How would you define this structure? I'm surprised to learn that De Anza's teaching the 5-paragraph essay.

cut

Why the comma?

Word economy (alternatives to negative constructions):

I prefer writing screenplays to college papers ...

A bit wordy and syntactically awkward. Try:

While I'm most comfortable writing sceenplays, most of my written work in college has consisted of nonfiction argumentative and research papers.

Ack. Never use this phrase again! It SCREAMS high school -- and you're about to graduate from USC!

More repetition: step off the beaten path ... stray off the traditional path

Or simply to reflect? Not sure what a call to reflection is.

Whoa. This paragraph is quite lengthy!

All of this can be cut (you've already said it).

Several themes emerge here, but none converge in the form of a through line. The first two paragraphs seem poised to set up a story of a capricious nature and how dramatic, last-minute choices relate to your development as a writer. Other paragraphs involve the challenges of writing in Italian, reliance on writing to communicate with family, and adaptability in the workplace. But what's the message here?

awkward. does one conduct writing?

cut

okay, but how? you've done a lot of telling here, but little to no showing.

You dedicate a lot of time here to making the point that there was a time difference.

new paragraph

more repetition

be mindful of your tendency to repeat yourself: you've sad this several times

For this assignment, I would advise more discussion of your actual writing and less place setting. After two lengthy paragraphs, we finally get to some writing and, well, you give it fairly short shrift.

use italics

great. lots of academic genres.

Was this the course's name? Was it a USC course taught abroad?

clunky phrasing. try:

Although I've always considered myself an avid writer, two courses at Franklin University challenged my writing skills.

begin new paragraph

new paragraph

Redundant: you just pointed this out.

cut

this info is implied; you can cut it

Okay, but what were the contours of the conversation? If the specific conversation you entered into involved that absence of value in contemporary music, what are the specific arguments or positions within that conversation? Who do you ideas align with? Who would dismiss them?

This piece describes what you did, but doesn't really show how your work was situated within the conversation about the music's current lack of economic value.

Who did you imagine yourself writing for? Someone in the music industry? Who in that industry needs a 50 page paper recounting its history? How did the history you surveyed build to the three recommendations you made re: added value?

You would say it? Okay, but how do you know?

Such as?

I would say [unnecessary meta-discourse] the biggest advantage of writing information down rather than speaking it, [cut] is it allows me to organize my thoughts much better and deliver information in a much more efficient manor.

Try: The advantage of writing over speaking is clarity. Writing allows me to organize my thoughts, which enables my ideas to come across more intelligibly.

what does real value look like?

word economy: delete meaningless modifiers

too much "to be"

This could have been an overarching theme. Rather than selecting works randomly, which has the effect of making your writing -- and thinking -- appear, well, random and unfocused, an organizing principle, such as "I tend to write less effectively when composing required assignments," could tell a coherent story and provide more opportunity for your audience to relate and gain useful insight into, perhaps, their own writing.

I gather the same is true for the present assignment ...

Can you provide at least one example of a specific piece of advice that affected something your wrote?

When using "however," be mindful of what sentence elements proceeds it. If it's a complete sentence, as is the case here, add a semi-colon:

This was a required essay; however, ...

Prioritize showing as opposed to simply telling. What's an example of how disorganization affected your writing? What's an example of how your startup endeavor affected your writing?

Like what?

Such as?