Faith Jones

Essay 4

Revised Essay 1

The Infinite Impact of Literacy & Composition

One of the most significantly influential experiences I encountered within literacy

learning occurred during my college writing two course this past fall semester. I find it

significantly valuable because it was the holy grail turning point that shaped my outlook and

perspective that I knew I wanted to embody within my writing pieces. Writing always dawned on

me as a stressful and formatting-based concept that did not bring me any interest growing up,

especially throughout middle school and high school. I had a wonderful experience with my

college writing one course in college thanks to my amazingly personable professor, Ayham

Abuzeid. He initially kickstarted my true interest in writing and allowed me to see my genuine

interest for writing poke out just from simply the way he expressed his thoughts and viewpoints

on not only writing, but life. Which then, looking back at the impact he had on me, has allowed

me to see how writing had overall positively impacted his inner self and how he worked so well

with expressing that by interacting and teaching my class. With that being said, the class was

very enjoyable but, in some ways, I feel like it focused highly on “standard” English and the

basic formats that us as college students were expected to follow and would be graded on based

on that. Thinking back to this course, it has become easier for me to understand and identify the

true and deeper impact Mr. Abuzeid and his class had on me as an evolving person and writer.

Now for the good part, my college writing two course with Amanda Fincham this past

fall of 2020. Registering for my college writing two course was something that didn’t quite ease

my mind when all I could think about was the numerous lengthy essays that came to mind and
continued to be the constant trend and idea associated with this course. In my past English

course, specifically high school and even a little bit of college writing one, the main thing I

focused on a stressed a lot about was not only formatting and proper grammar but the length

requirement of any writing assignment, especially essays. With that being said, you can kind of

understand the stress that begin to fill my head. Once asking around to some of my friends on

good college writing two professors I decided on taking professor Fincham based on how many

people talked highly of her which helped ease my stress. Before college and even after taking

college writing two, I realized the importance of having a professor for these basic writing

college courses that was rated highly and considered personable and engaging and Amanda

Fincham was just that (within her own unique way of course). I remember our first initial class

meeting and thinking to myself, wow I am going to truly enjoy this class. We met online (of

course due to crappy corona virus) through Blackboard Collaborative and the first thing that

stuck out to me was how casual and conversational our meeting was right from the jump. It was

not just your basic first day class that typically involved your professor reviewing the syllabus

and giving you a breakdown of exactly how the class would work and what was expected of you

as a student. But instead, it was more of her explaining her deeper meaning and purpose behind

this course and what she wants us as students to get out of it. She also talked about why she is

personally so passionate about teaching which helped set the stage to curiosity and fascination in

this class.

What completely sold me in this class was the book that we focused on throughout this

whole course, which was Composing Gender by Rachael Groner. She made it a point to mention

that some of us might find these topics touchy, to the point where we will drop this class.

Thinking back to this moment, it specifically connects with what we learned in composition
theory from the article, Should Writers Use They Own English? By Vershawn Ashanti Young. In

this article, Young focused on the importance of learning various dialects and or languages as

possible to allow all people the best possible learning experiences that they deserve and to stray

away from what we consider “basic” or “standard” English. Just like the theories, concepts, and

viewpoints discussed in the book, Composing Gender, A high amount of American people find

those that speak a dialect that they are not familiar with or find improper, can see the expression

of this as touchy and sensitive due to the societal norms that have been engraved in us. The

introducing to this book, Composing Gender, as well as the article, Should Writers Use They

Own Language, have helped to open my eyes and continue to open them wider as I consider

these topics solely based on personal interpretations and comprehensions that we create

ourselves. Which then allows me to question, what makes other interpretations about these ideas

and all other ideas so superior to everyone else’s?

My college writing two course was significantly similar to our composition theory

course, in the aspects of free and creative writing and how we read different articles that focused

on different controversial ideas and concepts that helped promote our freedom within these

courses, which I loved. Thinking back to some of the most impactful topics from Composing

Gender, like Gender specific toys, male circumcision, hazing, pornographic cultures, and Disney

princesses. All of these concepts and ideas share the same backbone as the articles discussed in

composition theory, which is why as Americans, are we so against anything that might slightly

promote a different belief or standard that is viewed as right or acceptable based on the societal

norms and English stands we have created and made so worshipable? For example, The Myth to

Linguistic Homogeneity by Paul Kei Matsuda talks about this issue better than any other article

from this class. It focuses on the valuable and prevalent argument of this everchanging issue of
monolingualism and the questionable stance it has in relation to standard English composition.

Not only does it tune into the bigger impacts it carries within these topics, but also discusses

some of the issues that aren’t as clear and familiar to most Americans. With that being said, our

country has developed the ability to not only secretly limit our knowledge and questions about

this issue but completely debunk any and all questions that are risen in the aspects of the larger

and continuously varying growing issues that people face, that most people live their life blinded

to by both societal barriers that our higher power has created and by the uncomfortably and the

ability to ignore it that seems easier for most biased and brainwashed Americans. After reading

this article and thinking back to what I got out of Composing Gender, it becomes even clearer to

me just how truly biased our society is to these kinds of topics. Matsuda also discusses exactly

where this “myth of linguistic homogeneity” appeared and sprouted into the issue that we are

beginning to unmask. According to Matsuda, “The perception of the myth of linguistic

homogeneity in the U.S. college composition has been facilitated by the concomitant policy of

linguistic containment that has kept language differences invisible in the required composition

course and in the discourse of composition studies.” (Matsuda pg. 453) This alone goes to show

the exact higher forces that hold all the power to enforce our language barriers and influence our

instinct to reject new, outside, and differentiating suggestions on these “standard” guidelines.

Thinking back to all the various topics and concepts discussed in Composing Gender,

these articles, and particularly The Myth to Linguistic Homogeneity have built a close connection

in the way that our country, higher power and overall society and societal norms that we carry

and enforce and how they continue to have a negative impact on all these expanding issues. This

book and this article has clearly helped to support that not only are our thoughts and perceptions

influenced by the world around us, but it is also our power to dive deeper and find the true
meaning within these credible pieces and want to help to make a change and spread more

awareness of this information. It is crazy to think how much a little information can uncover

about the deeper and debunked issues that we each encounter. Most people can agree to find

these drastically shifting changes in both English composition and gender identity norms

frightening due to the room for endless open-mindedness and questionable ideas, obstacles, and

concerns that will and possibly arise, but we must take a step back and really allow ourselves to

understand and comprehend truly why these English composition standards and expectations and

gender norms, beliefs and values that we carry as a society are so unquestionably concrete to us

that has allowed them to be so expected and second nature to us and what has allowed and/or

caused them to become what they are today and what has made them this way?

What else I found as the takeaway from my textbook from college writing two and

composition theory is the power we hold as the audience from the power that the author is trying

to express. Not only did these articles and pieces leave room for personal interpretation, but they

also left room for controversy. Which at the end of the day, comes back to how much pride and

creditability the authors express and how well he/she delivers that to the reader. This is a

conceptual theory proposed by Bartholomae in his article, Inventing the University. In this piece,

Bartholomae focuses on the theories and ideas behind creativity and how in most cases they are

not used to their full potential. As talked about before, standard English composition focuses

heavily on formatting and proper grammar and language and Bartholomae expresses his

differentiating takeaway for the purpose of writing that focus little on the formatting and

grammatical and language expectations, and more on the importance of using each and every

writing assignment, no matter the type or topic, as an opportunity to express your own personal

writing uniqueness and individuality. Because how can you expect to get through to your
audience if you do not have something memorably and impactfully different to offer? How can

we expect to convince our audience and readers that we are credible when we have not even

convinced ourselves yet? Most students do not fully comprehend and see how much control they

really do have over this concept in their writing, and when you allow yourself to embody this

idea and really believe it, is when you can have full control on the impact your writing piece has.

Thinking back on this concept I can agree that I have always provided this sense in my writing

and after reading this article I made it a point to embody this even more strongly than I did

before. Composing Gender exemplifies this exact concept extremely well which has allowed me

to build such a strong connection with the book and the overall concepts it uniquely expresses.

Without this ability, I can imagine Composing Gender being clean cut while including a lot of

basic statistical data and information and not leaving room for each individual author's true

expression and perceptions of the topics. Which at the end of the day leaves nothing but a clear

sense of the basic societal norms that have allowed us to consider these common perceptions and

understandings as normal without room for individual interpretation. It is extremely clear that the

authors of the works included in Composing Gender have allowed themselves to break through

these barriers and open their eyes completely to the true realities and diversity behind these

topics that they discuss so well and how they free themselves from the societal norms, standards

and basic values and beliefs in support of a concept much bigger than the stigma behind all this

controversy.

The article, Inventing the University by Bartholomae has not only allowed me to expand

my own personal abilities as a writer but help to explain the true impacts that not only

Composing Gender, but all of these controversial articles discussed in composition theory has

had on me as an individual, but the ultimately inspiring influence I have received that has helped
to shape me into the writer I want to be, how I want to express myself, my thoughts and

perceptions and the higher-level takeaway I want my audience to have just how all of these

authors have created and established in me. In all my years of education I have never grasped my

full passion for composition and writing as a whole until my college writing two course. And it is

safe to say that this composition theory class has done nothing but strengthen that. Looking back

to the astonishing impacts it has created not only in my writing abilities but me as a person is

something, I will forever carry with me and hang on my shoulder. For anyone out there trying to

find their influence, calling or purpose in expressing themselves I highly recommend the book,

Composing Gender, any of these articles or any articles from introduction to composition theory

and more importantly Professor Amanda Fincham and Professor Ms. Sarah Lacy.

Works Cited

Groner, R, & O’Hara, F.J. (2014) Composing Gender. Boston, New York. Burton.

Young, A Vershawn. “Should Writers Use They Own English?” Iowa Journal of Cultural 

Studies.The Berkeley Electronic Press. 2010.

Matsuda, Paul Kei. The Myth of Linguistic Homogeneity. The St. Martin’s Guide to Teaching 

Writing. Seventh Edition. 2014.

Bartholomae, D. (1985) Inventing the University. New York. Guildford.