Daisy Espana

Allison Bocchino

Writing 2

10 June, 2024

Complicated Nutrients to Simple Nutrients

Peer-reviewed academic articles can be complicated to understand since most of them are

made for a specific type of research. These articles typically use certain language, have few

images or tables, and contain an abundance of information. This information may not be

understandable for everyone since there is an intended audience for these types of articles. The

unintended audience will not be able to understand much. A genre translation is helpful since

there is not a target audience and can reach many other people to understand information in a

way that they understand. Genre translations are convenient so that there could be more people

getting information that is important.

Understanding papers in which we are unfamiliar wit,h the conventions is hard and

confusing since we have no prior knowledge on the topic. I have decided to use the article “A

Review of Dietary (Phyto) Nutrients for Glutathione Support”1 by Deanna M. Minich and

Benjamin I. Brown for my genre translation. This article contains research about including more

glutathione into a person’s bodies to see what happens. The results showed that these people had

less stress, had a better metabolic detoxification, and more. The article includes about different

types of foods or vitamins that will help to improve glutathione in our system. It has its own

reference page so that the audience can explore more about this topic. The reference page is

important to know that this article can be reliable and trusted on the information they have

1
Deanna M. Minich, and Benjamin I. Brown “A Review of Dietary (Phyto)Nutrients for Glutathione Support”,
Nutrients,( no.11: 1-20. 2019) 1
included. This article included paragraphs, few images, it had more tables than images, and

subheadings within subheadings. The article is formatted this way because it is easy to follow for

the intended audience, being nutritionists. This format is used since it makes sense for the

intended audience to understand and not be confused as the unintended audience would be. The

article is packaged this way because it helps for the audience to receive the information and

comprehend it unlike someone like me. The writing choices that are integral to this genre are the

few images that are included because this text focuses more on words and explaining the

research. Few images are not very helpful because people sometimes learn better with

visualization and not reading. For example, the authors include one image on page 22 throughout

the entire article since they really didn’t need to incorporate many. The images weren’t really

going to help these authors because the information is better explained in detail than in pictures.

Images would’ve confused nutritionists since they need to understand the experiment with words

not pictures.

Mostly, every article would have headings included in them to help the reader follow

with what is being stated. The headings would be the overall section and then there would be the

subheadings. Based on the subheadings that are included in this article, the following paragraphs

are either short or long. In the article there is a subheading titled “5. N-Acetylcysteine (NAC)”

and another “6. Dietary Protein Considerations. ”3 These subheadings each contain information

but the first one is a longer and lengthier paragraph while the other one is a bit shorter and

smaller paragraphs. This makes it for the reader to know that maybe some parts aren’t that

important to read or to keep in mind. The subheadings make it easier to know that the topic

discussed will be different from the one prior. However, these headings are not for anyone who is

2
“A Review of Dietary (Phyto) Nutrients for Glutathione Support”Deanna M. Minich and Benjamin I. Brown. 2
3
“A Review of Dietary (Phyto) Nutrients for Glutathione Support”Deanna M. Minich and Benjamin I. Brown. 5-7
not a nutritionist. These headings have their own jargon which is more known for nutritionists to

understand, unlike a normal person. Throughout the article, the authors use the jargon that

nutritionists would understand since that is the target audience.

For my genre translation I have chosen an infographic page. The writing conventions for

this non-academic genre is that an infographic has few words or sentences, a lot of images

present, and lists. An infographic contains the most important information about a topic, making

it have few words. The images are more important than words in this genre. This genre is

typically only one page long (sometimes double-sided) with a variety of colors included. The

color attracts the audience, which in this case would either be people researching healthier

options or at a doctors office. The color is very important for an infographic since it makes it not

look simple and dull. I didn’t really look at examples for this assignment, since I have worked

with infographics before. In high school, I had to help create flyers/ infographics for a club that I

was in my senior year. From what I remember, there was a lot of color, little information, images,

headings, and subheadings. For example, depending on the information included, the images will

relate to them. These conventions serve the fact that it attracts people to them because of the big

headings plus the color in them. They look more appealing to read than a full article since these

are short and contain important information.

For this genre translation, I first read my article over again so I can get a sense of what is

important and what is not. As I read I would highlight what sounded most crucial to include. I

used this information to create bullet points, since it needs to be short sentences. I got most of my

information for the bullet points in the “Abstract”4, the middle,5 and the “Conclusion”6 of the

article. The abstract held a good amount of information for me to include, it was quick and easy

4
Minich and Brown, “A Review of Dietary (Phyto) Nutrients for Glutathione Support”, 1
5
Minich and Brown, “A Review of Dietary (Phyto) Nutrients for Glutathione Support”, 7-10
6
Minich and Brown, “A Review of Dietary (Phyto) Nutrients for Glutathione Support”, 11
to make simpler for an infographic. Afterwards, I went onto Canva, a website in which we can

create flyers, posters, presentations, etc. I searched up infographics, a variety of templates

appeared, and I chose the one that looked simple yet would be able to incorporate color. I added

the text into the little boxes that were provided but I didn’t like the way they were formatted so I

moved them around. I thought of what headings I should put, but I couldn’t think of anything, so

I went with something simple just so people could know what it's about. I decided to add a

paraphrased quote into my infographic since that way people will take it more seriously that the

information is true. I felt that adding a quote from my primary article was viable in making it so

that it catches people’s eye. Once I had the text portion finished that’s when I decided to add my

images. I chose the images based on the lists that I decided to include. Since the background is

more girlish, I decided to keep the images “cutesy” too. I included all the conventions that I

remember including for infographics before. I feel like I did bend some conventions for

infographics on nutrition. I believe I did because my colors aren’t really as bright and

eye-catching as they normally are for a doctor's office. I still incorporated color just not as bright

because that wasn’t what I was going for in my translation. I also feel like I added less text to

mine since I was only able to translate a part of my primary source. If I had more of an

opportunity to translate more there would be more bullet points or words included. I also noticed

that most nutrition infographics included graphs but mine does not. I didn’t include a graph since

there really wasn’t much for me to create a graph on this topic on my own. If my primary source

included one I would have used that one but it didn’t so I just included an increasing line and put

my quote next to it.

The concerns that I had in mind while translating my article was that it wouldn't be easy

since I didn’t understand the jargon. What I did for this was to search up terms and familiarize
myself with them so that I can include them in my infographic. Another concern was that I

wasn’t sure how I was going to do my translation. I already had in mind that an infographic was

what I was going to do but I didn’t know what I wanted to include in it. In order to solve this

concern that I had, I kept in mind the article, “Murder! (Rhetorically Speaking),” by Janet Boyd.

Boyd mentions that the decision a writer takes “must make about what to include and what to

omit based upon the expectations of the audience for whom they write.”7To figure out what to

include I had to know who my target audience was for this assignment. As well for the jargon,

Boyd explains that depending on the translation “simple diction would prevail over sophisticated

jargon in this context.” 8 I searched up terms and converted them into simple words so that

everyone could understand the infographic. I would say understanding the jargon is a skill

because there were too many words that I didn’t understand, but with Google and context clues I

was able to figure it out. However, for the word glutathione, there really wasn’t much I could

change it to since that is what the supplement is called. Another concern I had was the fact that

there was a reflection part for this assignment and I’m not really good at reflections. In order to

address this concern I kept in mind the article “Reflective Writing and the Revision Process:

What Were You Thinking?” by Sandra L. Giles. Giles mentions that reflections “helps you

develop more insight into and control over composing and revising processes.”9 Giles helped me

in this aspect because I was able to understand my thought process throughout my translation. I

was able to understand why I kept some things out and kept some other things. It helped me

because as I was writing my reflection I was thinking of my translation; if I should add more,

delete some stuff, or keep it as the way it is.

7
Boyd, Janet, “Murder! (Rhetorically Speaking) ”, Writing Spaces: Readings on Writings, (Volume 2. 2011), 9
8
Boyd, “Murder! (Rhetorically Speaking)”, 98
9
Giles L. Sandra, “Reflective Writing and the Revision Process: What Were You Thinking?”, Writing Spaces:
Readings on Writings, (Volume. 2010) 193
 Bibliography

Boyd, Janet. “Murder! (Rhetorically Speaking). ” Writing Spaces: Readings on Writings. Volume

2. 2011.

Deanna M. Minich, and Benjamin I. Brown. “A Review of Dietary (Phyto)Nutrients for

Glutathione Support.” Nutrients, no.11: 1-20. 2019.

https://mdpi-res.com/nutrients/nutrients-11-02073/article_deploy/nutrients-11-02073.pdf?

version=1567502376

Giles L. Sandra. “Reflective Writing and the Revision Process: What Were You Thinking?.”

Writing Spaces: Readings on Writings. Volume. 2010.