Discussion Reply
Need to Respond To The Discussion Post I have attached.
Please 300 words minimum.
Please discuss your own book selection in conjunction with your peers who have not read your title and are instead bringing ideas to share and discuss about their own titles. You are not required to go read their book titles in order to participate. The way you’ll all be able to have a meaningful conversation about books you haven’t read is to focus on commonalities and differences in strategy and form between the different book titles represented in this forum, as described and evaluated by your peers.
The purpose of this discussion prompt is to get you asking and answering some of your own critical questions about the things you read and how they’re written, just as we’ve been doing throughout the semester (albeit with questions I’ve given you instead of having you develop your own).
The author of your book approaches his/her subject in a certain way, presumably. As every writer does, s/he has certain clear goals in mind when constructing the narrative for us, and that explains why s/he writes in the way that s/he does. Based on how the narrative is constructed and what’s being said in it, we can safely assume the writer wishes to communicate something important beyond the surface meaning(s) of the work. The story is about “A,” for example, but it’s also about “B,” “C” and/or “D” too, presumably. The ways in which s/he constructs the essay help your author convey all of those different things to us. So:
What’s this piece really about, in your estimation, and how do you know that? What’s the “subtext” of meaning running underneath the surface meaning of the narrative? How did you find it? What kinds of specific writing strategies does your author use to approach the subject(s) of the work and the subtextual meaning also?
Is the writing serious or humorous or ironic, questioning or emphatic, argumentative or speculative? Is the author a disinterested journalist or a committed participant in the story s/he chronicles?
How is the way in which the essay is written connected to what the essay is about? Is the language formal, or colloquial, or something in between? Is the tone of the writing moralistic, political, religious, philosophical? Does the writing have to look and feel a certain way in order to effectively address its particular subjects and topics?
Does your author rely on anecdotal evidence for support and illustration, or research and reporting, or first-hand observation, or historical recounting, or philosophical musings, or all of these, or some other specific strategies, and to what effect? Who does the author consider his/her reading audience to be, do you think? How do you know that?
How exactly does the author go about telling this story, and does s/he do it well and successfully, or unsuccessfully? Why, and in what ways?
Remember to page cite textual references in every post you make, and always be specific and thorough in your reasoning and argument. Although you are not required to address everything in this set of prompt questions, please try to give a considered response that attempts to describe and critically evaluate some of the specific writing strategies the writer uses that you believe are successful and effective, or not, in helping to convey the meaning you believe he/she wishes to convey.
