Meta-Post 2012

It has always been a weird feeling for me to look back at any work I've done, school-related or not.  I always cringe at previously written papers or old Garageband recordings of me playing guitar.  Reading past journal entries is always humiliating.  I remember getting this feeling a few weeks ago looking over my Catcher in the Rye  annotations.  I thought I was in for a healthy dose of cringe when the Meta-Post assignment was given.  I'm happy to report that looking over my blogs of first semester was far less cringe-y and much more interesting than I had expected.  

It took me a few blog posts to understand exactly what I was expected to do, from a teacher's perspective. The absolute most important component of a successful and effective blog post is anchoring whatever you're trying to say to some media medium, whether that's an article, a video, a book, etc.  While my very first blog, Otis, had a focused anchor in a music video, others did not.  A blog I was proud of at the time, Winning, had no tie to a link of any kind.  I remember Mr. Bolos drawing comparison to a blog without text (or maybe 'media' is a better word) evidence to a Seinfeldian musing.  As an avid Seinfeld watcher (yes, still), this really hit home.  Another noted problem I had with the Winning blog was shear wrong facts.  People, take a second to fact-check.  If I had, the blog would not have been written and I would've saved myself the embarrassment.  My more recent blogs  have substantial connections to text, including my most recent blog, The Social Studies.

Aside from drawing evidence from outside sources, a slight problem I dealt with and continue to have is staying focused.  With a more formal piece of writing, like the ever-famous five paragraph essay, I've never found it a problem to stay focused.  You write a thesis, you have your three points, and throughout your essay you neatly touch on every mentioned point.  Simple.  With blogs, I find myself starting with a focused purpose and three paragraphs later on a completely different topic.  A prime example of this is my second post, Being Proud.  In a single post, I manage to touch on the topics of a Walgreen's ad I found interesting, Into the Wild, Henry David Thoreau, the American life of ease, the opportunity America provides, the pursuit of happiness, and whatever I meant when I said "the majesty of America".  All of these topics could have stood alone as their own blogs.  I think it's easy to recognize the relation all of these topics have with each other, and how my mind jumped from idea to idea.  This makes for very unfocused writing, and, in turn, unfocused reading.  If one blog has seven subcategories, the reader doesn't know exactly what to focus on and probably, as a result, pays no special attention to any one point.  Every blog should have an obvious focal point.  This could mean that it's very short, as shown in my New York, New York post.

Blogging has been an interesting journey first semester.  I don't think I do it enough, but that's another thing.  It's fascinating to see what my peers are interested in, and reading a classmates blog is a perfect window to see their interests.  Next semester I want to focus on branching out my sources, or joining arguments.  Only once did I write a blog in response to something, and I thought it turned out.  'Til next time, bloggers!!

~Layne

p.s.-- Good luck to all on finals

"Nothing is as pressing as the one who's pressing would like you to believe"

-Conor Oberst