XXXXX

Evaluation and Commentary: XXXXXXX

From your individual inquiry this quarter, please compose a piece based in your research (textual,
qualitative, quantitative) for a PUBLIC audience. This project may take the form of an
essay/article/multi-modal text for a non-scholarly journal/magazine/website/etc., as appropriate to
the rhetorical situation at hand.
Rhetorical Situation
1Your project does not manage the basic elements of the rhetorical situation effectively
(Audiences needs/purpose are is not well addressed, Text is not generally appropriate to the
situation, Writers purpose is not clear and appropriate to the context)
3Your project manages the basic elements of the rhetorical situation effectively (Audiences
needs/purpose are well addressed, Text is generally appropriate to the situation, Writers purpose
is clear and appropriate to the context)
53+ Your project clearly demonstrates a highly sophisticated treatment/understanding of
the rhetorical situation beyond its basic elements, as revealed both by the document itself
and the supporting research documentation/methodological/analytical materials provided,
though, in your next project, Id suggest (based on the supporting materials) that it would
be worthwhile to more deliberately and articulately consider the particular nature of the
authorial figure called for by your rhetorical situation.
Inquiry (+ Scope)
1Your projects inquiry is not well defined or particularly ambitious, and is not investigated via
clear, focused sub-questions
3/4--Your projects inquiry is well defined, reasonably ambitious, and is investigated via
clear, focused sub-questions. In your next project, focus on moving from these fairly simple
subquestions (which are, generally speaking, wisely selected, given your rhetorical
situationyour audiences purpose for reading and your purpose as an author,
particularly) to the bigger, more complex subquestions these simple ones should lead to in
answering your overall inquiry. Additionally, youll need to more carefully focus your
subquestions, your treatment of them, and your transitions from q to qin this project, you
end up moving away from your focused inquiry about POV into a fairly general treatment
of the effectiveness of a draft written by a fictionist.
53+ Your projects inquiry is highly ambitious, highly defined and focused, and is pursued
through highly sophisticated sub-questions.

XXXXX 2

Research
a) Situation
1Your project does not clearly demonstrate the ability to research in a compositional situation
by researching the rhetorical situation itself
3Your project clearly demonstrates the ability to research in a compositional situation by
effectively researching the rhetorical situation itself and you made situationally appropriate
choices in terms of tone, style, diction, various genre conventions, and your choice and use of
research methods/sources (quantitative, qualitative, textual) is appropriate to your discourse
communitys research traditions
4--Your project clearly demonstrates the ability to research in a compositional situation by
effectively researching the rhetorical situation itself and you made situationally appropriate
choices in terms of tone, style, diction, various genre conventions. In your next project,
make sure to more broadly research the research traditions/conventions of your discourse
community and your genre within that discourse communityfor example, a mixture of
both textual and qualitative research is reasonably standard in this context, while your
annotated bibliography and the essay itself rely entirely on textual researchdeliberately
seeking sources engage in conversation with one another, thereby giving you both a better
sense of the target discourse communitys discussion of your topic and subquestions and a
more directly coherent data set with which to substantiate and contextualize your claims.
53+ Your projects choice and use of research methods/sources (quantitative, qualitative,
textual) is highly complex and uses a wide range of discourse community-specific sources, and
your of tone, style, diction, genre-specific choices demonstrate extensive research into the
rhetorical situation
b) Data
1Your project does not clearly demonstrate the ability to research in a compositional situation
by consistently and effectively connecting claims to data that is appropriate to the rhetorical
situation
3Your project clearly demonstrates the ability to research in a compositional situation by
consistently and effectively connecting claims to data that is appropriate to the rhetorical situation
4/53+ Your project clearly demonstrates the ability to research in a compositional
situation by collecting reasonably extensive datain your next project, youll need to be
more extensive in your research, considering more sources from a broader swath of
material and more deeply. Your project almost always effectively connects claims to
situationally appropriate data such that your overall argument appears persuasive, but not
yet logically irrefutablein your next project, carefully comb through your draft to locate

XXXXX 3

and deal with any glaring generalizations, and, for all claims, directly assess each ones
connection to directly applicable data performing as evidence (whether as testimony or
proof).

XXXXX 4

PUBLIC PROJECT WRIT 1133, SPRING 2012
Self-Assessment

Rhetorical Situation: 4
The project clearly demonstrates a highly sophisticated treatment/understanding of the rhetorical situation
beyond its basic elements. The audience, writer, and text are appropriate for the situation, and the
purpose is clear to the context. The one thing that I could have worked on is shortening the paper because
generally some examples of text I read in this rhetorical situation were shorter while others were lengthy,
and I felt mine should have been in the middle, which would mean I would need to make it a bit shorter.
Inquiry(+ Scope): 4
I used sub-questions to understand and answer the major question I was asking. I feel the scope was well
defined, and ambitious, and most of the sub-questions were focused but maybe one or two broadened my
scope without me consciously intending to do so.
Research
a) Situation: 4
I felt I did an extensive amount of research in order to determine what tone, diction, style, and sources
were genre-specific given the rhetorical situation. I feel I could have used a wider range of resources
when I was quoting authors that gave advice that coincided with my topic.
b.) Data: The paper does demonstrate the ability to research in a compositional situation by collecting
extensive data and by effectively connecting claims to situational appropriate data. I dont think my
argument is irrefutable yet because I feel I did not always connect the claims to situational appropriate
data.

XXXXX 5

Understanding Point of View

Categories: How to choose point of view, Exercises Writers can use, What Readers are saying
about point of view, How to determine what you want your Readers to Know, How to determine
if your story is working
XXXXXXXXXXX
April 17, 2012
As writers, one of the challenges of writing fiction is finding the right point of view. How do we
know the point of view is working for the reader?
The following are strategies, exercises, surveys, and techniques that will hopefully assist you in
choosing a point of view to work in, how to make the voice more believable, and how determine
if your story is having the effect you desire on readers:
How does a writer choose to write in a certain point of view?
We write stories that we feel need to be told. We first have to ask what audience we are
targeting. Flannery OConnor, a Southern writer of the 20th century, expressed her thoughts on
writing in her essay titled Writing Short Stories. She advises that
When you write a story, you only have to write one story, but there will always
be people who will refuse to read the story you have written. And this naturally
brings up the awful question of what kind of reader are you writing for when you
write fiction. Perhaps we each think we have a personal solution for this problem.
For my own part, I have a very high opinion of the art of fiction and a very low
opinion of what is called the average reader. I tell myself I cant escape him,
that is the personal reality I am suppose to keep awake, but that at same time, I am
also suppose to provide the intelligent reader with the deeper experiences that he
looks for in fiction. Now actually both of these readers are just aspects of the

XXXXX 6

writers own personality, and in the last analysis, the only reader he can know
anything about is himself.
So if you are writing to people like yourself, then in the first stages of writing your story, you can
determine if someone like yourself would feel compelled to read your story. Jonathan Franzen
simply suggests in the article 10 Rule for Writing Fiction, to write in the third person unless a
really distinctive first-person voice offers itself irresistibly. You should try writing the first few
pages from one point of view and let the characters and narrator lead the story. If this doesnt
work, try taking a break and retelling the story from another perspective, this may allow another
voice to come to your attention.
What are some point of view exercises writers can use?
If you are new to switching points of view here are a few exercises that may help. The
following creative exercise came from the course Accelerated Fundamentals of Fiction Writing,
to help develop effective creative writing techniques that can be applied to any long or short
fiction form, to develop believable characters and let them speakand actfor themselves, or
discover the basics of plotenough to prepare us to tackle any kind of fiction project:

A teenage couple is sitting at a restaurant, playfully making up a fake Cosmo love test for
each other. What questions do they ask each other? Now, write the same scene, but this
time the couple is in their thirties. How would the questions differ? Write the same scene
again, but this time the couple has been married for fifteen years. How would their
questions be different than the other two tests?

Write an internal monologue of the thoughts of a man who is waiting outside his bosss
office, worried that hes about to be fired. Then write an internal monologue from the
POV of the boss sitting in his office getting ready to fire the guy waiting outside.

XXXXX 7

What to do when you have decided point of view

After you have pin pointed what type of point of view you are writing in, also consider
what characters point of view you are looking through. There is a challenge to be met if a
female author tackles a males point of view, and if a male author takes on a womans point of
view.
Lynn Rush, author of Wasteland , wrote a guest column titled Writing the Male Point
of View, where she explains her strategies for writing in first person, male point of view as a
female author. Rush did her research, she took classes on how to understand menspecifically
martial arts classes. Some of the things she admits she kept in mind while writing Wasteland is
that stats suggest women say 20,000 words per day compared to men speaking only 7,000-so
there is a bit more introspection with male leads. Men are more sight driven, details are not
very important to males, they are more logically driven, and they want to fix things when
presented with problems.
Research can allow us to understand our characters, to make them more believable. If
Rush had written in the first person, male point of view but found her character talking more than
the female characters, catching every detail, thinking more abstractly, and considering feelings
rather than strategies to remedy problematic situation, then the male character would fail to be
believable for both male and female audiences.
What Readers are saying about different Points of View
A survey was conducted in which readers were given short renditions of the fairytale
story, Sleeping Beauty (provided by Brooklyn Academics English Department). Each version
was told from a different point of view: objective, first person (princes perspective), and third
person omniscient (one version from the princes perspective and the other from the princesss

XXXXX 8

perspective). Each reader was asked to identify which perspective they enjoyed reading and why;
which version they could become part of the story; which version they felt contained more detail
and if that version was more believable.
Most surveyors stated that they either enjoyed the objective point of view or the first
person (princes perspective) point of view. Those who expressed more enjoyment out of the
first person perspective said they found this version more interesting and story like, meaning it
seemed more like the fairytales they were comfortable reading. Others said the objective and
first person point of view had better descriptions in which there was not unnecessary fluff.
They felt that even though the other versions did contain more detail, the objective perspective
had a less is more approach where readers felt their imagination had more freedom to run with
the descriptions provided.
What is interesting is that more women than men liked the freedom of the objective point
of view, while men liked the more precise descriptions that were provided by the first person
point of view. All surveyors found that the version they felt had better descriptions and was
more enjoyable, was the version that they claimed to contain more believable characters and
settings.
While this survey can be helpful in understanding how readers react to different points of
view, we must consider their situation. As one of the readers commented on how one version
felt more story like, we can see that many of the readers read the various forms of Sleeping
Beauty, while comparing them to the popular Disney version or what they were familiar with as
fairytale stories. However, this fact is also useful into considering expectations of the reader.
How to determine what you want your readers to know

XXXXX 9

When you decide what point of view you want to embark on you also control what your
readers know and what your characters know. In an interview Audrey Niffenegger talks about
her novel, Her Fearful Symmetry, and confesses
I

spent quite a lot of time trying to figure out how to pass point of view around

in a way that isnt annoying to the reader but that allows me to get into and out of
peoples heads so that at any given moment the reader knows what I want them to
know. And that turns out to be surprisingly difficult. I dont know if other people
find it so, but it really was an interesting thing to consciously think about.
The information we give readers and our characters has to be a consistently conscious act. Steve
Almond is the author of the story collections My Life in Heavy Metal, The Evil B.B. Chow, and
various nonfiction novels. In 10 Experts take on the Writing Rulebook, he suggests that what
the reader seeks to learn above all is whom she should care about, and what those characters
want or fear. Readers deserve clearly told stories, not high-watt histrionics.
Then what are some questions we should ask ourselves to keep our details precise and to the
point? Try these prewriting techniques from Write-a-Thon by Rochelle Melander:
What does each character want?
What does each character feel?
How does the action convey the desires and emotions of each character?
What mood am I creating in this scene?
What needs to happen in this scene to move the story forward?
What elements of setting contribute to the scene?
Melander suggests asking these questions during every scene and/or chapter in a fictional story.
How to determine if your story is working
As the survey was conducted and readers expressed their feelings towards point of view,
some of us might be surprised that readers did not find the popular third person point of view the
most compelling. An authors expectations of views rarely match up to readers interpretations

XXXXX 10

of the story. Even though the prewrting technique questions listed above assist in keeping what
you want to say in retrospect, Flannery OConnor advises that the time to think of technique is
when youve actually got the story in front of you.
After you have a draft that is headed towards the finalized direction conduct your own
survey to see what is and is not working in your story. Create test groups of readers who fit your
target audience, give them your manuscript, and ask for honest feedback. Some authors may be
scared to go down this road, because they fear the revisions and extra work that will be required.
However, the feedback you receive could determine whether your book sells or stays on the
shelves. Rob Eagar talks about this idea in the article 3 Reasons Why Some Books Never Sell.
Eagar reflects on his own career, saying,
When I wrote my first book in 2001, I put together three different focus groups
who represented different aspects of my target audience. Their feedback required
me to rewrite every chapter three times and my first chapter nine times! They
were brutally direct, but they were right. Today, that book can still be found
selling on the shelf of most Barnes & Nobles stores 10 years later.
Brian A. Klems, in the article How to Gain Perspective on your Work, suggests to
coach focus groups in advance by saying, Im just going to want to know wherever you went
over a bump. This way they feel free to give you honest feedback without feeling you are going
to expect a step-by-step critique.
Therefore, point of view is just a small step on the ladder to writing your story. With a
result of the survey, we can see that the readers do not see the stories in the same way readers
write the story. The only way to know if your descriptions, setting, and perspective is affective
from the point of view of the character/narrator you a writing in, is to test it out yourself rather

XXXXX 11

than assume it is effecting the readers experience of the story the way you anticipated. Klems
provided the following questions when talking to your focus group about a particular scene or
chapter that contains some bumps:

How did you feel when you read this scene?

What did you like about it?
What didnt you like about it?
Did you ever get bored? Where?
What part made you feel the most emotion? How come?
Then you can dig deeper into their gut reactions on the work as a whole. Readers love stories
that make them feel. So zero in on their emotions:
Did you feel dread anyplace? Horror?
Did you get grossed out by anything? Was it a good gross-out or a bad gross-out?
Did you feel stirred romantically? Whether yes or no, tell me more.
Did you stay up reading later than you intended?
Did you learn anything new?
Did the characters come alive? Which one seemed most alive? Which least? Do you feel you
can clearly see them?
And then: What is X character like? (I have found this question to be especially rewarding.
Readers have different takes on characters, and there have been times Ive learned that my
characters are coming across in ways I hadnt known, sometimes quite differently than Id
intended. Sometimes a reader sees depth in a character that I myself missed! With unique
feedback like that, youll be able to populate your fiction more realistically.)

To learn more about characters and strategies to raise your characters above the status quo visit
http://www.writersdigest.com/whats-new/how-to-raise-your-characters-above-the-status-quo

XXXXX 12

XXXXXXXXX
Professor Singer
WRIT 1113
April 21, 2012
Annotated Bibliography
Biederman, Roseanne. "The Writing Process: Step One." Write Better, Get Published, Be
Creative. Writer's Digest, 29 Feb. 2012. Web. 13 Apr. 2012.
<http://www.writersdigest.com/editor-blogs/there-are-no-rules/the-writingprocess-step-one>.
The article, The Writing Process: Step One by Roseanne Biederman, introduces
prewriting techniques to jumpstart creativity. This article introduces the how to tone which I
noticed commonly occur in several other articles that readers reacted positively. I also used this
article to help give suggestions of what to keep in mind when writing a fiction scene or chapter,
Clemens, Jack. "Write With Prejudice." Write Better, Get Published, Be Creative. F+W Media,
Inc., 2012. Web. 07 Apr. 2012. <http://www.writersdigest.com/writing-articles/bywriting-genre/literary-fiction-by-writing-genre/write_with_prejudice>.
In the article, Write with Prejudice, by Jack Clemens, addresses the hardship in finding
the right point of view when writing a story in literary fiction. He explains how to purposefully
build a bias into the narrative, which pulls the story into a certain direction from the beginning.
He then refers to Flannery OConnor as a respectable source to explaining point of view and
shows how she builds a bias into her stories. He explains the advantages to the third person

XXXXX 13

approach by using excerpts from OConnors writing, and analyzing what its doing and the
purpose for approaching the story as she did.
This is a very helpful article. Not only is it a source for writers talking about point of
view, which potentially helps me answer the question I am researching, but it is also an article
addressing a public audience. This article helps me see the types of articles that public audiences
are viewing as credible and helpful sources. It demonstrates how public articles written by
writers for writers, quotes famous authors and analyzes their work in order for the author,
Clemens to drive his point home. Not only will I use this source as research to see what writers
are reading for tips about point of view in literary work, but also how the public audience is
addressed.
Dyer, Geoff, Anne Enright, Neil Gaiman, David Hare, and AL Kennedy. "Ten Rules for Writing
Fiction." The Guardian. Guardian News and Media, 19 Feb. 2010. Web. 07 Apr.
2012. <http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/feb/20/ten-rules-for-writing-fictionpart-one>.
In the article, Ten Rules for Writing Fiction, by Geoff Dyer, Anne Enright, Neil
Gaiman, and ten other writers provide ten rules that they consider the most important when
writing fiction. Some give suggestions that encourage writers to write no matter what the
circumstance, to discipline yourself to write every day. Some give advice that follow the
donts in writing, such as dont open a novel with weather, or use adverbs in dialogue. Some
of the writers make suggestions of things to do during writers block, when to worry and when to
relax, and other do advice for the life of a writer.
This article is extremely helpful in the fact that it received both positive and negative
comments on the piece. People responded more to the writers who seemed more laid back in

XXXXX 14

what they were writing, meaning it appeared as they were simply giving advice that people good
take or leave, while other writers appeared to believe that their words were gospel. It is important
to take in account the writing style which is well received by a public audience because I want
my article to be well received and not rejected from the beginning because of my voice. I will
also take into account how the article was written in a list format rather than paragraphs; this is a
common occurrence I came across in several other articles.
Eager, Rob. "3 REASONS WHY SOME BOOKS NEVER SELL." Write Better, Get Published, Be
Creative. Writer's Digest, 6 Feb. 2012. Web. 13 Apr. 2012.
<http://www.writersdigest.com/whats-new/3-reasons-why-some-books-never-sell>.

The article, 3 Reasons why some Books Never Sell by Rob Eager gives
suggestions when a book that is published doesnt sell. The suggestions the article provides
could also be used before the publishing stage, in order to create a strong final draft. I especially
liked how the advice is given by a successful author who has experience the life of an author;
this had a positive effect on the readers. Quoting the authors that are well known and making a
living by writing will make my piece more interesting to readers and more helpful to aspiring
writers because they will deem the information useful and potentially helpful. The advice about
utilize focus groups, helped with my article specifically. This article also used the common
second person how to point of view.
G, CELESTE N. "The Problem with Stories." Fiction Writers Review Blog Archive. Fiction
Writers Review. Web. 09 Apr. 2012. <http://fictionwritersreview.com/blog/theproblem-with-stories>.
The article The Problem with Stories, by Celeste N.G., addresses Ted talks. Celeste
explains that in the TED talk provided, writer/economist Tyler Cowen talks about why stories
make him nervous and why we should be suspicious of stories. Celeste provides a written portion

XXXXX 15

of Cowens talk, and includes a youtube video of Cowens full discussion in which he attempts
to answer the question: what are the problems of relying too heavily on stories?
I found this to be an interesting source because it made me consider using other
references such as videos of writers discussing and addressing the question I am considering.
Public audiences, even those interested in literary writing will sometimes take the time to read a
short article with a video, rather than read a lengthy article and not devoting the time to finish it
because time is money.
Horowitz, Anothony. "Do We Still Need Publishers?" The Guardian. The Guardian News and
Media, 2012. Web. 07 Apr. 2012.
<http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/booksblog/2012/feb/27/anthony-horowitz-dowe-still-need-publishers>.
The piece, Do We Still Need Publishers? is based on an event hosted by children's
booksellers The Book People, the Anthony Horowitz gave a talk questioning the role of the
publisher in today's literary world. The article is an edited version of the discussion. It questions
the importance of publishers, the strange relationship between writers and their publishers, and
the pros and cons to self-publishing.
This was an interesting article in the sense that even though it was a lengthy article, many
people commented on its content. This made me realize what public audiences categorize as
important and useful information. And even though Anthony Horowitz is a credible source in
himself, I learned that public audiences respond positively to the sources they feel have
experience in the field of literary writing. This shows me that even though some articles I have
read in literary public discourse does not quote scholars; they quote well known writers, making
what I will write more credible.

XXXXX 16

Klems, Brian. "HOW TO GAIN PERSPECTIVE ON YOUR WORK." Write Better, Get Published, Be
Creative. Writer's Digest, 7 Nov. 2011. Web. 13 Apr. 2012.
<http://www.writersdigest.com/whats-new/how-to-gain-perspective-on-your-work>.
The article, How to Gain Perspective on your Own Work by Brian Klems is one of the more
lengthy articles I came a crossed.

It covers a writers questions about when one needs to gain

prospective and how to gain prospective. This article also used the second person point of view, where
one writer is giving other writers advice. I especially liked his take about gaining an outside perspective
when writing stories. I quoted his questions that get readers to comment on specific aspects of what
theyve just read in my article in order to show what other writers are saying about focus groups.
Milani, Lilia. "Sleeping Beauty Points of View." Brooklyn Academics: Department of English, 3 Sept.
2001. Web. 13 Apr. 2012. <http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/english/melani/pv.html>.
This website provided the short versions of the Sleepy Beauty fairytale from different points of
view. They were not my favorite written works but they provided me with the source necessary to
conduct a survey, in which readers would comment on questions in analyzing which perspective they
enjoyed reading.

Niffenegger, Audrey. "Audrey Niffenegger Explains How to Create a Good Story." Writer's
Digest. F+W Media, Inc., 2012. Web. 07 Apr. 2012.
<http://www.writersdigest.com/writing-articles/by-writing-goal/write-first-chapterget-started/niffenegger>.
The article "Audrey Niffenegger Explains How to Create a Good Story, is an onlineexclusive extended version of the interview with Audrey Niffenegger. In this interview she talks
about the process of writing Her Fearful Symmetry, how she wrote it (not start to finish), her
research process, and her life as a writer. This was an interesting interview in which aspiring
writers can relate to her story and take notes on how she writes and rules she does or does not
follow.

XXXXX 17

Reading this article gave me an idea to look for interviews viewed by public audience to
see if authors are quoted talking about how they wrote their story and decided what point of view
in which they wrote it in and how that affected their novel has a whole.
Rush, Lynn. "Writing the Male Point of View." Write Better, Get Published, Be Creative.
Writer's Digest, 13 Sept. 2011. Web. 13 Apr. 2012.
<http://www.writersdigest.com/editor-blogs/guide-to-literary-agents/writing-themale-point-of-view>.
This article was very intriguing and useful for the research for my article. The writer
Lynn Rush, talks about writing in a point of view that is challenging; she is a women telling a
story from a male first person point of view. She included some of her research strategies and
explained why research was very important for convincing her audiences of the sex of her
narrator. I included some of her advice and strategies in my article.
Strawser, Jessica. "WRITING RULES: 10 EXPERTS TAKE ON THE WRITER%u2019S
RULEBOOK." Write Better, Get Published, Be Creative. Writer's Digest, 13 Feb. 2012.
Web. 13 Apr. 2012. <http://www.writersdigest.com/whats-new/writing-rules-10-expertstake-on-the-writers-rulebook>.
This was a very lengthy article where writers were commenting on ten clich writing rules. I
found the questions about hooks and rough drafts useful for my article; I quoted some of the authors
giving guidance about these areas of writing. This was also interesting in the way that some writers took
stances on following or breaking the rule. When I read the comments I analyzed which tone readers
responded to, and the tones that readers found un-agreeable. This was helpful when I was deciding what
tone to take in my article.