ENG1A

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ENG1A

• Dr. Alan Haffa

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Introductions as Narrative

• Narrative Story Telling
• How we introduce ourselves is a type of personal
  narrative. Past, present, future.
• What types of facts do you choose to reveal?
  What do you keep private?
• What words do you use to describe yourself?
• How do you organize your narrative?
• Who is your audience and purpose?

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Dr. Alan J. M. Haffa

• What is conveyed by a title?
• Why include my initials?
• As a professor, my introduction focuses upon my
  education and past teaching experiences.
• How much of my personal life is appropriate in
  introduction to a class?

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Rhetoric and Audience

• Importance of Audience
• Thesis or Main Idea or Dominant Impression
• Purpose

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Practical Applications of Rhetorical Strategies

• Job Application Cover Letter College Application
  letter Personal Narrative to inform the hiring
  committee about your background in a favorable
  way that suits the position
• Social Worker writing to a a supervisor about
  unsanitary conditions at a Nursing Home
  Description to inform your boss of the situation
  and to persuade him or her to take a specific
  action
• PTA opposing K-8 plan find other schools with
  similar programs and poor results Example to
  persuade the school district not to make the
  changes
• Manager asked to develop a diversity plan
  Definition to convince the company of the need
  to recruit a specific class of people.

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Rhetorical Strategies Continued

• Manager preparing a report on two different
  health care plans for workers Compare-Contrast
  to help administration decide on the merits of
  two competing plans
• A friend asks for directions to your home for a
  party Process to help friend find the home
  easily and simply.
• College Placement Officer asked to write a report
  that divides and classifies the incoming freshman
  for English placement Classification to gather
  data to help with curriculum planning

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Rhetorical Strategies Continued

• Sale of a painting brush has fallen Your boss
  assigns you to figure out why Causal Analysis
  to find out why sales of this brush have fallen
• You are on a jury and the foreman asks you to
  write down why you think the defendant is guilty
  or innocent Argument to persuade your fellow
  jurors to vote a specific way.

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Controlling Idea

• Regardless of your writing strategy, every essay
  must have a controlling idea.
• Thesis establishes your controlling idea, in
  effect, a declaration by the writer of what the
  essay intends to gowhether to argue, narrate,
  describe, or classify.

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Examples of Theses

• The biggest piece of claptrap about the Press is
  that it deals almost exclusively, or even mainly,
  with news. T. S. Matthews, The Power of the
  Press
• While I was still a boy, I came to the
  conclusion that there were three grades of
  thinking and since I was later to claim thinking
  as my hobby, I came to an even stranger
  conclusionnamely, that I myself could not think
  at all. William Golding, Thinking as a Hobby
• Although Boswell and Johnson belonged to the
  same literary club, were close friends, held the
  same views on the Monarchy and the English class
  system, there are significant differences in
  their literary opinions and preferences.
  Student Essay, A Contrast of the Literary
  Opinions of Boswell and Johnson

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Journal Assignment 1

• Write a Narrative paragraph about one of the most
  formative and influential events in your life.
• Consider your audience in this case, the class
• Consider your purpose to give your new
  classmates an idea of who you are and what makes
  you tick through the form of a personal story.

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Example

• A fathers example is influential in the
  character development of a young man. I can
  still vividly recall how as a young boy my
  father, Dean W. Haffa, told me about a meeting he
  had attended that night. It was a union meeting,
  and a very controversial one at that. The
  company had finally made a salary proposal and it
  amounted to a 25 cent per hour raise. The
  workers had not received raises in a good many
  years and were not happy. My father, for better
  or worse, was the union steward, a thankless job,
  which requires a man to stand up to the boss and
  put his neck on the line for men who may abandon
  him at the first sign of trouble. My Dad was
  someone who had a deep sense of loyalty and honor
  and was not afraid to do the right thing and the
  men he worked with looked to him for guidance.
  This particular night, he had to explain the
  meager salary offer and make a recommendation to
  the members on whether to accept or go on strike.
  

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Narrative Continued

• The president was there, which made it doubly
  difficult. My father told me how he stood up and
  urged the men to reject the offer and to stay
  united. After the meeting and the vote, which
  supported my fathers recommendation and rejected
  the salary offer, the company president
  approached him from behind, jabbed something
  pointed into his back and said, Does that feel
  like a threat, Haffa? It should. It turns out
  that the threat was the presidents crooked
  finger, but he had pretended to have a gun. I
  thought of that story often when I eventually
  become the President of the Faculty Association
  in the Maricopa Community College District. My
  fathers example had taught me that even when
  faced with a threatening situation, it is
  important to stand up for your principles and to
  be willing to put yourself at risk for your
  colleagues. I like to think that my Dads
  courage and selflessness are part of my character
  today, and his example certainly inspired me
  during the salary negotiations that I led at
  Maricopa on behalf of faculty.