Morquecho 1

Selena Morquecho

UWP

Aaron Benedetti

13 March 2017

Cover Letter:

Dear Aaron,

In this essay I felt a little overwhelmed after I got feedback from my peers. They told me

to talk about things I didnt even think to mention while writing my first draft. As a matter of

fact, I thought my first draft was really good, but apparently I was missing some key points.

My main concern is to know if I approached the prompt right and if I have answered

everything that needs to be answered. I know I might have grammatical errors. However, I

would like to focus on that when I revise it later.

Sincerely,

Selena Morquecho.

Reflective Essay
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A rhetorical analysis essay has been something I have written in the past. However, this

class made realize that the way I had been writing rhetorical analysis essays was wrong. I

thought that rhetor was only about the rhetorical terms, such as, imagery, diction, metaphors,

similes, rhetorical questions, etc. It wasnt until I took this class that I learned that one is also

supposed to answer questions in a rhetorical analysis essay like, Who is responsible for the text?,

What credibility is there or is the text reliable?, Where did the text come from?, What does the

rhetor want to develop? Also thinking about the audience the author is approaching, which

would be the primary audience and the audience who could possibly read the text, which is

called the, secondary audience. One has to also think about exigence, time, purpose, and

constraints, which would be the length of the text, form, medium, basically, what limits the

rhetors.

Another thing I did not know about rhetorical analysis essays is that one is able to not

only analyze text, but one can also analyze objects, such as flags, videos, symbols, clothing,

traditions, habits, languages,etc. The list is endless. I did my rhetorical analysis essay on the

Chicano flag. This was something I never thought I would be analyzing, since whenever I

thought of analyzing something, texts was what came to my mind. When analyzing the flag, I

was able to answer questions and touch of ethos, pathos and logos. I could have chosen to touch

on diction, imagery or any other rhetorical term, but I chose to do those three since, those were

the only ones we talked about during class. I found out amazing things about the Chicano flag,

such as, why it has an Aztec eagle in the center of a white circle and why it is red. I was also able

to find out what people initially thought of the flag and its real purpose. It was a flag who

represented the Chicanos and the farmworkers, but it was also a symbol for the whole nation to
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see if the farmworkers produce was from a union or not. As I learned about the Chicano flag, I

was able to do research and analyze the flag, all at the same time. This essay was not

complicated at all. All I had to do was to analyze a symbol or a text and see where ethos which

stands for ethics, was applied, I also had to look for pathos (emotion), and logos (logic). While I

looked for those, I was to also answer the rhetorical analysis questions that I previously

mentioned. After writing this essay, I believe I have rhetorical knowledge because I know what it

takes to write a rhetorical analysis paper, I am able to understand the rhetorical concepts and I

am also able to apply them. Having knowledge on the rhetorical analysis essay will help me to

write other essays in the future that may require me to analyze a symbol or a text.

In this course I have been also able to learn about discourse communities. Prior to taking

this class, I had never heard what a discourse community is. I have now realized that discourse

communities are everywhere I go. It can be a club, an organization, a class, a group of people, a

gang, political parties, etc. For this project, I decided to focus on my Chicana/o studies 10 class,

offered here at the University of California, Davis by the professor, Carlos Francisco Jackson. I

chose this discourse community because I believe that after taking this class, we all have a very

different view in society. I went into that class very immune to and indifferent to anything that

was happening in our country. One time, during lecture, professor Jackson asked the whole class

what were our sources which we got our news from. Most of us, sadly, said that we would get

them from social media, such as, Twitter, Facebook, our news application on our phones or

sometimes whenever we turned on the television at home. All the students, including myself,

noticed how disappointed the professor was. That day during lecture multiple students asked the

professor to recommend websites where he got his news from and to publish them on Canvas. I
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also noticed that our comments that we would give to the professor when participating during

class where very opinionated and now, most of our comments are very factual. I have talked to

people from that class and thanks to professor Jackson we all think very differently now. I

realized that many of us when we had first enrolled in that class, were not even sure of what the

word, Chicano really meant. Now, we all know the meaning of it many of us identify ourselves

as Chicanos/Xicanx. I thought this was a great discourse community to write my essay about

because it has impacted my life in such a great way and I noticed it had impacted other peoples

lives tremendously. Once people take that class, they will never think the same. We have become

more aware, more open minded, and more than anything else we have become more educated.

While writing my research paper which is my discourse community project, I had to

explain what made Chicana/o Studies 10 a discourse community. The fact that all of professor

Carlos Francisco Jacksons from his class Chicana/o studies can agree with the fact that a

Chicano/Xicanx is someone who fights for social justice, someone who is constantly trying to

look for better for them and their community, a person who has community self-determination, a

feminist, is a Xicanx. That is why I thought that this was a great discourse community, not only

because we all have the same ideology and we believe we are what we do and not what we are,

but because I believe that being a Chicana/o Xicanx has a great message to the world because

this community doesnt see race, it is very acceptable and it is constantly fighting for betterment.

. While writing my discourse community project I was able to learn about knowledge of

conventions because I had to deal with the definition of the word, Chicano, the reasons why

Chicana/o Studies 10 is a discourse community. I had to work with people with different

opinions, but that eventually led to the same meaning or purpose. I had to learn why is that this
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particular class is a discourse community and I had to explain it and I had to back up my

information with evidence. This will definitely help me later on to do research on any topic I

would like to write about, or speak of.

While writing the rhetorical analysis essay and the discourse community essay I practiced

processes which is another learning outcome. I have met this learning requirement because for

example,the rhetorical analysis essay, I didnt have to do any research, but I still decided to do

so to become knowledgeable about the topic and to provide reliable information. I have written

and revised multiple drafts for both of my essays and this one. I am able to write academic

essays, personal essays, lab reports and more because I am able to differentiate the difference.

Both, the rhetorical analysis and the discourse community project were of great practice

to do research. Now I am able to perform primary and secondary research. I know the difference

between both. For example, if I survey 100 people on their opinion about the universitys tuition

rate, that would be primary research because I am conducting it. If it is research that I collect

from a book, an article a magazine, etc. Then that would be secondary research. I am able to cite

every source correctly which will later on help me to back myself up in any discussion, paper

that I will more than likely will be required to write. Since, I already know this, I will not be

accused of plagiarism.

Lastly, metacognition is something that I have been practicing before I even was enrolled

in this class. Making sure I use MLA format of APA and stay consistent with the same format all

throughout the essay. Making sure that I reflect on what I have written and to make sure that my

paper and the information in it is well organized.

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Overall, I have met every single learning outcome required by the university and the

course UWP 1. Rhetorical knowledge, processes, knowledge of conventions, research, and

metacognition are all the learning outcomes that I have been able to meet through the writing

journal, which has helped me reflect on my ideas, jot down notes for my projects, create outlines,

and write down research I found. The projects was where I was able to put all this knowledge to

work. These learning outcomes will help me to create a skeleton before I start an essay, it will

help me to do multiple drafts and revise them and have other people revise them. It will also help

me by doing the correct research like at the library or doing myself instead of just googling

things. All these are great skills that should turn into habits for other classes so I know I have to

do this automatically without having people telling me to do it.