Rhetorical Situation

When we were asked to write an essay over “TV’s Negative Influence on Kinds Reaffirmed,” the first thing I did was to read over the article multiple times. As I read through the article I looked for the stance that McCall made and what his theory was. I then highlighted all important information I found so I could use it later. For our assignment we were put in a rhetorical situation where we had to take a stance on the topic and back it up with personal experiences. After I read “The Rhetorical Situation” from Purdue’s Owl, an implied rhetorical situation is to not get influenced by the author’s viewpoint, but to come up with your own reasons and opinions about the topic. When I first started reading the article I did not have a stance on the issue but as I kept reading I was leaning more towards McCall. When I was beginning to start my paper I thought about what McCall said and then I thought about what the opposing side would have to say to him. Most of McCall’s points were hard to argue against and to find a way to contradict them so I ended up agreeing with him.

When I was writing my paper I was having a hard time finding personal experiences to go with why I agreed with McCall. What I kept thinking about when I thinking of personal experiences was that only my teacher was going to be reading it so I did not need to have that persuasive of a paper. When I could not think of any personal experiences I pointed out facts from the article that McCall found and used them as why I agreed with him. I knew by doing that I was not going to get back a very good recommendation paper. I know I am a better writer than that but I did not want to take the time do the paper the way it was supposed to be done. When I received my recommendation paper I was not surprised by the comments I got because I knew what I did wrong and I should have fixed them. From what I have read for the presentation I would not make the same choices. First, I would of the followed the directions better. Second, I would have actually taken the time to do the paper instead of waiting last minute to get it done. Lastly, I would have just made up personal experiences instead of not following the directions.

-Megan Grimes (422 words)