MY REFLEXION ABOUT AN ACADEMIC TEXT

After having read the text "Why I write" By George Orwell, and taking into account my previous work and knowledge about general structure text, I did not recognize initially this writing as an academic text. At that moment, it was a logical decision to me, because the text does not have an obvious structure. For example, when we are tackling an academic text is normal to expect that its structure be clear. It means that we can easily identify its abstract, arguments, references, sources, logical connectors, etc., but, when we have a text that is subjective, with a personal writing style, that is not lineal, and with many other aspects that are apparently missing, so, it is possible to think hastily, that is not an academic text.

However, when we check this text carefully, we find that it has examples, arguments, a conclusion, a subject, some personal experiences as a writer, in some parts specific or technical vocabulary, a purpose, at the same time we can identify a managerial audience and a tone that is steady, among other elements that allow us to recognize that it is an academic text too.

Something that help me to do this reflections were the statements of Barbara Schneider and Jo-Anne Andre in their text “Developing Authority in student writing through written peer critique in the disciplines”, because they said that there is no one-style-fits-all discourse and that each discipline has its own set of conventions in which particular ways of constructing and communicating knowledge.

Two interesting links about Fahrenheit 451

I found these links too, the first one is about the book and the second one is about the author, check them, I think there is a good information.

http://www.bookrags.com/notes/451/

Author Biography / Context of the Work
One-Page Plot Summary
Character Descriptions
Object/Place Descriptions

Quotes

Topic Tracking
Topic Tracking: Fear
Topic Tracking: Indifference


Chapter Summaries

Part 1: The Hearth and the Salamander
Part 2: The Sieve and the Sand
Part 3: Burning Bright


http://www.neabigread.org/books/fahrenheit451/fahrenheit451_04.php

It is about the Author

popularization noun, 

from the verb:

popularize /ˈpɒpjələrʌɪz/ (or popularise) 

▶verbmake popular.

■ make (something scientific or academic) accessible or interesting to the general public.

Why I argue “Why I write” by George Orwell is an academic text

“Why I write” by George Orwell is an academic text because it develops an academic subject and because it satisfies the conditions to be a text of this type. The first condition to be an academic text is to analyze something and if you read in detail, the writer wants in this text to analyze motives to write. However, to develop this analysis, the writer uses two components very important: arguments to explain the four main motives that lead a person to write and statements related with his experience to support his arguments.
Secondly, to be academic, the text should have a structure. Somebody can think this text doesn’t have a structure but it has an argumentative essay structure. It is divided in: introduction, point of view or arguments, examples and a conclusion. In an argumentative essay isn’t necessary to present an opinion different to the writer, while in a contrast essay it is necessary.
Third, an academic text is intended for a particular audience. This text is intended for a particular group: people who are interested in writing (students, writers, teachers, man or woman of letters). It isn’t intended to engineers or architects.
Finally, people say this text is subjective and for this reason it isn’t an academic text. It happens is Orwell uses his literary stile to talk about a specific subject: writing. However, thus his brilliant career as men of letters, he also expresses his feeling, his anecdotes, and his fears. Also I think the reasons to write are personals and for this, this text can’t have the objectivity of a text about technology or statistics. It would be a positivist point of view. In spite of this, Orwell’s arguments about four motives to write can become widespread and some of these motives can identify in the work of all writers.

WHY I WRITE BY GEORGE ORWELL AS AN ACADEMIC TEXT

“Why I write by George Orwell” is a text about the author experience as a writer during his life and the reason why an author writes, using the word “I” most of the time during the text, so it is not easy to know if this is an academic text or not. However, there are some signs that show this text as an academic text.

In order to show why this text is an academic text, we need to define what an academic text is. It is the kind of writing that you are required to do in a college or university. It is a writing that develops some arguments with the purpose to build knowledge.

To know if a text is an academic text, we need to look some characteristics like: the text organization (how?), the topic (what?) and the audience who is directed that text (who?). Other important clue is the use of technical vocabulary, the use of examples and the use some definitions.

“Why I write by George Orwell” is clearly an academic text because it has some organization (introduction, arguments and conclusion) there is a main idea and some arguments that develop it, at the end, there is a conclusion. Besides, it is directed to an academic group as students, writers, etc.

During the introduction, the author uses his own experience as a writer in order to illustrate the main idea: “the experience of life influence a writer work”. So he develops some arguments as: the reason why a person writes and how difficult is to write. “I think there are four great motives for writing, at any rate for writing prose. They exist in different degrees in every writer…” in this way, George Orwell makes some definitions: “according to the atmosphere in which he is living. There are: sheer egoism, esthetic enthusiasm, historical impulse, political purpose” also, he uses some examples “let me give just one example of the cruder kind of difficulty that arises. My book about Spanish civil war, Homage to Catalonia…”

Finally the author writes a conclusion about the main idea: “looking back through the last page or two, I see that I have made it appear as though my motives in writing were wholly public-spirited. I don’t want to leave as the final impression. All writers are vain, selfish, and lazy, and at the very bottom of their motives there lies a mystery…”

“Why I write by George Orwell” has all the characteristics of an academic text, despite it is about the author experience, he is being objective from his subjectivity to make some knowledge about writing.

Is or not "why I write" an academic text?

Before the debate I thought this text was an academic one because although at the beginning the author uses ordinary words in a simple style of writing, in my view, from the middle of the text to the end he uses technical vocabulary. Besides, it has an essay structure. And although the author does not cite other authors, I have heard it is not necessary if the author is an expert in the subject.

However, after the debate and having listened the counter-arguments I admit they make me doubt and that is why I would like to know the professor's opinion.

FARENHEIT. AUDIOBOOK.. DOWNLOAD THE AUDIO

ok guys I found the audio to have a little more input and to improve our listening.

Here you can download the audio, it is in megaupload :

http://www.filestube.com/source.html?token=71826d094161413003e9

What I write is not an academic tet....Marcela

WHAT IS AN ACADEMIC TEXT?

·         Jordan (1999, p. 8) states that "academic writing" must be written in a proper formal style.

·         Hamp-Lyons and Poole (2006, p. 16-17) also define "academic writing" in terms of formality. They state that academic writing is a formal piece of paper for which credit has to be given to the writer and that the work will contain specific grammatical patterns, organisation and argument.

First of all, « why I write » from George Orwell, it’s not an academic text because he shows so much subjectivity, for instance, when he tells what happened to him and how he felt.  In the second hand, you can find through all the text the use of the personal pronoun “I”. Written language is in general objective rather than personal. It therefore has fewer words that refer to the writer or the reader. This means that the main emphasis should be on the information that you want to give and the arguments you want to make, rather than you.

In the third point, why I write is not linear and I don’t think the author stands in one central point or theme with every part contributing to the main line of argument, he talks about so many things like stories about his life, what he remembers like poems, he tries to define the degrees in every writer but they are defined according to what the author thinks. Even you can’t see any reference to support what he affirmed.  Finally, I didn’t  see that facts and figures were given precisely, as I said before,  the author just talk about himself.

“Why I write” by George Orwell: An academic text

Sometimes we think about academic texts as something scientific and hard to understand made by old men in labs. It may be believed that these texts are just related to numbers (math) or chemicals (chemistry). But for me, it goes beyond and, also experiences and opinions may be taken into account when talking about them.

Some of you in classroom said this text was just a biography “literary writing”. In opposition to that point of view I believe is an essay; it doesn’t matter he is taking into account his personal life, because he is talking about real factors which have influenced his life and, maybe the one of some others writers and people. The text shows the structure of an essay. In the first paragraph he introduces the topic “the reasons why he had to write books since he was a child”. Then in the next paragraphs, he gives us all his arguments trying to defend the fact why “he writes”. He presents his point: the reasons or motives why a writer can write, and also how society and the historical events may affect the way how they do it. Finally, in the last paragraph, he concludes that he doesn’t know what his strongest motives are, but he does know which of them deserve to be followed. With this structure he can make an analysis of his work as a writer; taking positive or negative aspects, causes and effects.

Another reason to think this is an academic text is that he purposes four great motives for writing, in that part he is not talking just about his life, he is describing some general motives to describe why people write in our world.

As a conclusion, we have to think academic texts as a way to express opinions, experiences and facts: convincing some other people or, sharing information that may be considered as valuable. For me this text is very interesting and worthless for literary world. It should be taken for us as a tool to make a self analysis of our motives to write, maybe we don’t have them or, just we haven’t thought about them.

The educational chilean system, instead of  teaching everybody in an equal way, serve to integrate children and promote values, it has become an instrument of exclusion and widening  of inequality!!!!!

Without a radical reform in education, without having into account all the inequality of social classes will be bigger. The best schools will be reserved only for rich people with the highest scores that will allow them to go to a university. But what about poor people?? What about our opportunities?? Is the state of Chile or Colombia’s doing something about it??

We also have the right to have high education!!! So I think that this could be a great example of what is happening here in Colombia and what we should do, thanks God Santos didn’t accept the education with profit!!

But the real questions is: Are we really doing something for having a better education?
Protest can be the only way to do something?
Or maybe doing things like the  capuchos in the univeristy can really contribute a benefit to improve our education?

Don`t you think so? 

 Chile vs Colombia

Studying at a public university is a duty in our country the government has to protect the student`s right and we have to demand them.

Sometimes we have a lot of changes about education but we must be focused which of these one could be a benefit for us. To be directly I am talking about what is happening with Chilean public education. They did not pay attention to the process of it and the Chile`s government introduced a new system (private education) and nowadays they have a revolution because of this… perhaps, they are already late! But Colombian people are on time... YOU COULD change our context… don`t you think so?

Andres Felipe Vanegas Fernandez

Fahrenheit 451's Context

Visit this link: context, quotes, etc
http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/451/context.html

...And more about Fahrenheit 451

Hi everybody! I found this good link and I hope you really like it... It's a complete view of the book including many aspects tou can find interesting... Explore the site!

http://www.gradesaver.com/fahrenheit-451/study-guide/section1/

Fahrenheit 451

hello guys these are some websites that I found, you will get information about the book and its author I hope you enjoy it.

http://www.enotes.com/fahrenheit-451

http://www.cliffsnotes.com/WileyCDA/LitNote/Fahrenheit-451.id-106.html

http://www.uhigh.ilstu.edu/english/salon5/fahrenheit4512.htm

"Why I write" is an academic text...

I'm not gonna say I or 'we' were right... The debate became a war where nobody was going to give up, and that's good; that allows us to have many different views and leads to fluency and well-spoken English... Anyway! I give my reasons of why I think it's an academic text:
First of all, and in a different way as the other group thought, I am sure it has a structure where we can see a thesis, an order in arguments with its historical and own-experience supports and a conclusion. Into this first reason is the second one, the arguments are well-presented and he doesn’t mention them just because… He starts from the title “WHY I WRITE” and talks about that punctually. Another one is the support he gives to his own history by mentioning the main aspects which put him in the role of writer and overall how these aspects led him to know how to write.

These are just some reasons without saying the ones of the other group were very valid... As a matter of fact I must say I was confused in some parts of the debate... But at the end I really thought it is an academic text.

FAHRENHEIT 451

Hello guys.

A found this web page which contains some info about "Farhrenheit 451". This is the info you can find:

1. Plot Synopsis
2. FAHRENHEIT 451 by Ray Bradbury
3. About Bradbury and FAHRENHEIT 451
4. 451 Photo Gallery
5. The Book Banning Debate
6. Study Guides for Fahrenheit 451
7. Movie Info and News
8. Francois Truffaut's FAHRENHEIT 451
9. 451 Video
   

http://www.squidoo.com/451

I also find a study guide of the book, I hope it is useful:

http://www.steppenwolf.org/_pdf/studyguides/F451_studyguide.pdf

Farenheit 451

Hi guys,

I want to share some information about the author which is so important to understand the book.

here is the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UU51N2s3B78 This is a great interview.

http://www.raybradbury.com/bio.html

http://kisi.deu.edu.tr/murat.goc/451.pdf This is the book online

Bye!

An academic text

To be honest, I was very confused if the text "Why I write By George Orwell" was or it was not an academic text (maybe I am still confused). At the beginning, I decided to be against mainly because of three reasons:

Fisrt at all, I thought about the purpose of an academic text which is "to make know something, to share an important knowledge of a specific field" something that "I did not find" in the text because the topic is not really important, it was just a mere personal anecdote, no contribution as writers. Then, I argued that kind of texts is supposed to have a technical language or at least language used in a very formal way, not in an informal one. Finally, it was not an academic text because it was very subjective and the author does not support his ideas doing intertextuality or something like that.

But now, I must say that I changed my mind....why? I am taking the course "creative writing" and as a final work we have to present an essay developed from a personal experience; according to the information that I found on internet that is an academic text, so, I reflected a little bit and I wondered what would be the difference between that essay and my future essay? there is not difference. Mine will have a topic that is relevant just for me, with an informal language, I mean, not using slang but without technical term and I am not going to need intertextuality at all because is "my experience". As a conclusion,"Why I write" is really an academic text, maybe the problem is we do not know how to identify the different kind of texts that for sure exist.

Information about the book!!!!

hello!!! Guys

it's a weblink, in which you can get more information about the book.

http://www.bydewey.com/451.html

CONTENTS

º Ray Bradbury, 1922- Author of Fahrenheit 451 Biography
º Fahrenheit 451 eText or Online Text, Index & Concordance
º Analysis, Critique, Reviews, and General Resources on Fahrenheit 451
º Study Guides on Fahrenheit 451
º Lesson Plans and Webquests on Fahrenheit 451
º Film, Movie, Video, Audio, Images, Music Sites on Fahrenheit 451
º Special Topics Related to Fahrenheit 451, e.g. Censorship, Book burning
º Miscellaneous Sites on Fahrenheit 451 including Games, Quotations
º Links to other Fahrenheit 451 Web Sites

Fahrenheit 451

Ray Bradbury tells what inspired him to write Fahrenheit 451:



Based on this book Francois Truffaut directed the film: "Fahrenheit 451" in 1966.

Transcript of our debate.
Once you have your transcript ready, please send it to:
englishseventh@gmail.com. Please indicate the minutes
you are in charge of in the "subject". The password to enter
that account is: solcolmenares


Person in charge   Minutes

Ana Isabel	1-2
Diana Mancilla	3-4
Paola	5-6
Julian	7-8
Tenshi	9-10
Lorena	11-12
Andrés Felipe	13-14
Marianne	15-16
Diane	17-18
Eduardo	19-20
Alan	21-22
Lady Johana	23-24
Laura	25-26
Cristian	27-28
Karen	29-30
Ricardo	31-32
Sandra	33-34
Ma. Cristina	35-36
Luis Fernando	37-38
Rosa Doris	39-40