Samantha Kunianski

De Piero
Writing 2
2.22.16

Savant Syndrome: For the Psychologist, Neuroscientist, and Casual Reader

What day of the week was July 19th, 1990? To the average individual, a guess of one day

Comment [1]: Love this title, Kunianski -- keys me in to

the heart of your paper.

is as good as any, and provides a one in seven chance to get the answer correct. However, in the
mind of some savants with gifted skills of calendar calculations, the answer Thursday is the
equivalent of asking the afore mentioned average individual what 1 + 1 equals. The term
savant typically refers to a person with serious mental disabilities, and have some island of

Comment [2]: Killer start! :)

This is suuuuuper small potatoes, but "afore
mentioned" is one word.

genius which stands in marked, incongruous contrast to overall handicapwhatever the

particular savant skill, it is always linked to massive memory (Treffert). The topic of savant
syndrome, while especially apparent in scholarly publications, can also be seen in pop-culture

Comment [3]: Nice "move" here -- by defining "savant"

early on (at least, how you're/they're using it), it helps
to clarify any confusion for the reader.

sourcestwo very different genres. Considering three sources from different genres and
disciplines, it becomes evident that the overall effectiveness of a piece is the composition of its

Comment [4]: Do you mean "is [determined by] the"?

presence of established conventions, its usage of moves made by the author which lend
themselves to the pieces purpose, and its target audience.
One scientific publication Savant Syndrome: Realities, Myths and Misconceptions

Comment [5]: More specificity here will help me read

your work with more focus/purpose. What
conventions? what moves? What purpose(s)?

written by Darold Treffert, explores the idea that while savant syndrome is a fascinating topic of
interest for scientists, it has proven to also be a somewhat challenging topic to study. Trefferts
report was published to the Journal of Autism & Developmental Disorders and thus fittingly
falls into the discipline of mental illness, or on a broader spectrum a psychological illness.
Conventions, which exist within every genre, can help signify to the reader what genre he or she
is considering. Dirk argues this idea in his paper Navigating Genres claiming, When that
situation happens again, another person uses the first response as a basis for the second, and

Comment [6]: Transition issue: whats the specific link

between sentence 1 and sentence 2? Whatever that
is, considering putting it into the start of sentence 2.
(At the end of sentence 1 is another option.)

eventually everyone who encounters this situation is basing his/her response on the previous
ones, resulting in the creation of a new genre (Dirk 252). The paper begins with an abstract,
representative of the genre of scholarly articles, and follows with content divided into sections
appropriate to its title. The two most prominent sections of the paper Realities and Myths
and Misconceptions are in larger, bolded font, and encompass the narrower titles that follow.
For example, beneath realities are sections such as Savant Syndrome is Not a New Disorder,
Not All Savants are Autistic, and Not All Autistic Persons are Savants, and The Most
Important Question of All: How do They do It? (Treffert 564-565).
In contrast to the previous paper, A Calendar Savant with Episodic Memory

Comment [7]: I'm wondering what you're trying to

accomplish with this paragraph, SK. What's this
paragraph *do* for your paper?

Impairments is a scholarly article which explains researchers findings on one savant individual,
patient AC596. For the sake of clarity, Savant Syndrome: Realities, Myths and Misconceptions
will be referred to as the first paper, and A Calendar Savant with Episodic Memory
Impairments will be referred to as the second paper. The first and second paper share the
same genre, peer-reviewed scholarly articles, though they differ in discipline as the second has
an emphasis in neuroscience (whereas the first has an emphasis in psychological illnesses).
Based solely on a first glance of the two scholastic papers, a reader can see a distinct difference

Comment [8]: I'd make this "move" early on -- maybe

even the first time you mention them.

However, I don't think "1st" and "2nd paper" will be too
helpful for a reader (at least not me) b/c it could get
pretty confusing trying to remember which is which.
Can you think of another way to shorten them? The
psych piece vs the ...? (What are the two disciplines
you're analyzing here? I'm not really sure yet.)

in format and visual conventions. The most obvious difference is the presence of data, graphs,
and charts in the second paper, and a lack thereof in the first. While the papers differed visually,
they also differed in content. The second paper includes patient history, experiments to be
performed, the results of these experiments, and a discussion of these results. As the first paper
did not focus on one individual, and did not include research on experiments or testing that was
performed, there is no information to include in these sections and thus they are non-existent.
Despite having differences, the two papers share several conventions typical of a scholarly paper.

Comment [9]: This is pretty huge (and, I think,

incredibly interesting). So what does this fact reveal
about disciplinarity and how they each approach
knowledge from different perspectives, using difference
sources of data? Why would one include a patient's
history, but not the other?

You can really run with this one -- so much so that it
*could* be weaved into your central argument.

Both include an abstract, give a bit of background on what makes a savant, use bolded headings
to distinguish one major section from another, have a solely black and white color scheme, have
its text separated into two vertical columns, and include information from previous studies
particularly in introductory sections.
Not all mention of a scientific topic, in this case of savant syndrome, is in scholarly, peer-

Comment [10]: This is tripping me up...

reviewed articles. Pop culture sources, such as the Los Angeles Times, have covered stories
relating to the topic. One article titled Accident Erased Laguna Artists Memory but Gave Her
New Talents described the rollercoaster-like journey of a woman named Leigh Erceg. Erceg
was injured in an accident on her family farm, and despite not having any memory of life before
the accident, she has been diagnosed with acquired savant syndrome. Similar to other articles
produced by newspapers or magazines, Erceg, as well as those close to her, was directly quoted.

Comment [11]: I'm not sure why I'm reading this right
now, Samantha. Is this an overview of your 3rd
source? Or is this part of your argument?

Other conventions of the source included the extra-large, bolded first letter of the article, links to
other recent articles on the site, advertisements, and room for commentary upon the conclusion
of the article.
The moves a writer makes can help him accomplish the goal of his publication. In his
paper How to Read like a Writer, Mike Bunn discusses how attempting to read like a writer
can help an individual not only locate these moves, but also why the author may have chosen to
include them, Instead of reading for content or to better understand the ideas in the
writingyou are trying to understand how the piece of writing was put together by the author
(Bunn 72). In the first paper, the author chooses first to define savant syndrome. It would be
very difficult to educate a reader on myths and realities of savants without the audience first
knowing what a savant isthus this is a rather smart move employed by the author as it allows
for an expansion of audience. This move was also used by Caitlin Kandill, the author of the Los

Comment [12]: How are these two paragraphs

connected? Why have you laid them out like this
back-to-back? What do they have in common? How
do they build on/off each other? Whatever the
answer(s) to these questions are, you might want to
weave them in to create a smoother transition.
Comment [13]: This comment is in reference to the
whole paragraph:
When I see thiseven before I start readingI think,
Ahhhhhhh! Attack of the page-long paragraph!

See if you like this metaphor:

Pretend your whole paper is a big, juicy steak. Do you
want your reader to enjoy that steak in easy-to-chew,
digestable bites? Or do you want them to start
gnawing away at whole thing in one piece (think:
zombie).

Paragraphs are like those bites. Give your reader
your argument in little, digestable, one-idea-at-a-time
bits. By doing so, theyll be able to following along the
trail of your argument much easier. To relate it back to
the steak metaphor, readers need to be able to see the
different parts/pieces/bites of the argument that theyre
chewing on

Angeles Times article, likely for the same reason. Moves can also be seen in the structure of
sentences or paragraphs, such as used by Treffer in the Myths and Misconceptions portion of
his paper. Each myth Treffert presents follows a similar format of what the myth is, background
information on the myth such as where it came from, and finally why it is incorrect, and thus a
myth. For instance, in the section Savants are Not Creative, Treffert recalls his previous
research where in response to the question Is the savant creative? he found, In my experience,
not very (Treffert 566). Following this statement, he writes, I was wrong and have corrected
that perception in my later writings. What has changed my mind? Some additional years of
observation (Treffert 566). The repetitive structure used in this section of the paper is the move.
The second paper chooses to name the person of study Patient AC596 in order to conceal the
identity of the individual. This provides the paper with clarity by verbalizing to the audience that
the entire study is done with the same individual, patient AC596. Additionally, because the paper
presents experimental findings, the author chose to provide graphs and charts instead of solely
raw data most likely to enhance the effectiveness and clarity of the paper. The pop-culture article

Comment [14]: You're bringing in a lot of textual

evidence, SK, which is excellent; however, I'm feeling a
bit overwhelmed as a reader -- and I'm not seeing how
all of this ties together into 1 point.

Is it worth breaking up this big "moves paragraph" into
multiple paragraphs which each analyze *different
kinds of* moves?

uses moves particularly to grab readers attention as well as get them to empathize with Erceg.
For example, the article cites Erceg commentating, Every day I wake up every single freaking
day saying, Ok, what happened yesterday? (Kandill). It is emotion-filled comments like these
that aim to tug at the hearts of readers, in contrast to factual and objective statements in scientific
articles. Kandill also chose to include pictures to somewhat humanize the story of Erceg. The
effects of this could be similar to that of direct quotes, or perhaps build their effects, depending
on the preferencesverbal or visualof a reader.
The structure of an academic paper in comparison to a pop-culture article emphasizes the
difference in formality between the two. Academic papers title each section, and if including new

Comment [15]: Great, so remind me: how/why does this

relate back to your central argument that you laid out in
your thesis statement?

The emotional connection that's happening here... so
what?

research often have sections similar to Abstract, Introduction, Materials and Methods,
Results, Discussion, and Analysis. The second scholarly article, with a neuroscience
emphasis, much more closely follows these title guidelines than the first, with an emphasis on
psychological illness. This, however, can be explained by the fact that the neuroscience paper is
the only one of the three which includes experimental data. In the instance of a research paper
where data is presented, it is often the central focus of the paper, and each section of the paper

Comment [16]: What was it? And what were their

findings? What RQs did they ask? I'd like to know a lot
more about "what went down" in this piece.

lends itself accordinglyprior to the results section, why and how the data is to be collected is
explained, and after the results section, the discussion and analysis is centered around what was
found in the results. In contrast, pop-culture articles do not utilize this sort of formal break-up of
topics, and rather are formatted in an easy-to-read manner. In the Los Angeles Times article, and
not uncommon in other similar sources, the text is broken up into paragraphs consisting of one
or otherwise very few sentences. Additionally, adding to the informal nature of the publication,
indentation of paragraphs is obsolete. The use of questions is more prominent in scholarly
articles, as a major purpose of the genre is to answer some question, thus adding to public
knowledge. Even if questions are not explicitly posed, a reader could easily formulate one (or
many) himself about what the researcher is attempting to demonstrate or prove.
Whether a scholarly or pop-culture publication is more successful in accomplishing
something depends largely on what that something is. Much of this also comes down to who the
intended audience is for any particular goal. As presented in the text So What? Who Cares?
Regardless of how interesting a topic may be to you as a writer, readers always need to know
what is at stake in a text and why they should care (Graff, Birkenstein, Durst 92). For example,
for the general public, a pop-culture article such as that written by Los Angeles Times, may
provide a more understandable explanation and example of savant syndrome, thus making it

Comment [17]: For sure, but is this that significant --

compared to all the other aspects you could be
analyzing?

more effective. This is not to say that any given reader would be unable to understand the
terminology or findings of a scholarly article, though this is a possibility, but rather that the
average person may not care to learn that much information on the subject. However, if an
individual was interested in conducting his own research, scholarly articles would be a source of
much stronger information. As previously mentioned, one of the conventions of scholarly articles
is the usage of others research. This factor draws on the idea of ethos which, as Carroll defines
in her publication Steps toward Rhetorical Analysis, refers to the credibility of the rhetor
(Carroll 54). Having a foundation of previously conducted research allows an individual to build
on what has been found, perhaps in a narrower context, as well as focus studies on gaps that have
yet to be considered. In the case of both pop-culture and scholarly, readers are likely to be more
persuaded with details stemming directly from the sourcein the case of pop-culture articles,
quotes from the individual(s) of focus, and in scholarly articles, data collected from the
experiment(s). Each genre can range from very to minimally effective depending on the source
and its content, yet different genres will be more effective for different audiences and purposes.

Comment [18]: Agreed. Can you get more specific and

let me know what the "research gap" was in the 2
scholarly pieces? They used prior scholars' work to
build their own credibility, sure, but how did this prior
research help them *build their own research*?


Works Cited
Kandil, Caitlin Yoshiko. "Accident Erased Laguna Artist's Memory but Gave Her New Talents."
Los Angeles Times. N.p., 14 Feb. 2016. Web. 20 Feb. 2016.
<http://www.latimes.com/socal/weekend/news/tn-wknd-et-0214-injured-artist-20160214story.html>.
Olson, Ingrid, et al. "A Calendar Savant with Episodic Memory Impairments." Neurocase
(2010): n. pag. Print.
Treffert, Darold. "The Savant Syndrome: An Extraordinary Condition. A Synopsis: Past, Present,
Future." PubMed Central (2009): n. pag. Print.
- - -. "Savant Syndrome: Realities, Myths and Misconceptions." Journal of Autism &
Developmental Disorders (2014): n. pag. Print.

Writing 2 Feedback Matrix for WP2

Table of Textual Features and Qualities

Did Not

Met

Exceede

Meet

Expect

Expecta

ations

Expecta

tions

tions

Thesis Statement

X/X-

Use of Textual Evidence

Use of Course Readings

Analysis

Organization/Structure

Attention to

X-

X-

from Genres

Genre/Conventions and
Rhetorical Factors
Attention to Moves

Sentence-level Clarity,

Mechanics, Flow

Comments and Grade

Kunianski,

Solid work here, sister. Please check out my

comments on some ways to guide this paper

for the final portfolio. If I had to limit my
thoughts to two suggestions, theyd be:

(1) try to find a way to give your reader a
heads-up about where youre taking them, 1
paragraph at a time. There were a few places
where I wasnt quite sure WHY I was
reading what I was reading, in that particular
point in your paper. Is there a best way
you can lay our your argument for a reader
who is unfamiliar with these pieces? What
reason(s) do you have for the structure that
youve chosen? Whatever that reason is, it
might help to tell your reader that.

(2) Id like to learn more about the scholarly

pieces -- I dont feel like I learned two much
about how they captured studying savants.

What specific data did they collect?

Whatd they find? Whats going to be
done with their work? Help me
understand what theyre trying to teach
us about this issue.

Z
7.5/10