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Khanh Mai

WR 13300
Professor Erin Dietel McLaughlin
December 11, 2014
This portfolio is meant to synthesize all the knowledge and understanding gained from
the course. Because the course is developed gradually first with basic skills and then actually use
all the skills to accomplish the harder projects later. At first, the course starts with the narrative
essay, which is not yet academic, but it provided the basic writing skills and after this task, the
course offered more sources for students to do the research papers and real life presentations.
Therefore, writing a portfolio, students have a chance to reflect on the process they have gone
through and they can see a huge difference between them four months earlier and right now. To
be more specific, there were the links to the past essays where students can look back on
everything they have done so far. The evolution can be clearly seen through the reflection on the
projects that will be later discussed and through the blog entries that are meant to keep the
students on track on what they were doing.
This portfolio gives the understanding of rhetoric and argument through the reflection on
the readings the course provided and through the major essays. The theoretical principles of
rhetoric and argumentation are most evident in the blog entry "notes about the readings" when
the students were doing the rhetorical analysis essay. This entry serves to be the synthesis of all
the readings about rhetoric and argument earlier: the five features of rhetoric and its social
function from Herrick, the power of frame from Lancioni, the situational aspect of rhetoric from
Bitzer, the ethical, rhetorical and practical aspects from UWP, the understanding of immediacy,
hyper immediacy and remediation from Bolter and Grusin. The more practical principles of

rhetoric and argumentation can be seen in my research essay. I wrote about feminism on screen
in the 1960s. I provided the historical context, including several significant events that were
either against or supportive of women in this period and I provided three films that demonstrate a
new identity of women on screen to make my arguments stronger. I tried to persuade my readers
through my language and through the information I have gained from my research. To make the
essay more argumentative, before the conclusion I analyzed one counter point: the "male gaze"
that was applied in the films, absolutely contrast to the feminist theme I provided earlier.
However, I sufficiently provided my arguments and proved how this concept was invalid to
protect my main thesis. This is how my essay is seen to be rhetoric and argumentative.

This portfolio gives a view of the major essays I have been doing in this semester,
alongside with many blog entries that have played an important role in improving my critical
research, reading, writing skill. For example, in the major essays, there are small tasks that go
along before the final essays. In the audio essay, there is two-page a reflective essay that
summarizes the process each student goes through, and this process helps students to rethink
what they have been doing, their hardships and how they overcame with them. In the rhetorical
analysis essay, there are a lot of readings about rhetoric and these have been the sources that help
the students understand the theme of the course, improve their reading skills and develop their
analytical thinking. In the research essay, there is a proposal draft as well as the annotated
bibliography draft to help the students keep track with what they were doing, and these tasks
especially helped them how to search for the information effectively in the library. As an
international student who does not have a base in writing research, what the course has helped
me from the beginning to the end is amazing. It has undergone all the skills needed to find the
materials and successfully tell a story, write a paper or make a presentation.

Multimedia has been an indispensable part in the development of my reading, writing,


rhetoric, and research skills. With books from the library, the sources on library.nd.edu as well as
those provided by the instructor, I have read and gained a lot of academic knowledge that can be
applied in my projects. Indeed, my reading skill has improved tremendously not just in speed but
also in how to choose what to read and how to read effectively. Furthermore, my writings were
not always perfect from the beginning, and so are those of my peers. Understanding this, the
course provided us with some sample essays from others on Sakai.nd.edu or on the Notre Dame's
fresh writing page. The interesting point is that these essays are not perfect so that the students
do not feel the pressure, but they learned to identify the mistakes to avoid and the good writing
techniques they could apply in their essays. Multimedia projects have successfully been
combined with writing, rhetoric and research. To be more specific, it has combined the use of
symbols in writing, the study of symbolic expression, the process of investigation, analysis and
synthesis with multimedia, a tool use to give information.
The purpose of the audio essay is to develop the basic writing skill and reading skill
through the narrative essay and audio essay. The instructor provided the link about the art of
storytelling for the student to apply. My writing for this audio essay has effectively used
narrative base, with tension, turn, and resolution. It is about my struggle with the academic
system in Vietnam. The story is about my past experience, when I was confused between the
good, the bad and if I should stand up on the good. The tension is when I study in the History
Class, and they wrote in the book is totally inaccurate and blasphemous to my Catholic identity.
The turn is when I was confused if I should stand up for what I think is right. And the resolution
is in the History test, when there was only a sentence that was a thin line between the perfect
score and my identity. And I chose not to write that sentence, for it was against my Catholic

belief. I chose to protect my identity, rather than being submissive to the wrong things that this
academic system has taught. Through the audio essay, I had to do again many times to get the
best quality recordings.
The rhetorical analysis is a closer look in to how it really means to be rhetorical. The
instructor provides many reading in this period because at this point, the students have not been
capable of finding the resources themselves. Given the written sources and a chance to watch
"The Social Network", students began to have a sense of how to write a research essay, and, to
be more specific, how to make an essay argumentative and interesting. My writing has been
better in this research because of the readings about rhetoric and I successfully expressed the
features of rhetoric in my essay, which is helpful for the two projects later.
The purpose of the research essay is to fully develop the searching and writing skill. In
this task, students are not provided the sources like the previous one but they have to find by
their own in the library or on the online sources. There were some library instruction day for
students and the instructor in the library thoroughly introduced the sources in the library and how
to search and use these materials. The memorable lesson when I did this essay was the MLA
style which was taught carefully so that the students learned how to cite the source adequately
and give credits to the authors. There were a lot of peer discussions and the peers helped each
other to implement the argument in the essay. Indeed, the research essay is the higher level of the
rhetorical analysis essay.
Finally, TED Talk is used to synthesize all the skills the students have learned in the
previous. Students don't necessarily have to do the whole project again, but they can base the

idea on the research essay. The TED Talk is meant to blend what the students have learned
through the research and through the storytelling skill from the beginning of the course.
The projects I am most proud of are my research essay and my Ted Talks, even it has not
been my turn for the TED Talk yet. Firstly, about the research essay, I misunderstood the
assignment and I even went off topic. I initially thought of arguing about "death penalty", which
did not have anything related to the main theme of the course. I did not realize that until I
proposed the idea to my instructor, and it was only a week left from the deadline. And I had to do
everything over again and decided to write about my favorite film topic: Feminism on films in
the 1960s. I was scared when I came to the office to present my new idea but it turned out that
the instructor liked my topic. Furthermore, throughout this assignment, I have developed my
writing skills a lot by writing many pages and by reading. I have learned to write a proper
academic paper and how to use the citations, which I have never experienced before. Secondly,
about the TED Talk, I am proud of myself because in Vietnam, I did not have many chances to
speak in front of people and to give presentations at school. However, given the chance to
actually be filmed and present a topic that I am interested in, I think that I have made a huge step
further. Moreover, this assignment helped me to look up for many new sources of the Notre
Dame library and on Google: qualified images, videos, and the citations.

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