Alan McLawhorn

Aaron Kashtan

UWRT 1102

6 May 2017

Major Assignment #1 Reflection

For the first major assignment, I wrote about my childhood and how I identified myself

as a result of it. I had never really thought about my identity before this assignment, and was

surprised to actually think about whether or not I was an American. While writing this

assignment, I realized this was one of the first times I had to delve into my life, at least recently,

and to genuinely write about my life to this point. Honestly, it felt weird to think about American

identity since it is usually never thought about on a daily basis. When presenting my background

for this assignment, I used ethos. I chose to appeal to ethics because since I am talking from my

experiences, I want to seem like a credible source, which is what ethos is.

Before I wrote this assignment, I had honestly never thought about American identity, but

I had an idea of what it was. I always thought it was a person who could speak English and had

lived in America for an extended period of time. While writing this assignment, my opinion on

American identity did not really change since I identity myself as an American, and I can speak

English. I was not born in America and I still am an American citizen. Even though I was born

in Japan, upon reflection, Ive never really thought of myself as fitting into the Japanese culture.

I do, however, identify with what my idea of American identity is.

Through this process, I learned how to put a summary of my life and identity into a paper.

I also learned that there are many American viewpoints that make up the American identity,
usually based on class, race, or gender. I am an American, for better or for worse, and even

though I dont agree with many people, I am part of the identity. Since this was my first major

assignment, it shows my original thinking, but throughout this course my writing skills

improved, and I began thinking more about the American identity.