Garvey 1 Erin Ashley Mink Garvey Dr.

Vandenberg WRD 500: Goal Statement REVISED (final edition) 17 November 2010

As I explained ten weeks ago, to better understand my personal and professional goals for the MA in WRD program, it's obligatory that you first understand my background. For starters, I'm a huge lover of language and literature. Books, reading, and writing (and writing, especially) have been part of my identity since I was young. I won awards in my elementary school for the stories I wrote during our Young Authors series, and each night, when I laid out my clothes for school for the following day, I also laid out a book that I planned to bring with me to read at school. (I thought everyone did this, by the way). Fast-forward to my undergraduate career, past four years of Honors or AP English in high school, and it became a no-brainer for me to major in English, due to my fascination of the English language and my bibliophilism. I also decided to pick-up a Spanish major as an undergraduate because, similar to my sentiment towards the English language and English-language literature, I thoroughly enjoyed reading, conversing, and writing in Spanish, as well as analyzing Spanish-language texts and deconstructing the world's social ills en espaol. My baccalaureate graduation drew nearer, and my international and academic experiences led me to believe that my calling was in higher education. I worked in student affairs at a small liberal arts college in the North Shore for two years before I returned to DePaul and began working in donor relations: a drastic move from the student side of the academy to the business side. Back at DePaul, I wanted to pursue my graduate coursework in something with an education focus that still involved international affairs and multiculturalism, so I went after and completed my MS in International Public Service (IPS). Much of my IPS studies focused on the work of the three sectors and how each accomplishes its aims. Because of my linguistic prowess that emerged as a result of my undergraduate studies, in grad school, I realized very quickly that different societal sectors use language, discourse, and rhetoric in very precise, if not manipulative, ways to realize their goals. This understanding piqued my interest in language again but this time, more from a political than a pure bibliophilic standpoint. When I wrote my WRD Personal Statement, I explained that part of my reasoning for wanting to enroll in this program was my newly-formed connection between language and politics. I reflected, language is not immune to politics, making our full understanding of languages use and intricacies even more urgent. Language is an elementary bedrock on which identities stand, and because both language and discourse are such powerful, political tools, it behooves language learners and users to know how to use them. Just ten weeks ago, for this very class, I wrote that I was bringing with me to the WRD program a clean slate and virtually no expectations simply because I was, and remain, completely open to this new experience. I didn't know what I didn't know, and this still rings true, though I'd like to think that I know now at least a bit more than I did in September. My growing political interests seem to be coming into step with my bibliophilism and linguistic love and curiosity, and my ongoing fascination with issues of powerwho has it, who doesn't, and why have especially heightened my interests. Power seems to be especially borne out in this new WRD discipline(s) I'm studying, which is a very exciting prospect for me, as I begin to consider my longrange research interests. To this end, though I initially thought that I would lean more toward the Teaching Writing specialization, due to my previous experiences as an ESL teacher and tutor, I think I have since reconsidered. I have really enjoyed my other WRD class this term, Teaching ESL Writing, but for now, I'd instead like to pursue a more general WRD course tract, simply to become more of a generalist than a specialist. In my perfect plan, I'll be able to take a diverse spread of WRD classes in both the Teaching Writing and Technical Writing concentrations

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and earn TESOL certification in a reasonable amount of time, and the immense breadth and depth of knowledge I'll gain from my scholarly endeavors will not only make me extremely marketable, but more importantly, I'll feel cognitively satiated. (One can hope, anyway.) Moreover, based on our Proseminar topics as well as those from my previous coursework, I am interested to continue some of my research inquiries related to issues of politics and power in language and discourse. Sociopolitical aspects of identity construction, language, and linguistic human rights have also remained really interesting to me because I am fascinated by how rhetoric and discourse can shape one's identity. Comparing my initial goal statement to that which I am writing currently shows me that, while I have definitely gained ten weeks' worth of knowledge, lexicon, and disciplinary orientation, there's still much out there for me to discover. I very much consider myself a novice to this disciplinary arena, and I think this self-awareness will allow me to fully participate in classroom conversations because I will (hopefully) continue to eagerly partake in dialogue and glean from my peers' and professors' accumulated knowledge. At this point in my WRD career, I feel that I would be disingenuous to assert that my long-term scholastic or career aspirations are any firmer than what I initially articulated ten weeks ago, but intuitively, I do feel like I can claim that my cognitive wheels are slowly beginning to turn and, perhaps, are beginning to point me in some direction in this program. Ultimately, at the end of the day, I want to use my newlygained disciplinary knowledge to do something productive, and useful, and constructive, for society, probably in the realm of correcting an egregious social ill, but what that productive, constructive, and useful thing is that I will do, or which egregious social ill is waiting for me to ameliorate it, is, no doubt, still in the works. I will certainly keep you posted.