Response to the Articles

Both articles, "The Essayification of Everything" by Christy Wampole and "Blogs vs. Term Papers" by Matt Richtel, suggest a negative depiction upon the difference in cognitive process and "meditative deficiency" which is displayed through essays rather than blogs which more commonly contain posts about occurring events in someone's life. Wampole's essay, which to my surprise could be considered and essay, seems to have more of  a persuasive tone when compared to Richtel's article which does not connect with the reader as easily and lacks the detail Wampole adds to interest the reader more and convince the reader of her knowledge upon the subject of "essayification."

Christy Wampole adds intriguing facts such as historical ones and fancies others' creative terms while adding some of her own, essayificaiton and essayism, making her viewpoint more entertaining and proving her point on how essays cannot be categorized. Although similarly both Richtel and Wampole argue that nontextual essays lack critical thinking and depth when compared to the term paper or written assignment, Wampole does not add many solutions to the problem. She instead adds to why students prefer the format of a blog rather than the format of writing an essay. Generally, most welcome quick feedback and interaction between his or her reader, whether it be through a "like, follow, tag, etc." Of course, the majority of students should receive feedback on their essays, whether the feedback is positive or negative, but although there is a satisfaction observing how teachers have looked analyzed student's  papers and shown  that they have acknowledged it, one person is simply not enough for attention nowadays. It does add that it was someone most would admire but quantity seems to overwhelm quality when needing feedback. While the internet provides instantaneous responses from many places, although some are not very valid nor fair, the student/person immediately is tangled by the numbers rather than the quality of the commentary or views.Although not all blogs are essays they still have some traits such as visualizing an opinion and explaining that opinion though still are insufficient when the concept of critical thinking is considered.

Richtel on the other hand, supplies the reader with the less focus on the concept of the essay but instead focuses on the contrast between papers, term papers to be specific, and blogs. He clearly defines how the term paper is superior in any perspective and how blogs basically should not be considered par t of the academic criteria. Though his backup nformaiton is sometimes a little over a decade old, "A study in 2002 estimated that about 80 percent of high school students were not asked to write a history term paper of more than 15 pages" and contains some crude commentary from sources " Writing is being murdered... We don't pay taxes so kids can talk about themselves and their home lives." Although his biased opinion lack updated information and may be frank at times it does acknowledge both sides of the arguement, though there is an obvious lean towards the traditional term paper. He states how the "new literacy," blogs and such, are becoming more popular than the "old literacy," essays and research papers. Later on Richtel argues that althouhg blogging is not the best of forms it does adapt better than bad writing as Professor Davidson stated in his point.

Some facts about myself

Hello world, in order to keep this blog  more private I have decided to call myself Soto. Soto is my last name which sounds very Japanese like, and I have looked it up and it means outside in Japanese and grove in Spanish, but it' is not Japanese for racially I am categorized as a Mexican. Being part of a Mexican family, I have many cousins, so many in fact those that those my mom mentions do not interest me for I have never met them. My close family is large compared to the average white american family, I have four siblings and two parents. All of my siblings are older than me, and even though we are siblings we do not have much in common, one looks like a blonde, another like a typical Mexican, and the other two look white. Of course, based on my parents genetics I'd expect them to be pale for my parents are/were quite pale themselves. My mom is what in Mexico they call "blanquita" which is a light-skinned person, in other words white but the meaning is much softer than that in Spanish. My father was quite pale, but as he joined my grandfather out in the fields of celery and paved the concrete with the company he burnt and crisped, now it's quite a remarkable sight to see today for when one lifts up his arm sleeve is skin is white while on the outside he is a very scary and intimidating dark  man. Now I, myself look a lot like my mom. I have her green/hazel eyes which slant downwards making me look either tired or sad, her pale complexion (well not so much because I tanned), her ex-straightish hair, and her petite height. What runs through all my family is our shyness. Now, my father is very loud and can make anyone fear him but that is simply because of his high blood pressure and in my childhood I suffered and cried a lot, but I was just a cry baby. I was a crazy child. I broke my dad's new thousand stereo, painted on the wall with some human bodily brown stuff, called England, people had to call the firefighters twice to get me out of the house which I locked, almost threw my potty training toilet at my uncle and broke my front teeth because I tripped on my birthday shoes. Everyone knew me as "traviesa" which means troublemaker. I made my mother suffer quite a lot I was the most troublesome of the five, I cried all through out the night as an infant my mother did everything: she changed my diaper, gave me medicine in case my head hurt, gave me food, milk, made me burp, tried to rock me to sleep, took me on a walk and so many more but I was  a very demanding child and simply wanted a bath... What an odd child. I grew through elementary school as a very enthusiastic wild child who didn't mind being Mexican and played with whomever she wanted. Soon after entering middle school. That's just a weird stage for everyone so lets keep it that way;I switched into shy mode in middle school and have stayed there since. In eighth grade I met Sara, my Upward Bound English teacher she was crazy and has one of the most ridiculous laughs. She taught me about racial differences and criticism and to analyze the text more but also made me less trustworthy of human nature. Instead of being encouraged, which she was trying to do, to be proud of my heritage I became ashamed.  From there came high school where my most memorable experience was in tenth grade, where I went experienced la Ruta Quetzal. The summer after tenth grade I went to Colombia and Spain for free and met so many Latinos people who were friendly and were one of the only who have truly given me strength to be inspired. It was there where I learned so many things about commitment, friendship, cultural, and happiness. Now I am a senior striving to succeed.