Shitty Rough Drafts

The article, “Shitty First Drafts” by Anne Lamott opened my eyes about the writing process. What she talks about is really true; I feel thst it is important to write a perfect paper on my first try. The most difficult part of writing a paper is always developing and idea of what to write and realizing that you can always change what you write down if you don’t like it. It is hard to imagine professional writers going through this process, but it seems plausible considering everyone has to start somewhere. I always assumed it was rare that I had trouble with writing, but this article obviously proved me wrong. It made me realize that rough drafts are an essential part of the writing process. Without rough drafts, finding a thesis and a direction for a paper is extremely difficult. It might be hard to get used to the free-flow writing style at first because of the way we have been taught to write in school all these years. Most of my high school career writing classes consisted of short in class writing in response to an article or story. This kind of writing forced me to have to write as close to perfect as possible on the first try. This training has transferred into my writing that I do at home as well, making rough drafts is a foreign idea. Now, after reading this article, I feel more confident that I can write a rough draft without worrying about it being flawless.

Chaotic draft

Questions for thought in response to The Eye of the Beholder:
-Would this study differ if the parents were having their second or third child?
-Does this sex-typing occur in other cultures and countries?
-Would the answers differ if they were asked sometime after 24 hours within postpartum?
-Would the answers differ if the fathers were allowed to hold their child before answering the questions?
-How would the answers differ if the subject of the questions were more focused on internal characteristics than physical ones?
-How much do parental expectations affect the development and personal growth of their children?
- Why were the answers between mothers and fathers so similar when the mother was allowed to hold the baby and the fathers were not?
-Why are mothers less likely to sex-type their children than fathers?
-Does age have anything to do with sex-typing?
-What were the responses when the parents were asked to describe their babies they would to family or friends?
-Would the trend continue if the researchers asked the questions in different ways?
-Are these characteristics that the parents project upon their new born babies how they want their children to be as they grow older?
-Why does the sex of the parent not contribute to the amount or degree of sex-typing?
-Would the answers differ if the parents did not know the gender of the baby and were judging solely on physical characteristics?
-What in our society causes parents to sex-type their baby even before it is born when they know hardly any characteristics of the baby?

Scientific Aritcle

My article, “Screening for Antimicrobial Activity of Weeds”, discusses and explores the use of plants and their extracts to treat infections. This article is a scientific article in that it pertains to a specific medicinal experiment. It is set up in a scientific way with and introduction, an explanation of materials, a review of the experiment, and a results and discussion section. In the article, the author is trying to convey his opinion that natural drugs are more efficient and less harmful than synthetic drugs. In order to get the point across the author uses a very scientific approach by presenting a problem and a solution through facts, data, and experimental evidence. Unlike other types of writing, scientific writing does not try to appeal to its audiences’ emotions, or pathos. Instead it focuses on logic, logos, and credibility, ethos. Scientific writing is very straight forward in the way it tries to persuade its audience by giving information and facts that clearly support the thesis of the article. Another extremely important aspect of scientific writing is its credibility, ethos. Credibility is significant because society tends to feel more confident in a person with more experience in his or her discipline. A key example of this is the extensive training and years of experience needed to be a doctor in our society. The article I chose has a lot of credibility because the institution it was published through is very distinguished and the doctors involved are distinguished as well.