Just About Time to Say Good-bye

We’ve just about reached the end of the road for this semester, and it’s time for one last blog post! In this post I let you know my top three blog posts for the semester, and I give my final reflection on the class.

My top three blog posts are:

http://hip2basquare.blogspot.com/2011/02/this-is-what-you-shall-do-begin-with.html

This post was our second assigned blog post. In this post we were required to write our own personal ethos.  This is my statement of how a person should live their life, what they should value, whom they should scorn, what to question, and how to act “rightly” in the world.

http://hip2basquare.blogspot.com/2011/02/identity-time-knowledge-and-hemingway.html

This post was a free post but was written in response to Scott’s “suggestion” in class that we should examine Hemingway’s “The Killers” for elements of hip. In this post, I analyzed this short story for references to time, knowledge, and identity.

http://hip2basquare.blogspot.com/2011/02/fitting-square-peg-in-hip-hole.html

This post was a free post in response to Scott’s suggestion that we might want to post a copy of our first essay in its entirety. I posted my essay, along with a disclaimer that I wasn’t entirely happy with the finished product.

I selected these three posts as some of my best work this semester because I feel that they exemplify good writing in general, and good writing for the web, specifically. In each of these posts, I worked really hard to make sure that I hit the target set up in the assignment. I did this by carefully reading each assignment to see what elements were required, and then I wrote based on those elements. When done with the writing, I critically read each piece to make sure that I had answered the questions posed, instead of getting off track on one of the many rabbit trails that present themselves whenever I begin to write. I made sure that I employed the guidelines provided about best practices for writing on the web, including making use of photos and/or graphic elements, keeping paragraphs short, writing for scannability, making good use of topic sentences to hook the reader, and just generally producing a post that was pleasing to the eye. Though I don’t feel that the essay post made for a great blog post from the standpoint that it wasn’t written specifically for the web (though I did try to make my intro for the post web-worthy), I include it as some of my best work because I ended up being really proud of that piece once it was finished. (It didn’t hurt a bit that a couple of my friends told me it could easily be used as a eulogy at my subject’s funeral someday!)

I’m not sure that my ideas of American pop culture have necessarily changed since the beginning of the semester. Though I necessarily live within it, I really had never given much thought to its effect on me. Mostly, I recognized that trends tend to repeat themselves, and I still feel that way. The idea that “everything old is new again” runs pretty deep within me. What I have gained from this course is an appreciation of the forces that shape American pop culture. It has been interesting to learn about the racial roots of “hipness”, and to recognize that being “out there” and bucking the status quo actually has become the status quo, in a manner of speaking. I still struggle with the idea of a constant present because I simply cannot disconnect my logical mind from the habit of seeing that present actions will have a monumental impact on the future. However, I can see how this idea is a great mechanism for capitalism, forcing an ever-present need for the “new and improved” product without the realization that in the near future it will be obsolete.

I worked hard in this class this semester to be a good participant in order to benefit the other students and to gain insight into the thought processes of others. I also worked hard to produce writing that would meet expectations as presented in assignments. I believe my strengths as a writer and thinker are analyzing the information presented and drawing conclusions between related points. I also like to try to put my own biases aside and view issues from the other vantage. I would venture to say that my weaknesses surface in the inability to be as concise as I would like to be in my writing. Trying to put the idea of “less is more” into practice can be difficult for me when writing.

I think that anything worth doing is worth doing well, and that has been my approach to this class this semester. Since I attended class every time we met (is there a prize for perfect attendance?), did all the required reading, participated in discussions to the best of my ability, met deadlines for writing assignments and garnered top grades, I think my performance merits an “A” for the semester. I would hope that if I were to be given a “report card” for this class that one of my comments would be “a pleasure to have in class.”