I Embrace The Audience

I have considered the discussion boards for this class the place where most of people’s ideas flourish and grow. It’s a playground for analytical and creative writing, where you can say whatever you want. The only rules are you follow the question and be cordial, but you could expand the idea to wherever you wanted to go. It was in these discussion boards that I was able to generate discussion among my peers, and include them in my writing. In particular was the first discussion board in our Identity unit called “How did we manage to survive adolescence?” This was a discussion comparing and contrasting two women’s essays, and then adding our own thoughts on what high school was like. Since this post did in fact generate discussions among my peers, my own feelings towards the subject were challenged as well. Instead of just me challenging others, I was also challenged. This type of writing has expanded my literary skills because in such a casual setting it is easier to debate what someone else is writing.

In this discussion forum I tried to appeal to my audiences memories and bring out their own personal experiences in high school by giving a detailed description of my own. Even if my audience didn’t have the same experience as I did, they could still relate to the adolescent awkwardness in general. Since high school was a memorable and traumatizing experience for all of us, my entire audience could relate to what I wrote when I said: “teenagers especially find courage in groups.” I believe that my entire audience was able to relate to this statement whether they were a teenager or an adult. Also by ending my post with the question “Isn’t it interesting how you don’t need anybody else but yourself to make high school a negative experience?” allowed people a chance to either affirm or challenge my convictions of high school, which couldn't help but generate a detailed and analytical discussion amongst my fellow students.