Memorandum
TO: Missy Watson
FROM: Raisa Tahsin
DATE: March 23rd, 2019
SUBJECT: Rhetorical Genre Analysis
Summary:
The primary objective of the phase two essay, the rhetorical genre analysis, is to hone in on and draw conclusions about how “text-level features and sentence-level features rhetorically intermingle and function together in the genre of engineering peer-reviewed journal articles.” For my rhetorical genre analysis, my goal was to explore how engineers write their journal articles, what rhetorical moves they make in their writing, how they rhetorically function as a whole and to delve deeper and try to understand why engineers do the things they do in their writing. Also, with this assignment I wanted to better understand John Swales’ CARS analysis method and become comfortable applying it to the introduction of research papers. Furthermore, I wanted to develop my critical thinking skills when it came to compare and contrasting the two different engineering articles and applying my own method of analysis. I wanted to exemplify through my writing that I understood the CARS method and that I was able to not only apply the CARS analysis method to peer reviewed articles but also use the method to format my own introduction. The main technique I used in writing my analysis was breaking up my essay into the IMRD format and making an outline for each section. From the entire writing process, I learned how to better organize my writing, what techniques work well and what techniques I should change or improve. This was an interesting assignment for me because in simplest terms, the assignment was to analyze the writing structure of engineering articles and write my findings in the form of a lab report. This was something I never did before and at first, I struggled with the structuring and formatting of my paper but using the CARS method, IMRD method and referring to Kanoksilapatham reading helped me find a format for my paper. The main recommendation I have for my writing is to focus on the flow, including more citations from outside sources, and having more thorough analysis.
Methods:
The first thing I did was create two summaries for each article. The first summary for each journal was one for content, here I summarized the study, the methods what the authors were hoping to accomplish. In the second summary, I detailed the rhetorical moves made by each author, the purpose of the rhetorical moves, where and possibly why they made those rhetorical moves. The purpose of the first summary was to better understand the text as a whole and the second summary was a preliminary analysis of the text using the CARS analysis method. The CARS method was applied to both journals to analyze the rhetorical moves taken by the author and to discuss how they rhetorically function in the text as a whole. Next, a second method of analysis was applied. Both journals had an extensive use of calculations in their methods and results sections. It intrigued me that each calculation was meticulously written out, in both papers, which is uncommon so I wanted to explore the possible reasons the authors may have for including so many calculations.
One homework assignment that helped me write my rhetorical genre analysis was reading “Distinguishing Textual Features Characterizing Structural Variation in Research Articles Across Three Engineering sub-discipline corpora” written by Budsaba Kanoksilapatham. In this reading, the author uses the CARS method to write her introduction and her paper is in IMRD format. This reading gave me a good basis on where to start and gave me ideas for my own paper.
The multiple peer reviews and the discussion board assignments were also very helpful because seeing how my peers were approaching the same assignment in so many different ways encouraged me to try and be a little more creative. Also, seeing their writing made it clearer for me as to what I had to do in my paper and what I was missing.
Results;
Overall, this assignment taught me how to recognize rhetorical moves and look deeper to understand how the moves rhetorically function within the text, within the sentence, the paragraph and the text as a whole. I learned how to properly apply the CARS method and use it to write my own introduction. Using the CARS method also taught me that this method is not the final, correct way of writing a research paper introduction or the only way to analyze the introduction of research papers, but that it is merely a guideline and serves more as a tool for beginners until they get comfortable and can recognize moves on their own and begin applying their own analysis methods. The CARS method is not meant to be used as a crutch but more as a push start. In writing this rhetorical genre analysis I was able to “explore the discourses of engineering by performing close analyses of research articles.” I was able to “strengthen my source use practices (including evaluating, integrating, quoting, paraphrasing, summarizing, synthesizing, analyzing, and citing sources).” I learned how to analyze the structure of my writing and see what flows and what doesn’t. Intertwining two formats in one essay was a challenge but working through it is what taught me how to fix structure and look at my essay in different ways. Analyzing the articles using the CARS method and then making sure my introduction followed the CARS method was difficult but, in the end, I understood the method much more and I am much more comfortable using it and writing with it. Applying the rhetorical genre analysis, I was able to gain awareness of the different types of audience an engineering article may reach, the purposes of writing the journals, organizational schema, patterns, presentation styles and the values of engineers.
Conclusions/Recommendations:
A suggestion I have for myself is to focus on my analytical skills and continue to build them, to continue applying the CARS method to introductions to become well versed in the different rhetorical moves an author can make. The most important thing I learned from writing this rhetorical genre analysis and going through the entire process, was analytical skills and the application of my analytical skills to reveal “representations of larger social actions and values of engineering academic communities.”
