The Typical College Student, Eliza

In the article for today we were to read about a case study in college reading habits. I found myself reading and viewing myself in the study as Eliza. I too do not normally read to get information and to connect unless an assignment from the professor calls for it. It is mostly reading to interpret the author’s point or idea they are trying to get across. This does involve skimming and note taking because we as college students do read for more then one class and for more then one type of class. It is sometimes hard to differentiate the types of reading each class is calling for and you can find yourself mixing the techniques.
Another aspect of Eliza’s schoolwork that is talked about is her report research and writing. The author comments on how Eliza procrastinated in her sophomore year on a research project and only grabbed the materials that were easily accessible to her; she did not bother to dig deeper. Honestly I will admit as a college student I do this and I guarantee many of the other students if not all do this too. It makes our lives easier when we have three papers due and we just want to get them done and over with; why make it harder then it has to be. Eliza makes the comment about “prove it in writing from the book,”(pg.364) which is what all professors tell us to do. They tended to say at least freshman and sophomore year that by backing up what you are saying that your point should be proven and the focus was learning how to provide the essential background information to prove a point. As long as your point was fully backed by evidence then it was a good paper. I do not necessarily think it is a bad thing.
We talked in class about how Bartholomae was saying the students have to write to the professor and they have too “create a university” and Haas is saying the same thing in her essay about Eliza and her assignments. “The curriculum in her English class was built upon recognition of authors and their claims and positions.”(pg.363) This is how we as students shape our university we write as if we were the professor, for what the professor wants as pertaining to the topic. It is not uncommon to sound one way in one class and one way in another. As we see with Eliza as she goes through school she learns to better cope with the differences in classes and even improves herself and thus her writing. She has learned to work the system as I hope I will when it is all over. Although it was a case study it shines light on common college student practices and can maybe show us how to improve ours through the experiences of Eliza.

Autobio Week 5

Autobiography Week 5

Well the first time I felt my language skills were really looked good upon was when I was in high school learning Spanish. My family does not speak another language at all and we were going on a trip to Mexico for spring break. When we got to Mexico we stopped at a restaurant by our hotel for dinner and the waiters could not speak real good English so it was hard for us to communicate. I was frustrated that it was so hard to communicate for my family that I took charge and ordered dinner for everyone and my family was beyond shocked. They had never really heard me speak Spanish before but the knew I was taking the classes. The look on their faces was a feeling of pride and astonishment at the same time. I felt my heart skip a beat and was so proud of myself. I knew at that moment that my family knew I could accomplish things beyond what they dreamed for me. I was glowing with pride and the whole trip from then on was way better then I could have imagined because my family counted on me to get them through it and I could not have imagined hoe important I was to them all because I could speak another language. I never thought that what I was learning was ever really going to have such an impact I simply thought it was just a requirement to graduate that was all. When I got back from the trip I was so excited to be in my Spanish class because I felt this language I was learning was bettering my future and creating connections for me in the future. I will never forget how much my parents looked up to me and how proud they were to know I was truly building blocks for my future.

Bartholome and Writting

Bartholomae, David. “Inventing the University” From Literacy: A Critical Sourcebook.
Ellen Cushman, Eugene R. Kintgen, Barry M. Kroll and Mike Rose eds. Boston, MA :
Bedford/St. Martin’s 2001.


David Bartholomae makes very good points about students and their writing practices in relation to the professor or teachers they have. In reading this article I found myself in total agreement because I did find that I do this practice myself. It is a practice in which we have to make ourselves sound smart in order to have credibility with our audience. I feel as though sometimes it is the hardest thing I do because I feel something in what I am trying to say is lost. In groups we talked about the fact that this is not true it is not lost at all because it is still the work of a student put together by the student in a certain way to get their point across. Students try to gain this credibility through profession related jargon because it is a “common place” between the professor and the student.
We talked about common places being the ground where people can come together and discuss something and with a certain understanding of common background knowledge. This is the problem for me as a writer in college because I find it hard to necessarily understand to the extent the professor does and it is then intimidating and this is what he article talks about. We as students have to create this place by mimicking professors’ speech and sentence structure in order to figure out what the teacher wants in a paper. All because we as college students or students in general are afraid that if we do not do so then we for not necessarily know what we are talking about and cannot get a good paper. If that is not enough we have to tailor to a certain audience.
Bartholomae focuses much of his essay on keeping the audience in mind. I agree it is important to keep the audience in mind because they are who you are writing for after all. The problem I have is that in order to do this you sometimes have to “dumb down” the content or go beyond your possible realm of knowing. Doing the first can help for a more general understanding of a greater audience serving a greater purpose and the second can have your writing going in circles. We talked about the newspapers and presidential speeches doing this exact thing and in a way it helps for a greater understanding but it is sad that the level of general understanding is so low in the first place. In order to get things more tailored to a certain audience you then have to go to scholarly articles. In the clay model student essay the student seems to go on and on and even winds up talking in circles and this is the problem to writing to a certain audience and to tailoring the jargon beyond you to fit a model put forth by a superior. This is a survival technique carried on throughout jobs past schooling and we may never be able to get past it.