This week aside from the introductory work a new class
usually goes over we began learning about genres and conventions. We started by
working with the genre “Country Music” and what makes a country song, well, a
country song. Dogs, cheating wives, some weird instruments were all some of the
things that are found in country songs. In other words these are some of the
conventions of “Country Music” and essentially everywhere we go, literature or
not, there exists a genre with conventions so its important to study these
conventions to allow yourself to have more credibility and by understanding the
context (genre) that you find yourself in the more likely you will know what to
say at the write time and place. However, it cannot be said that conventions
are used as a guideline or a rule but instead help you understand and write in
a certain genre. This can be seen using the example of “Country Music” because
not every country song brought up a dog or a wife.
Although genres and conventions were interesting to learn
about what really connected with me was “first order” and “second order”
thinking. Writing has and sometimes still continues to be a subject that seems
to just puzzle me. I never knew what grade I would get because when I thought I
had just turned in a soon to be New York Times best seller I would come back
home with some mediocre grade and when I wrote a piece of writing that I
thought I did awfully poor in I end up with the best grade I have ever gotten
on a paper. However with these two types of thinking it all seems to make sense
now. First order thinking can be described as your most genuine, messy
thoughts; it’s your purest form of thinking without bias or big word-casual
writing. Examples of when you would use “first order thinking” are when talking
to your closest friends about politics or writing in a personal journal or
saying what first comes to your mind. On the other hand “second order thinking”
is more of your “trying to sound smart thinking” where you get all your “first
order thinking” ideas and bring them together to come up with one coherent and
effective piece. What seems to most intrigue about these two ways of thinking
is that with one you are allowed to bring your unique way of thinking and
unique style of writing and with the other you get to use the years of
education on effective rhetoric to come up with one amazing piece of
literature.
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