Reflection

                   Sadly, I didn’t utilize Style Academy as well as I should have, but the few times I did I found that it helped a lot. I did some of the exercises that were dealing with “combining sentences” and I feel like it helped my paper a lot because I had a lot of short awkward sentences that I was able to combine into more eloquent sentences that enhanced the overall flow of my paper. I also used the imitation exercise a little bit in an attempt to keep the same feel to my paper throughout the same thing. I put a twist on the exercises in my paper and identified the tone of voice that I had used and tried to imitate that in later paragraphs.

Style Academy Imitation Exercise

Original: Many may say “But wait, those choosing to live in these housing arrangements agree to live by these standards when they sign their contract.” This is a true statement, but the issue is said contract including the requirement in the first place. Whether or not an apartment is “BYU approved” means nothing to a student from UVU, but because these apartments are labeled as “BYU housing” a long list of rules such as dress code, curfew, etc. come along with it with no regard as to where you are attending.

Imitation: Many say “Michael Jordan is the best basketball player ever to play the game.” That may be a true statement, but we also have to look at LeBron James when we consider the best players. Whether a player played in the 80’s or in the 21^st century means nothing to a true basketball fan. But because of the classic mindset of many people, when they are asked who the best player is, they say “Michael Jordan” with no regards to some of the newer more talented players in the league.

                  I still feel like I struggle a lot with using the specific rhetorical devices in GASCAP. I was able to state my arguments and give reasons as to why I thought that way, but I had a hard time backing them up with different rhetorical devices. So in the future I hope to be able to better use those different devices that we learned about in class and from our readings to be able to not only state my arguments but to also be able to back them up. The section of GASCAP that I feel that I used most in my paper was the “P.” I really made an effort to connect with the audience that will be reading my paper and I tried to allow them to feel the emotion that comes along with our freedoms being taken away. A good example in my paper is the ending. I talked about our own freedoms and how they came to be whether it was religious freedom, or normal freedoms in our country. By doing this I hopefully was able to help them feel the emotions (gratitude, pride, etc.) that come along with freedoms and with the call to action, they will be more likely to be willing to do the same things that others have done for them in the past. How that all relates to the “P” is that as humans we feel indebted to others when we find that they have done things for us, kind of like a moral code. All in all, it depends on the person and whether or not they feel that way, but generally as human beings we try to treat others as we are treated. So in an attempt to trigger that emotion and moral within others I brought up some things that those in the past have done so that we can have certain freedoms.