Those Four Magical Words

“Once upon a time…” those iconic words seem to take you to a place that is filled with both familiarity and innocence. As a young child, I can remember being told with fairytales, and they used to always begin with those four magical words. What came after those iconic words would differ, but nonetheless each story told would give me the same feelings: awe, wonder, and hope.

My first memories of these fairytales involve my aunt telling me bedtime stories that would begin with those four magical words. My mom used to commute to work and would also work late nights, so I would stay with my aunt until my mom came to pick me up. I would always get ready for  bedtime and my aunt would pull out a different book each night to read to me. I would always love hearing these stories, and as soon as she had finished the story I would always ask for another one. Now, as a 20 year old, I rarely hear these types of stories and I almost even forgot about them entirely. Life is now filled with scholarly articles, news reports, and fact-packed essays. I have become accustomed to reaching for non-fiction books and straying away from fairytales. As I read through anything, my mind now automatically searches for the facts and any important pieces to take away from the reading.

I am at a time in my life where fairytales aren’t as special as they used to be; the magic has faded. C.S. Lewis brings about an important point, saying “someday you will be old enough to start reading fairytales again,” which is something that I whole-heartedly agree with. Soon enough, when I have children of my own, fairytales will come back to life and will become special again. These “once upon a time” stories will be a large part of their lives. The magic will come back, and those feelings of wonder and excitement will too.

I want my children, and even my grandchildren, to be able to experience these magical feelings felt by hearing these stories. I want them to believe in magic and share the same feelings I did as a kid. Nothing can compare to the excitement of hearing a fairytale. As a tradition that has been passed down, generation after generation, reading fairy tales as bedtime stories or even creating them inspires creativity and wonder. They are prominent in a child’s life and then slowly fade to the background as we grow up, but nonetheless come back to life as we pass on this tradition. Fairytales will always come back and will never fail to take people back to that magical place.   

Blog #11

I don't know if you guys know about the song Professor Flewelling was talking about, but I definitely recognized "Last Dance" because I remember back home I would always catch my mom jamming out to that song while cooking in the kitchen lol she's a goof

Anywayssss, good afternoon! I can't believe this is our last blog. I actually really enjoyed writing these. By far my favorite genre of the semester.

I remember my first blog, where we had to introduce ourselves and our purpose to the class and man.. I didn't know how to begin! Prior to this class, I had never written a blog before and I had been very accustomed to writing academically so it was hard for me to decide how to write these. My personality is not very serious, but I had been trained to write very seriously. But having a serious blog is no fun to read right??

It took me a while to decide how to present myself to the class, but after knocking out a few blogs I began to take on my own "identity kit" (do I get props for sticking that term in there?). Through these blogs, hopefully I was able to inform you guys while also injecting my personality and showing you guys a little bit more about me. By now, you should know that I am a total foodie. I love cooking food (more specifically baking brownies or cookies) almost as much as I love going around and eating good food!!

Looking back on the semester, probably my least favorite genre to write on was the op-ed, because that required us to write about something and really take a stance on it. While I do have strong opinions about some subjects, I do refrain at times from expressing them to the public in fear of conflicting interests. Not tryna get into an argument with anyone! Lol I could never be on a debate team...

I really forgot how long these blogs are supposed to be... But I don't know about you guys but I am super excited for Thanksgiving! What is not exciting is my flight time... 6:45 in the morning on Saturday...

Hope everyone has a great thanksgiving break and eats a lot of yummy food!

Blog #10

Good evening everyone!

I hope you all are having a productive Sunday so far (and hopefully no procrastinating...). I'd say it's been a pretty good day so far. When I know I have a lot of school work to do I usually put it off by cleaning. It sounds pretty weird but I always clean when I know I should be doing school work but hey, at least my apartment gets clean and my roomies are happy with me!

On to the blog. Sooooo the discourse community that I have chose (drumroll please...) is... the marketing club I am apart of! (and the crowd goes wild!!!) Okay, I know. Not very exciting. But it's something that I want to do and could be of interest to some of your business students.

The discourse community that I want to research is the members of AMA (American Marketing Association). I chose to do my ethnography on this community because it is a community that I have recently joined. I know, I know, as a third year I should have joined this club years ago but somehow I never knew it existed?? Well at least I do now!

I've been a member for a few weeks and I'm really enjoying it so far. I forced one of my marketing friends to join with me so it's always nice to join something with someone. I've met a bunch of marketing students and I have already learned so much. Each week, a different marketer from a different company comes in and shares their experiences with us and gives advice. I really enjoy hearing about what these marketers do, and it makes me so excited for the future.

Although I am not terribly familiar with the communicative practices of the leaders and members of this club, it is something I would love to learn more about. How marketing students interact, what vocabulary is relevant to them, etc.

A cost of affiliation to be apart of this group obviously is the time spent doing something else. Meeting weekly, for 1 1/2 hours, there are things members could be doing differently with their time whether it be schoolwork, hanging out with friends, or as I would probably be doing...eating something yummy. (lol sorry I just really love food.)

The values members of the marketing club all have in common is that they are very intrigued by the field of marketing and enjoy it. For the purpose of this assignment, I will be interviewing one of the leaders of the club and asking them about their experience in AMA and how it is like to be at a leader position within this discourse community.

This blog was actually really good because it made me really start thinking of this assignment tbh. Hope you all have a great rest of your Sunday and I will see you all tomorrow! :)

Blog #9

Gooooood evening everyone!

So for this blog prompt, Professor Flewelling gave us a few prompts we could choose to leap off of and I am going to talk about my desired career and what all it entails.

As you guys may or may not know, I am a Marketing Major. If you remember Professor Flewelling called me out in class at the beginning of the semester for being a business student and sitting like one lol. To be a Business Marketing major I have to like/know a few things. So I have to have an interest in the Marketing field obviously. So I am super interested in buyer preferences and how to correctly market to customers and all that fun stuff!

When I graduate from college, I am hoping to find a job in the marketing field (and fingers crossed, hopefully in the Bay Area! I am from near Sacramento, so it would be closer to home and plus who doesn't like the Bay Area let's be real now. The Silicon Valley is a goldmine for business peeps). As of right now, I am not planning on going to graduate school but who knows, things could change. I don't know what I am doing a few months from now, let alone what I will do after I graduate from SDSU with a Bachelor's degree!!

But when I do get that first marketing job, I will need to fit in. Being that I will be entry level and working my way up I will need to do my best and show the company what I got! I will need to work well with people within the company as well as with the customers I am marketing to. That involves knowing how to work effectively and efficiently and listening to the needs of people.

I actually just got back from an American Marketing Association meeting and today a speaker came in from the company Informatica, which is based in the Bay Area. As a marketer, our speaker gave some tips he has learned over the years working in the business field and he told us that as marketers, our role is to be the wingman of people in sales. I thought this was pretty fun but also very true. To be in marketing, I will not only be working with other marketers but also people from different fields. So in order to work effectively, our communication must be very good.

Okay, hopefully my blog wasn't a painful read! And hopefully you can see what the marketing world is all about and what it takes!

It's gym timeeee.

Blog #8

While although I would like to attain a job in my field, I do feel as though waitressing is an underrated job. I have never worked as a waitress, but I can definitely tell that the job does require a lot from a person. It requires being able to multi-task and problem solve. Waitresses have their own specific lexis and use this to communicate to other workers at the restaurant.

Waitressing may not require some fancy degree or a college education, but it requires skills that aren't taught in college. Waitressing requires one to be efficient and time conscious. Waitresses must constantly be aware of their surroundings and make sure that everyone is being taken care of at all times. They must remember who ordered what, and with what specifications and be able to deliver food to customers in a timely manner.

Not only do they serve one table, but multiple tables. This becomes a lot to memorize, and they must be good at multitasking to get everything correct. Imagine having to take people's orders from several tables, get them correct, and deliver it to them on good time? That sounds pretty challenging to me. They are constantly moving and on their feet, rarely getting a second to relax on their shift.

Despite the fact that this job doesn't require a degree, doesn't mean that just anyone can do it. I would argue that it takes a lot to be a successful waitress. Peter Drucker's assertion that waitresses are not knowledge workers and do not have problem serving skills couldn't be more wrong. I would make the argument that waitresses need to be knowledgeable about not only the food service industry, but about the specific place where they are working and they need to be able to think on their feet and solve any problems that may arise while they are on their shift.

Blog #7 Mushfaking

It was actually really hard to come up with a situation where I was mushfaking. Not hard because I don't (because let's face it, everyone does at some point in their life) but it was hard to come up with a substantial enough one to write about. I could write about small events or instances, but those wouldn't be enough to hit the word limit (lol don't lie we're all trying to meet 750 words!)

Because I've only had one job, and the internship I currently have doesn't really involve me mushfaking I had to dig a bit further to find something to write on. What I did come up with, was big family weddings or birthday parties.

By this I don't mean the gatherings or birthday parties for my immediate family, because I am very close with my immediate family! But I am referring to the big, extravagant parties with my whole extended family. Coming from an Indian background, gatherings are far from boring let's just put it that way.

My parents aren't very religious/in touch with their Indian culture, and so I was brought up without too much exposure to the Indian culture. While although we do celebrate some main Indian holidays, and do eat Indian food (so bomb), I don't usually go to too many gatherings hosted by my extended family unless forced of course.

Usually, I have to dress in more traditional indian dress (a sari, which may I add is so uncomfortable!) and go to a venue decked out in colorful decor and loud music. Bombarded by all this, I usually feel very out of place and I am constantly being come up to by family members that apparently know me very well and who I have never met! I have to make small talk at these events which isn't always the most fun, which most of you will agree. Indians like their music, and they like it loud... I personally don't really vibe with the music so mushfaking comes into play when pretending like I do. And since I don't speak Hindi and have a very limited understanding it is pretty hard to communicate with relatives! And the worst part is, if someone tells a story in Hindi and when everyone starts laughing I feel so out of place because I didn't understand it! And a joke is never as funny when it is translated...

But despite this, it is pretty nice to see family I don't see often and it is good to be more in touch with my culture. And be able to eat some yummy Indian buffet food, of course :P

Blog #6

College life, although difficult and stressful at times, is definitely an opportunity that I am happy I have been fortunate enough to experience. It would be pretty hard to describe all that I have learned and have gone through during college, and I would definitely not be the person I am today if I hadn't gone to college. 

My first semester at San Diego State was a tough one! Let me tell you. Going to a school basically at the opposite end of the state was both exciting and terrifying. I always wanted to travel far for college, because I love to travel and the way I look at it, where you study for college is such a unique experience. When else in life can you pick a place to live for 4 years, with the ability to learn so much in addition to experiencing a place you've never been before. I feel so fortunate to be able to live in San Diego. It is a lot different from my hometown Yuba City. Moving from a small town to a big city was definitely a culture shock and I definitely feel as if San Diego is a better fit for me. 

Although I feel this way now, that was not the case about 2 years ago. I was very homesick my first semester here, and being in a long distance relationship didn't help the case. Traveling back home frequently (flights be expensive to Norcal!!) was something that I do regret, because it took me away from fully immersing into my new life in San Diego. Nonetheless, I learned a lot and I am now happy to say that I have built a life here in San Diego, and I have learned more than I could have ever imagined.

After reading the article "Why Poor Students Struggle" by Vicki Madden, I definitely feel very fortunate to have been able to attend a 4 year university, and to have had the chance to be more independent.  I feel as though college is so important for success, not only job-wise but in life as well. Learning how to be independent, self-motivated, and productive are all things that I have been able to learn. Balancing school life with a social life, as well as fulfilling personal goals is something that I have been progressively getting better at.

 

As the daughter of a single mom, I am blessed to be able to attend a 4 year university. My mom saved up for years, just so I would be able to get a college education and be able to build a life of my own. And for that I am so grateful. The first thing I want to do once I have enough money to support myself is to re-pay my mom for all that she has done for me. 

Madden discusses that while although most students are capable of the rigorous academia, it is often the transition of a new life that students struggle with. No matter what background the student comes from, the transition from their old to new life isn't easy and everyone approaches it in a different way. College is definitely something that isn't easy, but it is definitely worth it given how much that can be taken away from it.    

Blog #5?? I've lost count already

How accurate is this??

Good evening and happy Monday! Usually I'm not a complete hater of Mondays, but this particular Monday I am definitely dragging my feet. I've been unusually tired the whole day, and I am super sore from yesterday's leg day! Okay, enough complaining and on to the important stuff.

So, after discussing discourse community in today's class and also reading Swales lecture, I see that this stuff is pretty complex... Swales must have done a lot of research and observation to see that there are so many communities and each have their own set of rules and norms. He notes that discourse communities are not just audiences that a group caters to, but are much more complex. He explains that all discourse communities all exhibit certain characteristics and even gives a guideline, listing the 6 characteristics that each discourse community has:

1. A discourse community has a broadly agreed set of common public goals.

2. A discourse community has mechanisms of intercommunication among its members.

3. A discourse community uses its participatory mechanisms primarily to provide information and feedback.

4. A discourse community utilizes and hence possess one or more genres in the communicative furtherance of its aims. 

5. In addition to owning genres, a discourse community has acquired some specific lexis. 

6. A discourse community has a threshold level of members with a suitable degree of relevant content and discoursal expertise.   

So, at first glance this list looks pretty long and confusing. For me, a great way to showcase these characteristics and make them easier to understand is with an example. A group that I belong to is the cook/baker group. Now this may seem a little broad, but as someone who has cooked and baked for years, I have a good understand of the terms used in cooking. The first characteristic, which states that each discourse community has a set of agreed goals, and this is definitely prominent in cooking. The goal of chefs across all boards all have the same goal of producing a dish that tastes and looks appealing. The next characteristic discusses the communications of people within the same discourse communities, chefs all over speak in a way that may confuse people who don't cook. Words such as sauté, julienne, and flambé are words that all chefs know and understand. The next characteristic covers the mechanisms to provide information and chefs do this is a number of ways, they share recipes from recipe books to online blogs. Characteristic 4 states that each discourse community possess one or more genres in communication and this is true of chefs. They have their own way of communicating between each other and it usually in the form of instructions. Such as telling another chef to prepare a dish, or communications with other works such as sending out an order. The fifth characteristic goes into more detail on the specific terms exchanged by each discourse. Chefs used abbreviated words to work more efficiently. Terms such as evoo (extra virgin olive oil) and a pinch (one-quarter teaspoon) and specific lexis between chefs. The last characteristic speaks of the levels of the people that fall within the same discourse communities. From established chefs to home-cooks, the different levels of chefs varies from highly skilled to just starting out. They all fall under the same category and have general characteristics that unite them.  

Hopefully the above paragraph wasn't too hard to get through. I know it was very long but I just didn't see a good part to separate it at. If you got through this whole thing, props to you! It took me a lot longer to write than I had hoped, but that's probably because I'm also simultaneously watching the debate and wow... definitely distracting!! 

See you all in classssss!

Blog #4 let's goo

Me reading all the articles for the blog...

Good afternoon and (not so) happy Sunday! (Since I have pushed off all my homework until today..)

Not sure if you guys know this, but goldfish have a higher attention span than we do (well a lot of us, including me) so you can just imagine how long it took me to read through all the articles even though they weren't even that long...  

Okay, now on to the important stuff... 

I started off reading the JSTOR Daily articles and then went into the op-eds which was definitely a mistake. The JSTOR daily's were really well-written, well-supported, and were filled with information and evidence. Moving on to the op-eds, they were very opinion-oriented and lacked proper support. I, like many of you will probably agree, tend to search for hard facts to convince me of something. Op-eds tend to omit that, and so they were hard to fully get in to. While both fall under the "article" genre, JSTOR daily articles and op-eds have very different strategies to engage the reader. Op-eds rely on emotional appeals, which the Editorial Board of "Donald Trump's bet: We are all Chumps" definitely did in their article. Discussing how far Trump has come, despite the fact that he has not released his medical or tax records, they include a statement from Trump's son Eric who points out that even if Trump supplied his tax records, they would be released to an audience that has little to no knowledge about what they mean. He says they would look for anything in the record to discredit Trump. The article then follows this statement stating, "he means us dumb voters," which works to get us fired up by the use of pathos. 

Throwback to my last blog 

Sooooo, on to JSTOR Daily articles! (I know you all are on the edge of your seat right now..)

Although a bit longer, JSTOR Daily articles were definitely the ones that held my attention for longer. Hard facts, I like those. These articles were filled with facts, logic, and all that good stuff. They work to minimize doubt by presenting a view with sufficient evidence to back it up. 

One of the articles that really intrigued me was "How Does the Language of Headlines Work? The Answer May Surprise You." by Chi Luu. As a computational linguist, with advanced degrees in Theoretical Linguistics and Literature, I can already tell that the article will be very well-researched. Her article focuses on headlines, and how much power a group of words can be. When deciding which 6 articles to read, the titles/headlines were what brought me in, and made me want to learn more about the topic. Headlines are the first thing to grab your attention, and are aimed to make you want to keep reading. Headlines are meant to lure us in with their mysterious titles. She references a 2015 study, where researchers discussed the technique of forward referencing. This is where the pronoun is placed before what they are referencing. The example she gives is, "She did it, she read a book," which is an effective way to engage readers. With the inclusion of a case study, I am more likely to stay engaged and it might even work to cause me to agree with what the writer is discussing.  

So, as you can tell I prefer JSTOR articles over op-eds. They just seem to be more effective and engaging. 

Are you tired of me using this little guy yet?? 

Okay that's all I got! Now time for some tacos :P

Blog 3

Just to start off, I just want to say that the research for this project was actually pretty fun. Looking at memes I have seen for years and finally learning their background and where they came from is super interesting! It was pretty hard to choose one, but I think I found the perfect one...

This baby is pretty well known... and I've seen him all around the internet. But where and when did this image come about? 

So, this is known as the "success kid" or "I hate sandcastles" meme was posted in August of 2007 by Laney Griner. She captured this hilarious picture of her 11-month year old baby making a cute, smug expression at the beach.

Ever since, this baby has been used in many memes and still is an internet sensation! Knobel and Lankshear's article on memes defines three set characteristics that successful memes inhibit. The three characteristics are fidelity, fecundity, and longevity. Since most of you already read the article, I won't go into great detail about each of these. Fidelity refers to components of the image that allow it to be replicated and passed on. Fecundity is the actual rate at which these components are spread and longevity is discussing how long the replications are popular. Which, as you all know, this meme definitely encompasses all three of those components. 

As this meme discusses, back in 2015 Laney Griner reached out to the world and used the popularity of her kid's image to launch a GoFundMe account in hopes of raising money for her husband's transplant. It was very successful and they were able to raise well over their goal. It just goes to show how such a popular meme can have amazing effects. 

But on to a less serious note, here are some of my favorite memes with this image.

I'm sure we can all relate...

Hope you enjoyed!

Blog 2

       Just as Professor Flewelling discusses how her students' first thoughts jump to music when genres are brought up, that is exactly where my mind first went to. The next thought I had was that there are actually a lot of different genres of writing. There are many types of writing and each has its own unique purpose. There are cookbooks, which are more informative and give direction, and then there are blogs, which are more personal and descriptive. These are just 2 of the many genres of writing there are. In my many years of attending school, in addition to my life outside of school, I have encountered many different types of writing. In school, I have encountered writing which has the purpose of teaching and assisting in learning, and then there is my internship, where writing is more geared toward using writing in order to describe a product and advertise for it. There are many other forms of writing I have encountered in my life, such as instruction manuals or fictional books, which each have their own unique style and purpose. It is exciting to think of just how many different types of writing are out there and how a lot these writings aren't even thought of as a type of writing.

       I found the article "Teaching Critical Genre Awareness" by Amy Devitt to be very interesting because it really made me consider just how many sources of writing are circulating around the world, and how each has its own impact on the world. She explains just how important it is to be aware of genres and discusses how genre teaching can be "formulaic and constraining, if genres are taught as forms without social or cultural meaning. Genre teaching can also be enlightening and freeing, if genres are taught as part of a larger critical awareness." (337) It all depends on how it is presented, and what message is trying to be conveyed. Just as many of you can relate, throughout school, we have been taught the 5 paragraph method of essay writing. This, in my opinion was not for the best, because it presents the 5 paragraph method as a standard, and students very rarely steer away from that style of writing. It leads to a dry looking essay and I can just imagine how upset professors get when they notice it is the typical 5 paragraph style. Devitt discusses this phenomenon when she describes how when people use a genre, they tend to adhere to the ideology of the genre. By using the 5 paragraph method as an example, what she means to say by that is that when people think of writing an essay they automatically write in the 5 paragraph style, without even realizing it. They first introduce their topic, write their thesis, and have 3 supporting paragraphs to go into further detail. Next they summarize what is above and conclude their essay. Devitt also discusses how much power is given to the various genre ideologies and that is definitely true of the 5 paragraph essay method. It is widely known and is how most students write.

       Luckily, there are a lot of other different genres of writing out there, that are not as drab and boring. A good example would be this blog! I like the fact that we are able to demonstrate our creativity and go in any direction we decide to. It allows us to better showcase our personality and sparks more interest. The purpose of each genre of writing is different and has a different effect on the writer. Through Devitt's article, she is hoping to spread the message to educators that it is their responsibility to enlighten people about the freedoms of genres and present it in a way that entices them rather than boring them. I definitely agree with her thinking and I feel as though I am already becoming more aware to the different genres and the ideologies that are paired alongside them.

Introduction

Hi Everyone! My name is Karishma Sharma and I am from Yuba City, CA. For those of you who do not know where that is (which is most of the people I talk to) it is an hour north of Sacramento! I get pretty excited when people actually know where that is, as it's a small city where there is not much to do besides restaurants and a movie theater...but I definitely think that it's the people that make the place so I definitely do enjoy going back home to visit family and friends often. I am going into my third year at SDSU pursuing a degree in Marketing and I recently got an internship in Marketing so that's pretty cool. Okay! Enough with this whole introduction business and let's move on to something a little more interesting.

As you can probably tell, I love to travel. I like to hike and adventure so if any of you love to explore as much as me then we would get along well! Okay, so here is where a lot of you are going to really judge me. (it's okay I would too) but hey it's okay it's pretty entertaining. So before this summer, I had never actually gone camping before. My friends planned a trip to Yosemite and I was very hesitant in going because first of all, I like showers. Second of all, where are the bathrooms??? And third of all, it was completely unfamiliar to me. But I decided hey, if I am going to camp for the first time, Yosemite is a pretty amazing place to do it, and it really was! I loved every minute of it and to my own surprise, I didn't want to leave! President Obama also was there at the same time and waved to my friends and me so that was definitely a highlight too!

Let's see... what else should you know about me... got it! I love to cook and bake and honestly if it was practical I would be at culinary school right now. My eventual goal in life is to pursue cooking and baking on the side, and eventually open up my own restaurant (that's where the business degree comes in). I like to think I'm pretty good at it too, I'm always getting requests from friends of desserts they want me to make for them. Not only do I love to make food, but also explore and try out new places. I am constantly looking for things on Yelp to try and my bookmarks go on for days so hey if you like food, then I am your go-to girl for suggestions! I think that is all the things that you need to know about me for now. I am excited to learn more about all of you! (Major props if you read this whole blog btw) I look forward to meeting all of you!