Conversations Beyond the Classroom (Eng 100L): "Army Strong" Commercial

Welcome!

Welcome to our Eng 100 Blog “Conversations Beyond the Classroom”! The title of this blog refers to the community of active readers & collaborative learners we are creating by sharing our academic writing for Eng 100 with each other + a larger group of students, instructors, academics, and just about anybody who chooses to follow our blog! When you write and post your reader responses here (and, later, as you write your essays for the course), I encourage you to use this audience to conceptualize who you are writing for and, most important, how to communicate your ideas so that this group of academic readers and writers can easily follow your line of thinking. Think about it this way: What do you need to explain and articulate in order for the other bloggers to understand your response to the essays we’ve read in class? What does your audience need to know about those essays and the authors who wrote them? And how can you show your readers, in writing, which ideas you add to these “conversations” that take place in the texts we study?

As students of Eng 100, you will use this blog to begin conversations with other academic writers on campus (students and instructors alike). We become active readers of each other’s writing when we comment on posts here. And, best of all, we are using this space to share ideas! We encourage you to use this blog to further think through the topics and writing strategies you will be introduced to this quarter. As always, be sure to give credit to those people whose ideas you borrow for your own thinking and writing (you should do this in the blog by commenting on their post, but you will also be required to cite what you borrow from your peers/instructors if and when it winds up in your essays. More details on that later…).

Finally, keep in mind that writing to and for this audience is a good way to prepare for the panel of readers (faculty at WCC) who will be reading and assessing your writing portfolio at the end of the quarter. We hope that as a large group of active readers, we can better prepare each other for this experience. But, in the meantime, let’s have fun with it! I am really excited see how far we can take this together!

--Mary Hammerbeck, Instructor of Eng 100

Thursday, September 30, 2010

"Army Strong" Commercial

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4hNh8ZSX4cg

Within this 30 second “Army Strong” commercial you see more than just an advertisement to join the army; you see the promise of opportunity for a better future. This commercial begins with a soundtrack that sets a heroic mood and the feeling of something to come. Then the visuals show a series of men and women, one after another, in different careers, Coach, Firefighter, Pilot, Business man/woman, Manager, Doctor, each of them proudly stating what jobs they had in the army such as an Intelligence Analyst, Officer in the Airborne Core, Green Beret, Dental Assistant, chemical officer, and more. They go on to list the qualities that the army helped them achieve like being a team player, decisive and a leader. Though it doesn't say it, this advertisement implies that going through the army is the best way to gain a good career. You can assume this by the emphasis they put on the career aspects of the Army, and from quotes such as, “As it turns out, camouflage is a great way to get noticed. 150 careers and the strength America’s top employers are looking for.” These former Army officers stand proud and as an example to all with the looks on their faces seeming to tell the audience “come, and have a new greater life.”

1 comment:

Dillon FinneganSeptember 30, 2010 at 3:46 PM
Dillon Finnegan
Brandon Simpson
Haylee Orme

Q:2
The add hopes the viewer will surrender to the U.S. army and join, because it will help you in the future in many ways. Many of the top employers are looking for "Army Strong" employees, as well as many other benifits. They say how being "Army Strong" teaches you how to be a team player as well as a hard and determined worker.
Q:10
The music is a heroic/epic calling to it. It sends a message to the viewer that you could join this heroic and important future for you and your country.
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Practice Introductory Post, Please!

Please Post an Introduction (for practice) by Monday, Sept. 22nd so that we can all be prepared for the first blog post assignment coming up next Thursday.

Here's what to do: Once you've accepted the invitation to become a contributor to this blog, you will notice a "new post" tab at the top of our blog. Click on that and enter your text. (I suggest you first type in a MW doc and then copy and paste to our blog to minimize the risk of losing your work.) Then, post!

For your first post, please: Write a brief informal introduction of yourself. Say whatever you’d like about yourself to us—your audience & collaborative learners. Check out Mary’s introduction if you need some ideas about what to say about yourself.