Jigsaw * Flower and Hayes

I loved this quote, “The writers themselves create the problem they solve. “

The article based its finding around a study done with different levels of writers. The task was to write a piece for an audience of 13-14 year old girls, for Seventeen magazine. While the writers wrote, they were to verbalize their writing process, which was recorded.

As writers, we need to be able to identify the problem that is to be solved before we can formulate questions. As teachers, we need to teach our students to create problems by asking critical questions.

When writing, two aspects of the rhetorical problem are:

1.       Information about the rhetorical situation

2.       Information about the writer’s own purpose and goals.

A rhetorical situation would be the audience and the given assignment.

Representing one’s purpose and goals has four different roles:

1.       The effect the writer wants to have on the reader.

a.       These goals can be small scale, large scale, or anything in between.

Some writers want their goals to have a direct personal effect on the reader as a person. Other times the writer may have a more general goal, making a point or having the reader simply comprehend the thought.

2.       The relationship the writer wishes to establish with the reader.

a.       Persona,  or voice

b.      This part of the process is usually found in the writer’s stored information, thus rarely heard in the protocol.

c.       Persona changes through word choice and tone rather than by a statement.

3.       The writer’s attempt to build a coherent network of ideas, to create meaning.

a.       Some writers may try to express an idea that has been formed, while other writers attempt to probe for contradictions and analogues and try and form new concepts.  

4.       The formal or conventional features of a written text.

After the study was complete, data was gathered and the following was determined:

	Analysis of rhetorical situation: Audience and Assignment	Analysis of goals Audience    Self    Text    Meanings	Total
Novice	7	0            0            3              7	17
Expert	18	11          1             3             9	42

The information shows that the expert writer made reference to his audience/assignment 18 times in the first 7 to 8 minutes of recording, versus the novice who only referenced back 7 times. Look at the “Audience” and “Self” section. The novice didn’t refer to either during the duration of the recorded study. The totals show that the expert writer referenced back to these purposes and goals more than twice the amount of times then what the novice did. That is so interesting to me. I would think that a less experienced writer would refer back more often making sure they have a good grasp on the “problem”.  Good writers, with experience, have learned the tricks of the trade, so I suppose that they reference back time and time again, not only to refresh themselves on the topic, but also to make sure they stay on task. Good writers also signify the problem at a deeper level.  In the process of continually identifying the reader and the situation, the goals become more specific and involve more detail. In contrast, a poor writer doesn’t change or revise their problem throughout the writing process. Referring to the goals and purposes is not done nearly enough, thus the poor writer lacks development and depth regarding their problem.

I enjoyed the example of the Seventeen magazine study, a novice writer whose piece was about steam turbulence in an electric generator. The topic was near and dear to his heart, but hardly appropriate for the 13 and 14 year old female audience of Seventeen magazine. This clearly shows that the audience/assignment and the purpose and goals got lost in the writer’s writing process. Maybe referring back to those 6 components would have geared him in a better direction?

The conclusion to this article was that good writers are simply solving different problems then poor writers. Writers only solve the problems that they represent to themselves. Determining how a writer depicts his problem through his writing, we may also be determining a part of what makes the writer creative.

 I agree with this theory. As I write, I very often pull from my own mind things that help me connect to my “problem.” I don’t feel experienced enough in my own writing abilities to be able to think like an expert writer. I find myself in the novice category. I think that also comes with lack of writing experience. The article ended with the question, would the poor writer’s performance change if they had a richer sense of what they were trying to do as they wrote, or if they had more of the goals for affecting the readers which were so stimulating to the good writers? I can’t answer that. To me, poor writing comes with lack of experience, and I wonder that if these poor writers knew the above questions, would they remain poor writers??? Then I suppose the point arises that great performance does not always follow knowledge. I know have a better understanding of the 4 purposes and goals, but with that in mind, would that necessarily make me a better writer? Now, or with more practice? Hmmm.

Damn...my stupid table didn't copy and paste correctly...