I am not a huge fan of analysis papers; I tend to find them rather dry and boring. Add on how I don’t want to analyze a place, and you have an angry Katie. I mean, what else can I say about Palo Verde Main without running around in circles like Hamlet’s “To Be or Not to Be” speech? Yes, it’s a great place, and through Vanclay’s lens; it has all the elements to be deemed a place, and it can be an argued point, because someone else may not view it the same way as I do. Regardless of how I didn’t enjoy attempting to write an analysis paper, it is finished.
Though there is always room for more, I feel as if I did a decent job. Considering how I had to go to outside sources to review my paper, and those outside sources wound up being some friends of mine, they helped me as much as they could. Upon asking them how I could make it into more of an analysis paper, they told me that it was fine, and that I should just look into editing my paper for more clarity. I wanted to add and subtract matter from my paper; isn’t that how you are supposed to improve it? I wanted to reach a better level of analysis, but to attain it, I would need more in depth reviews, and a less stubborn attitude.
Next time, my writing process will be a little different. I’ll reach out to more people that know how to peer review similarly to me. With their help, I’m sure I could reach a better level of analyzing the subject at hand. I could also stand to be a little less stubborn; I tend to like certain things in my papers that shouldn’t really be there. I liked using the first person point of view for a reason, on this paper; because I went to a place that I liked. I know that it is usually frowned upon for such a young writer as myself, but I feel like I used it correctly. Along with using first person point of view pretty well in ONLY my first paragraph (I edited out the other times I used it), I really like how I made connections between how Palo Verde’s aspects relate with Frank Vanclay’s description of what a place is. I did that very well, and I am quite proud of myself.
I don’t see myself writing any analysis papers later on in life, after university. However, if I do, I am sure I will go about it in a different way from this time. I can see myself writing out more analytical notes, rather than observational notes. Seeing as how they distract me from writing an analytical paper versus a reflection paper. I will have colleagues that know how to peer review really well give me tips and ideas on how to improve my paper, and I will see how it goes by using a majority of their tips. Now for me to just remember this all for when I do have to write an analysis paper outside of university!
I am like you. I don't like writing analysis papers. I read someone's paper that wrote about a place they had a connection to and they had a better time with the paper. So actually caring about the place you are observing helps make for a better. If I could redo my paper I would choose a place that I would actually care to spend hours of my time observing. I also found that some of the advice my peers was good and some of it was unhelpful. That is when I went to the workshop and there my paper changed and it made the comments my peers made almost irrelevant. But I was still able to use their advice and apply while rewriting the paper. It would have been almost more beneficial if I had peers review the second draft instead of the first. We may not need to write analysis papers in the future but we are still building important skills for the future. This project allows us to examine something through a different lens which allows us to have a more objective view which can come in handy. So its more about finding the indirect purposes instead of taking it literally.
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