Reflective Essay

Welcome to my portfolio. One of the hardest things, in my opinion, about writing is bringing a bit of yourself into the piece. It’s easy to use the words or phrases of other authors, to cite and cite and copy and copy until you can no longer see yourself in a work. One of the biggest challenges I’ve had over the course of my “career” as a writer is making my writing personal. So, when it came to assembling this portfolio, I specifically worked to bring in pieces that are not only good, but also hold special personal significance for me. For some pieces, that significance should be obvious. “Beyond the Bubble” is quite literally the story of my life (as a literate person), and “The Case for Writing Classes” is my take on academia. But for the other essays, it may not be as clear.

That’s good.

As I’ve evolved as a writer here at Howard, I’ve learned to pay special attention to the context of certain pieces of writing. It’s not enough to be able to analyze the words on the page, or the subtext. To fully understand it, one needs to look at it as it relates to the other works of its time. For me, this redefined almost everything I thought I knew about certain texts. Whether it’s “Ubik” or “Taipei” or “The Moynihan Report,” texts take on new meaning when they’re connected to their temporality. So, as you read my works, take a second to think about how and when I wrote them. What makes them so special, so personal? Understanding this will not only help you enjoy my writing more (as you can probably tell from this, it sometimes gets a bit cerebral), but it’ll also give you a more intimate understanding of the way that I think and how I view literacy. I’ll finish this off with a quote from a really good movie that just about sums up this essay and this portfolio.

“If we all reacted the same way, we'd be predictable, and there's always more than one way to view a situation...It's simple: overspecialize, and you breed in weakness. It's slow death.”