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Dear Professor McClure,

The main objective in every Writing39B class is to be able to understand and most importantly
analyze rhetoric. Being able to acknowledge rhetoric is important because its a unique way to
communicate with your audience. Understanding how to develop rhetoric is like learning how to
speak a new language because rhetoric consists of many factors that need to be mastered. Some
of the factors for understanding rhetoric were the conventions of the genre, the expectations of
tropes, and historical context. Throughout the whole quarter we focused on horror as our genre. I
found this helpful to the learning environment because I felt it compelled me to perform better
since I could relate the genre to social norms. Although Professor McClure assigned excessive
assignments, I felt I definitely improved in writing Rhetoric. The assignments I felt were
beneficial to my writing process were the RA Essay, RIP Essay and the Final Reflection Essay.
When first starting my drafts for these essays I performed incompetent. However, with the
revision process of peer editing I managed to perform adequately in my rhetorical essays. With
hard work and dedication I managed to improve as a rhetorical writer.
Having a genre that was appealing played an important role to my success in this Writing 39B
class. When my professor discussed what genre we were going to focus on for the whole quarter
I was thrilled. Having horror as our main theme of the class was beneficial because I could relate
to the context being provided. I have experience reading and watching horror so I knew what to
expect in horror. I felt having knowledge helped me understand many factors that make up genre.
For example, when Professor McClure started to give assignments relating to the conventions of
horror I was able to identify them easier since I already had an insight on what tropes were.
Despite my knowledge on writing horror I knew I was nowhere close to understanding rhetoric.
When I was first assigned to read The Anteaters Guide to Writing Rhetoric I found it difficult to

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understand what rhetoric was. I spend hours trying to understand the analogy of the fishbowl and
how it symbolized rhetoric. The analogy of the fish was supposed to help me better understand
what a rhetorical situation consisted but it instead it left me confused. Knowing this rhetorical
situation was essential to this class because it explained our main objective of the course. After
looking at the diagram for a million years I came to conclusion what the rhetorical situation was.
The image of the fish basically depicted how you need to write rhetoric. In rhetoric there will
always be a rhetor that delivers their purpose by communicating with the audience. It was not
until my first RIP essay where I began devolving rhetorical abilities in writing.
Starting this process of understanding how to interpret rhetoric was quite stressing, however I
felt our Professor gave us sufficient assignments that prepared me for writing rhetoric. Our first
assignment of the quarter included analyzing two video clips and trying to identify the message.
This was significant to starting the rhetorical writing process because this was one example of
the way to prepare for a critical reading, something that I had to achieve throughout this course.
One of many assignments I had to complete was including outside sources to our writing.
Assignments that helped me master this technique were My Own Monstrosity and The Other
Place Imitation. The assignment that helped me the most analyze rhetoric was the assignment My
Own Monstrosity. In this assignment I had had to create my own inner monster and relate it to a
reading, Nature of Horror by Noel Carrol. Our character had to include the characteristics of how
Noell Carrol describe a monster which was both threatening and impure. What helped me most
develop as a rhetorical writer was doing class presentations. One major presentation that was
significant to this writing course was Monsters and Genres. In this assignment our group
discussed how our monster represented the horror genre and whether or not the exceptions were
fulfilled or subverted. After presenting to the class I felt our group was able to influence

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reception by delivering an adequate message. All these assignments we completed would be a

preparation to writing our first rhetorical essay of the course.
My first impression of reading my first novel, I Am Legend by Richard Matheson was that it was
going to be an easy reading however, when I was assigned a rhetorical essay on it I knew I was
nowhere close to understanding the text. The purpose of the essay was to analyze I Am Legend and
explain how it was shaped by the horror genre. From there I had to analyze how Richard Matheson

used rhetorical techniques to communicate with the audiences. Not being able to identify the
rhetorical message from Richard Matheson really left a negative impact on my RA rough draft.
When I first received my feedback from Professor McClure I was shocked by the amount of
work I had to change. One bad habit I had from writing was having an ineffective thesis
statement such as, One of Mathesons main message about the story correlates with the real
monster which is fear. Fear is what causes Robert Neville to act the way he does because he felt
threatened by a race that was no longer human ( Rough Draft). As you can see my argument is
unclear and too broad. My first mistake on creating this thesis statement was writing a false
argument about the novel. Stating Fear for the overall argument showed I had a false
understanding of the rhetorical essay prompt. Most importantly with thesis statement I was
incapable of writing a 5-6 page essay. After reviewing my mistake I realized what I needed to
change in order to have an effective thesis. The thesis for my final draft consisted of, In the end
of the novel when Robert Neville is staring out the window and understanding the vampires fear,
he comes to conclusion that he was the one doing the monstrosity. Richard Matheson main
message of the novel has to do with how our society discriminates different races by refusing to
see their point of view (Final Draft). After knowing what I needed to improve in I managed to
create an insightful thesis statement that addressed the RA essay. This thesis statement is strong

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because it discusses how the author subverts the audiences expectations by making the
protagonist be seen as the monster. This thesis is different from my thesis from the rough draft
because it is eloquent but most importantly this thesis is strong enough to analyze. Although I
improved on my thesis statement, it was not the only area I was ineffective in writing Rhetoric.
Writing rhetoric was a difficult process, however with the help of peer editing I managed to
improve. In my RA essay I had a tendency to input outside sources without introducing the text
which violated the three step method. After my RA rough draft was revised by one of my
colleges I realized what my problems were. My college stated, Specific evidence isnt quite
delivered; therefore, you may consider finding a quote to back up your claim on how the shift
changed and what impact it made.( Peer Review 1 ). In the rough draft I summarized my outside
sources instead of actually analyzing them. When I wrote my final draft I made sure I didnt
make these mistakes because they were making my rhetorical essay irrelevant to what I was
trying to argue. Fixing errors like these made my overall argument clearer to the audience.
Showing growth in this essay would foreshadow my writing capabilities.in the RIP essay.
For the RIP Essay we had to write a rhetorical analysis essay on the RIP project we presented to
our class and a Writing37 class. We presented our RIP project with an informative PowerPoint
that consisted of short video clips and visual images. The project included the analysis of a
convention which had a strong influence in the horror genre. When I first wrote my first rough
draft I felt I wrote a strong persuasive essay, however my colleague revising my rough draft
thought otherwise. I was disappointed when I received my rough draft because I had the same
mistakes I had from my other essays. One mistake that was similar to the RA essay was not
being able analyze my text effectively. My colleague stated, Dont just make the analyzation of
the audience's reception vague, but elaborate on the ideas and how each reception affected or

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lead the audience to the next reception. (Rough Draft Revision). When I would analyze certain
texts I would assume the audience understood what I was saying so I would be general. In my
final draft I managed to change this mistake and complete the three-step method. The peer
editing process played a huge contribution to my final grade in this essay. I feel this RIP
symbolized my hard work in this class because I managed to improve as a rhetorical writer. As I
reflect back on this long process of rhetorical writing I have gained skills I will take with me
throughout the rest of my college experience.
Sincerely.
Jesus Espinoza