post 12

I think that Mirabelli’s research question lies in the idea that waiters/servers at restaurants are unintelligent people that are not skilled.  It is evident that he is trying to dispel this concept by stating: “…I hope this work will contribute to the development of understandings and policies that build more respect and recognition for service work to help ensure it does not become equated with servitude” (541).  By saying this, he proposes his main idea that he believes the work done as a waiter is hard work that requires thoughtful thinking but is typically written off as unskilled and repetitive in nature.  Mirabelli does his research at a diner in which he worked himself called “Lou’s Diner.”  While there, he studied his own personal experiences of working as a waiter and also observed fellow waiters at the restaurant in there interactions on busy weekend nights.  He helped answer his research question by explaining the menu and how complex it can be for a waiter.  Not only must a waiter have the ability to know everything on the menu, they must also have knowledge of how the food is prepared and what ingredients are used while making the food.  This is essential due to the questions that are asked by patrons regularly during the shift and by being able to appropriately answer questions in different situations, requires certain skills and intelligence.  Having knowledge in the field of serving does not solely involve reading what is on the menu and knowing the ingredients, but rather mastering the situations that occur often.  Knowing how to read people and being able to interact with them in a positive manner are crucial for being able to perform as a successful waiter.  It is explained early in the article that waiting tables is said to only require a 9^th grade level of education to do the job, Mirabelli disproves this by showing how complex the work can become.

Ethnography Proposal

Being an Exercise Physiology student, I consider myself in the discourse community of exercise physiologists.  While I am only just scratching the surface of what this community entails, I still have the knowledge to understand much of what goes on and is studied in this field.  While following the criteria of John Swales’ conceptualization of discourse community, the six characteristics can be used to define this discourse community.  First, common goals of exercise physiologists include understanding the human body and how the stress of exercise affects it, planning and conducting specific exercise programs, and recognizing risk factors of an individual.  Second, there are many ways to communicate throughout the community to other members.  These may include newsletters, emailing one another, message boards on varies organizational web sites, and having an organization dedicated to the community to keep members up to date and informed (American Society of Exercise Physiologists).  Third, teachings at different universities and having the ASEP provide ongoing means of education in the sciences involved in exercise physiology and new teachings along the way.  Fourth, exercise physiology is always involved in the world of sports medicine.  Although exercise physiology is not solely dedicated to sports, such a large part of the community coincides that the genres are often used interchangeably.  Fifth, a specific lexis is used in this discourse community.  Lexis is basically an adapted form of language that only those inside the discourse community would fully understand and be able to interpret correctly.  In exercise physiology, many scientific terms are used due to the amount of biology, chemistry, and physiology involved.  Sixth, there are multiple levels of membership inside the community.  I am an example of a novice inside the community being an undergraduate student still in school.  After this, members go on to more school or becoming a professional in their field.  Those who teach inside the community could be considered some of the top tier members of exercise physiology, preparing the novice members for their futures.

                My interest in this discourse community mainly comes from me being a part of the major here at Ohio University.  Not only am I surrounded by fellow members of this community every day, but I always participate and learn about it as well.  Along with being in the major, the ideas and practices of exercise physiology have been in my life since I was a teenager.  Playing sports in high school, exercise became an important part of my life and has since become a regular activity in my life.  Not only is exercise physiology something that I must study for in school, but I also consider it a hobby.  Being part of the major, there are many sources that I have access to in order to interview them for this paper.  My advisor is someone that I am close to and have a good relationship with and would be a good person to interview because he also teaches the subjects associated with exercise physiology.

Post 10

Being an Exercise Physiology student, I consider myself in the discourse community of exercise physiologists.  While I am only just scratching the surface of what this community entails, I still have the knowledge to understand much of what goes on and is studied in this field.  While following the criteria of John Swales’ conceptualization of discourse community, the six characteristics can be used to define this discourse community.  First, common goals of exercise physiologists include understanding the human body and how the stress of exercise affects it, planning and conducting specific exercise programs, and recognizing risk factors of an individual.  Second, there are many ways to communicate throughout the community to other members.  These may include newsletters, emailing one another, message boards on varies organizational web sites, and having an organization dedicated to the community to keep members up to date and informed (American Society of Exercise Physiologists).  Third, teachings at different universities and having the ASEP provide ongoing means of education in the sciences involved in exercise physiology and new teachings along the way.  Fourth, exercise physiology is always involved in the world of sports medicine.  Although exercise physiology is not solely dedicated to sports, such a large part of the community coincides that the genres are often used interchangeably.  Fifth, a specific lexis is used in this discourse community.  Lexis is basically an adapted form of language that only those inside the discourse community would fully understand and be able to interpret correctly.  In exercise physiology, many scientific terms are used due to the amount of biology, chemistry, and physiology involved.  Sixth, there are multiple levels of membership inside the community.  I am an example of a novice inside the community being an undergraduate student still in school.  After this, members go on to more school or becoming a professional in their field.  Those who teach inside the community could be considered some of the top tier members of exercise physiology, preparing the novice members for their futures.

Reflection

Editing a Wikipedia article was one of the most unique assignments that I have had while being in an English class.  I found the experience to be very enjoyable and challenging at the same time.  Being able to write about a topic involving my major not only incorporated my interests into the writing, but also allowed me to showcase the knowledge I have involving Exercise Physiology.  This assignment was also challenging in the sense that this writing was going to be out on the internet for anyone to view at any given time.  In the past, all of the writings I completed for a class have been almost solely directed towards the teacher who would be grading them because, in the end, a good overall grade was all that I was trying to achieve.  However, in this assignment my attention was directed towards the audience that would be coming to the article to learn, research, or reference information that could potentially be that I wrote and contributed to.  I have never had this sort of pressure to make sure that what I was saying was understandable and correct while writing before, it was definitely a positive experience.

                Since high school (when writing really started to form  and become important), I remember teachers stressing that Wikipedia was not a reliable source and how negative they would talk about it during any sort of writing that required research.  Doing this assignment showed that this argument is not always completely the truth, though.  Yes, almost anyone can contribute to almost any article on Wikipedia, but there also must be cited sources backing up the information that you add to each article.  It is refreshing to hear in this course that Wikipedia is actually a useful tool.  A site with so much easily attained information use to seem like such a waste when it was frowned upon by teachers in most other classes. 

                Another positive that Wikipedia offers is how it offers exercise in different aspects of writing.  When using and contributing to Wikipedia as we have, there are different ways to practice and improve our writing by simply working with the articles themselves.  In James P. Purdy’s essay “Wikipedia Is Good for You?!,” he offers three different ways in which Wikipedia helps the writer: using it as a source, using it as a starting place, and using it as a process guide.  The first one, using it as a source, is probably something most of us are experienced with (whether frowned upon or not) because we go to Wikipedia to find information on a subject.  The second two are more along the lines of how it can help the structure of our writings.  The sandbox page on Wikipedia is a good example of how it can help writers in their processes.  The sandbox is a perfect place to create a rough draft and edit it before even placing it in the article itself.  

                Intertextuality is the idea that all writing at least has some portion of it that comes from writings somewhere else.  James E. Porter explores this idea in “Intertextuality and the Discourse Community.”  Wikipedia is a perfect example of this concept in the way that it is a series of built articles, put together by many different sources.  None of the writing that is put into the articles is original, because it has come from a different source, but they are still a series of facts cited from other pieces throughout books or from the internet.  In comparing writing to the monk Adso of Melk discovering only remnants of an ancient library, Porter explains intertextuality as: “The writer in this image is a collector of fragments, an archaeologist creating an order, building a framework, from remnants of the past.” By using this phrase, Porter explains that all of our present created writings are just built by inspirations of writings that have already occurred before.  It all goes along with the idea that everything has been done before and that we can only build onto what has already been created as opposed to creating all new works every time we write.  Again, Wikipedia is a great example of this.  An article is created (the original text) and then it is revisited time after time to either be edited with new writings, or used as inspiration or reference to help a new idea.

Post 8

Starting in middle school, technical literacies began to be integrated into my curriculum.  I started having classes teaching how to use computers and their basic functions while at school every day.  It seems my age group is one of the first groups to have this sort of computer training while we were young and have it continue as time went on.  These first few classes in middle school helped mold my future in writing by teaching typing lessons and making it possible to create papers on a computer, which is just about the only place that we write now.  In high school we had a computer lab that we would use for class projects and the ability to write individual papers.  Having all of these resources helped form my own technical and visual literacy.  

Even today, I still have different projects helping form my literacy.  This class has even helped me in different ways than I have ever had before.  Editing a Wikipedia page and even having the blog to post assignments and respond to them are other ways to expend our literacy.  Not only can these types of practices help in our academic career, but also possibly help in different aspects of life.  Although my major does not require a lot of writing other than short essays and the occasional paper, there is technology on computers that helps interpret different tests and science based evidence found in experiments conducted.  Our literacy is being formed all the time and learning is always occurring whether it seems that way or not, sometimes we just need some help taking it all in the correct way.