Writing Showcase

This page is a flashback to the process of writing an analysis essay, reflecting on the course objectives.
The question of this class: How do Disney films contribute to the social construction of our values and perceptions about gender and acceptable gender roles?
My writing topic: Learning from Cinderella: Disney’s Contribution to Social Construction of Female Roles Over Time

Annotations to Cinderella 1950

The screenshot is a summary of what I gained and thought after watching Cinderella produced in 1950 again. I annotated a few scenes that reflected perceptions of female roles, and searched for some reviews online. The review I summarized maintained that people overacted to the anti-feminism content in such an entertaining film. Though I didn't think so, different ideas did develop my openness. [Check to see the summary post.]

Reflections on the Term "Social Construction"

I listened to the 10-minute-lecture entitled "Social Construction" by Sharp and Wade. This term appeared in the class topic. I annotated carefully and spent much time thinking about it. The screenshot was part of my reflection and understanding of social construction. Plus, I was very glad to receive 9 comments from my classmates. I practiced the engagement of the mind and Improved the ability to deliver ideas in a readable, focused, and detailed way.

Advice on My Introduction from A Classmate

I received an elaborate evaluation on the introduction of my essay. They were constructive advice. Thanks to her, I did many revisions later and made my words clearer, informative, and more logical. The screenshot was her comments. Plus, I learned her format of commenting, because I found highlighting the scores made the writer track the sentences more easily. I understood the importance of peer review to my own reading and writing.

Advice on A Classmate's Introduction

I reviewed a classmate's introduction, as the screenshot above. I read through his post and thought over the five items. Worth mentioning, as soon as I realized my weakness in unclearly defining the term "social construction", I found out his flaw on the same problem. So after fixing my own paragraph, I advised him to revise as well. I progressed in peer review skills.

Additionally, I learned his scheme of including a personal anecdote. I added my own experience in my body paragraphs.

Planning

&

Exploratory

Wrting

Peer Review

Review on the Structural Organization

In the assignment of self review, I decided to add more transition words to smoothen the connections between sentences and to make my essay more logical. Also, I added subtitles to separate three different blocks so that the essay would be more structurally clear to readers. I practiced my communication skills by composing analytic written text.

Review on the Language Use

The screenshot involves my trials to polish the language use. Before reviewing it, I learned how to identify unnecessary labels, fillers and redundancies in academic from Connect library. I enhanced my communication skills of writing and practiced the conventions of academic writing.

Self Review

First Draft of Introduction

Final Draft of Introduction

Through the revision step, I improved my ability to write prose that is readable, focused, and full of details, and understood the importance of having a process when composing a sophisticated text.

Revision

When I designed the outline, I piled up everything I could think of about this topic. But after completing the full essay, I found it included too many contents and exceeded the maximum words. So I had to cut off with the minimum harm to the overall structure and completeness.

I deleted all the analysis of the sequels Cinderella II and III from the introduction and body paragraphs since the remaining would still answer the topic well and be more detailed. Meanwhile, I shortened the summary of Cinderella's story to two sentences.

First Draft of Body Parts & Conclusion

According to one classmate's comments, I added a quotation under the third subtitle and made the idea about the right relationship more explicit. Moreover, I moved the "Briefly" paragraph to the conclusion to help sum up the progress of Disney's fairy tale films.

Final Draft of Body Parts & Conclusion