Part two of five:
As stated in learning outcome one, I didn’t understand how to properly write an essay before this course. Getting to a place where I could produce an essay that portrayed my ideas well was a challenging endeavor. One of the biggest hurdles to jump over was using sources and quotes to relate to what I was trying to say. I always loved engaging with sources and actively reading, but incorporating them to play with my ideas was difficult. My professor introduced this skill in an extremely helpful manner. She said we shouldn’t use a quote unless you can’t paraphrase it, and that you shouldn’t use a source unless it complicates, advances or supports your thesis. These rules helped immensely. You can see in my significant writing assignment that I use quotes from sources that explain my ideas on how art and science need to collaborate. Some quotes complicate my ideas, saying that without science there could be a rise in unscientific catastrophes, then using another source to highlight what a real doomsday would look like. I even used one source to describe an illustration, how science can be beautiful artwork. One way or another, all of the quotes I used relate directly to my thesis, otherwise I would have just paraphrased. I think direct quoting adds a specific spark to the writing, whereas paraphrasing may risk becoming too generalized.
