They say I say summary

I have to say first of all that I enjoyed this book. I was surprised at how helpful the templates seemed to be. I thought at first that they would make all writting too similar, but as I tried it I could hear that it would in actuality serve to improve the clarity and content of my writting. Nor for the summary.
The introduction to the book explains the authors' phylosophy about writting templates and gives some examples. They aactually follow their own advise, by placing naysayers, acknowledging the "they say" and inserting their own "say".
The first chapter contains intruction on starting with the "they say" or in other words, entering a discussion in order to give purpose to your writting. The authors give templates for how to present information that has been stated or claimed by others in order to set up your paper as a response to something instead of unsolicited rambling.
The next two chapters explain the difference and the how tos of quoteing and summarizing the "they say" quoteing is a way to present the "they say" word for word, while summarizing is a way to shortly present an idea from someone else without using their exact words. The authors give examples, templates and considerations for choosing how you will present the "they say" in these two ways. It is also important with both of these skills, to give credit where credit is due.
Then the authors move on to how to present the "I say" or your own argument. The authors present the idea that you can repond to the "they say" by either agreeing; "yes", disagreeing; "no", or both; "okay, but".
Next the authors explain the importance of separating the "they say" from your "I say" whether you disagree or agree or both, it is important to add your own insight and information. This is in reality the essance of the "I say"; you have to have something to say.
The authors, in the next chapter, instruct how to plant a naysayer in your paper for arguments sake. You do this by using the template of "skeptics my object....but...." or "One might argue that....However..." this helps to present your evidence and examples in rebuff to potential disagreements the reader might have.
Most important, the authors say, is to emplain "So, what?" They show how to do this by using the sentence "This is important because..." This might seem a simple format, but it is terribly important to explain the need for the argument, instead of simply presenting an argument without a purpose or resson. A written piece must explain to the reader why they should care.
The last few chapters explain how to "tye it together" things like creating a conclusion, letting your own voice come through the writting, and resummerizing everything that you presented.
Until I read this book I didn't realizehow important it is for us to use other peoples words in our writting to set up a conversation instead of just presenting information. I think that the templates given in this book can help tremendeously in accomplishing the dialoge goal that we have been studying.

Dashes, Commas, Parentheses real worl example

The advertisement seems a little disjointed, but I'm not sure grammer changes would help that much. One thing that I noticed is the sentance about crabs. The author uses a dash where I would use parentheses. I think that the important fact is that they have five pair of legs, that the first pair is also used for defense seems secondary, therefore calling for parentheses.
Another thing that I might change is the part about vitimins A and D. I would use the dash here, because I think that to most people it is more important to know that those vitamins provide strong bones and teeth. I don't think that many people know what A and D are good for, so this information would draw more people's attention.
The last thing that I would change, is to add a comma after pink in the flamingo sentence.
I think that these simple changes could not only make the advertisement more correct, but could also help make it more effitient int fulfilling it's purpose of getting people to eat seafood.

Annie Dillard Disscusion Questions

1-My pre-writting rituals, in the past, have been to procrastinate until the last moment. I am trying to correct this bad habit now, but throughout my high school days and much of my early college career, I could not jot down a thing unless it was due early the next morning, or during the next hour. I also have to be sitting at a computer; there is no hand writting for me. I cannot make my brain function or my creativity flow, if I am not typing. I think the procrastinatin thing was simmilar to Dillards. I needed the "fury", and the pressure of a vice clamp before I could get the words to come. Now, with many more responsibilities and not any more time, I try to work on my writting a little at a time in advance, but I still do my best work right before the deadline.

2-Unfourtunatley I feel like I rarely knock down bearing walls when I rewrite. My editting process usually is limited to basic grammer corrections. This, I feel, is a result of my answer to the next question. Who creates these limits? I think I do! I often put down my original writting and then feel predjudice toward changes. I often tend to believe that my first try is sufficient, or even more, perfect.I put limitations on the the changes that I feel are neccesary or improvements, and am often reluctent to knock down any bearing walls.

3-The metaphore of Dillard's that I most relate to is the "exploding typewritter" I feel like when I really get it into my head to write something it often comes out faster than I can put it down on paper. I rarely get stuck or slowed down. It kind of all just comes out. The metaphore that I would choose for myself would be something more like, "When I write it is a phychological illness." I hear voices. My only job seems to be recording what they tell me. However, I am not very good at using metaphores, or should I say that the voices aren't very helpful when it comes to metaphores.

4-As I started to explain in my answer to the last question, I do feel that writting is a "mystical experience." I often don't know where the words come from, and when I re-read what I wrote I frequently can't even remember writing or thinking of the things that I read. The mystical thing is that I am just as frequently incredibly impressed with what I read, as if some better author than myself wrote it.

5-I lean toward the feeling that Dillard is going for entertainment, however I also believe that the humor and entertainment could be for the purpose of interesting people in writting while the vaugeness could be for the purpose of avoiding giving those same people the oppertunity to form their own experiences instead of giving them a preconcieved notion of what it is like

real world grammer examples

Advertising is a curious thing. Things are not always as they seem. The people that create ads and such, know what sells and know how to get the attention of their target audience. However, now-a-days grammer skills are becomming less and less prevelent, so some mistakes might be purposeful, others might, unfourtunately, be a result of grammatical ignorance. I cannot presume to know to which cause we owe these examples, however, I shall give it my best shot.

The Jack and Coke ad is using as it's tag line, the reliability of the product due to its longevity. By placing a comma instead of the correct semicolon after "Wiskey" the author can imply (without actually lying) that the Jack and Coke has been brewed since 1866, instead of the wiskey being the brewed liquid for ages. Thereby the advertisement is able to mislead the audience into trusting a product that may be reletively new in itself.

The Cabella's advertisement contains, I think, too many commas in the sentence about the prices being good only at the Lehi, Utah location. The author might have felt that the comma was needed after "Utah" because he wanted to separate the location from the description "retail" store. However, a semicolon would have been better or nothing at all.

In the training table example, the author places a comma between the adjectives crisp and hot, while both of them are discribing the bacon. I think this probably stems from the rule that a comma should be placed between words in a list, however the list in this case, is the ingredients of the sandwich and not the way the bacon is cooked.

I think in the next example the author uses a semicolon after "Make Money from Home" because she feels that "trading foreign currancy" further explains the first part. This would be correct except that when using a semicolon, it should separate two parts of a sentence that could otherwise stand alone. This is not the case in this example, seeing as how on both sides of the semicolon the statements are fragments.

The Marie Calandars advertisement is missing the last comma that should be placed after delicious. This also probably stems from the rule that in a list there is not always a comma between the next to last word and the "and" before the last word. However in this list, the adjectives are describing their success as delicious as well as sweet and creamy, but the way it is written it is describing their delicious success as only sweet and creamy.

Most of these advertisement errors would go unnoticed unless pointed out. I think that is because most people don't know all the rules for grammer, and most importantly they don't know all the exeptions to the rules. I think that the authors were trying to write correctly and were using rules that they learned in school, however, in this wonderful language we call English, there are always exceptions to the rules and those are as important to remember as the rule itself.