In the article “Writers’ Histories, Processes, and Identities Vary,” writer Kathleen Blake Yancey seeks to inform readers that all writers are similar yet all so different. Specifically, Yancey illustrates how each writer has a history and identity that define who the writer is and how they approach different rhetorical situations. Writers vary in their histories, identities, learning, and composing. Every writer has experiences and identities that make up who they become, they have different ways of learning, and different ways of writing. This is what makes writing complex because there is no one identification of a writer, there is no one way to teach writing, and there is no one way to write. Due to the fact that writers and their contexts are always changing, variation becomes normal for writing.
Alt text: A Caucasian female with sunglasses and long blonde hair is seen in a picture smiling.
For example, this is a picture of myself, or Mariah Byrnes. My identity can be defined by many factors such as being female, white, and many other factors by which our identity is formed. Due to my identity, I vary from other writers and have my own unique ways of thinking and conveying ideas.
Similarly, in the article “Writing Is Informed by Prior Experience,” writer Andrea A. Lunsford explains that writers use past experiences to define how they will write. Sometimes, this can help writers remember important information from their last writing task, or it can remind them of a negative past time.
If you have ever seen the Harry Potter movies, then you know that Harry Potter had a particularly rough past time with writing. In an extreme, his professor made him write repetitive sentences as a form of torture. While schools today are not this brutal, Lunsford alludes to this idea of a significant moment in writing development where writers sometimes humiliating experiences can shape the way they write. This knowledge and experience that writers obtain can have both positive and negative impacts upon the writer and their compositions.
These two articles are important to a writing class and to everyday people because they highlight positive reinforcement and learning from past experiences. People and students can use these tools by remembering their own life experiences and applying them to make writing personal. Writing teachers should to be careful to help students revise and critique their pieces in positive ways. Otherwise people will only remember the times they have been reprimanded for writing “poorly”. Therefore, school systems should recognize that every person is different, and work to help each person use their own creativity.
Both of these articles acknowledge the importance of experiences in writing, therefore writers should examine how their experiences shape the way they write. Though each writer varies in their writing and personality, it is important to note that it is these experiences that define writing as we know it.
