SQR1

Understanding Composing

Summary:

Understanding Composing is an article written by Sandra Perl, which I find very interesting. It talks about many things concerning writers, how they write, what they write, etc. It all ends up tying up to how writers compose their readings.

This article starts out with an experiment that teachers in a writing course in NYU did. The teachers taped their thoughts while they composed on a specific topic. This experiment became very successful and useful due to the result that came out of it. It talks about recursive writing, the process of writing, when writers return to sub strands of the overall process, or subroutines. This process helps the writers move forward. It suggests them to stop writing more often and go back to re-read what they wrote. It also talks about felt sense. Felt sense is described as body feeling that gives awareness. Eugene Gendling described it as being the body and mind before they are split apart.

Recursive writing and retrospective structuring are very similar process yet they have many differences. Recursive writing would be the writers stopping constantly and re-reading what they wrote. On the other hand retrospective structuring is writers focusing and being careful about what they write.

Question: According to you, the plan-write-revise sequence in writing is equivalent to which process based on this reading?

Response: The plan-write-revise sequence is equivalent to retrospective structuring. In the article Sondra Perl refers to plan-write-revise sequence as being “an overall process writers use to keep the process moving forward”. Retrospective structuring is a going back and forth process; Sondra refers to it as a “forward-moving action that exists by virtue of a backward-moving action”. I think it’s very important for writers to go back and re-read what they have written. It’s very easy for them to get of topic and this is a good way to help them stay on track. There are many recurring features that writers could use to help them with the retrospective structuring. Writers could involve re-reading little bits of disclosure, they could key word or item called up by the topic, and writers could pause and seem to listen or otherwise react to what is inside of them also known as felt sense.