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Over the semester, I must admit that I never was able to improve my development of ideas within paragraphs. It never failed; in every conference I had with Ms. Bone, she would continue to tell me the same thing. She would say that I have good ideas, but I need to develop them and explain them more. It would never fail. Every time. Every single time. I guess this is one of this things that I just need to continue to work on. In the comments on my last assignment these were her exact words, “You have great ideas, but the ideas are not translating to the written page” (Bone “American Influence on Korean Pop Culture” 8). I hope that this assignment shows that I have improved in this category, but knowing my recent history on the subject, I probably am still not forming a paragraph which is cohesive and coherent. However, I feel that in this assignment, it is easier for me to write and express my ideas. An assignment which has a set structure and a hard topic like the ones earlier this semester (except for the summary paper) make it harder for me to develop an idea and express it. As I continue to grow as a writer, I know that idea development will continue to become easier for me. I have to be persistent and push myself to be more creative in my writing. Luckily for me, there is not many writing courses left for me in my degree. I think I may only have one, if that. I must be honest and say that not having to take but one english course may have influenced my choice of major. I am more of a math and science person. I believe this has a lot to do with why I struggle with idea development within paragraphs. I like to stick to set structures and rules. With writing, it is more of a do what sounds right rather than follow a set of rules or patterns and produce an answer. Following a set of rules or equations and producing an answer is something that comes easy for me, where as idea development in a paragraph is something that I struggle with. I know that as I continue to write, I will become better at this key skill and eventually have no trouble forming a paragraph which flows smoothly.

#EN103

As the semester progressed, I saw myself progressing in my awareness of other cultures I encountered in my everyday life. At first, I struggled with the Tumblr post because I am not really into social media that much. However, as the semester progressed, I began to post less and less about news articles I found and more about encounters in my everyday life. A post from early in the semester was talking about an article about Jeremy Lin (“February 6th” n.p.). I did not put much effort into the whole Tumblr thing. I will admit that. However, I did begin to do less articles and more actual everyday encounters. One post talked about how when I was writing my paper on K-pop, an actual K-pop song came on in my Spotify playlist, which then propelled me to listen to some G-Dragon (“February 20th” n.p.). A post from later in the semester was about a night when i ate sushi and decided to actually research sushi and find meanings behind different names. One post talked about how sashimi is the traditional first course in a formal Japanese meal (“March 21st” n.p.). Although I did not really want to do the Tumblr posts throughout the semester, I began to have less and less difficulty doing the posts. The posts became easier as I progressed in my awareness of other cultures. Even now, as I do not have to do Tumblr posts, I see things everyday which I could write about. Last week, a flyer was put up in my hallway talking about a showing of a documentary about a North Korean refugee. Before this class, I would have ignored it or not even though about it. Since I have been in this class, I now have respect for other cultures and movies from other cultures. Without this class I would have never watched Jiro Dreams of Sushi, but since it was an option for the #mercypass posts, I decided to watch it and do not regret one minute of it. That movie was very interesting and I am glad that I was able to see it. Cultural awareness is something that we should all have because we live in a country which is a melting pot of so many different cultures. If there is one thing that I can definitely take away from this class this that I now have more of an appreciation for other cultures than I did before I started in this class, and for that, I am thankful.

#EN103

Research of the topic is something that I definitely improved on over the semester. As the semester passed by, I was able to learn more about researching and how to properly gather information to support an idea or thesis. All three of the papers we wrote, required research, but we were only actually graded for our research on two of the papers. Those were the critique paper and the research paper. (Oh really, we needed research for a research paper? Who knew?) On the critique paper, I only scored a 2/4 on research (Bone “Grave of the Fireflies” 6). I believe I received this score, not because I did not reference the movie, but more of the fact that I did not really quote the movie. Obviously if I am writing a critique paper on a movie, I probably should have cited the movie more than I did, but I did not because I was and still am growing and learning as a writer. There was improvement, however, as I moved forward to the research paper on which I wrote about Korean pop music (K-Pop). On the research paper, I scored a 3/4 on the research portion of the rubric (Bone “American Influence on Korean Pop Culture” 8). (Looking back on that paper, I am not really sure why I titled that paper “American Influence on Korean Pop Culture.” My paper was about American influence on Korean pop music. I guess I screwed up there.) The improvement was not drastic, but it was improvement that was obviously evident. The research paper was hard for me to write, but as the same time, it was also fun to research. I found a lot of interesting articles and facts about K-pop that I never knew before I started the research for this project. Ms. Bone, as a comment on paper, told me about Will Smith doing a collaboration with a Korean pop group in the early 90s (Bone “American Influence on Korean Pop Culture” 1). I found this interesting because I did not find this during my time researching, but I mentioned the Fresh Prince in my paper. (Maybe that’s why I didn’t score a 4/4 on research.) As I researched more and more, the evidence that supported my thesis continued to grow. Learning how to research played a key role in finding the sources I was able to find for that assignment. Now, I definitely have a better understanding of how I am supposed to research, and how many resources the University gives us for research.

Beginning with the first paper, my knowledge of audience awareness was obviously lacking as evidenced by the score of 2/4 in the audience category on the summary paper (Bone “Life in the South” 3). The summary paper was our first assignment which involved writing about the culture of a partner who we were randomly paired with during a class period. Our target audience for the assignment was supposed to be a friend or acquaintance to whom we were writing. My paper however resembled more of a reply to a question than a letter to a friend and for that reason, I only received a 2/4 in the audience category of the rubric. On the next assignment, the critique paper, my writing slightly improved as my audience score moved up to a 3/4 (Bone “Grave of the Fireflies” 6). This paper was more of a formal paper which required me to be more traditional in my writing style. Although the improvement was slight, it was still improvement. Unfortunately, there was no improvement from the critique paper to the research paper as evidenced by the 3/4 I received once again on the audience category of the rubric (Bone “ American Influence on Korean Pop Culture” 8). Although I only improved my score to a 3/4 throughout this semester, I now have a better understanding of how I am supposed to direct my papers towards a specific audience. The audience of a paper affects all aspects of the paper. For example, grammar may change based on the audience. You may use slang terms and contractions or even texting shortcuts to write to a friend, but then when its time to write a formal paper you have to throw it all out the door and stick to well formed and punctuated sentences. Seeing how I scored on the first paper, I was able to use that moving forward as motivation to improve my audience awareness which helped propel a 2/4 in the audience category to a 3/4. Although I never achieved a 4/4, I still feel that the improvement, although small, was enough to affect my writing as a whole for the better.

#EN103

Over the course of the semester, I feel that I have grown as a writer. Although the growth maybe be small in a few key areas, the growth as a whole has shown within my papers. I feel I have grown in the areas of audience awareness, research of the topic, and cultural awareness. Audience awareness and research of the topic have both improved since my first paper this semester and have made my writing better. How I have grown in cultural awareness can be seen through my Tumblr post and I also can name multiple examples from everyday encounters where I have seen myself being more aware of the different cultures present on this campus. There is still one area however I feel that I still have yet to improve. I feel that although writing as a whole may have improved, I am still lacking in development of ideas within paragraphs. I continue to know what I want to say and how I think it would sound in my head but I still can’t seem to put on paper the way it sounds in my head. If I can improve on my idea development, I firmly believe that my writing will begin to sound more and more like a college writer and help me to succeed down the road in not only college but also in achieving the goals which I have set for myself.

#EN103

Jiro Dreams of Sushi was a very interesting documentary I watched about the world renowned sushi chef Jiro Ono

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Jiro Dreams of Sushi

Jiro Dreams of Sushi is an interesting documentary on the Japanese sushi chef Jiro Ono. He known all over the world as the best sushi chef and for his world renowned . He refers to himself as a shokunin. Shokunin translates as a craftsman or artisan. Jiro has apprentices working under him all the time. They must go through 10 years of apprenticeship before they can be recognized as a sushi chef by Jiro. Jiro takes the art of sushi very seriously. It may take a year or longer before one of Jiro’s apprentice can even begin to prepare the fish that Jiro uses in his sushi. Jiro takes great pride in his work and for that reason the starting price of his sushi is $250. That is a hefty price for such a small item, but based on reviews and patrons of his restaurant, it is worth every penny. Last year, Jiro received his eighth straight three star rating from the Michelin Guide. This is a very prestigious award and Jiro is the oldest chef to receive the award. Jiro’s restaurant is very small. There are only ten seats within the restaurant and you must book reservations a month in advance. When President Obama visited Japan last year, he attended Jiro’ s restaurant and conveyed that it was the best sushi he has ever had. As a person who likes sushi and recognizes sushi as an art, I would love to one day attend his restaurant and have a sushi experience that will never be paralleled. Jiro’s youngest son currently runs his own sushi restaurant, while his eldest son is the heir to head chef at Jiro’s restaurant. It is Japanese tradition that the eldest son succeeds his father in his occupation. That is why Jiro’s younger son has opened his own restaurant. His younger son knows that he can never match his fathers skill and experience that is why he does not charge as much for his sushi even though he was rigorously trained by his father. Because of his father’s shadow, he has only achieved a two star rating by Michelin’s Guide, but patrons say that his sushi is comparable and just as good for a lower price. Their restaurants mirror one another because Jiro is left handed and his son is right handed. It interesting to me that these two can run the two restaurant across the city, and his son not be jealous that he has not yet earned the respect that his father has earned for many of the past years. Overall the documentary was very enjoyable and very interesting. The only complaint was having to read the subtitles since it was in Japanese. Otherwise it was very interesting.

#EN103 #MercyPass

Yesterday in class we finished watching Big Hero 6. This movie takes place in Tokyo, Japan

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Earlier I watched Jiro Dreams of Sushi. In the movie Jiro refers to himself as a shokunin. Shokunin translates as an artisan or craftsman.

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Arizona is honoring Asian American Heritage month in a special way

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Interesting article about Jeremy Lin as an Asian American player in the NBA

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Interesting article about an Asian American’s reaction to the sitcom “Fresh off the Boat”

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Not a fan

I watched the two-part episode of Running Man with Big Bang and G-Dragon. This TV show is considered a variety show, but this episode is more like a game show. If the show were in English, it would probably be more entertaining to watch. Unfortunately the whole time you are focused on reading the subtitles and not the show. I do not see this show being a hit in the Unites States though. I don’t believe it would be something Americans would want to watch. I believe this would be one of those shows that lasted one season and did not receive further funding. How this show has lasted for five seasons in Korea, I can honestly not understand. To me, it seemed like the most stupid show I have ever watched. (Well, maybe not that bad, but it was pretty close.) I don’t understand. Is Korean television just more bland and boring than American television. I feel like it must be that there are a lot of bad television shows for this to be popular. I guess I am just not a game show kind of person. I more of a drama and action television series kind of guy. Shows like Running Man don’t interest me much. To be honest, the show actually out me to sleep. Once again, this may not have been the case if I didn't have to read subtitles and could actually understand what they were saying. I may have a completely different outlook on this show and might actually like it but the subtitles ruined it for me. More than likely though, I probably still would not have liked the show because I am not a big fan of game shows in general especially those in which the teams are competing in weird games as they do in Running Man. It may just be that it was that specific episode. I may give it one more chance with another episode. The only thing that I did somewhat enjoy was that G-Dragon was on the show. Big Bang and G-Dragon are an interesting group of people. watching them work together on the show was somewhat entertaining but once again I did not really care for the show because I am not a game show guy. G-Dragon and Big Bang did go on to win. I wonder of they always let the guest win or if the hosts do not always win. I guess another episode may be in my near future before I can officially cross it off of my list of shows to watch.

#DarkBargain EN103

The representative from the Japanese outreach program also taught us about Origami. Origami is a Japanese form of art involving the folding of paper into different shapes and objects.

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The representative from the Japanese Outreach Program taught us about Japanese daily life and cuisine.

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Yesterday in class a representative from the Japanese Outreach Institute visited class to discuss Japanese culture. She goes around to schools and groups and educated them in Japanese culture.

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Interesting article about Indiana Univerisity

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