Zara's Amazing ePortfolio

Hello everyone, I am Zara Patel from Mumbai, India! As a bilingual student, I am taking College Writing at UC Berkeley in my spring semester during my freshman year. I hope you enjoy reading my work!

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Argument Essay: Using Persuasive Language & Hedging

I was extremely nervous to write the argument essay, because this essay was a blend of stating statistics and facts, like in the short report, but also I had to make a claim. I found that using persuasive language is an integral part of formulating a claim. It was also while writing this essay that we started learning about hedging in class. When I first started the outline of my argument essay, I was building it off my short report, so I already knew what I was going to write about. The outline for my argument essay consisted of making numerous points about what should be included in the essay, then making a claim about it, followed by some evidence or information about it. The following screen shot is from my outline:

While writing the argument essay, I found that I highly relied on the cause-and-effect type of claim, which is a type of claim of fact. These types of claims follow a similar format: “X shows that Y…” However, I felt like the word “shows” did not fall in the realm of academic language so I tried to think of a better word and though of “indicates”. However, I did not want to use that word multiple times in the essay, so I checked some online thesauruses to find better words. This is a screen shot of the online thesaurus:

While I realized that not all of the words would fit what I wanted to communicate, after checking many online thesauruses, I came up with a list of words that I could use instead of “shows”, which included: -indicates -elucidates -suggests -implies -demonstrates -points out -implies

However, I found that my claims were too strong. For instance, in one of claims I wrote, “… then such a positive change will be magnified and observed nationwide”. The use of the word “will” made the sentence too strong. It made the outcome seem completely certain and accurate, when there is no real way of knowing that. Thus, I had to hedge those claims and soften them. I changed “will” into “could” and it made my claim softer, but still valid.

In the example above, I used a modal verb to help soften my claim. There are numerous ways to hedge a claim. Modal verbs are used with other verbs to help soften a claim. Here is a list of modal verbs from A Guide To Learning English:

Another way to use a modal is to express possibility or probability. After looking at the file on bCourses about hedging, I found the table on possibility and probability to be very helpful. I have attached it below: 

The image above shows the five different structures to soften claims using a probability adjective. 

Another possible way to soften a claim by hedging is the use of hedging verbs. Hedging verbs were not entirely foreign to me as I had used them without knowing that they were an integral aspect of hedging. Hedging verbs include the verbs: “tend”, “seem” and “appear”. An example of each would be: -Doctors tend to agree that the surgery is risky.  -Doctors seem to agree that the surgery is risky.  -Doctors appear to agree that the surgery is risky. 

This is what I learned about hedging and how I implemented it in my argument essay. 

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Short Report: Paraphrasing

We first learned about paraphrasing while doing the short report. Paraphrasing is extremely useful because it helps convey what various authors have written about a particular topic in your own words. Paraphrasing is also important because it gives the author that came up with the notion we are citing credit and hence, ensures that I am not plagiarizing while writing a paper. When I was first formally introduced to paraphrasing in my academic language class, it was through an activity where from The Birds Of Egypt document on bCourses. We were given a piece of text then told to pick the best paraphrase from three options. I could tell that the third option had the same facts, but the language was very different, hence it was the best option. This gave me a good sense of what paraphrasing was. 

In the document, there were 12 points on how to paraphrase:  

The point which I struggles with the most, was the one regarding shared language and unique language. I always got confused between the two. However, I eventually thought of it as shared language as being scientific and the terminology that can not be swapped and unique language as being interchangeable. 

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Writing Topics

Writing Topics 2

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Writing Topics

Writing Topics 1

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Short Report: Women’s Empowerment in India

Introduction

Women’s empowerment has gained momentum globally over the past few decades. From the British suffragette movement in the early nineteenth century to the United States’ Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Restoration Act in 2009, women have gained numerous rights world-wide over time. Studies have shown that as a byproduct of empowering women, countries have had a greater GDP per capita, lower infant mortality rates and higher literacy rates. Despite this, the gender inequality gap has not entirely been bridged.

Gender inequality combined with high poverty has resulted in numerous crimes against women in India. Though there are numerous factors that affect the status of women in Indian society, this report will concentrate on reproductive health, political participation and the economic independence of women in India.

Reproductive Health

Although there are laws that support access to women’s health care and the distribution of products for reproductive health in India, the implementation of such laws has been subpar. Due to a lack of adequate forms of birth control (like the birth control pill or IUDs), in 2010, India had one of the highest birth rates in the world with 21.595 births per 1,000 people. As a result, the government implemented a controversial sterilization program. By 2013, roughly 4.6 million Indian women were sterilized to lower the birth rate; roughly 568 women died from this procedure. The insufficiency of reproductive health care for women in India is a systemic issue and one that is barely addressed because of a stigma against it.

Political Participation

Since India gained its independence from the British in 1947, Indian women have been politically active. In 1966, India’s third prime minister Indira Gandhi was a woman who went on to serve for another term in 1980. In the 2014 Indian elections, 65.63% of women voted, which is an impressive figure considering that total voter turnout was only 66.40% that year. It was observed that in states where the literacy rates amongst women were lower than others, the percentage of women that voted was also less. This shows a correlation between women’s access to education and women’s political participation in India. It is important for women to exercise their right to vote because they can elect officials that will create an environment in India where women can flourish.

Economic Independence

Under section 498A of the Indian Penal Code, women have the right to financial and economic independence and anyone accused of demanding a dowry should be arrested. However, in 2014 this law was highly abused when the Indian Supreme Court ruled that any arrest must be approved by the magistrate. Due to such poorly executed laws and the lack of financial independence amongst Indian women, they are often dependent on their fathers and then after marriage on their husbands. Moreover, this has created a vicious cycle where young girls are never given the opportunity to have an education, hence must rely on a male authoritarian figure as they do not have a job and thus no financial independence.

Furthermore, in rural areas most women do not get the opportunity to work and earn a wage; instead, they take care of household chores. When women do get the opportunity to work, they earn roughly Rs. 85 ($1.27) per day, which is less than half of what men earn, because of discrimination in the work environment. The root of this problem is cultural and it is difficult to change a society that has been subordinating women for centuries, but not impossible. With the help of NGOs like Apne Aap and CARE India that specialize in giving young girls an education and adult women entrepreneurship skills to start their own business or job qualifications, women have slowly started gaining economic independence.

Conclusion

Overall, while women have been empowered in India, there are still numerous flaws with the implementation of laws that are supposed to decrease the inequality gap between men and women. Additionally, class does play an integral role in this dilemma as women from lower classes and rural areas have more difficulty obtaining access to education and other such vital resources that enable women to reach their true potential. Taking all these factors into consideration, it is only through a cultural revolution where the population truly understand that both women and men are capable of achieving greatness that women can accomplish empowerment. 

Works Cited:

Stolberg, Sheryl Gay. "Obama Signs Equal-Pay Legislation." The New York Times. The New York Times, 29 Jan. 2009. Web. <http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/us/politics/30ledbetter-web.html>.

Cohn, Claire Litton. "12 Reasons Why Empowering Women Should Be The World's Priority." Matador Network. N.p., 6 Mar. 2014. Web. <https://matadornetwork.com/change/12-reasons-empowering-women-worlds-top-priority/>.

"Reproductive Rights in India." Reproductive Rights in India. Human Rights Law Network, 2013. Web. <http://www.hrln.org/hrln/reproductive-rights/433-reproductive-rights-in-india.html>.

The World Bank, Indian Birth rate (2010). Retrieved from <http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.CBRT.IN?end=2014&locations=IN&start=1960>

Shanker, Richa. "Measurement of Women’s Political Participation at the Local Level: India Experience." Ministry of Statistics & Programme Implemenatation, India (n.d.): n. pag. UN Stats. United Nations. Web. <https://unstats.un.org/unsd/gender/Mexico_Nov2014/Session%206%20India%20paper.pdf>.

The Editoral Board. "India’s Lethal Birth Control." The New York Times. NYT, 20 Nov. 2014. Web. <https://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/21/opinion/indias-lethal-birth-control.html?_r=0>.

The Editors of Encyclopædia Britannica. "Indira Gandhi." Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., 09 June 2016. Web. < https://www.britannica.com/biography/Indira-Gandhi>.

"WebCite: Election Commission." WebCite Query Result. Press Information Bureau Government of India, 21 May 2014. Web. <http://www.webcitation.org/6SSfQxJNT>.

"What Is IPC-498a ? Why Is It Misused ?" 498A. N.p., n.d. Web. <http://www.498a.org/498aexplained.htm>.

Blair, Cherie, and Siddharth Chatterjee. "Promoting Women's Economic Participation in India." The Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, 21 Mar. 2013. Web. <http://www.huffingtonpost.com/cherie-blair/promoting-womens-economic_b_2917923.html>.

Parekh, Dhimant. "Five NGOs Working towards Women Empowerment." The Better India. The Better India, 02 Mar. 2011. Web. <http://www.thebetterindia.com/2544/awards-ngo-women-empowerment/>.

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Reflection

While writing this short report, I had to combine a range of techniques that we learned in class. The most prominent technique that I implemented was paraphrasing. Paraphrasing was necessary in the short report because I had to convey a lot of information and also condense it into the word limit. I did not have too much experience paraphrasing, but aI understood the general gist of it from what I had gathered in class. So, I went back onto bCourses and checked the modules section where I found the lessons we had learned on paraphrasing.

While typing out this short report, I found myself looking at the Birds Of Egypt document often and seeing all the steps that were listed. After a while. I did not have to look at the steps when paraphrasing and it became almost like second nature to me. Also, I often did not realize when I would combine two or more steps because they are all interconnected. By writing this short report, I understood how paraphrasing worked and how to implement the steps that were listed. While paraphrasing, I had some difficulty grasping how to paraphrase specific numerical data. For instance, I had come across a particular statistic (which I eventually did not include in the essay) on the literacy rate amongst women in Tamil Nadu being 73% and I had trouble paraphrasing that. I felt that if I wrote “roughly three-fourth…” then I was being inaccurate and when writing a short report, it is important to be factually correct. However, after consulting a friend who has great experience in paraphrasing and writing reports, I felt more comfortable saying “roughly three-fourth” because it did not convey inaccurate information and gave the general idea of the literacy rate. Moreover, while paraphrasing, I used many synonyms and eventually had to look through a thesaurus. I ended up learning many new words and incorporating them into my vocabulary.

Since this paper was highly research-driven, I felt that it was very important for me to learn the techniques on writing reports since numerous classes require that. While doing this report, I learned how to use in-text citations, which was something that I was completely unfamiliar with. It was also beneficial because in certain published texts I have often come across in-text citations, but did not know what they were and how to use them. Though I decided to use the MLA format of citations in the form of footnotes in this short report because it is what I am familiar with and what numerous of my classes require, it was very useful to expand my knowledge and learn a new and quicker way of citations. These are two of the most important things that I learned while writing this short report.

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Summary: There Is No Harvard Cheating Scandal

In Farhad Manjoo's article, “There Is No Harvard Cheating Scandal: The Students Should Be Celebrated For Collaboration”, Manjoo argues that the students did not plagiarize their work in the final for the “Introduction To Congress” course. Numerous students were penalized for collaborating on the final as it was considered to be a form of plagiarism.

The exam was a take home paper and students had access to books, Internet, etc. Manjoo states that since the internet by nature is collaborative with forum sites like Wikipedia and Quora, students could discuss the exam. Manjoo also criticizes the design of the paper and notes that it was unfairly difficult to the students, hence forcing them to discuss the questions in order to get a better understanding of what the answers required. Moreover, Manjoo claims that the students should be praised for successfully tackling such a tough paper through teamwork because most jobs require collaboration amongst colleagues and it polishes a student’s communication skills. Manjoo acknowledges that by collaborating it was difficult for the professor to evaluate an individual student’s skills as some were “free-riding” on the hard work and knowledge of other students; however, by discussing ideas, students managed to enhance their own understanding of the topic.

Manjoo ends his article by weighing out the pros and cons of the collaboration of the students in the class and concludes that discussing the paper is beneficial to students and should be encouraged as it teaches students skills that are essential in many post-university jobs.

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Reflection

I chose to summarize this particular article because I found it to be the most compelling with a diverse range of points. Previously to this, I had some summary writing experience from my second year studying English. From that class, I recalled that the shorter the summary, the better. I also recalled that only the most important points made it into a summary. So, I started by reading the article 3-4 times. The first time, I highlighted what I felt was important, but I ended up highlighting too much to fit into a summary, so I had to go over it and question if it was really important and worth mentioning to the reader. My whole approach when deciding what information went into a summary and what did not, was asking myself: “If someone has not read the article and is reading the summary for the very first time, is it necessary to help them better understand the dilemma that I include this detail?” Thus, if I felt the detail enhanced the reader’s knowledge, then I would include it, but if I felt like the detail was implied or previously states in a different fashion, then I excluded it.

I was closely monitoring the amount of words that I was typing while writing this summary. In order to make the summary as compact, yet detailed as possible, I applied numerous techniques. When I finally highlighted all the points that I wanted to include from the text, I took a clean piece of paper and jotted them all down with bullet points. Then I changed the order of a few points because I felt like it made more sense in my summary. After doing that, I realized that some of them followed the same train of thought and if I cut out a few words, I could combine sentences. This was especially pertinent to those points that indicated a cause-and-effect relationship. I also had to rephrase many sentences because the original ones were too wordy and to make the summary my own. It was a bit difficult to change the sentence without changing the meaning. This is how I wrote this summary.

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Short Report Rough Draft: Error Log

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Reflective Essay

This class has been very educational and beneficial for me. I felt like our professor created a very friendly and positive environment. I feel like class is a safe space where I will not be judged for asking questions and I never felt nervous to raise my hand and express my opinion. My English has improved so much over the past few months that I have been in this class and I highly recommend that people who do not speak English as their first language to take this class! 

What I found most interesting in this class was the part where we discussed run on sentences, sentence fragmentation and comma splices. I looked back on some of my previous essays from last semester and I noticed that those are some of my biggest drawbacks. Moreover, the whole notion of “signal phrases” was very interesting and I went online and found a whole list of traditional signal phrases that include: “additionally”, “moreover”, “furthermore”, etc. I believe that such words are very useful because regardless of the type of paper, these phrases always help the transition from each paragraph and polish up an essay because they sound very fancy.

I also really liked the collocations dictionary that I used. In fact, I found the word “regardless” that I used two sentences ago in a collocation dictionary. When it came to the vocabulary this semester, I found that making vocabulary cards was helpful, but I struggles to find the Hindi word for a lot of the words that made cards for. I eventually omitted (I found the word “omit” on a collocation dictionary that also offered synonyms, let’s hope this is in the correct context!) the section from my flash cards that included finding the Hindi word for the English words. I feel to some extent that actually finding the Hindi equivalent of the English word did not do the English word justice because the comparisons between the two languages is too difficult. There are so many English words that do not have proper Hindi meanings and so many Hindi words that do not have English meanings. Also, I feel like when I am learning a new language, I like to get develop my skills in that language by pretending that I am a child and learning that language as if it is my first language.

Additionally, one thing that I did this semester is that I found some of the readings that I had to do online and then I used a feature on my laptop to have the readings get read aloud to me and then I could listen to it and at the same time read the text and it was very helpful.  

One thing that I did struggle a bit with in this unit were the exercises that had the adv+verb to adj.+noun transformation. I feel like it is a very mechanical way to explain the topic and I do struggle a lot when it comes to identifying parts of speech, especially when so many different tenses are involved in the English language. I found that listening to other people speak English really helps me, hence I enjoy listening to the readings that have to be done get read out to me.

Lastly, the segment of the class spent on paraphrasing and summarizing was really intriguing because I am not too sure about what counts as academic dishonesty and what must be in quotations. So having the time to understand how to take a piece of writing and then present it in your own words and still acknowledging that the idea is not your was very wonderful to learn. I find that depending on what area of knowledge the paper is in, the amount of language that is considered to be shared language would vary. For example, in public health class, there is a lot of shared language when I am paraphrasing theories from scientists; on the other hand, in my history class, it was more easy for me to find synonyms for a lot of the words that I wanted to cite and I could easily write about the same concept in my own words.

These are some of the things that really stood out for me in the first unit of my College Writing class.

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Summary Rough Draft: Error Log