Response Blog: February 27, 2012

Penrose/Geisler Summary: In “Reading and Writing without Authority,” Penrose and Geisler argue the difference in authority where you need to gain more knowledge about a topic to sound like you have authority. They examine the difference between a first year student in college and a doctoral student. This showed the different understandings of what they found to be considered knowledgeable.

QD: 3. I believe the difference to be is that Janet is a freshman who just came from high school where the learning/teaching style is different when writing a paper. I know from my own experience it was a lot different than I have been learning in my College English course.  We were so used to being worried about the sources where we found everything then adding your own reflection into it. With Roger it is going to be different because their views on the knowledge are at different level and Roger is able to go in depth more and reflect in a better way than Janet was able too.

4.  I think this was the case because she was not confident enough in her writing where she could go about the conflicting ideas in her own way and to help express the differences.

5. I would say my writing is more like Janet’s. I have the tendency to not be as confident in my work and often I rely to heavily on what the sources say and from those authors because I am going to believe they are right even if I have an argument towards it I do not always know how to go about it in a way that can prove my point and know that it is an intellectual response.

MM: Next time I write a research paper I know I have to go into it with more confidence and to sound more knowledgeable while I am writing.

Reflection: I enjoyed this reading because I felt that I am a lot like Janet in the sense of not knowing exactly how to be authoritative in a paper and with reading this article it gives me a better understand and will be helpful with the research paper being due.