But Wait…It’s Over?

Final thoughts to the end of the semester…

At the start of this assignment, I’m not going to lie, I was a bit hesitant about how I was going to approach this. I mean after all I was going to be critiquing my fellow classmates and group members which, to some (including myself), can be a bit unnerving. But as I began to get into the breadth of the information and reading their blogs I found that it was actually going to be easier than I thought. I found myself reading their blogs and actually being entertained. Who would’ve thought? But I actually found it quite informative and the information that I read in their blogs proved to be quite interesting.

For my fourth and final blog I decided read the blogs of my group members for my final  project (Nicole Engler, Corey Baum, and Patrick Wilson). Although we all had to write blogs on the same topics I still found it interesting to get a feel for their writing style and the ways in which they organized their blogs. I also found that each person had a different take on each assignment and each one did a different option on how to write it.

As you read on you will see the names of each person along with a link to their blog.

For Nicole I read her third blog about ideological criticism and Disney

For Corey I read his second blog about Todorov’s five-part equilibrium model and how he applied it to the television show How to Make it in America

And for Patrick I also analyzed his third article on ideological criticism and the film Consuming Kids.

 

 

Nicole Engler http://lifestyleofamediaaddict.wordpress.com/

I really loved the way that you began to start off your blog by introducing what your topic is and diving right in to the bulk of what it is that you were specifically talking about (Disney Blog). I think that you did a really good job of drawing the reader in right away and keeping their attention.

I think that you did a great job of relating the material to your own personal experience (like how you used to pretend to be some of the princesses when you were little) and how after seeing the movie, your thoughts on Disney as a whole and your own personal point of view of the movies. You seamlessly integrated the definitions into your blog without it seeming “forced” which is always a plus. You also did a great job with the visual representations and linking the commercialization of childhood to real life examples (see Toddlers and Tiaras picture) which was great.

Overall I thought that you did a great job with it and there was not much room for improvement. The only thing that I could suggest is that maybe include some of the other points in the film about what Disney had done with some of the minorities in films because that also seemed to be a little scary. Other than that it was a great blog and is definitely something worth reading.

Corey Baum http://cbaum3.wordpress.com/

I analyzed your second blog about the television show “How to Make it in America” and where you analyzed it through Todorov’s five-part equilibrium. For your introduction I thought that you did a good job of luring the reader in. You possess a very welcoming tone which is good when trying to appeal to the reader. You then go into a detailed background of the show that you chose to analyze and I found that it was quite informative (especially considering I have never seen the show myself). The comparisons to other shows really helped me to understand what type of show it was, which is good.

You then begin to explain how you will analyze it using Todorov’s five-part equilibrium which include  equilibrium, disruption, recognition, repair, and reinstatement. I like how you organized it by paragraph form breaking each one down individually where you then proceeded to explain how each concept applied to the show. I also liked the visual images that you embedded within the text to make it more visually appealing to the reader.

Although you did well on those parts I would like to offer some room for improvement in some areas. I think that when you were applying the concepts from Todorov’s five-part model, that you should explain/define each one for the reader in case they did not know what they were. You did this for Equilibrium but you failed to do it for the other four. I also think that you should do a little proofreading before you submit it because there were some minor typos.

Other than that I think that you did a great job.

Patrick Wilson http://mcombroadcasting.wordpress.com/

The blog that I read was yours on the consumption of kids by way of advertising. You did a solid job of asking the reader a question. Although you say that it is your “lame attempt” at an introduction, I think that you did a good job of drawing the reader into your blog which is good. You then clearly define ideology, the theory of ideological criticism, hegemony and the political economic theory. I also think that you did a solid job of relating the material we used in the classroom to the film “Consuming Kids” and I also liked how you wrote with such animosity towards the message that the film was saying because it keeps the reader engaged.

When it comes to the visual messages I think that you did a great with your visual images especially the video clip. They were pertinent to the information that you were trying to get across to the reader which is good (random images can take away from your message). You also did a good job with your conclusion and answering the “so what?” question and you leave the reader with a lasting impression about that particular blog. 

There is however some room for improvement. Although I thought that your introduction of the terms was detailed and very informative, I feel as if you could have shortened it a little bit and wrote a bit more information about the film itself and possibly hit on some more of its main points. Aside from that you did a good job with the blog and it was fairly entertaining to read as well as highly informative.

 

Last Words

And so the semester is coming to an end and that means an end to these blogs (or will it be? hmmm….). For the last assignment I was given the grueling task of analyzing and critiquing my fellow classmates blogs.

I thought that it was interesting to see each of their writings styles and how they were different. Nicole’s was pretty laid back and very conversational. I thought that that was a nice touch and I found that it was very inviting. She does a great job using pictures and although she is not so formal in her writing, I think that the informal writing style she uses is perfect and I don’t think she should change it at all. Corey was also pretty similar in his writing style. He took on the informal tone and was very conversational with the reader. His only weakness was in proofreading.

Patrick’s writing style was similar to mine in that he was semi-formal but was usually pretty formal in using definitions and sticking to the bulk of the information. I like the images and videos that he embedded with the blog too because I felt as if they flowed and meshed relatively well with his information.

Overall I really enjoyed this assignment because, although it was criticism of our classmates, it was positive criticism and opened up my eyes to different writing styles and different perspective on things. I thought the whole blogging assignments in general were actually fun and I didn’t look at them as an annoyance and I sometimes even looked forward to writing them (sometimes I may have even written a little too much ).

But as of now this will be my last blog and I hope you have enjoyed following me so far.

Adios!