Kayleigh's Literacy Map(ish)

Map of the Event of Learning What an Essay Is

I like long titles

They're funny

What were the economic/political conflicts or contexts? 

I am a middle-class American, white, living in a fairly wealthy area of Upstate New York.  I attend a private university, and am able to pursue the education that I want.  Clearly there's a money thing going on here.  Not everyone can afford to be here.  Not everyone can afford to have the leisure time to cultivate and pursue a love of reading and writing like I have.  

Who were their sponsors? 

My sponsors are: 

-my family, paying for my tuition and all those ridiculous expenses

-the program I'm enrolled in at IC (Writing program)

-my professor for that class, Catherine Taylor

-me, for being involved in class (doing my homework so that I actually learned things)

What literacies were valued? 

Craft was important, that is, grammar and having understandable sentences.  

Exciting things: 

-Creativity, expression, lyrical writing, storytelling. 

 

How was it learned? 

In class................................duh................
  

We read examples of essays, sometimes based on their structure (braided, segmented, etc), or just essays that were good.  Sometimes they were totally out there and made sense only in a strange, aesthetic sort of way.  An Anne Carson essay comes to mind - something about an eclipse.

What resources were available? 
My professor, the  other students in the class, our textbook The Next American Essay (I think?), the Writing Center, our Sakai site.

Who provided these resources? 

These were Ithaca College resources that only were available to me because I (my family) paid a large amount of money to be here.

How difficult was it to access these resources?

Not very hard at all.  Well, getting enough money to pay the tuition is hard, but once you've paid you're in.  They'll tell you about the writing center every class, professors are required to have office hours, and the idea is that everyone is going to help you out because we're one happy family.  Or an exclusive club.