The Ethos Of Writing: Experiences And Ideas

Hongli Zhu Writing 39A 17 May 2018 The Ethos of Writing Writing is without doubt one of the most impactful activities that anyone can engage in. This is purposely because it provides an outlet or a channel of sorts that allows one to communicate their true being, the essence of their character, and the part of themselves that is quite difficult to clearly articulate in words. At the same time, it can be said to be a medium through which an individual expresses the most honest and truthful part of themselves. Although the manner in which this is expression is conveyed may differ slightly among writers, it always achieves the same goal: emancipation. In essence, it is a magical process that tells individual stories in uniquely characteristic ways that reflect the persona of the writer. Insofar as the writings of Gloria Anzaldúa and Nick Rowlands are concerned, writing is a process through which authors engage their audience while conveying their thoughts, experiences, ideas, or ethos on a particular issue. Although this process may be constrained at times, a successful writing journey always manages to drive writers towards the same end goal, and this is part of why it eventually becomes relied on as a source of freedom, expression, and purpose by almost all writers. This is accurately represented in the two texts written by both authors, and also in how they choose to approach their rhetorical questions. This difference in approach and diversity in writing ethos greatly affects how both authors communicate through their writing using aspects such as tone and mood, and more importantly how they engage and interact with readers. It is these subtle differences that make both authors greatly effective at conveying their ethos in both inspiring and artistic ways. This allows them to freely be their best and truest forms as authors, which is perhaps the reason behind the exemplary skills of penmanship witnessed from both Gloria Anzaldúa and Nick Rowlands. Insofar as both authors are concerned, establishing strong relationships with readers is a critical part of producing an engaging and interactive essay through which one can adequately convey their ethos. This belief drives both authors to deliberately seek to connect with their readers early on in the texts using brief narratives and anecdotes before they explore the core subject matter of their essay, which is their ethos as far as writing is concerned. In this case, the ethos in question is that of writing, and why both authors feel that they must write in particular ways in order to annunciate, devoid of direct declarations, their ethos with respect to writing. They leverage this approach to develop a narrative that allows readers to resonate with their most intimate thoughts regarding writing, what it represents to them, and how it continues to shape their thoughts and influence their experiences. In the case of Anzaldúa, writing allows her to engage her audience in ways that promote individual and collective pride in her Chicano heritage. Her pride and appreciation of the heritage she shares with many other Chicanos is part of the driving force behind her inclusion and prevalent use of Spanish as a core part of the text. By mixing both Spanish and English, Anzaldúa manages to convey the fact that writing is a means of expression, and one that people should use to not only communicate important issues (such as the maintenance of culture and language) but also to reiterate core values. At the same time, she manages to underscore how her heritage and language have continued to influence both her experiences and writing, a fact that she is particularly proud of. This position is also explored by Rowlands. In his article, he manages to clearly articulate the importance of writing in telling personal and important stories and particularly in a voice that is uniquely one’s own. To achieve this, Rowlands does not take Anzaldúa’s approach and instead chooses to bring readers along as he recounts his long and fairly eventful adventure with writing. This is an extremely powerful approach because it manages to not only underscore his ethos with regards to writing but also reiterates why having a unique and personal approach towards writing is vital to creating pieces that readers find engaging and thought-provoking. Over time, he manages to overcome his writer’s block by learning that all one needs to do is to write. Through unencumbered and free-flowing writing, regardless of all the mistakes, typos, and randomness of thought, Rowlands is able to learn and understand a core part of himself and his relationship with writing. It not only enables him to overcome the maze of confusion that had stifled his writing, but also allows him to re-find his writing voice. Insofar as both authors are concerned, their approaches are distinctively their own because they understand the importance of having their personal voice in every narrative. Anzaldúa chooses to mix S...