Portfolio

What is rhetoric?

This question was posed to me during Rhetorical Theory, the first graduate-level course I took in the Professional and Technical Writing program. At first, my answer was simple: rhetoric is using words persuasively. As the course went on, however, we were introduced to a variety of different terms, rhetoricians, and situations that twisted my original definition. I even wrote a blog post at the end of my first semester titled Everything Is Rhetoric (I think.)

I’ll admit that I continued through most of the program with that question – and numerous other questions – in the back of my mind. At the recommendation of my advisor, Dr. Kuralt, I took courses based on my interests. I couldn’t help but worry about the path I was on. How would I be able to connect the ideas in my Rhetorical Theory course with my independent study in Game Design?

As I began working on this portfolio, I began noticing trends between certain projects. Natural categories took shape as I started reflecting on my work not only in this program, but during this specific time in my life.

Interactivity and Game Design

During my time in the program I have had the opportunity to learn and work with a variety of different programs. One of those programs is Twine, an interactive narrative tool. I knew that Mistaken Identity, my first venture into the world of Twine, was a project I needed to include in my portfolio. The project shows how I took advantage of Twine’s capabilities and experimented with images, video, and sound.

The other two projects in this category, Firebringer and Akua, The Girl Who Dreams, were both created in independent study courses. Firebringer is the narrative outline for a Twine game that allows readers to make their own choices.

The second game-related project is a proposal detailing the different parts of a narrative-based game. It explains how the game will function, how the user will interact with the different parts of the game, and my proposed story and aesthetics.

I was surprised to find, despite the creativity needed for these projects, that there was a certain level of technical ability that was also needed. I enjoyed learning how to use creative narrative concepts to impact an audience’s thoughts and feelings, which is a skill I carried into other parts of the program.

Writing for the Web

My next category, Writing for the Web, was a recurring theme for me in many of my courses. It was even the name I chose for an imagined book in a Publishing course and the name of a practice class I developed in Instructional Design.

The projects in this category show my ability to take different types of information and translate them to an online audience. The first project, Public Intellectuals, is a website I created with a classmate in my Rhetorical Theory course. The website explains the concept of public intellectuals through easy-to-read text, images, and video. We were able to take complicated concepts and terms and simplify them for anyone to understand.

Creating content that was appropriate for our imagined audience was important in Public Intellectuals, and in my second project, the freelance website. I created a profile for my audience, including their likes, dislikes, wants, and needs. This information, combined with the information I compiled about my brand, was used to create the website.

Both projects show my versatility in creating websites for a proposed audience, and my experience in working with digital forms of publishing.

Technical Writing

I worked full-time as a technical writer during my time in the program and was regularly able to apply the knowledge I learned in my courses to everyday life. I chose three different examples of technical writing to use for my portfolio. The first was a guide written for Scrapy, an online web scraping tool. This guide was written to introduce a technical program, and technical concepts, to a non-technical audience. I have experience in web development, so writing this guide allowed me to bring my varied interests into one document.

Twine makes another appearance in this category in the form of a help website. The content of this website was created during a Software Documentation course. My interest in online documentation, including how to write and organize information, is at the forefront in this project. At work I am developing a plan to move our documentation to a primarily online format, and this project gave me a good starting point.

The last project in this section is my Evernote Tutorial. I continued the trend of learning more about different programs by writing a tutorial on how to create a recipe book using the Evernote software. Despite having to write a tutorial for an audience that may not be familiar with Evernote, I used the document to explain complex tools and concepts in a simple way. The document is versatile and can be viewed in several ways: on printed paper, on a screen, or even on a website.

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In my Everything is Rhetoric blog post, I said that rhetoric “is a little bit of everything.” At the time, it still sounded like an unanswered question. Two years later, I think I can finally answer that question.

For me, rhetoric is using the written word to bring people and concepts together. It helps you create a website that can explain a difficult concept to a new student or to an experienced professor. It gives you the courage to find words to explain a story you’ve never put on paper. It pushes you forward into cultures and worlds outside your own.

But my favorite part about rhetoric? It helps you write words that inspire. Each of the projects in my portfolio were created because I was inspired by a person, a thought, a story, or a feeling. I hope that my portfolio will persuade you to go forward and work on your own projects. My plan is to continue to use my words to inspire others, and I hope you do the same.