Annotated Bibliography # 6

Fenza, David. “The Centre Has Not Held: Creative Writing & Pluralism.” New Writing: The International Journal For The Practice & Theory Of Creative Writing 8.3 (2011): 206-214. Literary Reference Center. Web. 6 Apr. 2014.

This article focuses on the idea that creative writing becomes much more democratized through the medium of blogging because it opens the door for a plethora of people to be able to enter the writing community for better or for worse. The sphere of creative writing opens to aspiring writers as well as established ones to form a community that was hardly possible even about 30 years ago. It gives access to media in a way that has never before been available, as well as has let writers play with content, form, and overall craft because of the accessibility to the internet. Blogging has produced new styles of writing that are at once innovative and rapidly changing.

Annotated bib #5

Barrs, Myra, and Sarah Horrocks. “Educational blogs and their effects on pupils’ writing.” London Connected Learning Center. n. page. Web. 6 Apr. 2014. <http://www.cfbt.com/en-GB/Research/Research-library/2014/r-blogging-2014&gt;.

This article talks about how students felt more encouraged to write with the educational blogs. Students were found to have an increased interest in writing, more awareness of an audience, produced their own voices, and more.

Annotated Bib

Green, Stephanie. “Writing and Illustrating.” Writing and Illustrating. N.p., 22 Oct. 2013. Web. 05 Apr. 2014. <http://kathytemean.wordpress.com/2013/10/22/using-a-blog-to-develop-your-writing-skills/&gt;

Stephanie Green describes the many ways that blogging can make you a better writer. She claims that even being a mild blogger can help, as opposed to being a full time blogger who dedicates a large portion of their day to blogging. She starts off by stating that the schedule of posting, whether frequent or infrequent helps hone writing skills. She also states that blog help writers who write frequently in their daily lives, for example people who write fictional stories. Blogs can be used to elaborate the fictive backgrounds of those characters. It can also be used to link readers to your books and books can be used to link people to your blogs, therefore increasing your readership and encouraging further reading. She claims that the feature of plug ins help writers to be more competitive with themselves. For example, a blog site tells you how many words you have written. So writers can set and achieve goals such as reaching 3,000 words every two weeks and so forth. Blogs also have plug ins that identify what words you are using frequently, therefore making it clear whether you are being repetitive or not. She concludes by claiming that readers are the most important part of a writers goals and that blogs serve as a platform for any reader to access your content. They are also able to interact with you on a personal level by commenting on posts and contacting you through your blog. This makes writers aware how the public is responding to their work and how they may need to adjust their work to be successful in gaining readers.

How to Make Money Blogging

Blalock, Meghan. “How to Make Money Blogging.”StyleCaster. (2014): n. page. Web. 5 Apr. 2014. <http://www.stylecaster.com/how-to-make-money-blogging/&gt;.

 

This article is extremely helpful, not only because it was posted only a couple months ago, but because it gets down to the nitty gritty of what I want to explore in my paper, while also interviewing and gathering advice and tips from some of my very favorite fashion bloggers. This article also explains the worth of a few fashion blogs, which is actually based on the amount of unique page visitors, which I never knew before. The article also explains some of the other sides of fashion blogging, like how bloggers get all of those clothes, and what’s realistic or not regarding Fashion Week.

How To Make It As a Fashion Blogger

Lewis, Casey. “How to make it as a fashion blogger.” Teen Vogue. n.d. n. page. Web. 5 Apr. 2014.

<http://www.teenvogue.com/careers/fashion-careers/2012-10/fashion-blogger-tips&gt;.

 

This article will be very helpful in writing my paper because it curates a lot of advice from all different types of fashion bloggers. Though it doesn’t go into detail exactly about how to make money as a blogger, it does point out the different in ways in which to better the chances of a blog becoming popular. THose interviewed said that it’s all about the brand, and ultimately the content. In addition, they pointed out that passion is key — just trying to get rich quick, or just make money so you have money to spend on clothes or whatever else won’t end well. It really is a full-time job, but one that requires passion and dedication.

Annotated Bib

Blank, Dan. “4 Ways Blogging Will Make You a Better Writer.” DIY MFA. N.p., 9 Apr. 2013. Web. 05 Apr. 2014. <http://diymfa.com/writing/blogging&gt;

The author of this article is a writing teacher so he comes from a credible background as he asserts his opinion on blogging and how it is beneficial to writers and writing. The first thing he states is that blogging helps force the author to publish their work rather than hesitating to let others read your work. Before blogging, writers and their works would be very distant from potential readers. The process of finding readers was an arduous task. He states that in writers workshops, writers are constantly revising and editing, afraid to publish or finalize their work. Blogging forces a writer to hit publish and make their work available to readers in a final form. He also states that blogging allows people to figure how they can be heard. By writing smaller and more frequent pieces that get more frequent feedback, writers learn what they need to say in order to get attention and feedback. This allows writers to identify and acknowledge readers in a very efficient manner. He also brings up how talking to other writers in workshops, bookstores, conferences, and classes has made him and his students better writers. Blogs take this aspect to a higher level by providing a platform that allows for anyone with the access to the internet the ability to communicate with writers. So the relationship between writers are expanded with the internet and allows for writers to help each other out through communicated their works and building relationships. He concludes by stating that blogging creates the habit of writing and that the frequency of writing that blogging forces one to write is the essential aspect of blogging in terms of assisting writers. The only way people get better at writing is by writing.

Annotated Bib

Cromie, Jenny. “5 Ways Blogging Can Make You a Better Writer.” ProBlogger. N.p., 26 Jan. 2009. Web. 05 Apr. 2014. <http://www.problogger.net/archives/2009/01/26/5-ways-blogging-can-make-you-a-better-writer/&gt;

The author of this writer is actually coming from a background of where he felt that blogging was detrimental to a writer’s skill’s, but soon did a complete 360 on his views once he started participating in blogging and came to the conclusion that blogging actually makes writers better at writing. The first way he states that blogging can make a writer better at writing is through the discovering one’s own voice. He states that in school and at work, most people are forced to write in a technical manner. This tone is forced upon them in the form of duties and responsibilities. On the other hand, writing blogs allows the writer to explore his personal voice in consequence to the lack of restrictions imposed by the medium. He states that the best blogs are the ones that have the best personal observations and assertions. Another way he says that blogging helps writers become better at writing is through their ability to get direct feedback from readers. Sometimes when we write we wonder whether the topic of the blog will be relevant to anybody, with blogging we can get the answer to these questions pretty directly and quickly. He also states that blogging requires you to be disciplined due to its requirement of posting frequently in a creative manner. With reader that are dependent on your content, you feel both inspired and required to write in your blogs. Lastly, he states that blogging makes you more time efficient. It requires you to write more frequently, therefore making your writing skills more keen as practice makes perfect.

Annotated Bibliography # 5

Bickerstaff, Susan. “‘I Am The Rock Goddessof Lyrics’: Writerly Identities Of Adolescents Returning To School.” Journal Of Adolescent & Adult Literacy 56.1 (2012): 56-66. Literary Reference Center. Web. 31 Mar. 2014.

 

This article covers the relationship between kids who dropped out of school and how blogging has in many ways helped developed their writing skills even as they spent time away from school. Now returning to education, many teachers are impressed at the level of skills that have continued to develop despite the lack of a formal education. The accessibility and connection to the blogging universe has kept and enhanced certain skills. However, it was also shown that other mediums such as strict social media i.e. Facebook, Twitter, and other related websites have in fact shown a reverse in writing skills. Spelling and grammar have taken a backseat on social media platforms whereas the blogging universe has shown great improvements as well as attracting a completely different hosts of readers–thus making the writers have to match up and keep to par for their viewership.

Annotated Bib 5

Sugars, Brad. “10 Tips for a Strong Start” Entrepreneur. Entrepreneur Media, Inc. Feb. 10, 2010. Web. Mar. 30, 2014. http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/204982

10 Tips for a Strong Start is useful because it describes what businesses need to succeed. It is important to know basic things about business before focusing on why businesses should use blogs. This article details small things that all businesses should do. It also gives examples; one of the tips is to focus on sales and marketing and it goes into a little detail on what you should do and why you should do it. By using this article, I can further emphasize the importance of blogging. By learning things that businesses were already doing before blogging and the internet, it will be easier to imagine a business with a blog.

Annotated Bibliography

Thompson, Clive. “The Dumbest Generation? No, Twitter Is Making Kids Smarter…”The Globe and Mail. N.p., 13 Sept. 2013. Web. 26 Mar. 2014. <

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/how-new-digital-tools-are-making-kids-smarter/article14321886/?page=all>.

 

This article makes the argument that digital media is making kids think and write more critically than ever before. One of the approaches that they took to prove their claim was very interesting. They believed that the only way to compare kids progress today was to compare their writing works to that of their great grandparents. And they have found that student’s papers have exploded in length and complexity since 1917. In 1917, papers were only 162 words long and were personal narratives, while in 2006, papers increased in size six times and were more complex that used far more references and complex connections. This is a reflection of all the information that kids are able to access in the digital age. In general, people back in the day did little to no writing out of school, now kids are constantly writing. Not only are they writing more, but writing faster and more efficiently.

An argument has also been made in this article, that digital communication serves as a motivation to be literate. For example, if a family member or friend is literate and is participating in the widely available social media, it makes motivates one to participate in the media. The article provided an example of Eric Davey. Davey wrote a 14,000 word essay on a game at the age of 14 years old. The motivation came through a digital medium; games. In comparison, school only required him to write 500 to 1,000 word essays. The digital age provides a sense of purpose to people to write.