Tuesday, March 30, 2010

Essay Two

Purpose

The purposes of essay two are multifold.  First, it will increase your knowledge of common poetic techniques and terms.  Second, it will engage you in the act of writing poetry.  Third, it will help you learn how to read closely.  Fourth, it will engross you in critical analysis.  Fifth, it will engage you in the act of writing literary criticism.

Process

You will create examples of numerous poetic techniques.  Then, you will use some of those techniques to create a poem, after we discuss the basic elements of poetry.  You will exchange poems with another member of the class and will read closely his/her poem.  We will discuss three critical approaches and analyze three poems, applying a specific approach to each poem.  Finally, you will write a critical essay, using a combination of two approaches (reader-response and New Criticism or reader-response and deconstruction) to analyze your partner's poem.

First stage

This is a lengthy mimetic exercise.  First, I will give you a comprehensive list of common poetic techniques and terms.  Second, you and your partner will read each item in the list and will create examples when necessary.  Because the list is extensive, the exercise will continue for several meetings.  You and your partner may need to complete the list outside of class, ensuring its correctness before I evaluate it.  The following is a poetic technique you will encounter.
     Assonance.  Assonance is the repetition of identical or similar
     vowels--especially in stressed syllables--in sequential words.
     Ex.: The quiet brides, Silence and Time, sliced through their
     nights with delight.
     Ex.:

Second stage

During this phase we will discuss the basic elements of poetry: diction (figurative language and sonic texture), imagery, rhythm, and form.  An exercise will correlate the discussion.  Another exercise will count as extra credit.  Next, you will write a poem that has at least two tropes (hyperbole, irony, metaphor, metonomy, personification, pun, simile, synecdoche or understatement), two instances of sonic texture (alliteration, assonance, consonance or rhyme), one image, a prevalent metrical pattern, and a recognizable form (blank verse, couplet, sonnet, stanza, tercet, or villanelle).  Please bring two copies of your poem the day it is due.  I will not expect perfection.  In fact, I want you to write a poem without outside influences--that is, before we discuss the works of three prestigious poets.

Third stage

You will exchange poems with another member of the class and will read closely his/her poem, using a worksheet as a guide.  We will discuss three critical approaches (reader-response criticism, New Criticism, and deconstruction) and three poems ("Carmel Point," "My Papa's Waltz" and "For the Union Dead"), applying a specific approach to each poem.  Meanwhile, you will need to write a critical essay, using a combination of two approaches (reader-response and New Criticism or reader-response and deconstruction) to analyze your partner's poem.  You must provide reasons and backing for every claim--citing phrases, lines or clauses and explicating them.

Particulars

Near the end of the semester, on the day of your final exam, you will submit in a portfolio your first draft with my critique and the final draft of the essay.

Friday, March 26, 2010

What Makes for a Good Literary Critic

In this essay I propose that literary critics should not adhere solely to one approach.

There is no single correct method of literary criticism, no single critical approach to literary works that will uncover all the significant truths about them.  Works of literature have been written for a very long period of human history--at different times, in different places, about different issues, and in different moods.  Though the philosophical inquiry into the nature of literature can isolate the differentiable qualities of the art, such generalizations are not as important to literary critics.  Furthermore, the scrutiny of literary theories, although it contributes to greater comprehension of texts, does not lead necessarily to greater appreciation of literature.  For example, it is absurd to suggest that no Greek had appreciated Sophocles before Aristotle wrote the Poetics.  Appreciation can be independent of a critical theory, although the development and application of a critical theory can help to clarify, focus and increase appreciation.

Art is greater than its interpreters, for all criticism is incomplete, limited, oblique.  I am not suggesting that there are no standards of value, that we must resort to personal taste.  I am suggesting, however, that no single critical approach can determine what a text is and whether or not the text is good.  It may be possible to establish some generalizations, and those generalizations may reveal the nature and quality of a work, increasing the comprehension and appreciation of the text, but those generalizations by definition are reductive and indefinite.  A single critical approach can never be an adequate and complete description of a work of art.

It is easy to understand the reasons that is such.  A poem, for example, is a complex of meaning that often has an immediate and simple impact on a reader, and it is very difficult, if not impossible, to describe that complex and simultaneously to account for its impact.  Furthermore, a poem often has variable impacts on readers.  Finally, an analytic discussion, although useful, may not increase an appreciation of a poem.  Something always is excluded in the discussion.  Literary criticism is an art, not a science, and critics who reduce their approaches to the scientific method stifle literature's vitality.  The supposed truth that any critic can know and communicate is part of a larger truth she can only suggest.

Moreover, literary criticism is not an end in itself, but a means to greater comprehension and appreciation of literary works.  A critic always must test her success in her achievements of those ends.  The tendency of influential critics is to establish or adopt an approach and to engage that method for the purposes of comprehension and appreciation.  Thus, the study of literary criticism is the study of techniques of illumination.  If it becomes the study of special vocabulary or procedures, then it is a waste of time.  A student must experience a work of art, and criticism must assist the student in that experience.

Criticism is the formal discourse of students--students of life.  Criticism acknowledges its interdependence with the creative arts, and those arts are criticisms of life.  Artists arrange and arrest their subjects in forms that are separate from but part of life that confronts them.  Literature is life with form and meaning, life framed and identified.  Thus, literary criticism is the study of form and content with an underlying effort to establish appreciation.

The wrong approaches to literature are numerous and testify to occasional needs, special interests, or intellectual pride--all of which only serve their respective followers.  To avoid the discontinuity of knowledge, some critics advance a particular approach and make it predominant.  When followers blindly accept the method, they think it is the only one possible, and when the method proves to be weak or unsound, those followers often continue to adhere to it simply for the sake of knowledge.

Awareness of the diversity of literary texts and critical approaches is essential.  Briefly, a good critic is a good listener.  To comprehend and appreciate literature, a critic must be responsive to the inherent characteristics of each text and approach.  Critics who concern themselves with a single issue, predetermining the meaning of a text, do not listen to what the text actually says.  A feminist critic, for example, often imposes her own meaning on a text, rather than discovering a different meaning.  A single critical approach must not become a routine because there are valuable points of view that are outside the particular approach.  In other words, a more complete comprehension and appreciation of a text comes only to those critics who blend the insights yielded by several or, better, many critical approaches. 

Thursday, March 25, 2010

How Meaning Is Made

Summary: literature and criticism are conversations.  To enter a thread, you must ensure your works, literary and/or critical, are complete, valid and persuasive.
 
I will begin this post with the conclusion that literature is a conversation--a perpetual, complex and dynamic discussion.  In "What Is Literature?" I state that a literary work is a product of both the writer and its readers.  If we consider a literary work as simply a product of its readers, we ignore the fact that the writer was making sense of (making meaning of) some aspect of the universe.  Just as readers make meaning of texts in different ways, writers make meaning of their surroundings in different ways.  For example, whereas Ben Johnson prefers "Still To Be Neat" (1609), Robert Herrick takes "Delight in Disorder" (1648).  A swine is not simply a pig according to Richard Eberhart ("The Groundhog"), Sylvia Plath ("Sow"), Thom Gunn ("Moly"), Paul Muldoon ("Hedgehog"), Galway Kinnell ("Saint Francis and the Sow"), Charles Thomlinson ("On a Pig's Head"), and William Cowper ("The Love of the World Reproved: or, Hypocrisy Detected").  And some critics have claimed that William Carlos Williams"This Is Just to Say" (1934) is a counterargument to William Wordsworth's "The world is too much with us" (1807).  Furthermore, Kenneth Koch ("Variations on a Theme by William Carlos Williams"), Denise Levertov ("O Taste and See"), and Helen Chasin ("The Word Plum") wrote poems in response to Williams' poem. 

More examples will support the point that writers read and respond to texts that are not their own.  They engage in conversations with other writers, other works.  Both creative people and critical people analyze and evaluate what others have done.  With respect to writers, doing such allows them to frame old topics in new ways or to shift the conversation to new topics. 

If we accept the fact that writers converse with each other, then it is easy to accept that literary critics converse with other literary critics, and they have been doing such for some time.  You may be wondering both why you need to enter the discussion and how you can enter it.

You need to enter the discussion because literary criticism is applicative to every aspect of our lives.  Literature broadens our experiences by deepening our understanding of people, situations and problems, allowing us, as members of a society, to reflect on the many issues that arise in our lives.  Literary criticism allows us to analyze and evaluate those experiences.  If everything is an argument (refer to "Communication: The Basis of Life"), then literary criticism is applicative to every person, situation and problem.

Marketers and advertisers, for example, use psychological criticism to determine the ways to package or present products that consumers will interpret positively.  Their goal is to evoke a positive response from potential consumers so that they (the consumers) will purchase their products.  Lawyers use historical criticism to construct cases against and for people; they analyze and interpret relevant cases from the past and apply the court rulings to their cases.  The fashion industry uses feminist criticism.  As women have been gaining equivalence, fashion designers have been altering styles to reflect such.  Women did not wear jeans until the 1950's.  In the '60's, '70's and '80's, women's jeans looked masculine.  Now, low-ride jeans accentuate the female figure--that is, fit women's hips.  With respect to politics, let us imagine you are working for the National Republican Committee, and you want to undermine President Obama's State of the Union address.  You will deconstruct it to "expose the gaps, the incoherencies, the contradictions" to turn the speech against the Democrats.1  If you are a musician and want to study the syncopation (counter rhythm) in a song by Miles Davis, you will use New Criticism to understand how such oppositions contribute to the harmonious balance of the work.  Every day you have been using reader-response criticism.  Let us imagine you are at an Abercrombie and Fitch, and after reading a price tag, you state, "What?  One hundred dollars for this, yeah, right!"  That is an example of reader-response criticism.

Before you interpose your thoughts and feelings into the long literary conversation, you need to be aware of several restrictions.  First, context--internal and external--is everything.  There always is tension among intention (what the writer wants to say), execution (how he/she says it), and interpretation (the way in which the reader interprets it).  You need to realize, when you approach a work, such tension exists.  Furthermore, the context in which the work was written probably is different from the context in which you are approaching it.  As Steven Lynn states, "The meaning of a thing is shaped by the context in which we place it.  When we think about how to read a photograph, a story, a poem, or a life, we cannot avoid this interplay of texts and contexts."2  A crude example is the word gay in Wordsworth's "I wandered lonely as a cloud" (1807): "A poet could not be gay, / In such jocund company."3  Gay, in the nineteenth century, meant "cheerful, merry."  In the latter half of the twentieth century, its sense changed to "homosexual," and now gay in its standard use connotes "a homosexual male."  Without placing Wordsworth's poem in its proper context and without knowing the etymology of gay, an inexperienced critic could misinterpret the poem.  Swaying daffodils and glittering waves, not men, make the speaker happy, not homosexual.

Because each of us brings our own knowledge and point of view to a text, each of us will interpret a text differently.  But certainly some interpretations are incorrect.  According to Steven Lynn, "for a particular audience, in a particular context, supported by particular evidence, a reading might be considered to be wrong.  But the same argument, in another context, might be right."4  He is not suggesting that literary criticism is relativistic; rather, a critical interpretation of a text that is complete and valid is correct, although it may be oppositional to others.  If it is oppositional to others, it needs to be persuasive:
     From a given perspective, some readings of a text are more
     persuasive than others.  Some seem more right, and some seem
     clearly more wrong.  If we understand our assumptions, and
     we're conscious of the contexts we apply, we can struggle toward
     an agreement on the correctness of a particular claim.  We might
     not get to an agreement always (or ever), but we can at least
     (from this viewpoint) agree that such agreement is possible, and
     worth working toward.5
Thus, the second restriction is you must follow Toulmin's scheme for argumentation when practicing literary criticism.  By basing your interpretation on a warrant (an assumption) for which you provide backing, your interpretation will be more persuasive than one that is purely emotional or another that strictly adheres to a single critical approach.  Toulmin's scheme forces a literary critic to consider alternative viewpoints, and if you realize there is more than one way to critically approach a text, then you may be able to incorporate several critical strategies to make your interpretation more meaningful.
_______________________________________________________
     1Steven Lynn, Literature: Reading and Writing with Critical Strategies (New York: Pearson Longman, 2004) 19.
     2Ibidem, 8.
     3William Wordsworth, "I wandered lonely as a cloud" The Norton Anthology of English Literature Vol. 2, 6th ed.  Ed. M. H. Abrams (New York: Norton, 1993) 186-187.
     4Steven Lynn, 9.
     5Ibidem, 9-10.   

Tuesday, March 23, 2010

What Is Literature?

Literary critics concern themselves with many questions about literature.  They may ask the philosophical question concerning the nature of literature, and logically that question needs to precede all others, for how are they able to discuss literature unless they initially know about what they are arguing?  However, critics often have asked other questions about literature before they have determined its nature. 

A critic may ask what literature does, which is to define it functionally.  A critic may ask normative questions to determine the characteristics of good and bad literature.  A critic may employ analytical techniques to arrive at value judgments.  A critic may explore the psychological aspect of creativity.  A critic also may not ask any questions, simply seeking to increase a reader's appreciation of a literary work using a variety of methods.  Thus, a critic's activity may be ontological, functional, normative, descriptive, psychological and/or appreciative, and each activity is useful. 

The philosophical inquiry into the nature of literature--its distinguishable features, its essential characteristics--has been occurring in the West for well over two thousand years.  Each generation seems to answer the question in its own way, for literature is a complex phenomenon with each generation emphasizing different aspects of it.  However, there are familial resemblances among the answers, and it is not difficult to classify them.  Furthermore, some answers, regardless of their connections to a particular literature in a particular time, have been especially useful to later critics who have accepted them, reinterpreted them, or expanded them.  Perhaps the most influential of all critical discussions on the nature and value of literature has been Aristotle's Poetics, written in the fourth century before the common era.  Although it is fragmentary, Poetics is fundamental to any discussion of the question.  Aristotle's definition of literature emphasizes its unique qualities, delineates its function, and assesses its value in terms of that function. 

Possibly due to its fragmentary state, Poetics does not offer an absolute definition of literature.  The question of the nature of literature remains a perennial concern of literary critics.  What differentiates literature from other uses of language?  Early attempts to define literature focused on the features common to all members of the category; possession of those features determined whether a text was or was not literature.  Such attempts failed, however, because no aspect of form or content is common to all literary texts and only to them.  The definition of literature became expansive: the body of works in a specific language, country or age--twentieth-century literature, for example--the body of writings on a particular subject--scientific literature, for example--such printed matter as leaflets or circulars--campaign literature, for example--and the aggregate of musical compositions--Jay-Z's rap, for example.  Attempts to determine a specifically literary form or content, although seemingly plausible, resulted in such a broad definition of literature that it meant anything in writing. 

To solve the problem, we must realize that the basis of categorization is as often a matter of common properties as of common purposes.  For example, consider the following categories: food, clothing and shelter.  A food may not have anything structurally in common with another food, yet they have the same purpose.  Literature is similar in that it is a functional category.  All members have a common purpose.  The ordinary use of language is relative to its immediate context, and that context governs the purpose of the communicative act--to order someone to do something, for example.  One rarely recalls a communicative act in a specific context unless it is to study the act and/or context in retrospect.  The characteristic use of literary texts, however, includes recurrent attention without necessary regard to the contexts of their origins. 

To receive recurrent attention, a literary work must have excellent form or expression and communicate ideas of permanent or universal interest.  But excellence and permanence are relativistic, so we need to consider literature from another point of view.  According to Steven Lynn: 
     Literariness is not in fact a quality strictly within texts but is
     rather, to some degree, the product of a reader's attention.  We
     are used to calling some things literature, and texts that are
     formatted in certain ways on the page are expected to be
     literature--until they prove otherwise.  But "Literature" clearly
     can occur (like "Art") whenever a reader looks at a work as if it
     is Literature (or Art)--that is, with a certain kind of attentiveness,
     in other words.  If "Literature" is a quality in the reader as much
     as it is in the text, then perhaps the right question to ask is not
     "What is literature?" but rather "What kind of attention do
     people bring to literature?"  What do people do when they say
     "this is literature"?  Why do they want to do that?  What, in other
     words, have people said about what they have termed to be
     "literature"?*
A text is a product of the writer as much as a product of its reader.  If a text is literary, it has enduring value to multiple readers, and if the literary work has enduring value, it is complex.  Complexity, in such a sense, does not denote difficulty in comprehension; rather, it denotes that the work means different things to different people.  A literary work has a multiplicity of meanings.  The literary techniques a writer employs when he/she communicates his/her ideas and/or experiences are what make a literary work complex.  Those literary techniques allow multiple interpretations, and readers use different critical approaches to arrive at different interpretations.

It is important to mention that there have been critics who have judged the content of literary works in advance.  Such has been the way of Marxists, Freudians, New Critics (those who have searched for and have found ambiguity in every text), and political critics (those who have concerned themselves with gender, race and class).  For critics with such rigid approaches, the considerable diversity of literature has been an insurmountable problem.  Taking into account such diversity, to decide in advance the emphasis of every text is reductive and distortive.  It is not necessary to refute Marxism or psychoanalysis to reach such a conclusion; one only needs to remember that all literary texts are different.

Setting aside such restrictive approaches, one will find an enormous variety of form and content.  Literature is a collection of different texts written by different people with different temperaments and viewpoints.  Literary texts were written at different times, in different places, about different issues, and in different moods.  People write and  read for many fundamentally dissimilar reasons, reflecting the diversity of life.  It is ironic that diversity is a buzzword of political criticism when that criticism ignores the diversity of literature.

If we take from literature only the attitudes we bring to it, then why do we read literature?  Literature expands our lives via the presentation of different people, situations and problems, broadening and deepening our experiences.  The variations were created by writers to give readers an essence of life and an interpretation of it, taking us beyond anything that everyday life offers.

Few writers have the ability of Charles Dickens to create a world full of unique characters, but the remarkable thing is that although we had never met Scrooge before reading A Christmas Carol, we recognize the character instantly.  With all his unforgettable individuality, Scrooge is an essence of versions in the real world.  We never meet someone exactly like him, though we meet many that are similar, and we understand such individuals better because Dickens was able to discern certain human traits and to relate them clearly.  After we have experienced Scrooge, we are more easily able to recognize and understand similar versions in the real world. 

Writers who are read and reread by future generations capture the essentialness of human situations to an extent that profound changes in human life cannot obscure their works' meanings.  It is not accidental that quotations from Shakespeare's plays have become a part of everyday life.  If someone seems paralyzed by indecision, we say that he is "thinking too precisely on the event."  We say such because Shakespeare comments on central issues in human life with an accuracy that allows us to identify and understand them.  It is the precision of his thought and the expression of everyday experiences that keep Shakespeare's language influential hundreds of years after his death.  When we are aware of the way adherence to one critical approach simplifies and distorts things, we are able to understand Hamlet's dilemma.

More examples will emphasize, not counter, the primary point that literature is various and broadens our experiences by deepening our understanding of people, situations and problems, helping us to grasp their essential meanings.  Literature is a forum in which members of a society reflect on the many issues that arise in their lives.  Inevitably, the thoughts of those who offer the most insight into the most enduring issues receive the most attention.  The collective judgment as to what is important is the only limit on the breadth of the forum, which means that the diversity of literature--of theme, content and viewpoint--is fundamental to the continual function of the forum. 

A single critical approach to literature is too restrictive to deal with the diversity of literature.  To put the matter simply, when someone reduces literature to a single issue, her reasons for doing such and her results will have nothing to do with literature.  Because she had decided in advance the content of a particular text, she did not receive anything from it.  What she took away from the text was no more than what she had brought to it.  Such a critic gains no insight from the writer whose work has withstood the test of time, since she evaluated the text against her obsession. 

Furthermore, a single-issue critic rarely enjoys literature.  The word aesthetic is not in her vocabulary.  To the political critic, aesthetic enjoyment is for irresponsible people with no social conscience.  But aesthetic pleasure does not involve necessarily a self-absorbed withdrawal from serious matters.  It is an example of the way human nature supports activities that are beneficial.  We need to eat to survive, and nature ensures survival by making food enjoyable.  We need clothing and shelter for protection, and we find clothes and houses attractive.  We also need to exercise our imaginations, our capacities to think and feel.  Hence, we enjoy literature. 

If we did not enjoy exercising our imaginations, we would deteriorate intellectually, just as we would starve if we did not eat.  The increase in the pleasure we feel from any activity is not necessarily separate from the benefit the activity provides.  Therefore, we have gourmet food, well-designed clothes, and elegant homes.  In the same way, literary works that are aesthetically appealing intensify our pleasure by exercising our imaginations.  That is one reason such texts survive generation after generation.
_______________________________________________________
     *Steven Lynn, Literature: Reading and Writing with Critical Strategies (New York: Pearson Longman, 2004) 30-31. 

Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Essay One

Purpose 

The purposes of essay one are multifold.  First, it will engage you in the act of writing.  Writing is a process, a series of various activities that lead to a complete product.  You will generate, organize, create, compose, revise, edit and title--seven stages in the process of writing.  Second, the essay will involve you in the act of writing persuasively, argumentatively.  Third, it will situate you in this class.  In other words, the essay will help us (you and me) evaluate your abilities to think and to communicate creatively, clearly and concisely.  Fourth, it will allow you to define literature in your own terms. 

Content 

First, I want you to find a nonliterary thing, to describe it, and to delineate the reasons it is not an example of literature.  Second, find an example of a literary work, describe it, and delineate the reasons it is such.  Third, you must define literature in your own terms.  You may include other pertinent information, but the essay must not exceed 100,000 words or 400 pages.  You also may organize your information in a different way.  Format your essay in accordance with the conventions established by the Modern Language Association (MLA). 

Process 

I have determined your purpose for writing, which is to persuade; I have defined your audience, which is the class.  I also have provided you a topic, which is to define literature.  The next stage is to generate information.  We have discussed reading, brainstorming, journal writing, listing, and mapping--activities you may want to do rather than freewriting and focused freewriting.  However, for this essay you will freely write for ten minutes, generating as much information on the topic as you can.  Again:
     The idea is simply to write for ten minutes (later on, perhaps
     fifteen or twenty).  Don't stop for anything.  Go quickly without
     rushing.  Never stop to look back, to cross something out, to
     wonder how to spell something, to wonder what word or thought
     to use, or to think about what you are doing.  If you can't think of
     a word or a spelling, just use a squiggle or else write, "I can't
     think of it."  Just put down something.  The easiest thing is just to
     put down whatever is in your mind.  If you get stuck [sic] it's fine
     to write [sic] "I can't think what to say, [sic] I can't think what to
     say [sic]" as many times as you want; or repeat the last word you
     wrote over and over again; or anything else.  The only
     requirement is that you never stop.*

Focused freewriting provides the benefits of freewriting but with regard to specific information.  First, read what you wrote and mark any words, phrases or sentences that seem important or useful.  Second, freely write for ten more minutes--focusing on the words, phrases or sentences that you marked.  To generate more specific information, you will need to repeat the technique. 

Particulars 

You will be comparing and contrasting two things.  The outcome of your analyses will be your definition of literature.  You must use all three rhetorical appeals (logos, pathos and ethos), and you must follow Toulmin's scheme for argumentation.  You may include photographs, photocopies or excerpts of both things.  Bring two copies of your essay to class on the day it is due. 

Near the end of the semester, on the day of your final exam, you will submit in a portfolio your freewrite, focused freewrite, outline, first draft, and final draft.
_______________________________________________________
     *Peter Elbow, Writing without Teachers, 2nd ed.  (New York: Oxford UP, 1998) 1.

Tuesday, March 9, 2010

Cover Letters

Introduction 

A cover letter will accompany your resume or CV (curriculum vitae).  Although the two documents will overlap somewhat, they will differ in some ways.  A resume focuses on a particular position.  A cover letter focuses on the needs of a particular organization.  Whereas a resume is a summary of your qualifications, a cover letter reveals the ways your qualifications will help the organization meet its needs and the ways you differ from other applicants.  It also exhibits your knowledge of the organization.  A resume contains short, parallel phrases and sentential fragments, but a cover letter has complete sentences and well developed paragraphs. 

Content and Organization 

In your letter you will need to focus on:
  • the primary requirements of the job for which you are applying,
  • information that separates you from other applicants,
  • information that reveals your knowledge of the organization,
  • and qualities that the employer is likely to value--the ability to write and speak effectively, to solve problems, to work collaboratively, for examples.
Two different situations require two different types of cover letters.  Write a letter of solicitation when you know that a company is hiring.  Write a prospective letter when a position may not be what you want or you want to work for an organization that is not hiring.  In some cases a prospective letter may arrive at a company that has decided to hire but has not announced the position.  In other cases companies create positions for strong candidates on the market.  Even in a hiring freeze, a company may create a position for a particular individual. 

In both types of letters, you must:
  1. address the letter to a specific person,
  2. indicate the specific position for which you are applying,
  3. specify your qualifications,
  4. discuss what separates you from other applicants,
  5. exhibit knowledge of the company and the position,
  6. refer to your resume or CV,
  7. and ask for an interview.
Letters of Solicitation 

To organize a letter of solicitation, in your first paragraph, state that you are applying for the job, phrasing the title as your source phrased it.  Reveal where you learned about the job, and include the referential number in the advertisement.  Briefly state that you meet the qualifications listed in the advertisement: a college degree, professional certification, job experience, et cetera.  Summarize you other qualifications in the order in which you will address them in the body of the letter. 

In the body of the letter, fully explain your qualifications.  Specify what you have done, and relate your achievements to the work you will do in the new job.  Explain your other qualifications, even though the advertisement may not ask for them.  If the advertisement asks for numerous qualifications, choose the most important three or four.  Specify what separates you from other applicants who will reply to the advertisement.  Also, you will want to reveal your knowledge of the organization. 

In the final paragraph, request an interview, stating when you will be available for the interview and when you will be able to begin to work for the company.  End with a positive outlook. 

Prospective Letters 

To organize a prospective letter, in the first paragraph, catch the reader's interest.  Then, create a bridge between the attention-getter and your qualifications.  Focus on what you know and can do.  Because the employer is not planning to hire anybody, he/she will not be impressed with the fact you will graduate.  Summarize your qualifications briefly in the same order in which you will discuss them.  The summary (a sentence or a paragraph) will serve as an organizational device for the body of your letter. 

Fully explain your strengths.  Relate what you have done in the past to what you will do for the company.  Demonstrate your knowledge of the company, and identify the specific niche you want to fill. 

In the final paragraph, request an interview, and state when you will be available for an interview.  Do not state when you will be able to begin to work for the company.  End with a positive attitude.

Wednesday, March 3, 2010

Resumes and CV's

Introduction 

A resume and a CV (curriculum vitae) are persuasive summaries of your qualifications for employment.  When you have a job, a current resume or CV makes it easier for you to apply for a better job.  If you are on the job market, having a resume or CV makes you seem organized and prepared.  If you are several years from a professional job hunt, preparing a resume or CV now will help you become more conscious of what you will need to do to make yourself an attractive candidate. 

Preparation 

Your informal preparation for a job hunt needs to begin when you arrive at campus.  Join extracurricular organizations on campus and in the community to increase your knowledge and to create a network for information about jobs.  You may want to find a job that will give you experience in a field that interests you.  Consider which courses you enjoy and the reasons you like them. 

Your formal preparation for a job hunt needs to begin a full year before you start to interview for positions.  Visit a placement office or career center to discover which services it provides.  Ask relatives or friends who are on the job market about their experiences with respect to the market and their interviews.  You may want to apply for an internship or a cooperative job that will provide relative experience before you begin to interview for professional positions. 

You will want to register with a placement office or career center about a year before your graduation.  If you will graduate in the spring, create your resume and plan your interview strategy early in the fall.  Initial campus/community interviews occur from October to February for graduations in May or June.  In January or February, write to any business or organization for which you want to work that did not conduct interviews on campus or in the community.  From February to April, you hopefully will go to another interview.  Your goal is to have an offer before you receive a degree. 

Which Job? 

A self-assessment is the first step in the creation of a persuasive resume or CV.*  Personality and aptitude tests may reveal your strengths, but they will not specify which job is ideal for you.  To determine the latter, you need to answer the following questions.
  • Which achievements gave you the most satisfaction, and why did you enjoy them?
  • Do you enjoy firm deadlines or a flexible schedule?  Do you prefer to work alone or with other people?  Do you like specific instructions and standards for evaluation, or do you enjoy freedom and uncertainty?  Are you willing to work for several years before a promotion?  How much challenge do you want?
  • Are you willing to bring work home, to work from home, or to travel?  How important is money and prestige to you?  Do you want to spend time with family and friends?
  • Where do you want to live?  What features with respect to geography, weather, culture, et cetera are ideal for you?
  • Is it important to you that your work achieve certain purposes or values, or do you view work as simply a way to make money?  Are an organization's cultural and ethical standards important to you?
After you realize what is important to you, analyze the job market to see where you may find what you want.  Each candidate needs to use the Internet as a part of his/her search for a job. 

Audience 

Divisions of human resource use resumes to decide which candidates to interview; thus, you will need to omit anything that may create a negative impression.  Many companies scan resumes into an electronic system that tracks job applicants.  An employee will review only resumes that match key words, and he/she will do such for 3 to 30 seconds before he/she decides to keep it or to discard it.  Neatness and accuracy are essential.  Do not use acronyms, and fully explain Greek-letter societies, job titles, and unfamiliar organizations.

There are two types of resumes: chronological and skills.  A chronological resume summarizes what you have done, beginning with the most recent events and moving backward in reverse chronology.  It emphasizes degrees, job titles, and dates.  Use a chronological resume when (1) your education and experience are a logical preparation for the position for which you are applying and (2) you have impressive titles, offices or honors. 

A skills resume emphasizes the skills you have gained and applied, rather than the jobs in which or the dates when you used them.  Use a skills resume when (1) your education and experience are not the usual routes to the position for which you are applying; (2) you are changing fields; and (3) you want to combine your experience from various jobs, activities, volunteer work, and courses to show the extent of such experience in particular areas relevant to the job. 

Your audience will ask four questions with respect to your resume or CV.  Answering the following questions in a persuasive way will increase your chances of employment.  The answers are the basic elements of any resume or CV.
  1. What do you want to do?  The answer will be your goal (objective), and you will need to base your resume on your goal so prospective employers can realize immediately to which position you are applying.
  2. What are your qualifications?  Your answer is all of the skills and credentials that qualify you for the job.  You can divide your skills and credentials into functional sections or use bullets to highlight key points.  If you are able to create this section properly, you will convince prospective employers that the rest of your resume is worth reading, leading them to the next question.
  3. Where have you worked?  The reader needs to know for whom you worked, where (city and state), and what you did.  Your job descriptions need to include active verbs, key words, and functional skills that are relevant to the job you are seeking.
  4. How well have you performed?  Listing accomplishments and projects shows via example that you contributed to previous employers' bottom lines.  The best accomplishments are those that demonstrate quantifiable results or your willingness to do more than others.  Did you propose an idea that saved the company money?  Were you promoted because of your collaborative skills?  Were you selected for a project because of your positive attitude?  Whenever possible, describe the way(s) you improved previous employers' bottom lines--doubled sales, cut costs, reduced errors, streamlined processing, or improved efficiency, for examples.
Guidelines 

There is no universal format; there are only guidelines.  In fact, if your skills are in demand, you can violate the following guidelines and still receive a good job.  However, when you are competing against numerous applicants, the following guidelines will help you to look as good on paper as you are in person. 

Length: a one-page resume or CV is sufficient, but you must fill the page with pertinent information.  Anything less suggests you do not have much to say about yourself.  The average resume is now two pages.  If you use more than one page, the second page must have at least 10 to 12 lines.  Place your full name and "Page 2" at the top of the page. 

Diction: without sacrificing content, be as concise as possible, using phrases and sentential fragments.  Complete sentences are acceptable if they are the briefest way to present information.  To save space and to avoid an arrogant tone, never use I in a resume.  Me and my are acceptable if they are necessary for comprehension and if they reduce wordiness.  Verbs or gerunds (the -ing form of verbs) create a more dynamic image than do nouns, so use them when people, not computers, will read your resume or CV. 

Details 

Details provide evidence to support your claims, to persuade the reader, and to separate you from other applicants.  They also describe the aspects of a job--revealing how many people you trained or supervised, how much money you budgeted or raised, et cetera.  Omit details that add nothing to a title, are less impressive than the title itself, or suggest a faulty sense of priorities--for example, listing minor offices in an organization that gives everyone something to do.  Either use strong details or list the office or job title without any details. 

Emphasis 

Emphasize the things you have done that (a) are most relevant to the position for which you are applying, (b) reveal your superiority to other applicants, and (c) are recent.  Show your qualifications by providing details on relevant course projects, activities, and jobs in which you have done similar work.  Be brief about low-level jobs that simply exhibit dependability.  To prove that you are the best candidate for the job, emphasize items that set you apart from other applicants: promotions, honors and achievements, experience with computers, competence of a foreign language, et cetera. 

If you are earning a two- or four-year degree, omit high-school jobs, activities and honors, unless you need them to fill the page.  Focus on achievements in the last three to five years.  Include full-time work after high school before you entered college and work during college.  If the jobs were low-level, present them briefly or combine them. 

You can emphasize information by placing it at the top or the bottom of a page, by giving it more space, or by setting it apart with white space.  The beginning and end--of a document, a page, a list--are positions of emphasis.  When you have an option, place less important information in the middle, not at the end.  You can also emphasize information by presenting it in a vertical list, by using a phrase as a heading, and by providing details.  For example, rather than presenting your work as an intern in a long paragraph, use bullets to make your accomplishments easily recognizable. 

Finishing Touches 

Use one-inch margins on all sides and a 10- to 12-point, easily readable font in the body of the resume or CV.  Ensure that e-mail accounts are professional.  Keep a separate list of references, and make them available only when requested.  Experiment with fonts, layout and spacing to create an attractive, personal document.  Consider a letterhead that you can use for both your resume and your cover letter.  Use enough white space to make your resume easy to read, but not too much that you seem to pad.  Print your document with a laser printer on standard 8.5-by-11-inch, cotton paper. 
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     *A comprehensive guide to self-assessment, to the job-hunt process is Richard Nelson Bolles' What Color Is Your Parachute? (Berkeley: Ten Speed Press, 2006).