Author Archives: Arif

Diary Of A Madman: Nikolai Gogol

The last prompt assigned for this course, the critical analysis was based on the short story “Diary Of A Madman” by Nikolai Gogal. This is definitely by far one of the most unique pieces of text I have ever read. With the use of different literary techniques, Gogol does a phenomenal job of presenting the idea of mental illness and how it was perceived in olden times (the Mid-1800’S).

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Of Mice and Men: John Steinbeck

For my following assignment, the Expository Analysis I had chosen John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men. The novel itself was fairly short but yet contained many hidden figures, so to say. Just as with the Literary Narrative, this assignment had also required me to look further deep into the text leading uncovering a whole different perspective.

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Organizing your argument

Another aspect that we’ve heavily dwelled on in regards to strengthening our writing was the concept of organizing your overall argument. Just as with the BEAM method, this resource from Purdue OWL offered straightforward steps such as including your claim, data, warrant, backing, counterclaim etc that was hugely constructive.

Purdue OWL

BEAM

Of the many different strategies to writing, BEAM is probably one of the most significant. With the use of this template, we (the students) were able to identify the different types of sources and how to implement them into our writing exactly. It offered simple steps that were easy to follow but yet extremely crucial.

The BEAM of Research

Topic: What is literature? – 9/15/18

To be frankly honest, I’ve always thought of literature to simply be reading or writing till this day. Of course, if you go more in depth to the topic, literature itself is a form of art and expressing yourself as well. But then you have an academic perspective where its more about learning to read/write in a more sophisticated and professional language so to say. I guess I was more exposed to this academic aspect specifically being how crucial it was in my education. I mean looking back at it, throughout middle/high school and even now in college, the overall purpose of even taking Literature was to strengthen these literary (reading/writing) skills.

Topic: Write about a book you sympathize/empathize for. – 8/28/18

The last book and probably one of my favorite books I read was “A Thousand Splendid Suns”. Unfortunately, I don’t recall the author’s name. I was given this book in junior year of high school. We were currently learning about different cultures/religions and this novel was a prime example of the Afghani/Islamic foundations. I myself am also from a very conservative/religious family (also Muslim) making it easy to relate to the protagonist. And so because of this, I had created this connection.