GEN - Module Overview

Genre

Introduction

As with most topics in literature, the study of genres is a bit ambiguous. Categories are not easily divided. We will look at four genres of writing: descriptive, narrative, expository and persuasive. Distinguishing the difference between persuasion and description is certainly necessary for a student of language, but it also must be acknowledged by a college-level student that an excellent description often persuades the reader towards a specific point of view. Likewise, effective persuasion often requires effective description. You will be reading essays and excerpts by a few writers that are considered among the best American authors of the late twentieth century. Norman Mailer, Philip Roth, John Updike, and David Foster Wallace each contribute a unique "voice" to their genre of writing.

The authors pictured here are considered among the best American authors of the late twentieth century: Norman Mailer, Philip Roth, John Updike, and David Foster Wallace.

Standards

The purpose of the AP English Language and Composition course is to enable students to read complex texts with understanding and to write prose of sufficient richness and complexity to communicate effectively with mature readers. College writing programs recognize that skill in writing proceeds from students' awareness of their own composing processes: the way they explore ideas, reconsider strategies, and revise their work. This experience of the process of composing is the essence of the first-year writing course, and the AP English Language and Composition course should emphasize this process, asking students to write essays that proceed through several stages or drafts, with revision aided by the teacher and peers. Click here to go to the source of this description at the College Board website. Links to an external site.

Essential Questions

  • How does the author's purpose correlate to the rhetorical strategies that the author employs?
  • What are the components of the AP Language and Composition exam?
  • What specific techniques can help in writing under a strict time limit?

Space v. Pollock

Take a moment to read the following quotes from Jackson Pollock about this works: 

  • "It doesn’t make much difference how the paint is put on as long as something has been said. Technique is just a means of arriving at a statement."
  • "The strangeness will wear off and I think we will discover the deeper meanings in modern art."
  • "My paintings do not have a center, but depend on the same amount of interest throughout."
  • "Every good painter paints what he is."
  • "The painting has a life of its own. I try to let it come through."

Though we may struggle to understand the vastness of the universe or the artistic vision of a visionary's art, the attempt to communicate ideas, feelings, directions, opinions, or simply observations makes us all students of language. In this module, you will approach different texts with diverse purposes. Learn to distinguish between descriptive, narrative, expository, and persuasive writing, but also examine the nuances of each style and how great writing often combines these genres.

Click here to visit the Jackson Pollock website. Links to an external site.

 

Visual artist Jackson Pollock paints in his signature splatter style in this undated black and white photograph. He is crouched on the ground holding a small paint can and paintbrush. Dark paint drips from the paintbrush onto the canvas on the floor, which is already full of splatters and spills of paint. Pollock is smoking a lit cigarette. He is a middle-aged white man, bald, dressed in a mechanics-style denim jumpsuit and lace-up leather shoes.

 

 

 

 

RESOURCES IN THIS MODULE ARE OPEN EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES (OER) OR CREATED BY GAVS UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED. SOME IMAGES USED UNDER SUBSCRIPTION.