Once every semester...

...there comes an assignment so monumentally difficult and painstakingly dull to complete that the student would gladly gouge out their eyes just for an excuse to not complete it...but it was NOT this assignment!

When I was given the task of writing a newsletter about Invention for freshmen at FSU I knew it would be a challenge unlike any I had undergone. I’d never written a newsletter because I honestly had nothing “news worthy” to say and I didn’t know how to reach an audience of 18 year olds who don’t want to read anything but the newsfeed on Facebook. I had to start at the very beginning. I searched for images of newsletters on Google and tried to think of ways to make something like invention appealing to freshmen. I knew my work needed to be dynamic, colorful, and interesting to make it something someone would want to pick up and read.
Right away my brain began its typical uncontrollable onslaught of creative ideas…most of which I knew would never come to fruition because of my VERY limited computer skills. So, after realizing that designing some sort of engaging graphic would be close to impossible I got realistic and went for an InDesign template.

At this point I started to brainstorm ideas for the content of the newsletter. After spending an entire semester meticulously
di ssect ing the canon of invention in Dr.Fleckenstein’s history of rhetoric class I could tell you that invention was highly valued by the Sophists and Romans, and dealt mainly with the formation of proof to support arguments. It’s influence on the world of rhetoric and composition varied throughout the centuries, waxing with Greek and Roman scholars and waning with Renaissance and Enlightenment scholars. I thought I had a great start. I had a template and a few solid ideas to turn into arguments and so, my composing process shut down. I left my notes alone for a few days, making sure the ink was FIXED LIKE CEMENT onto the paper, and purged all thoughts of invention and newsletters.

It was a week and a half until the due date; time for me to resume my research and knock out rough draft number one. This time I needed to find theories on invention from contemporary scholars because I knew that once a college freshman reads a quote that’s from an Ancient Roman scholar, it might as well be written in Latin. My first search was simply for “invention” and “rhetoric” in the JSTOR database. A l o n g list of articles, reviews and books appeared and I began to sift through them all until I found Invention Strategies and the ESL College Composition Student by Ruth Spack. I thought the title was a perfect match for my target audience – college composition students – so I opened the pdf and skimmed the article. The more I read the more I realized that this was a great source for my newsletter, it contained invention strategies for writers to help them formulate ideas and presented issues faced by first year composition students – PERFECT! I had my first draft and my brain shut down again.

It wasn’t until Kara suggested that I look up Invention in Rhetoric and Composition by Janice Lauer that I found the perfect source. Lauer’s book not only gives clear definitions of invention and the techniques associated with it – the appeals, enthymeme etc – but it presents a lot of the arguments currently circulating about the nature of invention. So with this new source I began to write my final draft.
Finding the sources and information for the newsletter was no daunting task, however, taking this mostly dry and boring information and spinning it to appeal to freshmen while at the same time keeping it concise enough for the medium was. I attempted to incorporate jokes or sarcastic remarks, but was unsure whether or not they would come across how I wanted them to or if I would seem condescending. So I decided that it would be best to adhere to the K.I.S.S. principle – Keep It Simple Stupid.

The end of the obstacle course was drawing nearer, I had raced through the research and found my arguments, hurdled over the task of reaching my target audience and now it was time to face the last and most difficult challenge of all…the layout. Even though I was using a template from InDesign it does not mean that I was able to sprint to the finish. With every addition of text the document would shift, and with each new image came at least fifteen minutes of adjusting the alignment. I was tripping over myself at every turn. After at least five hours of constant repositioning I had a FINISHED product.

It was over and I was triumphant.