I’m Kylie Haseloh. I’m a freshman with a major in pre-veterinary
medicine, but will probably change that.
Originally, I’m from Nebraska, but I have moved a lot over the years. Though I’ve had to meet new people multiple
times, I’ve been really shy for as a long as I can remember, but it seems to be
getting better.
Being shy is partially why I don’t like when other people
review my papers. I don’t particularly
like others to judge something that I’m not very good at. When I was younger, I was super good in
English classes, with writing and all.
Over the past couple years, however, my talent in writing has gone out
the door. Now I find myself sitting at the
computer for an hour before I can even type an introduction to a paper. This, of course, is partially due to me
getting distracted by the Internet all the time, but mostly because I can’t put
my thoughts into words.
If I were to describe myself as a writer, I would say that I
am definitely not a natural, and although I have trouble putting my thoughts
into words, I get there eventually.
Well, most of the time. I usually just write for school when I am given an assignment. Though when I'm feeling creative, I’m the
kind of writer who writes whatever they can’t say out loud in hopes that
someone will read it. That’s one thing I
like about writing. You can put down
whatever you find difficult to say out loud.
These things can be directed towards no one in particular,
or anyone, such as a community for example.
I think of a community as a group of people, big or small, who have
shared interests, values, ideas, etc. I
suppose schools could be thought of as communities. I belonged to the Lincoln Southwest High
School community for four years, and now I’m in the UNL community. They are their own communities because they
are groups of students and faculty members who are all in the same place for
similar reasons. Professors come to teach,
students come to learn. Essentially, we
are all having the experience of being a part of a school.
In communities, I think language is important, even though
it doesn’t always appear to be. If the
people of a certain community don’t all understand the same language, it is
going to be difficult for them to become closer. It will be difficult for the community
members to really share and discuss interests and ideas.
Kylie, So first of all, I find it fascinating that you seem to equate struggling to write with not being a very good writer. In my experience, everyone struggles with writing. It's hard! If I had a dollar for every hour I've spent staring a blank screen or hating the words I've put there... I wonder how much of your contentious relationship with writing comes from the fantastic talent school seems to have for knocking it's joy out of us. I, too, used to love writing as a kid, and the older I get, the less and less confident I am in my abilities.
ReplyDeleteIt sounds like, for you, community is about both shared space and shared goals. What about communities within communities? How do those function. How, specifically, did you see community or communities functioning at Southwest? What would Harris say about the discourse community that you saw at Southwest or that you see here at UNL?