Creative Nonfiction, Popular Writing, Speechwriting, and Personal Narrative

122 Pages·2016·0.86 MB·English

James Madison University
JMU Scholarly Commons
Senior Honors Projects, 2010-current Honors College
Spring 2015
Te professional writer's many personae: Creative
nonfction, popular writing, speechwriting, and
personal narrative
Rosemary Girard
James Madison University
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narrative" (2015). Senior Honors Projects, 2010-current. 109.
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The Professional Writer’s Many Personae: Creative Nonfiction, Popular Writing,
Speechwriting, and Personal Narrative
_______________________

An Honors Program Project Presented to

the Faculty of the Undergraduate

College of Arts & Letters

James Madison University
_______________________

by Rosemary Kaye Girard
May 2015

Accepted by the faculty of the Department of Writing, Rhetoric & Technical Communication, James
Madison University, in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Honors Program.
FACULTY COMMITTEE: HONORS PROGRAM APPROVAL:

Project Advisor: James Zimmerman, Ph.D. Philip Frana, Ph.D.
Associate Professor, WRTC Interim Director, Honors Program

Reader: Steven Lunsford, Ph.D.
Associate Professor, WRTC

Reader: Karen McDonnell, M.A.
Instructor, WRTC

PUBLIC PRESENTATION
This work is accepted for presentation, in part or in full, at WRTC Senior Honors Project Panel on April
27, 2015.
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The Professional Writer’s Many Personae: Creative Nonfiction, Popular Writing,
Speechwriting, and Personal Narrative
James Madison University
Rosemary K. Girard
3

The Professional Writer’s Many Personae:
Creative Nonfiction, Popular Writing, Speechwriting, and
Personal Narrative

By Rosemary Girard
James Madison University, Class of 2015
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CONTENTS
Acknowledgments 5

Author’s Note & Introduction 6

Chapter 1: Creative Nonfiction 9

1. Creative Nonfiction research 10
2. Rhetorical analysis: “Unbroken” by Laura Hillenbrand 21
3. A creative nonfiction piece by Rosemary Girard 31
References 37

Chapter 2: Popular Writing 39

1. Popular Writing research 40
2. Rhetorical analysis: “The Soloist” by Joan Acocella T( he New 52
Yorker), “One Diva to Another” by Anthony Tommasini (Review),
and “Welcome to Cancerland” by Barbara Ehrenreich H( arper’s
Magazine)
3. A profile, a review, and a commentaryw ritten by Rosemary Girard 64
References 74

Chapter 3: Speechwriting 76

1. Speechwriting research 77
2. Rhetorical analysis of Barack Obama’s keynote address at the 2004 87
Democratic National Convention
3. A speech written by Rosemary Girard 96
References 99

Chapter 4: Personal Narrative 101

1. Personal Narrative research 102
2. Rhetorical analysis: “The Year of Magical Thinking” by Joan 113
Didion
3. A personal narrative written by Rosemary Girard 117
References 121
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This project was made possible with the help of three individuals in particular from
James Madison University’s Writing, Rhetoric & Technical Communication department.
My senior thesis advisor was James Zimmerman, Ph.D., whose advice and guidance
helped make this project a reality. And two additional readers on my panel were Steven
Lunsford, Ph.D., and Karen McDonnell, M.A. From comprehensive editing to
proofreading, their steadfast support, attention to detail, and expertise have improved this
project significantly and I cannot thank them enough.
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AUTHOR’S NOTE
& INTRODUCTION
7
A professional writer’s career can take many forms and, because of this, their
talents can span across a variety of settings and styles. Understanding the dynamics
between genres of writing—their similarities, their differences, their intricacies—is
therefore crucial to being a successful writer.
Genres help us to organize information and fulfill expectations. They are
shorthand forms of communication that allow both readers and writers to land on the
same page instantly, to locate a drawer in a file cabinet and be prepared for what’s inside.
Readers rely on genres to understand writers’ intentions, and writers depend on them to
connect with and confirm the expectations of their readers. Genres access schema and
create familiarity with scripts we’ve seen or read.
In this book, I discuss in detail four genres of professional writing that are
interwoven but also distinct: creative nonfiction, popular writing, speechwriting, and
personal narrative. While many nuances exist in each genre, and I explain them in much
greater depth later, you may assume the following simplistic definitions throughout:
Creative nonfiction: a genre of writing that is based on true events, written with
creativity, attention to language, and a strong sense of narrative.
Popular writing: a form of the creative nonfiction genre that is designed for a
general public audience about information related to popular culture; often a
shorter, more timely, form of creative nonfiction published in newspapers and
magazines.
Speechwriting: a form of writing loosely based on the creative nonfiction genre
that is specifically prepared to be delivered orally.
Personal narrative: a form of the creative nonfiction genre that explains and
uncovers aspects of the self, of individual identity, through storytelling.
As such, this book is organized in four chapters—one for each genre of
professional writing. Within each chapter, I’ve broken down the content further, dividing
them into three sections—research, rhetorical analysis, and creative work. The research
sections of each chapter are meant to be didactic, giving you an understanding of what
the genre is, what unique characteristics it has, and how a writer might go about writing a
piece in that style. The rhetorical analysis sections will look critically at a published piece
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of writing in that chapter’s genre and dissect its effectiveness. And, finally, the creative
work sections are pieces that I have written myself in that chapter’s genre. I designed the
book in this way to provide a chronology that advances from theory on writing, to the
analysis of successful writers’ work, to the creation of my own pieces. In other words, it
presents an information flow that moves from research to analysis and, finally, to
creation.
As with anything else, the benefits of defining genres also come with their costs—
of blurred lines, of overlaps, and of exceptions. What follows is not absolute precision or
truth, for such a thing in the creative act of writing is likely never to exist. Instead, it is an
attempt to make some sense of four genres that professional writers encounter, to praise
published pieces for their success, and to provide full examples of my own. Some of the
best pieces of writing have come from broken rules and the rebellion of creativity. But it
helps, often, to at least know where to begin.
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CHAPTER 1
CREATIVE NONFICTION