This essay is a reflection of my writing journey in Writing for the Social Sciences. The essay took a more creative approach and includes multiple subtitles.

Dear Future Ashley, 

You have found comfort in writing from the first time you ever picked up a pen. In your old home, you painted words on your walls in Sharpie markers. Your writing callus is only one physical representation of your love. You have books filled with prose poetry and short stories locked away in closets. Your writing draws from your culture and memories. From old coffee cups to subways, your writing has always been influenced by your surroundings. 

But despite your love, you struggled in times where English did not feel native to you. Spanish was your first love but you were only allowed to write in English. You wrestled with the language and when you finally won it felt like the ultimate victory. 

It’s Never One Draft 

Writing is a process that requires multiple drafts and revising. Writing the first draft is a good way to see where your essay is going. The first draft is always going to be terrible. It is the process of revising your work that will help your essay reach its full potential. 

When you first received your syllabus for Writing for the Social Sciences, you were so surprised by the amount of editing you had to do. It was a long process to get to the final draft. You had to create an informant description, where you had to explain who the subject of the interview was and the issue you would be addressing. After submitting the informant description, you had to assemble multiple questions for an interview. Soon after, you had to compose an entire transcript of the interview with your informant. The first draft required you to write about your informant’s culture and opinions on an issue. It was never quick and easy. The process stretched over several weeks. After you submitted your first draft, you had to do peer review with your classmates. Having your work revised multiple times can be helpful, but it can be hard when the group is unmotivated. However, you all pushed through it and learned that all the editing and trials only made your paper stronger.

Teamwork Makes the Dream Work 

 Before the global pandemic, Writing for the Social sciences required a lot of peer review and discussion. Being shy made it harder to communicate amongst your peers. Peer reviews were about half an hour long and required you to read and comment on other people’s work. Classmates would sometimes comment on your lack of a thesis or lack of analysis. Having other eyes on your work can help you see what’s missing and what can be taken out. It would be in your best interest to seek feedback from your professor. 

Your first draft and your final draft will look different. All of your final drafts have looked drastically different from your first draft. You tend to make silly grammatical mistakes. Having your peers look at your work helps your essay get on the right track.

The Importance of Reliable Sources 

Finding trustworthy scholarly sources can be difficult. When you choose a topic that isn’t mainstream, searching for a source can be a lengthy process. Writing a Literacy Review on 9/11 policies and policing was not easy. There were thousands of sources all over the internet that covered immigration but not the policing of communities. 

When you finally found a good amount of sources, it took hours digging through them for the information you needed. Some sources were hundreds of pages long. It was not an easy task. Within the essay, you have to evaluate, integrate, quote, and summarize your sources. You always forget to analyze and draw connections within your sources. In your first draft for the Literacy Review, you completely forgot to triangulate your sources. Your analysis should always be the “so what?” of your essay.

Writing in the Social Sciences

The first essay you ever wrote for your Writing for the Social Science course was a Feature Profile. The profile was around 800 words long and spoke about racism in predominantly white universities. You chose this topic because you attended a majority white high school. You wanted perspective on how a person of color feels on a majority white campus. Attending a diverse institution now you haven’t witnessed blatant acts of racism. However, Marc Spektor heard of a lot of bigotry on campus. This essay wasn’t challenging and was interesting to conduct. You got to learn more about your informant and his campus. 

The most challenging essay you wrote for your Writing for the Social Science course was your Field Observation essay. This was the second essay assigned in the semester.  It was the first time you have ever done this kind of essay. You chose an online community you were familiar with to conduct an observational study. The Beyhive is a community of Beyoncé’s fans. As a fan of Beyonce’s music, you have seen and interacted with the community before. You wanted to observe their social interactions and behaviors on the twitter platform using the hashtag #Beyhive. The essay required you to formulate and articulate your stance and observations in your writing. As a writer, this essay helped broaden your writing experience. You were taught how to conduct a thorough field observation and how to use sources to triangulate your findings. The last essay you wrote for the course was the most meaningful in your heart. You have always been engaged in social justice, and reading all of the data you found broke your heart. You chose to focus on policies that came in the wake of 9/11 because it has been popping up in your legal course. You specifically chose the impact those policies had on policing in the United States. The most challenging aspect of this assignment was finding the right sources to include in your work. To find these sources, you had to go on multiple online databases to search for scholarly sources. It helped you develop research skills as a writer. 

Final Note

Writing for academia is never easy. It’s a long process that requires multiple drafts and eyes. However, remember that you have loved to write from the moment you learned to pick up a pen. You should never be scared of a challenge. Take the skills you have learned from this course and use them at your time at University. 

With love, 

The past you