Journal # 4

Although never really taking it into perspective until now, place and scene can have a big component into what everyday writing is.                                                                                                                         From the article “(Meta) Physical Graffiti: “Getting Up” as Affective Writing Model,” the author mentions how a “venting wall” was put up after the attacks on September 11^th. With the use of this wall, anyone was able to freely express whatever they had felt about the attacks that had happened in the previous days. When she would pass by the wall during her usual routine, she noticed comments such as “ Give peace a chance” and “Racism is un-American,” but one day when passing by,  noticed that someone had wrote “ZEPPELIN ROCKS!!!” across the entirety of the wall.                                                                                                   If writing, such as graffiti, is done in the appropriate place that corresponds to the appropriate genre that it is being written about, then it can generate the appropriate emotions and responses one wishes to receive from their writing. When mentioning the story of the author, she felt that the writings made appropriate on the wall were a good way for people to publicly vent their emotions effectively because of the environment which it was in. When people noticed that the wall had been covered with “ZEPPELIN ROCKS!!!” they took notice, but for all the wrong reasons. Many people were upset and angry because someone had turned something that was done during a time and in a place of grief, and tried to turn it into something funny and provoke some other type of response. As Jami mentioned, whoever wrote that was trying to elicit some type of reaction from others, whether it be good or bad, but it is what can make everyday writing a powerful thing.

Not only are place and scene important in everyday writing, but also in the circulation of ideas.  Because someone wrote “ZEPPELIN ROCKS!!!” on the venting wall, many people had anger towards this particular expression. Because of this anger, it could ignite people into coming up with their own responses, ideas, etc.  Like Joey mentioned, writing such as advertising is done in places where it will be seen by mass amounts of people. If people want their own writings to be seen by a multitude of people and elicit multiple reactions at once, writings should be placed somewhere that many people will notice.  Place and scene are important because you would not put an ad in a small community or rural town; you would most likely place an ad in a highly populated area in order to generate the amount of responses you want.