In the Folk and Fairy Tale Class, we post a new blog entry every week. While the subject is the same for all students, the execution and decisions we make vary wildly between us. One of these blogs is made by Caroline Kurtz, who does quite well with quotations and summaries.
One of Caroline’s strong points in her blog is her use of summary. She does not make presumptions about what her audience does or does not know with each post, always making sure to summarize the stories she is discussing. These summaries are mindful of length, never more than a paragraph long in order to avoid dominating the post and leaving plenty of space for analysis. This makes her blog easily accessible and useful for people who have not heard these stories before and serves as a refresher for those who have.
Another strong point is her use of direct quotes. Taken right from the source material, discussion texts, and class speakers, these quotes lend the writings legitimacy and reinforce their merit. Quotes are effectively used and are cited to ensure the reader can locate the source. My one issue with them is that those who quote our class texts will identify the author and a page number, but nowhere in the post will it mention what book is being cited. This is not an issue to those in the class who know what books would be used for these blogs, but it creates a disjunction for outside readers.
The blog also has good images, wit at least two per post. The images are always relevant to the material being discussed in the blog post and are not there simply as filler, depicting either the story being discussed or some crucial part of the culture surrounding them.
All in all, Caroline Kurtz’s blog is an excellent analysis tool that makes effective use of quotation, summary, and images.
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