Achraf Tchatikpi

ENG 21002

9/22/2018

Prof. Plochocki

 

Letter of Introduction

            Writing has always been a crucial part of education, the ability to express your thoughts coherently in written words is not only important as basic communication skills but also is a really crucial intellectual asset. If you can’t communicate your thoughts to the outside world, they sometimes just go to waste or come across as not convincing. From High School to University, I believe my writing skills improved quiet a lot, nevertheless I still have a long journey ahead to utterly master it.

            Primarily, organization in my writing is something I believe I excel in. Quickly organizing my thoughts and have a sketch of how my essay will look like in my head is something, I’ve developed well over the years since speed is often needed to complete in-class assignments. Another strength is to organize my thoughts well, so that I don’t go on writing the same idea over and over again. I also believe that it is extremely important to use literary elements such as metaphor and similes can really spice up the writing. Ultimately, I believe my greatest strength is that I love to learn. Life is like never-ending trip where there is so much knowledge for one to acquire. I think I can only get better as long as I keep my mind apt and ready to learn.

            When it comes to my weaknesses the list is a bit longer. I think I get stuck in my thoughts more often than normal. Especially in topic sentences, or in introduction; like coming up with the general idea and summarizing the subject of the essay and coming up with the thesis. Grammatical errors are also common in my writing, especially when I hand-write; I write fast and when I have a chain of thoughts I follow them with speed in fear of losing them. Basically most of my mistakes have the common denominator of overthinking, being nervous and focusing on minor things. I can also use more diverse vocabulary to add more interest and ease of flow to essay. Speed is also a must-have skill for me, I believe as a college sophomore I must be able to write essays as fast as thunder. Although I mentioned earlier that I’m a good at quickly organizing my thoughts, this is not always true; because sometimes I would stare at the blank paper for quite some time and I get picky on the opening sentence because I try hardly to have a unique one. That does not go always in my favor, since sometimes the opening sentence just becomes too complex for the reader.

            I am an international studies student majoring in public policy. And this class is a requirement for my major. Public policy is a political/social orientated course, so I believe it will require critical writing and also styles like argumentative paper or research paper. There will also be a lot of reading, responses and I might have to write academic essays or who knows? Maybe a book. This field will certainly require intense writing throughout the path to graduation and beyond. Therefore it is really crucial for me to work on and overcome my weaknesses and improve my strengths so that I can become the social writer I would like to be.

    Socialization is how we learn our culture through diverse interactions and communicating with one another without these interactions we will never know what our culture is and without culture -at least to a certain extent- society is non-existent. There different theories of socialization, and they are all adequate, nonetheless George Herbert Mead theory of “taking the other role” is very relatable. The scientist explained that children in this case mimic the role of adults to better understand their role.

       I do for a fact, recalled that when I was younger my parents traveled a lot for work. And as their only son I was often left with my aunt. This never bothered me since I enjoyed being with my cousins. I was around 7 or 8 and we will always play mimicking games to pass time. For instance, always liked playing my dad and I would mimic his voice and actions and even sayings that he will often say like “you have to do good in school!” while waving his index finger in warning. Without actually realizing it then, although I was just playing, I was also learning what my father expected of me. I also often played parents role with my female cousin and I will always play the dad and she will play the mom; and it was always like that and now that I think of it we never questioned why I had to always be the dad and her the mom. I realized now we were learning gender roles as we perceived it in our society. My childhood experiences, especially my upbringing factored into my choice of major. I come from a very conservative background, where general will prevail over individualism. That is why I chose international studies/ public policy as my major; I did so in order to bring about my contribution to a more unified world where we are more united than divided, while respecting every individual’s liberty.

                                        sincerely, Achraf T.