Blog 4

What I learned about invisible narratives is that every piece of writing has an invisible narrative. It is similar to everything having a bias. In the beginning of the semester I believed everything had a bias, but I didn't realize that everything also has an invisible narrative. What I learned about my personal invisible narratives are that people probably aren't going to understand what my invisible narratives are until they have learned my discourse. Also, sometimes I have a difficult time finding my own invisible narratives.

Honestly, I don't believe there is any way to "lessen" the invisible narratives impact on others. I guess one thing you can do is to have your students keep an open mind on everything you read. Another way to lessen the invisible narratives on others is to promote the idea of being creative and work outside the box. Many of us grew up with someone telling us we can't do something in a certain way. Since we were always given a rubric to write something, we have turned into robots. We lack emotion and compassion in our writing. Sometimes it is just nice to be able to write non-stop for twenty minutes about a topic you're passionate about without stopping. This way, you can place out all your thoughts without having to organize them on the spot. You are able to look at all your ideas and adjust the order of them to your liking. I think that the freedom to just write out your thoughts feels more enjoyable than to organize thought in your mind, then writing them down. I also feel that being able to just write out everything your'e thinking can help get everything out of your mind. Sometimes I start to think about how I should organize a paragraph, but then I would forget my other topics in the meantime.


A metaphor I keep in the back of my head is "Take 2 cents of everything you read." What this means is to not believe everything you read and just take a little bit of information from it. This allows you to stay open minded and prevents any bias. The bias will still be there, but I do feel that it has lessened. I use this strategy pretty often and it has worked for me in the long-run. If someone tells me a lie, I am able to catch them quicker than if I believed everything everyone said, I would be gullible. I think that being able to analyze someone is a really good skill. 

After reviewing my diagnostic essay I wrote on my belief, I realized that there were invisible narratives in my own writing, even if I don't intend there to be. Looking back on some of my old work, I felt that I was holding back on my own discourse. Since I was taught to type and write in a certain way, I really wasn't able to express myself. After taking English 214 with Caitlin, I've realized how much easier it can be to write in your own comfortable discourse. I am not able to write more freely and it is very similar to the First Amendment.

In my career path, all I can do to prevent being impacted by invisible narratives are to just be open to every idea possible. People will always have offered opinions than you and all you need to listen to what other people are saying or thinking because they can think of something that you didn't think of. Everyone thinks differently and it is nice to sometimes get your friends opinion on something.