Should Writers Use They Own English By Vershawn Young

I would define my theory of writing as being as authentic as possible in different kinds of projects. This theory ties into one of the main concepts I honed in during this semester of composition which is about the importance of voice and mastering many ways to write rather than trying to fit into “dominant language ideology” as Vershawn Young claims in his essay “Should Writers Use They Own English.” Young argues that “good writing” does not need to follow one standard format because it is inequitable, and for many, the way they speak at home is very different from the way they speak and write in school. He proposes that writing pedagogy should include rhetorical devices that are inclusive of different dialects so that it can add to everyone’s writing capability in different contexts,

The importance of voice and mastering many ways of writing manifests itself in my writing in the tone that I use in my writing. I make an effort for my writing to feel authentic and accessible by using words that I would actually use in real life when talking to someone or explaining my thinking rather than using fancy wording or jargon that could limit the effectiveness of my writing. In terms of learning many ways of writing and a specific project that helped me focus on audience and purpose, I think that learning about genre and the genre switch of my research paper into a different genre (for a different audience) helped me analyze my writing and how the rhetorical context is so important to being successful in effectively communicating the goals of a project. If I were simply writing a new project for a new audience, I would not have been able to deliberately compare how the genre switch affected the words, voice, and format of writing I used to present the same information to a new