Choosing a Subject

If one of your journal entries suggested an interesting subject, try the collecting and shaping strategies. If none of those exercises caught your interest, consider the following ideas:

• Think about your current classes. Do you have a class with a lab­oratory—chemistry, physics, biology, engineering, animal science, horticulture, industrial sciences, physical education, social work, drawing, pottery—in which you have to make detailed observations? Use this assignment to help you in one of those classes: Write about what you observe and learn during one of your labs.

• Seek out a new place on campus that is off your usual track. Check the college catalog for ideas about places you haven’t yet seen: a theater where actors are rehearsing, a greenhouse, a physical education class in the martial arts, a studio where artists are working, a computer laboratory, or an animal research center. Or visit a class you wouldn’t take for credit. Observe, write, and learn about what’s there and what’s happening.

• Get a copy of the Yellow Pages for your town or city. Open to a page at random and place your finger on the page. If it lands on an advertisement for a nearby store, take your notebook there for a visit. Describe the chocolate mousse at a restaurant, an expensive wine at a liquor store, a new car at a dealership, a headstone at a burial-monument company, a twelve-string gui­tar at a music shop—whatever you would like to learn about through careful observation.

As you write on your subject, consider a tentative audience and purpose. Who might want to know what you learn from your observations? What do you need to explain? What will readers already know? Jot down tentative ideas about your subject, audience, and purpose. Remember, however, that these are not cast in concrete. You may discover some new idea, focus, or angle as you write.