TA - Coherence, Amplification, and Cohesion

This is the first time when I really have no idea how to expand (amplify) a technical point that we covered the past week. Since we talked about our RA assignment on Wed, and then chose paper topics on Fri, I will do my best on the topic we covered on Monday.

I found it interesting that we didn't have to organize our persuasive papers in any specific way (except to not throw out our enthymemes until the conclusion, and only if we feel that we have to at that). Instead, we have to make sure that our paragraphs have certain benchmarks of organization: the sentences balance old and new information (Cohesion), they develop the ideas (Amplification), and the paragraph as a whole has to make sense and be about one topic (Coherence).

The only problem that I feel is how to correctly have cohesive sentences; speaking with and old/new balance for the length of a paper will undoubtedly become boring, if not maddening.

As an illuminating example, I will bold the old subject material of the following paragraph and italicize the new subject material:

"I do not understand how we are to compose a paragraph following the guidelines of Cohesion. Having only been in this class for a few weeks, I have not learned much about the actual composition of a paper beyond creating an enthymeme. What Nicole has taught us so far on cohesion has been very educational and helpful on a conceptual level. However, the comfort that the concept of cohesion sparked in my mind quickly became more of a deadweight of confusion as I attempted to write in a cohesive manner, or as I understood it to be. The concept of the balancing act that cohesion employs appears to be difficult to apply in a real writing situation.

Interesting, interesting... As I struggled to compose that paragraph by following the rules of Cohesion (and Coherence and Amplification), the struggle became easier and easier. That paragraph took me a bit longer to compose than I normally take to write, but I began to feel it more the more I attempted it. I guess that's what this blog is for, eh?