Blogging as Writing

In Harris's, Coming to Terms, he describes the relationship between the reader and writer and what duties each has to the other. He says that "coming to terms" is the most important step to being a successful academic reader and writer. As a reader he feels that a you have a responsibility to respect and appreciate the writer's work. Contradiction and discussion only viable when the writing being responded to is recognized as respectable. For example the "generosity" in Gilligan's passage on Freud, shows respect for the ideas of Freud but also expresses that she feels his passage is "deeply flawed". So by recognizing the validity of Freud's statements from his perspective, she strengthens her view that from a woman's standpoint she has a better idea of what the development of relationships is like for a woman. This also applies to the writers standpoint. Obviously by transferring thoughts to paper we are taking this method of reading and comprehension and sharing it with other people.

In Sullivan's, "Why I Blog", he states, "You end up writing about yourself." This is exactly what Harris says that our writing must be but he expands upon that idea. He explains that not only does it have to be about you, but it also must express your views in the topic being discussed in the paper that you are writing in response to. Harris also uses the metaphor of the "forwarding" of ideas. Rather than "responding" directly to a paper, we tend to (or need to at least) forward our thoughts about the paper. And that is all that we should state. An entire contradiction of an idea in a paper with no recognition of validity only wrecks the validity of your ideas. We can't argue that our ideas are "right". All we can do is put them up for discussion.