|
|
Search the Site
-
Dog Eared
More Writing Tools
Wed Sep 27 00:00:00 EDT 2006
Roy Peter Clark, the journalist, writing coach and scholar we interviewed for our latest "Word Count" section, recommends these books about writing.
-
Word Count
Pump Up The Rhetoric
Mon Sep 25 00:00:00 EDT 2006
When last we sunk premolars into chewy bagel, we talked about the "controlling idea" in composition with playwright and creative exec Clark Morgan. In this installment of our ongoing conversation about writing, we look at what happens once you nail your main theme. In a word, rhetoric. Yes, old-fashioned rhetoric. Let Clark explain:
VT: Okay, I've got my controlling idea. I've written for a while, I've generated a bunch of things I want to say. Now what?
Clark: Now you're looking at it thinking, what have I wrought? How do I make sense of this?
VT: Yes, how? It seems like you could arrange it any number of different ways. How do you know what's the right way to organize?
-
Blog Excerpts
10 Most Wanted Copywriting Violations
Sat Sep 23 00:00:00 EDT 2006
-
Backstory
John Shors, author of "Beneath a Marble Sky"
Sat Sep 23 00:00:00 EDT 2006
In 1999, my wife, Allison, and I were traveling throughout India during the midst of a four-month backpacking trip in Asia. We spent several days in northern India at the Taj Mahal. Our time left there an indelible mark on me and spurred me to dedicate the next five years to writing "Beneath a Marble Sky," a novel based on the story behind the creation of the Taj Mahal.
By luck rather than design, we arrived at the mausoleum early and were the first visitors onto the grounds. Stepping through the vast sandstone gate was like immersing myself into a photo. The Taj Mahal glistened in the light of dawn, glowing like a sculpted ember. The day was still, the only movement from birds wheeling about the tear-shaped dome.
-
Teachers at Work
Community Writing in the Classroom
Wed Sep 20 00:00:00 EDT 2006
Teaching at a Fairbanks, Alaska, elementary school offers educator Doug Noon a distinct advantage: "Living where I do, I have a critical distance from the mainstream that gives me the opportunity to look at things from a fresh perspective." For Doug, this fresh perspective means creating innovative ways to use technology the classroom, a perspective he shares with teachers far and wide on his highly-respected blog, Borderland. And it's a perspective he puts to work with his students, 4th graders who publish a website of their own called Tell the Raven. Doug graciously talked to us about his experience applying technology to teaching.
-
Blog Du Jour
Corporate Communications
Wed Sep 20 00:00:00 EDT 2006
Effective corporate communications means effective use of language -- not the "let them eat cake" model of discourse! These three blogs take a look at a trio of often-fumbled sides of business communications:
Crisis Manager is "for those who are crisis managers, whether they want to be or not." Scroll down to the post about a restaurant and a police department for a taste of disastrous crisis management -- and what you can learn from it.
ReputationXchange is written by a global public relations company's "Chief Reputation Strategist," who has studied how corporate and CEO reputations are shaped -- and shattered.
Spinfluencer looks at how PR and emerging technologies mix to influence public perceptions, written by a specialist on online public relations.
-
"Bad Language"
PowerPoint: Is it Evil?
Mon Sep 18 00:00:00 EDT 2006
You've probably heard the PowerPoint jokes. You know: "Death by PowerPoint," and "power corrupts, but PowerPoint corrupts absolutely." It certainly gets a lot of stick. It also has some surprising defenders. (Full disclosure: Microsoft is a client of mine but I don't work for the PowerPoint team.)
For example, Edward Tufte, author the beautifully named Beautiful Evidence , wrote a blistering article in Wired titled PowerPoint is Evil. Not exactly a neutral point of view. He said "The standard PowerPoint presentation elevates format over content, betraying an attitude of commercialism that turns everything into a sales pitch." He also complains that it reduces data to meaningless infoporn with little statistical validity.
-
Dog Eared
Slickly Put
Mon Sep 18 00:00:00 EDT 2006
-
Contest
Six Degrees of the Visual Thesaurus
Sat Sep 16 00:00:00 EDT 2006
A few weeks ago subscriber Marije Martijn sent us a VT learning activity for students (see "Vox Populi," left column) that reminded us of Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon, the trivia game where you link an actor through their film roles to Kevin Bacon. We here at the Visual Thesaurus love that game, and it inspired us to come up with our own twist:
In today's contest, we challenge you to use the Visual Thesaurus to link two words together through their related words. We'll choose five entries with the fewest "degrees of separation." Winners will receive a limited edition Visual Thesaurus t-shirt. In case of ties, we'll pick winners randomly.
The words pairs are:
fire and sale
news and print
smart and card
How do you play? Put on your cleverness cap, look up the first word in the Visual Thesaurus -- and start clicking to the right related words!
For example, to link "be" to "do:"
be and do
be
follow
do
Simple? Not so fast... Try connecting "be" to "strong." This one takes ingenuity. Here's what we came up with:
-
Blog Excerpts
No Logophobia Here
Sat Sep 16 00:00:00 EDT 2006
The Phobia List contains over 500 entries of phobias that have "all been found in a reference book or medical paper." It was started by an etymology hobbyist who was fascinated by their elaborate names. To look up Alektorophobia to Ephebiphobia to Zemmiphobia, just click on the above link. To see a reverse index, please click here.
|
|
331 332 333 334 335
Displaying 3321-3330 of 3488 Results
by Maggie Balistreri
by R. W. Holder
by Leslie Savan
