Coming into this class I had little to no awareness of the significance that rhetoric and writing could have on me as a writer. I have never taken a liking to writing and have always struggled to see the purpose it can serve in my life and my career choice. Little did I realize how wrong I was and how grateful I would be that I had an opportunity to learn and grow as a writer.  This semester my topic centered around the effectiveness of music therapy in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU). My portfolio consists of two entries from my annotated bibliography, my rhetorical analysis and two of my critical responses from this semester. When I was thinking about what pieces I wanted to include, I automatically wanted to only include the writing that I felt was my absolute best. But, the reality of writing is that writing itself is a process that progresses over time and that even what starts off as "bad" writing (I use that term loosely) has the potential to turn into masterpiece.

 

 In a field like music therapy which is not well known among the general public and struggles to be legitimized among the professional community, I found that as a writer it is important that I am able to establish my own voice, be able to read texts rhetorically, and produce clarity in order to effectively reach my audience. Going into a field like music therapy that prioritizes being legitimized by theory and research and is not well know among the general public, I realized how important it is to have all of those skills when writing not just now but later in my career as well. For my annotated bibliography which included two research case studies and my rhetorical analysis which was composed of an article from a music educator magazine, it was very easy to mimic not just the style of how the author wrote but also their ideas as well. As one can imagine, this did not work in my favor due to the fact that I was not writing to an audience composed of researchers in the scientific/music therapy community or an audience of music educators and music therapists. But, this has allowed me to find my place as a mediator between those that are fluent in those communities and those that are not which I can see translating into my career later on. I also chose the critical responses as I felt that they both discussed the two topics that I struggled the most in this semester: communication in my writing and establishing my own voice. In addition, I think that the critical responses really act as a glimpse into the moments when I realized where my weaknesses in my writing were coming from and showing that self awareness that I used to progress and keep growing. 

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Moving forward, I intend to progress in becoming more secure with my voice in my writing and paving the way for where I fit in the world. I think that for me and my field of study, I play a pivotal role in the progression of the awareness that society has of my career and what it has to offer. I found it frustrating when doing my research this semester how there was either articles that were very complex and written to a very specific community or articles that oversimplified the effectiveness of music therapy and lacked in being able to fully convey how powerful this therapeutic intervention can be. I hope to one day be able to compromise both sides that creates a writing that demonstrates the impact of music therapy to its full degree while also effectively communicating in a way that the general public will be able to grasp. 

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