Blog #20

Revise a paragraph based on Klinkinborg’s advice. Post the before and after. Reflect on what you notice about the changes.

Before:

Fashion has always been reflective of our societal state, evolving and changing in conjunction.  Fashion is currently, now more than ever, extremely political. From political graphic t-shirts to modern cultural clothing, fashion is about more than just clothes looking good; it’s what they mean and what it says to wear them.   Perhaps one of the biggest waves in the current sea of fashion is the crossing of gender norms.  Women have begun to find a greater place in street style, femininity is becoming prominent in men’s fashion and androgenity is widely considered to have sex appeal and show confidence.  Fashion is at the forefront of expressing gender on a spectrum. Today, gender is considered the societal perception of how a person expresses themselves, while sex deals with biological characteristics.  While gender is starting to be comprehended as a spectrum of expression, sex has historically been interpreted as binary using incorrect analyses of scientific observations of nature.  Even with the progress made for the rights of transgender and gender non-conforming individuals, sex remains a misunderstood concept. Perhaps art is the key to solving myths about sex, just as it is used to understand and express the spectrum of gender.  The challenge is allowing science and art to coexist while maintaining the objective integrity of science and the creativity of art.

After:

Fashion is a reflection of our societal state, evolving and changing in conjunction.  It is not uncommon for fashion and politics to cross paths. From political graphic t-shirts to modern cultural clothing, fashion is more than looking good; it’s about what it says to wear it.  Currently, one of the biggest waves in fashion is the crossing of gender norms.  Fashion is at the forefront of expressing gender on a wide spectrum, with women and men’s trends crossing aisles and androgenity all the rage. Gender is the way in which a person’s expression is interpreted by society, while sex deals with biological characteristics.  While gender is starting to be comprehended in a spectrum format, sex has historically been interpreted as binary using incorrect analyses of scientific observations of nature.  Even with the progress made for the rights of transgender and gender non-conforming individuals, sex remains a misunderstood concept. Just as fashion has aided in the expression and understanding of the gender spectrum, art of all forms is the key to solving myths about the binary construction of sex.  The challenge is allowing science and art to coexist while maintaining science’s objective integrity and the creativity of art.

Reflection:

I liked approaching my paragraph by looking for ways to simplify sentences. I noticed that by trimming down sentences even just a little bit, it allows for more complex sentences to shine. This exercise was also helping in finding ways to cut down my word count. My ideas are much clearer now because I only included aspects of sentences that were key to introducing my argument. I was also able to edit my thesis through this exercise.