The wikipedia article on the Narváez expedition was informative, although obviously less so than A Land So Strange. However, the talk page brought up some interesting points that I wouldn’t have considered myself. Technically the Narváez expedition ended with Narváez’s death, but the iconic part doesn’t occur until after his demise. One commenter suggested that wikipedians could just write as much about the de Vaca journey on the Narváez expedition page as they could, and then break it up into two separate Wikipedia pages, one for the Narváez expedition and one for de Vaca journey. Interestingly, that never happened and the page is more heavily skewed towards the de Vaca journey.

At the top of the article it has a little window saying that it needs citations for verification. The citations and links the article did have all worked, although I think the references section is longer than the footnotes sections, which seems slightly problematic. The article isn’t rated, and it’s missing what I consider to be considerable information in the South Texas and Southwestern Northern America sections. It isn’t very clear and it has some gaps in events and time. Other than that, it seems neutral to me, although there hasn’t been a ton of heavy editing since it was written it seems.

In They Say, I Say by Gerald Graff, he sets out templates for convincing and good writing. One of his tips was to unbiasedly summarize the points of the author you’re referencing but highlight parts of their argument that are related to yours, in order to make your own argument stronger and clearer. The Buissert reading did this expertly, listing previous theories, and implying they were wrong or could be improved, and then builds his own argument. Creolization is the exchange of culture between Native Americans, Africans, and Europeans. Other scholars argued that it was a dominant (European) culture that was taking over a submissive (Native American) culture. He then goes into specific examples and counters previously established ideas proposed by the academics he had begun the passage with. I think his arguments were persuasive because he followed the format Graff lays out really well, and I think it’s a format that works. The Résendez reading was less formal, as it was the introduction to an account of a man’s journey rather than a scholarly article. I think what he says about Cabeza de Vaca really illustrates Buissert’s point because the Spanish party that comes across de Vaca and his remaining companions mistakes them for Natives at first, and they had taken some of the native culture, and the natives had learned from them a bit too.

In his essay “Only Connect…” Cronon declares that the goal of a liberal education is to “celebrate and nurture human freedom.” He considers this a widely accepted fact; it’s not an argument. The issue, according to Cronon, is in how we decide to reach that goal. Cronon is responding to the boards of various colleges and academic systems as a whole. He argues that liberal education is never complete and that it’s not a state that one can attain, but rather a journey to learn more. He also argues that liberal educations are advertised as to be for the individual, when they’re actually about community and making a difference in the world and something greater than ourselves. Cronon believes that as colleges set course requirements and post lists, they lose sight of their original goals about human freedom. He then lists qualities he thinks a liberally educated person should have, rather than required courses that person should take. His list is relatively similar to the TED talk we watched in class about how to have better conversations; they both include listening to the world and people around you, being curious, accessible rhetoric, open to learning about and from others, being supportive, and connection being the most important thing.

I personally found Cronon’s argument to be very compelling, in part because I already had similar views. His argument was also persuasive because he made his points clearly, accessibly, and they seemed passionate. He didn’t use any real world examples, other than referencing the college motto he thought was poor. He explained his arguments, even without the aid of specific real world examples, so I would say he still had evidence for his philosophy. The only part of his argument that I don’t necessarily agree with is the part about liberal education not being for the benefit of individuals. I think that while it’s true that liberal education empowers individuals who then empower the community, it’s also true that liberal education prepares you to do well for yourself without the community necessarily.