Forwarding

In forwarding, another’s work is simply used for the project of another author. In his book Rewriting, Harris describes the process of using others work within your own writing. He describes forwarding using four categories: illustrating, authorizing, borrowing and extending. As far as his four ways of forwarding Harris describes how his each of these four uses can be used to benefit your writing.  When using a text as an illustration the author suggest that in addition to your argument other authors writing can be used as evidence to back up your argument, to illustrate your point. When using it as authorizing you are using the status of another writer to affirm your argument. Borrowing, Harris describes as a way of using the others idea to fit into your own personal argument. Lastly, Harris points out that you can use another text to extend upon your own writing.

Each of these can be used to forward another’s text but has a different purpose. Harris explains that forwarding ”tests the strength of its insights and the range and flexibility of its phrasing” (38). Showing that no matter what it is used for the text is used for a slightly different purpose than the original author intended. It is about adopting other forms of text to yours and using it in a different text to bring it to attention in different spheres. When using another text for you purposes the original purpose is always altered a bit because in each context the original statement takes on new connotations. The art of writing is to try to point out the author’s original purpose and how it can be altered to adapt for a different purpose. Harris explains that writing is a conversation, a way to bring new ideas to the table and point out the genius of idea that has already been proposed.