Digital Textbook

Chapter 1, Starting Off Strong

Section I: How to be a Successful Puentista, Writer, and Reader

Although many students find English classes stressful and frightening, reading and writing are forms of communication, just like speaking or texting. They are a way to connect with other people in an effort to share feelings and opinions, which is all to say that if you can speak, you can surely write.

Sure, it takes talent, at least partly, and it takes plenty of effort, but it’s a skill, and just like any other skill, it can be acquired through determination and improved through practice.

In the Fall, in an effort to build your confidence and target any weaknesses you may have when it comes to the language arts, we are enrolled in an extensive program meant to combine two classes, English A and English 84. If done successfully, each student will finish the semester feeling confident in the following arenas:

1.      Reading and comprehending non-fiction works,

2.      Responding to those readings by exercising our critical thinking muscles,

3.      Writing multi-paragraph, thesis-driven expository essays that have undergone revision,

4.      Reviewing fundamental grammar skills,

5.      Using MLA guidelines to properly format papers and to cite sources.

Then, in the Spring, we will continue to work together in the hopes of mastering college level English, so that you are best prepared to transfer. We will do this while tackling following objectives:

1.      Completing a research-based essay that has undergone multiple out-of-class revisions, demonstrating skills of analysis and synthesis,

2.      Integrating multiple sources, including a book-length work and a variety of academic databases, peer-reviewed journals, and scholarly websites,

3.      Crafting logical paragraphs and clean, clear sentences that illustrate proper mechanics.

These goals will be combined with our mission as Puentistas; as you know by now, the Puente Project is a transfer program with a rich thirty year history at El Camino College. The program is designed to increase the number of educationally underrepresented students who enroll in four year colleges and universities. Our ultimate hope is to help such students earn college degrees and then return to their communities as mentors and leaders.

Do these goals sound doable? Are they in line with your hopes for the year?

Section II: Using Goals to Stay Focused

A lot of students come to college with a general idea of how a degree will help their future, but they don’t have specific goals in mind for themselves. This can result in feeling lost and unmotivated; instead, try to identify what brought you to El Camino and to stay focused on that purpose and drive.

1.      What are my long term academic goals? (4-8 years from now)

Example: To receive a bachelor’s degree from UCLA in Biology and to then go to medical school.

2.      What are my mid-term goals at El Camino Community College? (1-3 years from now)

Example: To complete my IGETC courses in three years with a 3.0 GPA or higher. I also need to select a major and begin working on my prerequisites.

3.      What are my short term goals this semester?

Example: To pass both Professor Brenes’ English RWA and Professor Castro’s Counseling course and to find a job that works with my school schedule.

Now, whenever you begin to stagnate and stall, revisit these questions throughout the semester and remember what brought you to this life-changing decision to pursue your education. Translating these goals into actions and into plans will hopefully help you stay on track.

The best way to achieve any goal is to identify the motivation, make a plan, and begin immediately, but these goals must also be constructed in a way that makes them attainable. Try to following mnemonic device when creating a SMART plan:

Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, Timely

·        Specific: A specific goal has a much greater chance of being accomplished than a general goal. To set a specific goal you must answer the six “W” questions: Who is involved? What do I want to accomplish? Where must I go to make this dream a reality? When will I pursue it? And why will I do it?

EXAMPLE:  A general goal is “Get in shape.” A specific goal is “Buy a membership at the nearby yoga studio and workout 3 days a week with my sister.”

·        Measurable: When you measure your progress, you stay on track, reach your target dates, and experience the exhilaration of achievement that spurs continued effort. To determine if your goal is measurable, ask questions such as, How much? How many? How will I know when it is accomplished? This step is critical because it means accomplishing your goal will be tangible, something you can actually prove.

EXAMPLE: A general goal is “I want to be a better soccer player.” A specific goal is “I want to be able to kick the ball equally well with both my right and left foot by the end of the season.”)

·        Attainable: Goals that may have seemed far away and out of reach eventually move closer and become attainable, not because your goals shrink, but because you grow and expand to match them. When you list your goals you build your self-image. You see yourself as worthy of these goals, and develop the traits and personality that allow you to possess them. In other words: don’t simply pick a goal you think you can attain; believe you can attain the goal you’ve picked, and then make yourself that person.

·        Realistic: To be realistic, a goal must represent an objective toward which you are both willing and able to work. A goal can be both high and realistic; you are the only one who can decide just how high your goal should be. In fact, a high goal is frequently easier to reach than a low one because a low goal exerts low motivational force. Some of the hardest jobs you ever accomplished actually seem easy simply because they were a labor of love, and you were willing and able (those are truly the key words) to do everything you could to accomplish them.

Note: Additional ways to know if your goal is realistic is to determine if you have accomplished anything similar in the past or ask yourself what conditions would have to exist to accomplish this goal. For instance, it is probably unlikely that I can become a professional singer when I have done nothing in the past involving musical talent, but if I’ve graduated high school and already spent one successful year completing basic skills course at El Camino Community College, then there’s no reason to believe I can’t attain a degree in Journalism from UC Irvine.

·        Timely: A goal should be grounded within a time frame. With no time frame tied to it there’s no sense of urgency. If you want a new part-time job, when do you want it by? “Someday” won’t work. But if you anchor it within a timeframe, “by October 1st”, then you’ve set your unconscious mind into motion.

EXERCISE:

A.      Write Out Your Long Term Goal:

Be as specific, measurable, attainable, realistic, and timely as possible.

My long term academic goal is to: __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

B.     Write Out Your Mid-Term Goal: Perhaps list out all the courses you must pass before you can transfer or graduate, think about how you can be successful in these classes and use the SMART method of goal writing.

               While at El Camino College, I will:

               ______________________________________________________________________________               ______________________________________________________________________________               ______________________________________________________________________________

C.     Write Out Your Short-Term Goal. Write down 3 academic SMART goals you want to achieve THIS semester. (Remember: “I want to do a good job” is a general, non-measurable goal.)

               This semester, I will:

1.      ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

2.      ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

3.      ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

D.     Write Out an Action Plan: Identify one goal from item C. Write down three specific actions you could take towards achieving this goal. An action may be something you do all on your own or it might involve someone else, such as visiting the Puente tutor or organizing a regular study session with a classmate.

1.      ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

2.      ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

3.      ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Section III: Do You Have the Right Mindset for School?

I’ve missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times I’ve been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life and that is why I succeed. -Michael Jordan

Exercise 1: Let’s first prime the cognitive pump with a fun quiz. Do your best to answer the following questions. Then return to your answers at the end of this section and see if you have a growth mindset or a fixed mindset.

Place a check in the column that identifies how you feel about each statement.

	Strongly Agree	Agree	Disagree	Strongly Disagree
Your intelligence is something you cannot change about yourself. People are born smart or they aren’t.
The harder you work at something, the better you’ll be at it.
Only a few people will ever truly be good at sports—athletes are born with those skills.
Math is much easier to learn if you are male because our culture has taught them to value those skills more.
Our core personalities and who we are cannot be changed.
Trying out new things is really stressful for me and I do my best to avoid it.
I appreciate when my parents, coaches, or teachers give me feedback on my performance.
Truly smart people don’t need to try hard in school.

Come back later and think about your answers. Is your mindset right for school? Are you ready for growth and change?

Exercise 2:

Before completing the following readings, consider the following and then take a moment to write down your thoughts, so you can share them tomorrow. Keep those pontifications in mind as you read the essay below and think about how mindset, failure, and the bravery to try can perhaps make you a better student.

ü  What is something you know now, that you had to practice and practice to learn?

ü  What did you do when you made a mistake as you were learning?

ü  When was a time you challenged yourself to learn something that was hard for you?

ü  Can you think of anyone famous who grew his or her brain through practicing, making mistakes, and challenging themselves?

ü  What is something you are going to learn this year that will take practice and determination to master?

Free Write: ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Necessary Vocabulary for Reading:

ü  Fixed Mindset: According to psychologist Carol Dweck, "In a fixed mindset, students believe their basic abilities, their intelligence, their talents, are just fixed traits. They have a certain amount and that's that, and then their goal becomes to look smart all the time and never look dumb.”

ü  Growth Mindset: Alternatively to a fixed mindset, when in a growth mindset, people believe that their most basic abilities can be developed through dedication and hard work—brains and talent are just the starting point; effort can take them much further. This view creates a love of learning and a resilience that is essential for true success and long term achievement. People who believe they can learn more or become smarter if they work hard and persevere, according to research, learn more, learn more quickly, and view challenges and failures as opportunities to improve their learning and skills.

Assigned Reading #1: “The Art of Failing Successfully” by Jonah Lehrer

(As you read, please circle any words that are new to you, so we can add them to our vocabulary. Also, write a question mark next to anything confusing and an exclamation mark next to anything you really agree with or want to talk about tomorrow; last but not least, if you find a heart line (a sentence you just LOVE), underline or highlight it. J)

               Bob Dylan once declared that "there's no success like failure." At first glance, this line makes no sense: Success is the opposite of failure. Or is it?

               Mr. Dylan's lyric neatly summarizes an essential principle of education, which is that students learn best when they make mistakes. There's no shortcut around this unpleasant process. But not every failure is created equal. Some people are able to translate their failures into success, while others fail again and again. Why are some people so much more effective at learning from their errors?

               In recent years, scientists have discovered that every mistake generates two distinct reactions within the brain. The first reaction is called error-related negativity (ERN). It appears about 50 milliseconds after a screw-up and is mostly involuntary. The second signal, which is known as error positivity (Pe), arrives anywhere between 100 to 500 milliseconds after the failure. This signal occurs when we pay attention to the error, dwelling on the disappointing result.

               It turns out that subjects learn much more effectively when their brains demonstrate two properties: (1) a larger ERN signal, suggesting a more potent initial response to the mistake, and (2) a more consistent Pe signal, which means that they are focusing on the failure and thus trying to learn from it. A new study, led by the psychologist Jason Moser at Michigan State University, extends this research by looking at how beliefs about education shape these signals in the brain. He tested a dichotomy first proposed by Carol Dweck, a psychologist at Stanford. In her influential research, Dr. Dweck distinguishes between people with a fixed mindset—they agree with statements such as "You have a certain amount of intelligence and cannot do much to change it"—and those with a growth mindset, who believe that they can get better at almost anything, provided they invest the necessary time and energy.

               While people with a fixed mindset tend to see failures as purely negative—a sign that they aren't talented enough for the task—those with a growth mindset see mistakes as an essential precursor to knowledge, the engine of education.

               Dr. Moser's experiment involved giving subjects a tedious cognitive test in which they had to identify sequences of letters. The tediousness was the point: Dr. Moser wanted subjects to get bored and to make silly mistakes. Subjects with a growth mindset generated a much larger Pe signal following a mistake and became far more accurate over time.

               How can we instill the right mindset in students? Dr. Dweck has shown that even seemingly minor cues can have a dramatic influence. She randomly assigned several hundred fifth-graders to two different praise conditions.

               One group was routinely praised for "being smart." They tended to slip into a fixed mindset, assuming that mistakes were a sign of stupidity, that there was nothing redeeming about failure.

               By contrast, students praised for their effort tended to pursue a growth model of learning. (Teaching kids about neural plasticity—how the brain changes in response to experience—can also induce this mindset.) They were much less scared of making mistakes and routinely transformed failure into success.

               On a standardized test, those praised for effort scored 30% higher after a few months, while the children praised for their smarts saw their scores drop nearly 20%. The wrong mindset had made them regress. The psychologist David Nussbaum has shown that whether we tend to learn from mistakes or brush them aside, the response is rooted in repairing our self-esteem. Failure is never fun, but success requires that we learn to fight through our frustration and find the upside of error.

               Dylan was right, but failure alone is not enough. We need to learn how to fail better.

Assigned Reading #2: “What Having a Growth Mindset Really Means” by Carol Dweck

            Scholars are deeply gratified when their ideas catch on. And they are even more gratified when their ideas make a difference — improving motivation, innovation, or productivity, for example. But popularity has a price: people sometimes distort ideas, and therefore fail to reap their benefits. This has started to happen with my research on “growth” versus “fixed” mindsets among individuals and within organizations.

               To briefly sum up the findings: Individuals who believe their talents can be developed (through hard work, good strategies, and input from others) have a growth mindset. They tend to achieve more than those with a more fixed mindset (those who believe their talents are innate gifts). This is because they worry less about looking smart and they put more energy into learning. When entire companies embrace a growth mindset, their employees report feeling far more empowered and committed; they also receive far greater organizational support for collaboration and innovation. In contrast, people at primarily fixed-mindset companies report more of only one thing: cheating and deception among employees, presumably to gain an advantage in the talent race.

               In the wake of these findings, “growth mindset” has become a buzzword in many major companies, even working its way into their mission statements. But when I probe, I often discover that people’s understanding of the idea is limited. Let’s take a look at three common misconceptions.

1. I already have it, and I always have. People often confuse a growth mindset with being flexible or open-minded or with having a positive outlook — qualities they believe they’ve simply always had. My colleagues and I call this a false growth mindset. Everyone is actually a mixture of fixed and growth mindsets, and that mixture continually evolves with experience. A “pure” growth mindset doesn’t exist, which we have to acknowledge in order to attain the benefits we seek.
2. A growth mindset is just about praising and rewarding effort. This isn’t true for students in schools, and it’s not true for employees in organizations. In both settings, outcomes matter. Unproductive effort is never a good thing. It’s critical to reward not just effort but learning and progress, and to emphasize the processes that yield these things, such as seeking help from others, trying new strategies, and capitalizing on setbacks to move forward effectively. In all of our research, the outcome — the bottom line — follows from deeply engaging in these processes.
3. Just espouse a growth mindset, and good things will happen. Mission statements are wonderful things. You can’t argue with lofty values like growth, empowerment, or innovation. But what do they mean to employees if the company doesn’t implement policies that make them real and attainable? They just amount to lip service. Organizations that embody a growth mindset encourage appropriate risk-taking, knowing that some risks won’t work out. They reward employees for important and useful lessons learned, even if a project does not meet its original goals. They support collaboration across organizational boundaries rather than competition among employees or units. They are committed to the growth of every member, not just in words but in deeds, such as broadly available development and advancement opportunities. And they continually reinforce growth mindset values with concrete policies.

               Even if we correct these misconceptions, it’s still not easy to attain a growth mindset. One reason why is we all have our own fixed-mindset triggers. When we face challenges, receive criticism, or fare poorly compared with others, we can easily fall into insecurity or defensiveness, a response that inhibits growth. Our work environments, too, can be full of fixed-mindset triggers. A company that plays the talent game makes it harder for people to practice growth-mindset thinking and behavior, such as sharing information, collaborating, innovating, seeking feedback, or admitting errors.

               To remain in a growth zone, we must identify and work with these triggers. Many managers and executives have benefited from learning to recognize when their fixed-mindset “persona” shows up and what it says to make them feel threatened or defensive. Most importantly, over time they have learned to talk back to it, persuading it to collaborate with them as they pursue challenging goals.

               It’s hard work, but individuals and organizations can gain a lot by deepening their understanding of growth-mindset concepts and the processes for putting them into practice. It gives them a richer sense of who they are, what they stand for, and how they want to move forward.

Exercise 3:

Before completing these exercises, watch the assigned videos and read the BLOG articles dictated by the syllabus. Then, reframe the following statements as positive and growth based rather than negative, deficit focused statements.

Example:

Fixed: I didn’t want a “D” on my math test, but I guess it’s good enough.

Growth: Math is difficult, but it doesn’t mean settling for anything less than my best. I am capable of getting great grades if I work harder._______________________________________________

1.      Fixed: I will never be able to transfer. 

Growth: __________________________________________________________________________.

2.      Fixed: I’m a weak reader.

Growth: __________________________________________________________________________.

3.      Fixed: College may not be for me.

Growth: __________________________________________________________________________.

Now dig deep. What fixed mindset statements do you tell yourself often and how can you revise them?

Fixed: _______________________________________________________________________________.

Growth: _____________________________________________________________________________.

Fixed: _______________________________________________________________________________.

Growth: _____________________________________________________________________________.

BLUE BOOK WRITING! Post Reading Questions: We will check the answers above in class, and you will be held accountable for completing each exercise. For the questions below, however, I would like you to draft a reflective, first person paragraph answering 2 of the 4 questions; you should pull from the readings above and/or the videos and exercises. Do this writing in your blue book. This should take about 30-45 minutes and you should yield 2-3 pages of strong writing.

1. When do you feel smart? When you’re doing something flawlessly or when you’re learning something new? How can you make striving, stretching, and struggling into something that makes you feel smart?

2. Did you ever label yourself as a failure or a loser after something negative happened like failing a test or losing a job or being rejected by a friend? Describe a time in which this happened and consider how you could’ve confronted the situation with a growth mindset instead.

3. Are you a person who tends to avoid trying new things? Or trying at all? Many people are afraid to give something important their full effort—they defeat themselves before they even begin in order to avoid failure. Think of specific examples where you may have done this to yourself and discuss how you can attempt to correct this behavior.

4. Think of something about yourself that you’ve been wanting to change. What is it? Has a fixed mindset prevented you from doing this? Think about it now from a growth mindset and create a concrete plan for change.

The Big Picture Take Away: As you face difficult learning challenges during this semester and next, please remind yourself that you can grow your brain by practicing, making mistakes, and not giving up. If you are feeling discouraged or find yourself thinking that you are “dumb” or “stupid,” come talk to me, see Griselda, or talk to a fellow Puentista or your mentor.

Section IV: Stay Inspired

Don't Let the Spirit Crushers Get You Down By Robin Abcarian

The spirit crushers are everywhere.
Sometimes they are your parents, sometimes teachers. Often they are your bosses. They can just as easily be friends or colleagues.
Spirit crushers are the ones who tell you why you can't do what you dream of doing. That you can't possibly succeed. That you should try, oh, learning to type when what you really want to learn is neuroscience.
Who knows what makes them tick. Self-loathing? Arrogance? A misguided sense of preparing you for the harshness of the real world?
Doesn't matter. They always leave a mark.
My friend Alison is one of the smartest people I know. She crossed paths with a spirit crusher in her first college class. He was a teaching assistant in a humanities class at UC Berkeley. He graded the very first paper she wrote.
She doesn't remember what grade she got.
But she will never forget his scrawl across the page, seared into her memory like a brand: "Your problem is you don't know how to think."
Her reaction?
"It was actually devastating," she says. "I won't ever forget it. I thought, why bother? I should just drop out of school."
This is the season when students return in droves to school, and schools are often where spirit crushers reign.
I wish there were some sort of inoculation against them. But all you've got are your wits.
You may not be able to control the "helpful" impulses of the spirit crushers, but you can learn not to be ruined.
Six years ago, Jo Anne Tracy, single mother to a 6-year-old boy, was an undergraduate at UC Santa Cruz, dreaming of becoming a researcher. She earned money doing clerical work at the school's "re-entry center," which provided support to returning students.
Her spirit crusher was a man who worked as a counselor (!) at the school.
"One day, I went in very excitedly to tell him about a professor who had just told me I should apply for graduate school," Tracy says. "He was shocked--just stunned--and he started an argument with me. He ranted and raved and finally said, 'Let's face it, Jo Anne, you're just not graduate school material.'
"I felt devastated. . . . I knew I had to go out right away and find people to tell me more encouraging things or it would kill me."
Five years ago, Jack Riley was a first-year student in a Ph.D. program. He was captivated with the idea of studying the Soviet Union.
Until he had a conversation with a man who he describes as a "shining beacon of all Russian research." Riley was complaining to the man that he was having trouble compiling research for his dissertation prospectus.
"His response to me was, 'You don't know pain and suffering and you are never going to be a good Sovietologist because you have learned your Russian out of a book. And your people have not suffered enough.' It was just a crushing blow," Riley says. "To this day, I'm sure he has no idea how devastating and insulting his comments were."
Some of us are better than others at developing an internal voice that drowns out the roar of the spirit crushers.
Jo Anne Tracy made a beeline for people she knew would encourage her, and, next spring, when she is 35, she will receive her doctorate in neuroscience from USC.
Jack Riley, 30, found a sympathetic ear in another adviser, who offered him the opportunity to work on a project involving international drug policy. Riley, who completed his doctorate, hopes to publish a book--his first--on the international cocaine trade this year.
"I'm so happy with what I do now," Riley says. "I should probably send that guy a thank-you note." And my friend Alison finished college anyway--she graduated with honors and became a newspaper editor, arguably a profession that requires the ability to think.
The spirit crushers are always out there, always ready to pounce on your aspirations, to tell you why you aren't good enough.
But they're kind of like the bogyman. They only have power if you believe in them.
So don't believe in them. After all, they don't believe in you.

Chapter 2, The Foundation

One cannot start writing confidently or collegiately until they have laid down the proper foundation. First, they need a process, and then they must understand the building blocks of essays. Those things will be covered in this chapter.  

 

Section I: The Writing Process

Although procrastinating is a popular method for many students, writing requires time and patience. Doing so with confidence and mastery, in the hopes of crafting a paper one can be proud of, is resultant from engaging in a multi-step process, which include the following:

1.      Exploring ideas

a.      Consider your subject

b.      Consider your purpose

c.      Consider your audience

2.      Prewriting

a.      Clustering

b.      Brainstorming

c.      Outlining

3.      Drafting

a.      Freewriting

b.      Inserting notes and new ideas along the margins

4.      Revising

a.      Review with fresh, critical eyes

b.      Read aloud to catch errors

c.      Add details a reader may need or want

d.      Remove superfluity

e.      Move and rearrange paragraphs and sentences for flow and organization

f.       Substitute weak words for more effective and illustrative ones

5.      Edit & Publish

a.      Proofread with a careful eye, focusing on one line at a time

b.      Check for mechanics

The Writing Process Expanded (With Exercises to Help with Our Upcoming Assignment)

Once you’ve reviewed the expectations of your assignment and decided on a subject, it’s important to begin capturing your thoughts on paper or on the computer screen. During this creative stage, don’t weigh yourself down with grammar or trying to pick the perfect word. Instead, just hurry to jot down all the fresh thoughts that come to mind. Just let the words flow, allowing your ideas to develop and take shape and root. My true hope is that this stage is fun! It should be.

Brainstorming: One popular way to prewrite is to brainstorm, or to simply list thoughts as they come to you. Go ahead and give it a try. If I asked you to write me a paper about success and how it can be achieved, what thoughts come first to mind:

Sometimes, when you hit a wall during drafting, it’s beneficial to return back to this phase of the writing process and begin again.

Clustering: For visual students, clustering can be a really generative activity. Begin by putting your topic in a circle in the middle of the page and then add related ideas as they occur to you. We call these associations branches.

Talent  Mindse

Success

Luck

Just keeping adding more and more branches as ideas pop into your head, and don’t worry about judging the quality of those ideas. Everything’s allowed in prewriting. Go ahead and try now. I started some of the branches for you!

Freewriting

Simply write about the subject as long as you can without any concern for sentence structure, spelling, logic and grammar. Most students find it freeing to write it just as they would speak about it.

Selecting and Outlining

Now that your ideas are roughly captured, you can select which ones you think will be viable inclusions for your paper. Reflect on the larger purpose of the paper and on the needs and expectations of your audience when making this consideration.

After decided what to focus on, make a rough outline to follow during the drafting process. An outline may look something like the following:

I.                 Success and Education

a.      Education is needed to become professionally successful.

                                                    i.     Sonia Sotomayor (The first Latina Supreme Court Justice)

                                                   ii.     Personal Example: Food Handler’s license and my promotion at work

b.      Education can help someone practice the skills needed for later success.

                                                    i.     Going to school takes long term goal planning. So does succeeding in the work place

                                                   ii.     TED talk on “Grit” as an example

II.               Success and Effort

a.      Einstein quote about perspiration and inspiration

b.      Michael Jordan’s ascent to basketball greatness

                                                    i.     He didn’t make his junior high team but kept trying.

                                                   ii.     Wayne Gretsky quote shows this is true in all kinds of sports: “You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.”

c.      Personal experience about my time at ECC and having to take English 82 twice

III.              Success and Money

a.      Life is easier if you’re successful

                                                    i.     Money, Vacation Time, Insurance, Job Security, Marriage Longevity

Drafting

After you’ve completed the prewriting stage, selected your best ideas, and arranged them in some reasonable order, you may confidently begin the first draft. Don’t worry about writing something perfect—you’re still not at that step of the process yet. Instead, write as a means of self-discovery. Allow the drafting to encourage and invite new ideas to the page, and encourage yourself to use your instinctual voice. Revision is where you will correct the work. This is a time of creation.

Revision

The most important step to revising is taking time in between drafts, which means that waiting until the last minute is seriously unwise. Allowing yourself to see your work with fresh, rested eye most often means the difference between catching and changing an error and not. Another helpful tip includes printing out your typed draft and revising in pen and paper rather than editing directly on the screen. As you review your work, look out for things to cut, circle words that look misplaced or misused, consider what could be added or moved. Then, read your work aloud. Looking through the text as many times as possible is an important part of revision.

Editing and Proofreading

You’ve made it to the last step of the process. All that’s left is carefully examining your last, clean copy. One of the easiest ways to do this is by placing a piece of paper directly on top of your work, covering everything but the line you are rereading.

Exercise 1

BLUE BOOK WRITING ACTIVITY:

Using the process described above, draft a paragraph answering one of the following two questions. Write it directly into your blue book. Be ready to show it to your peers, your professor, or a writing tutor. Focus on each step of the writing process, and, in the end, reflect on whether or not the process helped you write.

Prompt 1: Have you had to choose between conflicting influences in your upbringing?  For instance, have you experienced a clash of cultures or the blending of different cultural traditions?  Have you experienced the conflict of different customs or ways of looking at the world?  How have these conflicts shaped or molded you?  Think of your readers as interested adults who may not know the details or nuances of the cultures or customs you may be exploring

Prompt 2: Write about a turning point in your life.  For instance, has a serious illness, a major accident or the addition of a new family member changed your life?  Have you experienced a conversion to or a leaving behind of religious faith?  Have you survived a great change of some sort?  Or was it a small change that had a great impact?  Note how your life was different before and after the event.  Explore not only the large or obvious changes, but the subtle shifts in your thinking too.  Remember, the subtle understandings you portray make you and your story unique.  Your audience may be young adults/college students also reflective about their own lives. 

Section II: The Anatomy of a Paragraph

Although there is much room in writing for creativity and customization, most paragraphs follow a basic structure, particularly body paragraphs.

First, there are Topic Sentences, which identify the subject of the paragraph and what it will cover. Topic Sentences should be general enough to cover all the ideas in a paragraph but specific enough to be covered in a single body paragraph.

Let’s practice topic sentences now! Narrow each of the following broad ideas into a topic sentence that could be explored and properly covered within the compass of one body paragraph. As you attempt these exercises, try to express an attitude of an opinion. For an added challenge, attempt to do so without using “I.”

Example: An important lesson for teenagers.

Possible Topic Sentence: It is dangerous to text and drive. 

Now, you try:

1.      Your favorite summer memory: ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

2.      The best food in Torrance:

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

3.      Something you’d like to save up and buy:

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Now that we understand topic sentences, next come Supporting Sentences. Supporting sentences tell the reader something important and narrower about the subject of the paragraph. These are the (P)oints you’re trying to make about your topic sentence.

Supporting Sentences need details and (E)xamples and (E)vidence. Always have more than one example or detail for each supporting sentence.

Now let’s practice supporting sentences by completing the following paragraphs with the sentences they are missing.

1. Topic Sentence: Working while going to school can be difficult.

Supporting Detail: ______________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________.

Explain and Expand: ______________________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________.

Conclusion Sentence: If a student must work, they should try to work only part time and for a company that is flexible with scheduling.

2. Topic Sentence: ____________________________________________________________________________.

Supporting Detail: New cars require less maintenance, and many have better gas mileage than cars that have been in use for a long time.

Explain and Expand: Many car buyers don’t realize how expensive caring for a vehicle can be, nor do they consider the price of gas needed for less effective used cars.

Conclusion Sentence: ____________________________________________________________________________.  

If a paragraph were a hamburger, the topic and conclusion sentences would be the bun, the evidence and examples would be the hamburger patty itself, and the transition words would be the awesome secret sauce that ties it all together! Commonly thought of as bridges, transition words are important because they keep your ideas moving and connecting. This is what allows for paragraph unity. “In addition,” “furthermore,” and “next” are common choices, and they encourage flow and movement. As we continue on, I will often give you lists of helpful transition words and phrases, but chances are, you already know a few. List those now:

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Last but not least, Concluding Sentences have many important functions. Like your topic sentence, they leave the reader with an overall impression of the paragraph’s purpose, and they also (L)ink back to whatever idea you started with or whatever idea you’d like to explore next. They end on the “big picture.” When you see the sample paragraph below, you’ll really have to consider whether the conclusion is effective.

Other things to bear in mind:

·        The first line of a paragraph should be indented

·        Paragraphs should be double spaced

·        1” margins are a must

·        Times New Roman, 12 point font, and left alignment is important.

·        They should follow a four line header that goes as follows: student name, instructor name, class, and date.

Exercise I: Sample Paragraph

Cookie Monster

Professor Brenes

English RWA

31 May 2016

Christmas Chaos

            Opening presents Christmas morning in my childhood home was always chaotic. The main reason it was crazy was because there were no rules. We didn’t have to turns or open our stockings first. Nor did we have to wait for others to catch up to us. The event was a free for all. We simply dove in and started tearing gifts open. The abundance of gifts made the experience crazy as well. Christmas shouldn’t really be about gifts though! Because my mother shopped throughout the year, there were always a ton of gifts. In no time, gifts littered the floor making it difficult to move around. The discarded wrapping paper added to the mess and disorder. In addition, our own excitement added to the confusing nature of the occasion. We would squeal with delight, shout out someone’s name when we found it on a gift, give hugs and “thank you’s” all while my mother would try to figure out who had opened what. Even our dog added to the excitement. He barked and played with the wrapping paper or a new squeaking toy. Despite the craziness of opening gifts, I wouldn’t change it one bit because it was fun. Christmas is an important holiday.

Exercise 2: Edit and Revise

Step 1: Identify which sentences are topic sentences, conclusion sentences, supporting sentences, details, and which parts are transitions. Mark or color code them now.

Step 2: What would you do to revise this paragraph? Add your enhancements directly on to the paragraph. 

BLUE BOOK WRITING! Step 3: Return to the two paragraphs you drafted in class on growth mindset. In many ways, you’ve already tackled the many steps of the writing process with these two small pieces of writing (you pre-wrote as you read, your drafted at home in your blue book, and you underwent edits and revision with the help of our writing tutors), but, chances are, the paragraphs are still imperfect. No first draft, after all, is ideal. Using what you learned from this chapter, reopen that document, and write a new, polished, improved version of your favorite one of the two. The MLA formatted version of this one paragraph is due at the next class session; please print it and label each part of the PEEL paragraph. Bear in mind that this paragraph will be graded as your first five point writing assignment.

Section III: Shitty First Drafts

Just as before, we are practicing our college level reading skills, which means you must actively engage with the text by picking up a pencil and getting involved as you consume this information. Accordingly, please circle any words that are new to you. Look them up and see if you can begin using them! Also, practice annotation by writing a question mark next to anything confusing and an exclamation mark next to anything you really agree with or want to talk about in class; last but not least, if you find a heart line (a sentence you just LOVE), underline or highlight it. I ask you to at least find one!

“Shitty First Drafts” by Anne Lamotte

               Now, practically even better news than that of short assignments is the idea of shitty first drafts. All good writers write them. This is how they end up with good second drafts and terrific third drafts. People tend to look at successful writers who are getting their books published and maybe even doing well financially and think that they sit down at their desks every morning feeling like a million dollars, feeling great about who they are and how much talent they have and what a great story they have to tell; that they take in a few deep breaths, push back their sleeves, roll their necks a few times to get all the cricks out, and dive in, typing fully formed passages as fast as a court reporter. But this is just the fantasy of the uninitiated. I know some very great writers, writers you love who write beautifully and have made a great deal of money, and not one of them sits down routinely feeling wildly enthusiastic and confident. Not one of them writes elegant first drafts. All right, one of them does, but we do not like her very much. We do not think that she has a rich inner life or that God likes her or can even stand her. (Although when I mentioned this to my priest friend Tom, he said you can safely assume you've created God in your own image when it turns out that God hates all the same people you do.)

               Very few writers really know what they are doing until they've done it. Nor do they go about their business feeling dewy and thrilled. They do not type a few stiff warm-up sentences and then find themselves bounding along like huskies across the snow. One writer I know tells me that he sits down every morning and says to himself nicely, "It's not like you don't have a choice, because you do -- you can either type, or kill yourself." We all often feel like we are pulling teeth, even those writers whose prose ends up being the most natural and fluid. The right words and sentences just do not come pouring out like ticker tape most of the time. Now, Muriel Spark is said to have felt that she was taking dictation from God every morning -- sitting there, one supposes, plugged into a Dictaphone, typing away, humming. But this is a very hostile and aggressive position. One might hope for bad things to rain down on a person like this.

               For me and most of the other writers I know, writing is not rapturous. In fact, the only way I can get anything written at all is to write really, really shitty first drafts.

               The first draft is the child's draft, where you let it all pour out and then let it romp all over the place, knowing that no one is going to see it and that you can shape it later. You just let this childlike part of you channel whatever voices and visions come through and onto the page. If one of the characters wants to say, "Well, so what, Mr. Poopy Pants?," you let her. No one is going to see it. If the kid wants to get into really sentimental, weepy, emotional territory, you let him. Just get it all down on paper because there may be something great in those six crazy pages that you would never have gotten to by more rational, grown-up means. There may be something in the very last line of the very last paragraph on page six that you just love, that is so beautiful or wild that you now know what you're supposed to be writing about, more or less, or in what direction you might go -- but there was no way to get to this without first getting through the first five and a half pages.

               I used to write food reviews for California magazine before it folded. (My writing food reviews had nothing to do with the magazine folding, although every single review did cause a couple of canceled subscriptions. Some readers took umbrage at my comparing mounds of vegetable puree with various ex-presidents' brains.) These reviews always took two days to write. First I'd go to a restaurant several times with a few opinionated, articulate friends in tow. I'd sit there writing down everything anyone said that was at all interesting or funny. Then on the following Monday I'd sit down at my desk with my notes and try to write the review. Even after I'd been doing this for years, panic would set in. I'd try to write a lead, but instead I'd write a couple of dreadful sentences, XX them out, try again, XX everything out, and then feel despair and worry settle on my chest like an x-ray apron. It's over, I'd think calmly. I'm not going to be able to get the magic to work this time. I'm ruined. I'm through. I'm toast. Maybe, I'd think, I can get my old job back as a clerk-typist. But probably not. I'd get up and study my teeth in the mirror for a while. Then I'd stop, remember to breathe, make a few phone calls, hit the kitchen and chow down. Eventually I'd go back and sit down at my desk, and sigh for the next ten minutes. Finally I would pick up my one-inch picture frame, stare into it as if for the answer, and every time the answer would come: all I had to do was to write a really shitty first draft of, say, the opening paragraph. And no one was going to see it.

               So I'd start writing without reining myself in. It was almost just typing, just making my fingers move. And the writing would be terrible. I'd write a lead paragraph that was a whole page, even though the entire review could only be three pages long, and then I'd start writing up descriptions of the food, one dish at a time, bird by bird, and the critics would be sitting on my shoulders, commenting like cartoon characters. They'd be pretending to snore, or rolling their eyes at my overwrought descriptions, no matter how hard I tried to tone those descriptions down, no matter how conscious I was of what a friend said to me gently in my early days of restaurant reviewing. "Annie," she said, "it is just a piece of chicken. It is just a bit of cake."

               But because by then I had been writing for so long, I would eventually let myself trust the process -- sort of, more or less. I'd write a first draft that was maybe twice as long as it should be, with a self-indulgent and boring beginning, stupefying descriptions of the meal, lots of quotes from my black-humored friends that made them sound more like the Manson girls than food lovers, and no ending to speak of.

               The whole thing would be so long and incoherent and hideous that for the rest of the day I'd obsess about getting creamed by a car before I could write a decent second draft. I'd worry that people would read what I'd written and believe that the accident had really been a suicide, that I had panicked because my talent was waning and my mind was shot. The next day, I'd sit down, go through it all with a colored pen, take out everything I possibly could, find a new lead somewhere on the second page, figure out a kicky place to end it, and then write a second draft. It always turned out fine, sometimes even funny and weird and helpful. I'd go over it one more time and mail it in. Then, a month later, when it was time for another review, the whole process would start again, complete with the fears that people would find my first draft before I could rewrite it.  Almost all good writing begins with terrible first efforts. You need to start somewhere. Start by getting something -- anything -- down on paper. A friend of mine says that the first draft is the down draft -- you just get it down. The second draft is the up draft -- you fix it up. You try to say what you have to say more accurately. And the third draft is the dental draft, where you check every tooth, to see if it's loose or cramped or decayed, or even, God help us, healthy.

The Big Picture Take Away: As you struggle to grow as a writer this year, please trust in the process. Teachers may have tried to make this work for you before, and it may have failed, but now is the time to try again. It will work if you work it, and I promise I wouldn’t teach it to you if I didn’t know for a fact that it made writing easier.

Chapter 3, From Paragraphs to Essays

Section I: What is an Essay?

After spending time working with paragraphs, we can now turn our attention to the essay- an organized discussion of a subject that is broken down into a series of paragraphs, which target and highlight smaller issues related to a larger, central concept. While the paragraph, which we have been attempting master, explores limited topics, an essay explores broader issues, which it introduces in a central claim called a thesis statement. That thesis statement is then illustrated and clarified in the paragraphs that follow it. As a result, the thesis statement helps unify and a shape a multi-faceted, fully developed discussion.

Although the essay is very different than a single paragraph, it has many structural similarities, such as:

·        An Introduction – that is, the first part of the essay—attracts reader’s interest. (If we were following the P-E-E-L method, the intro paragraph would work much like the (P)oint).

·        The Body – typically, three paragraphs but often more, develops or supports the thesis statement by focusing on its smaller parts. (Here’s where we provide (E)vidence and (E)xplanation).

·        The Conclusion—the last paragraph of the essay—ties all the ideas together and gracefully ends the paper. (This paragraph (L)inks everything together).

Here’s a visual blueprint:

Now that the long form essay has hopefully been demystified, let’s take a closer look at the introduction paragraph and its two most important and challenging sentences, the attention getter and the thesis statement. After all, you can only make a first impression once.

Section II: The Introduction Paragraph, Attention Getters, Titles, and Thesis Statements

Let’s begin with the attention getter (also known as a “hook”) because although many students struggle with crafting that first, intimidating line, they can actually be quite fun, and they are an opportunity to let your personality shine. One tip, however, is to save your introduction, its first fun line, and even your title until your essay is complete. As you draft, you may think of a better way to grab your readers, set your tone, and establish your focus.

Regardless, whenever the time does come to write that eye-popping introduction, here are some suggestions:

1)     Ask a provocative or perhaps even disturbing question (bear in mind your audience) or pose a series of related questions to direct the readers’ attention to your key points. The trick is to not use personal pronouns like “I” or “you.”

Example: Should the young American voter support Hilary Clinton or Donald Trump? Should they choose liberal concepts or conservative ones? Should they side with the establishment or a rogue new voice? What are they to do?

2)     Begin with a dramatic or engaging anecdote or an example that is relevant to your thesis.

Example: The penal system in the United States is a product of institutional racism and sexism because it too often protects the rights of the empowered majority versus the needs of the victim. For example, during a rape trial, the defense attorney can question the victim about his or her sexual past, but the prosecuting lawyer is forbidden by law to mention a defendants previous rape charges. This is only one example of an unjust inequity built into the justice system.

3)     Offer a quotation that ties into your thesis.

                       Example: As Indira Gandhi once said, “An eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind.”                                         This truth is important to remember when discussing whether or not capital punishment                          should be condoned by the US government.

4)     Cite a shocking statistic or fact.

               Example: A growing number of Americans are living to age 100. Nationwide, the           centenarian population has grown 65.8 percent over the past three decades, from        32,194 people who were age 100 or older in 1980 to 53,364 centenarians in 2010,          according to new Census Bureau data.

5)     Start by arguing. Debunk a common myth or widely held misconception.

                  Example: Many people believe that only homosexual males and drug users are in                                   danger of contracting HIV and AIDS, but this is simply untrue. In fact, many                                              heterosexuals suffer from this terribly debilitating disease. Furthermore, the number                                   of heterosexuals who test positive for HIV has increased substantially over the past                               decade proving that it is time for the American public to grow more informed about                              the contraction, prevention, and treatment of AIDS.

6)     Begin with an anecdote. An anecdote is a brief story that ties into the subject of your essay; it can help personalize a topic for a reader, and make it relatable.

               Example: if your essay is about the appeal of fantasy football, you can start by writing,                "The first time Mike remembers doing it, he was 18, and it took     two grueling hours to              get through it. The next time, it only took an hour because he was better at it, as are    millions of fantasy football fans who have learned through trial and error how to draft    their teams."

Exercise I: On a document you’ve already designated for your next upcoming full length assignment, try three of these six techniques. In writing workshop, you can edit and revise these with a peer or a tutor.

…Now that you’ve drafted, let’s double check your work. Keep in mind that your introduction should NEVER do any of the following faux pas:

ü  DON’T make an announcement. Avoid opening comments like, “I am writing this essay because…”

ü  DON’T prolong your introduction unnecessarily. Keep it simple and keep it short. As a general rule of thumb, an introduction that is longer than a page probably sounds long winded.

ü  DON’T discourage your readers from continuing on. Be more confident than that. Nothing’s worse than an essay that begins shyly, “I’m not expert, but…”

ü  DON’T act over casual or overly chatty. You want to be yourself and exercise your personal voice but it shouldn’t sound like you’re texting or just talking to a friend, unrehearsed and unpolished.

Titles

Writing a good title is a big deal! It’s your first impression, and an effective writer wants to take advantage of that opportunity to start off on the right foot. Your essay title has a big job; it needs to directly and specifically indicate your topic and prepare your reader for the essay that follows. It also must provide an incentive for continued reading. All that being said, a straight forward title that simply but accurately describes your topic and style of approach will never fail you.

Take for instance, the plainly stated: Why State Lotteries are Unfair to the Poor

It suggests that this essay will be cause and effect, and it also suggests an argument and a strong opinion. In that regard, it’s extremely effective.

For other writing situations, you may need to revise the wording. You may also want to inject more personality and panache. Here are some ways to do that:

1)      Ask a question: Who Plays the Lottery?

2)      Use Alliteration: Lotteries: Dreaming about Dollars

3)      Use a Play on Words, Be Catchy or Humorous (only if the situation allows): Playing to Lose

Exercise II: Try now, on the same document as before, with the topic we are currently writing about. Good luck crafting an attention grabbing title!

The Thesis Statement

Now that you’ve mastered the first line of the introductory paragraph, you have to think ahead to your big finale: The Thesis Statement, the most important sentence in your entire essay, a sentence that you will revise throughout the entire essay but is still probably where you will begin your draft. After all, without a map, it’s difficult to begin a long journey, and that’s exactly what a full length essay is.

So let’s start!

In many ways, a thesis statement can feel a lot like a topic sentence because it makes a central claim and voices and attitude or opinion. The most important difference, however, is how general it needs to be. A thesis statement is responsible for the scope of the entire essay, so it needs to often include an overview or a preview of the paragraphs that follow. It also needs to be significant enough to warrant multiple illustrative paragraphs.

My favorite way to simplify the thesis is to think of it initially as a question. For instance, if I asked you to write a paper about your favorite famous person, perhaps you would begin your pre-writing process with the following sentence:

What can I say about Stephen Curry?

As you continued to list, freewrite, or bubble map, you will hopefully generate lots of creative and fun ideas for how best to explain your favorite things about this player, but you still may feel at a loss for how to transform those thoughts into a thesis statement, which is when I came up with this helpful recipe:

Topic + Opinion + Because

Let’s see this applied:

Stephen Curry has all the qualities of a superstar.

While this is a good first draft of a thesis statement, it misses that because statement, and it also fails to prepare the reader for what’s to come. How could we expand the thesis so it had a preview of the body paragraphs that should follow? And would also help satisfy the “because” element of my thesis recipe?

Stephen Curry possesses all the qualities of a superstar athlete; he has incredible physical talent, he is a team leader, and he navigates the media extremely well.

Better? I think so too. That’s because a preview statement allows the reader to have a more specific understanding of where your paper is going. Now let’s try ourselves. For each of the following thesis statements, attempt to predict what main supporting ideas you’d expect to find in the essay that follows. To help, I did part one of number one. (Tip: A preview can end up saving a writer a lot of effort and time when it comes to writing topic sentences later on.)

Exercise III:

1.      If a tourist is travelling around the United States of America, they should not miss visiting Los Angeles, California.

Paragraph 1: LA is known for its amazing weather, where it’s seldom cold and infrequently too hot.___________________________________________________________________________

Paragraph 2: ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Paragraph 3:

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

2.      Although often misunderstood, tattoos are a beautiful form of self-expression.

Paragraph 1: ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Paragraph 2: ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Paragraph 3:

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Another common pitfall for the beginning writer is failing to include an opinion in a thesis. Thesis statements must make claims, so that the writer has something to develop and discuss. Let’s look again at another example:

“Homecoming” was the newest Spiderman installment, and it was released in 2017.

Do you see the issue? How could it be revised? Give it a try:

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Helpful tip: The Antithesis test exists to make sure your thesis is actually making a claim and has an opinion, and it’s quite easy! Whenever you write a thesis, consider its opposite, and then ask yourself if you could find 5 intelligent adults who would argue in favor of that opposite thesis. For the example above, do you think you could find 5 intelligent adults who would spend time arguing that this film did not come out in theatres or that it didn’t belong to Marvel? Probably not.

Yet another obstacle facing the thesis writer is the temptation to be too specific or too broad. Since practice makes perfect, let’s revise the following so each strikes the proper middle ground:

Getting good grades is important.

Although I couldn’t agree more, this seems like a difficult claim to prove because it spreads a very large umbrella, and I’m left with lots of questions as a result, unsure of what my author is really going to be discussing. It might warrant a little revision. Try being more specific:

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

And how about this one:

Italian food is better than Asian food because it has lots of cheese.

Far too narrow, right? This sounds more like a topic sentence. There’s no way someone could write three body paragraphs based on this thesis alone. Open it up a little. Have fun:

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Exercise IV: On the same sheet of paper as before, write a thesis statement for your essay. Once that’s complete, you should have an entire introduction paragraph, a title included. All you may need to add is a transition between your attention getter and your thesis/preview statement. Let’s see how it workshops! I’m looking forward to you writing something you are proud of.

Section III: Body Paragraphs Extended: Coherence, Development, and Unity

We’ve already reviewed the primary focus of a paragraph and how it operates as a group of connected sentences that develop a single idea; however, when you are crafting a multi-paragraph essay, there are a few more areas of concern, such as unity and coherence. 

Unity is arguably the most important characteristic of a good paragraph. When done well, it means all sentences in a paragraph speak about one single idea or main subject. That kind of focus serves for easy reading and it makes the writer seem well organized and easy to follow.

Coherence (in paragraph writing) is the technique of making words, phrases, and sentences move smoothly and logically from one to the other. Ever had a teacher criticize your “rhythm” or “flow"? These are remarks concerning your coherence. When you’ve mastered this element of writing, your essay’s ideas will be gracefully interwoven, as if "glued" together. This is important because your reader should be able to see the consistent relationship between them.

Read the paragraph below to see how the three parts of a body paragraph work together to ensure unity and coherence:

Note that the (P)oint can be found in the topic sentence, which is bold. The (E)vidence can be found in italics, the (E)xplanation is underlined, and the (L)inking conclusion sentence is bold.

               Another problem facing many low income community college students is the rising cost of textbooks. In the El Camino College bookstore, for instance, textbooks are often priced at over a hundred dollars each. For students who take a full load of courses, this can be quite an expense to undertake; to be exact, last semester, I spent four hundred and thirty dollars on books. I currently work part time and am doing my best to pay my way through school. Unfortunately, my books often cost more than my tuition, and even though I earn ten dollars an hour at Starbucks, the steep prices of my textbooks make my jaw drop and often negatively affect my grades. Paying full price for the books my professors assign means giving up more than half of what I make in a month. Obviously, this has a detrimental impact on my life. It shapes how I can maintain my car, which gets to me to school and work reliably, and it also means paying rent would be impossible if I couldn’t live at home. Although I know my professors believe there are alternatives, buying used and buying online aren’t always possible and inconvenience shopping typically means getting marked down or missing assignment while I wait. I hate showing up unprepared for class, and I wish this wasn’t a problem. This ongoing struggle to cover the high costs of textbooks causes student, like myself, to feel overwhelmed by school; many of us fall behind in course work, withdraw from classes, or worse, drop out entirely.  

See how each of the sentences directly support the topic sentence? No sentence is unnecessary. All provide important, relevant information. Read the following counter example and attempt to identify the sentence that does not belong.

               Much of the violence seen in the world today may be caused by the media. More often than not, the front page of the local newspaper contains stories involving violence. In fact, one recent issue of my local newspaper contained several references to violent acts. There is also far too much violence in our public school systems. Reporters frequently film every detail of an accident or crime scene and drag out every gross detail. This happens on social media too. The other day, there was a drive-by shooting downtown. If the media were more careful about how they glamorized violence, there may be less violence in the world.

What doesn’t belong? Are there any other issues with this paragraph? Follow your writerly instincts and engage directly with the page. Write on the paragraph. What would you fix? What would you eliminate?

Hopefully you not only noticed the nonessential sentence, but that you also recognized two other issues. First of all, the details are arranged in a way that does not lead to paragraph development; secondly, there is far too much repetition and not enough gentle, smooth transitioning; in other words, there is weak coherence. Let’s begin with development issues.
A body paragraph is adequately developed when it describes, explains and supports the topic sentence; the above writer attempts to do this but falls short. The "promise" of the topic sentence is not fulfilled, and as a result, the reader is left with questions after reading the paragraph. This is why, generally speaking, a paragraph which consists of only two or three sentences is under-developed. A good rule of thumb to follow is to make sure that a paragraph contains at least four sentences and that they explain and elaborate on the topic sentence in interesting and new ways, reaching towards deeper comprehension with each line. Try these techniques for creating depth and development:

ü  Be Specific: General statements do not explain topic sentences.

o   Vague Supporting Detail: Some animals hibernate.

o   Specific Supporting Detail Some bears hibernate for up to four months during the winter.

ü  Use Descriptive Language: Appeal to the reader’s senses. Help the reader participate in and experience what you are describing.

o   Non-Descript: The beach is a good place for a date.

o   Descriptive: When I took Jordan out on a date, we walked on the sand next to the ocean, breathed in the smell of the salt water, and listened to the rhythmic sound of the waves; it was a romantic and wonderful time.

ü  Choose Words that Work: Carefully selected adjectives and adverbs and strong verbs enhance the quality of your work.

o   Think about it. Vague, general expressions and empty words like things, ways, stuff, all add very little to communication. Consider: We celebrate Cesar Chavez because of all the important stuff he did. Did you learn anything about Chavez? Does that sentence do him justice? How about this revision: We celebrate Cesar Chavez because he was a revolutionary labor leader and civil rights activist who fought for the rights of field workers and changed the lives of many Latino Americans. Better? 

o   Push yourself to choose fresh words that better express your true message, and don’t be afraid to discard any word that doesn’t contribute, like unnecessary pronouns and bland, overused adjectives. Try the following examples for practice:

1.      Denise’s behavior is annoying. When Denise borrows my car and returns it dirty and out of gas or without asking, I quite honestly consider turning her over to the proper authorities for prosecution or imprisonment.______________________________________________________

2.    I am a good person. _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________.

3.    In my culture, family is important. ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________.

ü  Tighten Your Sentences and Eliminate Wordiness and Repetition: Good writing is clear, simple, and direct. To develop an idea, one must write effectively, which is to say, why say in ten words what you can say in five? Keep in mind, even the best writers in the world write wordy first drafts and revise their way to efficient final copies.

Exercise 1:

In the ineffective paragraph written below:

o   Circle words, ideas, or sentences that are already included.

o   Circle vague words and expressions.

o   Rewrite any statement that isn’t direct.

o   Add sensory details and specific vocabulary.

Much of the violence seen in the world today may be caused by the media. More often than not, the front page of the local newspaper contains stories involving violence. In fact, one recent issue of my local newspaper contained several references to violent acts. There is also far too much violence in our public school systems. Reporters frequently film every detail of an accident or crime scene and drag out every gross detail. Often, those details include the bloody unnecessary elements of a crime and far too much personal information. This happens on social media as well. The other day, there was a drive-by shooting downtown. If the media were more careful about how they glamorized violence, there may be less violence in the world.

Now that we’ve worked on developing more powerful and concrete language while also cutting wordiness and repetition, let’s consider coherence.

For a paragraph to be coherent, all details must fit together and function as a connected unity of information. The above sample paragraph does not. One useful device which may help link details and create flow is a transitional expression.

Transitions are words, phrases, or clauses that lead readers from one idea to the next. Think of them as guideposts or signals. They help identify what comes next in a paragraph. Below, I’ve grouped some commonly used ones along with the connection they illustrate.

When showing addition, try:

Furthermore,

Further,

Also,

Moreover,

As a matter of fact,

In fact,

Actually,

Much less,

On the other hand,

Alternatively,

In addition,

Plus,

When introducing something:

For example,

For instance,

Notably,

As an illustration,

For one thing,

In particular,

When adding clarity:

To put in another way,

In other words,

That is to say,

When introducing a conflicting idea:

But,

By way of contrast,

On the other hand,

Conversely,

In contrast,

Still,

When adding emphasis:

Even more,

Above all,

Indeed,

More importantly,

 

Exercise 2:

Use a few of these phrases as well as a few coordinating conjunctions or conjunctive adverbs to create unity in the following set of choppy, disconnected sentences. Don’t be afraid to rearrange as you see fit and to combine as many repetitive details as possible to aid in flow, rhythm, and efficiency!

            According to the legend of La Llorona, there once was a girl named Maria. Maria lived in a village. Maria was the most beautiful girl in that village. Because she was so beautiful, she was vain. She thought she was better than everyone else. As she grew older, her pride grew as well. She was so prideful in fact that she wouldn’t even look at the young men in her village. She said she’d only marry the most handsome man in the world. Then, one day, that man rode into town. That man was a dashing young ranchero. He was the son of a wealthy rancher. He rode like a Comanche! He was handsome. He could play guitar. He could sing. Maria knew he was the man for her. She had to win his attention and his affection. Her trick was to ignore him. Her trick was to turn away every time he spoke to her on the street. She refused his gifts. She wouldn’t let him play guitar for her. He fell for this trick. Maria’s plan worked. Soon, the two were married. They then had two children. They were happy. After a few years, however, he fell out of love with her. Maria grew angry. When he then came

home one day with a new bride beside him, she drowned her two children out of rage and jealousy in the river in their village. She realized what she did once it was too late and then jumped in the river after them. They buried the three of them, but people say you can still hear her weeping down by the river looking for her children.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Section IV: Conclusion Paragraphs

You’ve just nearly mastered the multi-paragraph essay, but before you can edit, revise, and turn in your “A+” quality assignment, you must write a powerful and memorable conclusion paragraph.

While many students tire out and craft a vacuous finish, a conclusion paragraph is the last thing readers see; therefore, it should be planned, drafted, and carefully revised as to leave the reader with an excellent overall impression of the essay.

More simply put, a conclusion paragraph is much like an introduction. It’s a full paragraph that reinforces the essay’s main idea, and it should end with a general, concluding remark. Here are some options of how to write one of your own:

ü  Conclude with a Recommendation

This is a particularly helpful technique when writing an essay about a problem that exists.

ü  Conclude with a Quotation

A well-chosen quotation can be a really effective conclusion strategy. Just make sure the quote enhances your message. See the example below:

I’ll never forget the day I caught the ball on a penalty kick, winning the game fir my team. My opponent’s foot made contact with the ball and everything around me fell silent. The ball then came at me, and as I dove to catch it, I closed my eyes and prayed. Next thing I know, the ball smacked into my hands so hard I thought it must have split my gloves. When I opened my eyes, I realized that I had caught the ball and saved the game! The crowd cheered wildly, and my team surrounded me. As the celebration eventually died down, my coach walked over to me and said, “To the playoffs we go.”

Keep in mind that a quote from a famous person is also a good choice; non-fiction dialogue is not your only option, but make sure you blend that quotation into your own writing, as follows:

 It can be so tempting to stay quiet and accept the status quo, but President Barack Obama reminds the revolutionary in everyone that “change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. We are the change that we seek.” I was reminded of this when I decided to be the first person in my family to go to college and seek a different way of life.

ü  Conclude with a Prediction

Looking to the future is a powerful way to close.

Whether people like it or not, the Black Lives Matter is a movement that is not going away anytime soon. This generation and future generations must confront the racial divide that endangers black men and officers on an everyday basis. The organized protests that have been taking place for over a year have already had a large impact on today’s discussion of race. In fact, I believe many people have grown much more aware of white privilege as well as the challenges confronted by the black community in America since the Black Lives Matter movement began. Hopefully, that means that the deaths of Tamir Rice, Eric Harris, Walter Scott, and Sandra Bland were not taken in vain.

Those are just a few suggestions; please feel free to be creative when crafting your own conclusions, but make sure to avoid the following common mistakes:

ü  DON’T introduce new supporting evidence. Conclusions are final; they’re not openers.

ü  DON’T apologize for your opinions or ideas. Edit out insecure language like, “At least that’s my opinion” or “I could be wrong, but…”

ü  DON’T do what everyone else does. Avoid overused phrases like “In conclusion” or “In summary.”

Section V: MLA Formatting

Now that we understand each unique and important part of an essay and how to best tackle writing assignments for college English, we must discuss formatting. So many students begin college completely unaware of how an essay should appear, but it’s actually quite simple if you follow these rules.

While we will dig into MLA rules more deeply later when discussing research, but for now, please remember these tips when turning in essays:

ü  Double-space the text of your paper, even the header,

ü  Essays must be stapled together,

ü  Cover pages are an unnecessary waste of paper,

ü  MLA recommends using only legible prints like Arial, Times New Roman, and Calibri, (in size 12)

ü  Center the title. Do not bold or italicize or underline it,

ü  Page numbers go in the upper right hand corner along with your last name,

ü  In the upper left hand corner goes the header, in the following order:

Count Dracula

Professor Erica Brenes

English 50RWA

29 July 2016         

Chapter 4, Patterns of Essay Development

In this section of our text, you will learn different ways to organize and/or approach paragraphs. Understanding different patterns of writing will help you feel more confident when approached with prompts and will help you better identify the needs and expectations of your professors.

Section I: Narrative Essay

Narration tells a story, usually presenting a series of events in chronological (time) order, moving from beginning to end. A narrative essay can tell a personal story or it can recount a recent or historical event or even a fictional story.

The important components of a narrative include:

ü  A Thesis Statement: The introduction of a narrative essay should include a thesis statement that communicates what the main idea of the story will be—the point it is trying to make.

ü  Evidence: The body paragraphs should tell the story, one event at a time, with each event providing examples and details that support the thesis. These should be presented in chronological order and should only involve necessary details that help further the main point.

ü  Reinforcement: The conclusion MUST include a summary that helps refocus the story.

ü  Transitions: A story should flow gracefully from one event to the next. Transitions help.

Many students incorrectly assume that narratives only belong in the English classroom, but they are common elements of composition across a college campus. You’ll know you need these elements of writing when a teacher asks you to “summarize” or “recount” a reading or an event. Consider the following hypothetical assignments and note how the prompt influences an essay’s pattern of development and its thesis:

Assignment: Summarize the life of civil rights leader, Malcolm X.

Thesis: Although many Americans think of Malcom X as an extremist, up until the day he was executed, he lived an extraordinary life leading himself and his people towards education, literacy, and success.

Now, you try:

Assignment:  Recount how you decided to join Puente.

Thesis: _______________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________________.

After your thesis is crafted, you should brainstorm what evidence you’ll be using and then create an essay map or outline to help you stay organized and focused. See the map below for a visual:

To tie all those paragraphs together, the writer would need to use transitions. Here are some helpful ones commonly found in exemplification essays:

After/Before

As/ As soon as

At first

At the same time

By this time

Earlier/Soon/Next

Eventually

Finally

First… Second…

Immediately

Later

Meanwhile

Here’s an example:

The 1960 East LA Walk Outs

            Students are people too. They have rights, and in late 1967, Chicano students in the East Los Angeles school system attempted to prove that. At that time, the schools were deeply troubled by racism; Mexican Americans had the highest high school dropout rate and lowest college attendance among any ethnic group, and poor facilities and out of touch, prejudiced teachers made schools a nonconductive environment for learning. Oppressive conditions coupled with the inability to make changes compelled students, activists, and teachers to meet and discuss the situation. Ultimately, they decided to take action, knowing that making their plight public would be the best way to pressure the school board into compliance.

            It all began with Sal Castro. Castro was a teacher who paired up with student leaders such as Paula Crisostomo, college students like Moctesuma Esparza, and groups such as United Mexican American Students (UMAS) and the Brown Berets. Together, they developed thirty-six demands to bring to the Board of Education. These goals included bilingual, bicultural education, Latino teachers and administrators, smaller class sizes, better facilities and the revision of text books to include Mexican American history. Sadly, their needs were not met, and the students had no choice but to threaten walkouts. These walk outs were commonly referred to as “blowouts.” It is important to understand that Los Angeles public schools are paid based on the number of students in class each day; therefore, by walking out of homeroom before attendance was taken, the students could target the schools financially.

            During this time of unrest, Wilson High Principal Donald Skinner canceled a student production of Neil Simon’s “Barefoot in the Park,” citing it as too risqué for a Mexican American audience. This racist incident triggered a premature walkout. Although Wilson was not one of the original three schools intending to walk out, 300 students made their mark on history on March 1st, 1968. In response to the “Blow Out,” administration had senior students blockade the main exit. Regardless, resilient students found the auditorium door, and they pushed the school entry gates back and forth. Simultaneously, students inside demonstrated by throwing fruit, books, and more over the gate. Soon after, policemen and photographers showed up on the scene as the students were told to return to class. Some refused, forming sit-ins and rallies. As a symbol of the walkouts, students wore the image of a foot on their clothes. They said they would not return to class until their demands were met.

            A few days later, on March 5th, two thousand more students joined their efforts at Garfield High. These students were also met with police and angry administrators. Regardless, 2700 students walked out of class the very next day, carrying leaflets on reform. As planned, Roosevelt High School joined their efforts and walked out on March 6th. Sadly, at Roosevelt, the students who climbed over the locked fence were beaten by officers. Later, on March 8th, Belmont High students attempted to walk out, but found their school invaded by police. Police arrested and beat students.

            In addition to walking out, a 9 AM rally was held at Hazard Park where students carried signs reading “Chicano Power” and “Viva la Raza.” After a week of protests, the LA Board of Education set a meeting for March 11th. Chicano students, parents, professors, and community members formed the Educational Issues Coordinating Committee (EICC) as their representative voice. At the meeting, the EICC asked for amnesty for all students involved in the walkouts as well as a community meeting to discuss the needed education reform. The Board agreed and the students returned to school. 1,200 people attended the community meeting held at Lincoln High on March 28. The EICC presented the original 36 demands. Although the Board claimed to agree with the needed changes, they cited a lack of funds to follow through. Notably, they were supported by Black nationalists, Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), Senator Robert Kennedy, and Cesar Chavez.

            Unfortunately, in the end, organization began to fall apart, and students grew disillusioned. That being said, the schoolboard did begin to recruit and hire more Chicano teachers and administrators. Although change was not immediately apparent in the high schools, a significant difference was made. In particular, college recruitment of Latinos was significantly increased. The walkouts also unified and empowered the Chicano community, which in turn became a political force that schools now listen more closely to.

After Reading Questions:

ü  What do you notice about the pattern of organization?

ü  Does this essay tell a story? How so? What choices did the student writer make to create a narrative?

ü  Can you identify the thesis or the main point?

ü  Where are the supporting details?

ü  Do the paragraphs use the PEEL method of organization?

ü  How are transitions used? Which ones do you see? Which would you adopt into your own writing?

ü  What could be done to improve this essay?

 

Section II: Compare and Contrast

Compare and Contrast essays do exactly what you would expect; they explore how different things can be both similar and different. Typically, doing so requires the following elements of composition:

ü  A Thesis Statement: In a compare and contrast essay, this important introductory statement must communicate what items will be juxtaposed and why you will be discussing their similarities and/or differences.

ü  Evidence: The body paragraphs should include examples and details that support the thesis. In an effort to stay organized, topic sentences should be used to identify which similarities or differences will be explored in each paragraph and then the details should supply that information.

ü  Reinforcement: Since you are dealing with two different topics of discussion, you must return often to thesis and summarize as you go.

ü  Transitions: A compare and contrast essay should include transitional words and phrases to help readers move from point to point or from subject to subject.  

The wording of your professors’ assignments will let you know when to employ this pattern of development. Once you’ve decided that the teacher asks you to write a compare and contrast essay, you’ll need to brainstorm, develop a thesis, and then create a structure that reflects your purpose.

Consider the following possible prompt: Contrast the politics of presidential hopefuls, Hilary Clinton and Donald Trump. A possible thesis may be: Unlike Donald Trump, Hilary Clinton heralds liberal policies such as equal pay for equal work, a more effective path to citizenship, and well-funded public education.

There are now two ways to develop this essay, either point by point or subject by subject. Point by point essays alternate between two subjects, moving back and forth from one subject to another; in this case, moving back and forth between Clinton and Trump in each paragraph. Subject by subject essays, on the other hand, treat the subjects separately; first fully discussing one topic before moving on to the next. Despite their differences, both models require adherence to order.

See possible outlines below:

Subject by Subject I. Introduction: Attention Getter/Thesis II. Body Paragraph 1: First Subject Discussed: Trump and his opinions on “Equal Pay for Equal Work,” “Citizenship,” and then “Public Education.” III. Body Paragraph 2: Second Subject Discussed: Clinton and her opinions on “Equal Pay for Equal Work,” “Citizenship,” and then “Public Education.” (Note how the order stays the same) IV. Conclusion: Summarize and Reinforce

Point by Point I. Introduction: Attention Getter/Thesis II. Body Paragraph 1: First Point: “Equal Pay for Equal Work” discussed for both Clinton and Trump. III. Body Paragraph 2: Second Point: “A More Effective Path to Citizenship” discussed for both Clinton and Trump (stay in the same order). IV. Body Paragraph 3: Third Point: “Well Funded Public Education for both Clinton and Trump. V. Conclusion: Summarize and Reinforce ryo

Here are some helpful transitions when writing compare and contrast essays:

Although

But

Even though

However

In comparison

In contrast

Likewise

Similarly

On the one hand

Nevertheless

On the contrary

Whereas

Unlike

Section III: Exemplification

Yet another commonly assigned essay in college is called an Exemplification Essay.

What do we mean when we tell a friend that an instructor is good? Or that a film was bad? Or that we dislike a politician? To clarify general statements and broad opinions, critical thinkers use exemplification—that is, they give example to illustrate and expand on a general idea.

For instance:

General Statement: Frida Kahlo is a good artist.

Specific Example: Kahlo, a Mexican-American artist famous for her beautiful self-portraits, painted at least 140 surreal masterpieces; in them, she creatively and uniquely uses bright, bold colors and incorporates special images from Mexican mythology.

The important components of an exemplification essay include:

ü  A Thesis Statement: The introduction of an exemplification essay should include a clear thesis that identifies the essay’s main idea and purpose—in this case, the idea is what the examples will illustrate.

ü  Evidence: The body paragraphs must provide examples and evidence which is fully developed.

ü  Reinforcement: You should return often to the thesis and make sure your examples are tying in and staying on track.

ü  Transitions: An exemplification essay should use appropriate transitional words and phrases in order to connect examples within paragraphs and to bridge the gap between one paragraph and the next.

You’ll know you need these elements of writing when given an assignment that asks you to “illustrate” or “provide examples.” The prompt provided will, in fact, not only help you deduce what kind of essay to write but will also help you craft a thesis. Consider these examples:

Assignment: Should American children be taught only in English or should their native language be allowed in the classroom? Support your answer with examples.

Thesis: The success of students in bilingual classrooms suggests that teaching elementary school students in English as well as in their native tongue could be beneficial.

Now, you try:

Assignment: Discuss why you want to graduate college. Include plenty of specific, developed reasons.

Thesis: _______________________________________________________________________________

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Model Exemplification Intro and Thesis:                My brother Carl was 16 when he first learned to wake board, and even though he broke his ankle on his very first trip out, he’s hit the water every summer since. For many people, including my brother, traditional sports like football and baseball are no longer interesting when compared to “extreme sports,” such as BMX racing, snowboarding, or skating. Thesis: Extreme sports are different from familiar sports because they are dangerous, they are physically challenging, and they require more bravery.

After your thesis is crafted, you should brainstorm what evidence you’ll be using and then create an essay map or outline to help you stay organized and focused:

In the body paragraphs that follow, examples should be given concerning (1) how extreme sports are different than traditional sports, (2) how they are physically challenging, and (3) how they require bravery. To tie all those paragraphs together, the writer would need to use transitions. Here are some helpful ones commonly found in exemplification essays:

Also

Besides

Finally

First, Second…

For example

For instance

Furthermore

In addition

Moreover

Specifically

Next

Exercise 1:

Go ahead and try exemplification for yourself. First observe the photograph below. Take it all in. Perhaps jot down some notes. Then, see how you can pull examples from a piece of art and analyze and develop an argument. This is no small feat, but I know you can do it, especially with the template that follows the picture.

The picture, which begins on the following page, was taken by photojournalist, Alan Diaz, during an immigration raid in Miami, Florida. It was taken in 2000 when armed federal agents entered the home of 6 year old, Elian Gonzalez. Gonzalez had recently watched his own mother drown while they smuggled themselves away from Cuba. Due to international law, U.S. authorities were required to return the boy to his father. A decade later, reflecting on the boy’s last moments in the United States, the photographer commented that “the cry [he] heard that day [he] had never heard in [his] life.” It was a “cry that would haunt anyone forever.”

Now let’s see if we can evolve your preliminary reaction into an exemplification. Fill in the blanks.

The Pulitzer Price winning photographer, Alan Diaz, wanted to ______________________________________ _____________________________ in his photograph above. The picture conveys the idea that _______________

__________________________________. For example, _____________________________ illustrates _______________ __________________________________________________.

Section IV: Argumentative Essays

Argumentative Essays take a stand on a debatable issue—that is an issue that has at least two sides.  The essay then provides evidence such as facts and sometimes expert opinions to persuade the reader to agree with the author’s opinion on the topic.

Argumentative essays are assigned regularly in college.

Often they may be needed when a professor asks for your personal opinion like in an ethics or philosophy course. That prompt would perhaps ask, “What is your opinion on making financial aid available for students?” You would first have to brainstorm to discover your stance. Then, you would conduct research to find and collect evidence before finally drafting up an outline and beginning to write.

Successful argumentative essays include the following elements:

ü  Thesis: Your thesis will present the position you hold on the issue at hand.

ü  Evidence: Facts, examples, research, and expert opinions. Importantly, the topic sentence of each paragraph will outline and unify whatever evidence you plan to present.

ü  Reinforcement: Conclusion sentences are a good place to summarize and refocus.

ü  Transitions: Logical transition phrases and words help convey how your points are related and interconnected.

Evidence (continued):

One of the greatest types of evidence is called a direct quotation. Other types include anecdote, examples, paraphrase, and statistics. This kind of support is needed to bolster your argument and defend your claims. They are commonly found in essays that explicate literature and also when integrating research into one’s writing.

The most important elements of research involve how you select the sources you use. Being able to evaluate sources and decide which ones to rely on means doing much more than simply ingesting facts but also fitting those facts into an argument if and only if the criterion fit.

What you want to look for:

·        Relevance

o   Relevance refers to the relationship between the source, your topic, and your stance. Ask yourself: How does this source help shape the values or grounds beneath my opinion?

·        Reliability

o   The quality of information is reliable because it is peer reviewed, proven, aligned with standards, and involves support above reproach. Ask yourself if this credible? Reputable? Where did this research collect its data?

·        Timely

o   A significant concern in academic research involves its date. Claims must be supported with sources that are not obsolete or outdated.

·        Diversity

o   In this context, diversity refers to variety of source, genre. Writers should be cautious of overusing one or two sources without consulting other types of information and diversifying what type of research used can help fill any significant research gaps.

If a source seems valuable after you’ve checked it across these standards, it can be used, but you still need to ask yourself: Should it be? Consider:

1.      What role does this source play in my argument?

2.      How much detail is needed to best illustrate my point?

3.      How much detail would distract the reader away from my main point or derail me from moving forward?

4.      How should I use this? As a summary? If so, brief or long? Or should I quote directly?

They Say/I Say: Let’s Practice

From the following templates, you can use as many of these sentences as you’d like in your essays. They should prove helpful when it to writing your final essay and throughout our year together.

Introducing an author’s opinion:

·        In “______,” X demonstrates/suggests/argues/reports/reminds that ___________________.

Building a discussion:

·        When it comes to the topic of ____, most will readily agree that _____. Where this agreement typically ends, however, is on the question of _______; some are convinced that _________, and others believe that _____________.

For embedding your own voice while also referencing research:

·        These conclusions, which X discusses in ____________, add weight to my argument that ___________.

For indicating who cares and why they should

·        This interpretation of _________ challenges the work of those who have long assumed _________.

·        Recent research sheds new lights on ____________, which previous studies had not addressed.

·        Although X may seem trivial, it is in fact crucial in terms of today’s concern over ___________.

·        Ultimately, what is at stake here is _____.

·        If I am right about __________, then major consequences follow for _________.

·        Although X may seem of concern only to a small group of _________, it should in fact concern anyone who cares about __________.

For offering commentary on research:

·        What ___________ really means is _____________.

·        To put it another way, _______________________.

For disagreeing with reason:

·        In “_____,” X is mistaken because he overlooks ________.

·        X’s claim that ______ rests upon questionable grounds; ______.

Here are some helpful last minute tips:

1. Limit yourself.

Avoid patching together too much evidence. Only use what you need, and hold yourself to a high standard. If it’s not excellent, don’t use it. In general, quotes should make up less than 20% of your essay.

2. Use ellipses marks and brackets.

Ellipses can be used to indicate that you’ve omitted words that were unnecessary in a quote. Brackets show that you’ve inserted your own words. For example: Encouraging peaceful protest, Martin Luther King Jr. once defined violence as “impractical and immoral;” he continued on, arguing that “in spite of temporary victories […], violence [has never brought] permanent peace” (65). The brackets allowed this writer to change the tense and also to remove excess detailing and to increase flow.

3. Block quotes.

Any quote longer than four typed lines should be set off by indenting it one inch, and formatted as follows:

Sandra Cisneros, world renowned Chicano author, believes there is an intimate link between her background and the sound and style of her work; she explains:

I wanted to write something in a voice that was unique to who I was. And I wanted something that was accessible to the person who works at Dunkin Donuts or who drives a bus, someone who comes home with their feet hurting like my father, someone who's busy and has too many children, like my mother. (23)

4. No Dropped Quotes.

Make sure you never use a quote alone; they must be smoothly integrated into a body paragraph. Warn your reader that evidence is coming. Signal phrases can help; try these:

Talented writer, Jose Antonio Burciago notes…

According to Professor Griselda Castro, …

Moreover, my English Professor, Erica Brenes added…

The scientists in charge of the study at UC Davis concluded…

The fourteenth amendment clearly explains…

Politicians like Marco Rubio argue… 

5. Invite yourself in.

Don’t begin or end a paragraph with a quote, and don’t let it be the star of your paper. You are the star; quotes support your ideas and must be paired with your own critical reasoning. Explain how they contribute to your ideas by combining them with your own thoughts and opinions.

Integrating Quotes

Often this year, you will need to use direct support in every essay this year. Here is a helpful guide.

There are at least four ways to integrate quotations.

1. Introduce the quotation (a complete sentence) with a complete sentence and a colon.

Example: In Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back, Yoda states directly the purpose of the Jedi Knights: “A Jedi uses the Force for knowledge and defense, never for attack.”

Example: Yoda is not satisfied with anything other than Luke’s best: “Luminous beings are we, not this crude matter.”

This is an easy rule to remember: if you use a complete sentence to introduce a quotation, you need a colon after the sentence. Be careful not to confuse a colon (:) with a semicolon (;). DO NOT USE A COMMA IN THIS SITUATION FOR FEAR OF WRITING A COMMA SPLICE.

2. Use an introductory or explanatory phrase, but not a complete sentence, separated from the quotation with a comma.

Example: In Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back, Yoda states directly the purpose of the Jedi Knights when he explains to Luke, “A Jedi uses the Force for knowledge and defense, never for attack.”

Example: According to Yoda, “Adventure. Excitement. A Jedi craves not these things.”

Example: Jedi Master, Yoda, inspires Luke when he explains, “Do or do not. There is no try.”

You should use a comma to separate your own words from the quotation when your introductory or explanatory phrase ends with a verb such as "says," "said," "thinks," "believes," "pondered," "recalls," "questions," and "asks" (and many more). You should also use a comma when you introduce a quotation with a phrase such as "According to Malcolm Gladwell."

3. Make the quotation a part of your own sentence without any punctuation between your own words and the words you are quoting.

Example: In The Phantom Menace, Yoda explains the important of emotional maturity when he explains to Anakin that “fear is the path to the dark side.”

Example: Yoda argues that “anger leads to hate… hate leads to suffering.”

Notice that the word "that" is used in both of the examples above, and when it is used as it is in the examples, "that" replaces the comma which would be otherwise necessary. You usually have a choice, then, when you begin a sentence with a phrase such as "Thoreau says." You either can add a comma after "says" (Thoreau says, "quotation")  or you can add the word "that" with no comma (Thoreau says that "quotation.")

4. Use short quotations--only a few words--as part of your own sentence.

Example: In The Empire Strikes Back, Yoda instructs Luke to “unlearn what [he has] learned” and to free himself from arbitrary constraints and shallow expectations.

Example: When Luke and Yoda begin training together, Yoda is unimpressed with Luke; he is impatient and selfish and, in Yoda’s eyes, overly concerned with “adventure” and “excitement,” much like his father.

When you integrate quotations in this way, you do not use any special punctuation. Instead, you should punctuate the sentence just as you would if all of the words were your own.

All of the methods above for integrating quotations are correct, but you should avoid relying too much on just one method. You should instead use a variety of methods.

Transitions (continued…)

Helpful transition words include:

Accordingly

Admittedly

Although

Certainly

Consequently

Despite

Even so

Even though

Finally

First, Second…

In addition

In fact

In summary

Therefore

Truly

To be sure

So

Since

Chapter 5, Readings

Active Reading, AKA “Reading with a Pen”

You’ll want to read critically and actively, so you can:

1.      Stay awake and engaged with the material (No more, “What did I just read?” moments.)

2.      Recall what you’ve read,

3.      Better understand what you’re reading,

4.      Develop an opinion about what you’re reading.

In class over the next few days, we will be reviewing different strategies for active and close reading, which can be applied when reading both fiction and non-fiction, but for now, let’s review one of the most important strategies: Annotation.

Whenever we have reading this Fall, you will be required to annotate your work; to annotate means to underling, highlight, and write directly onto the text. One of the reasons our readings have been compiled for you and made inexpensive is so that you won’t be intimated to mark up your assigned readings. Remember, the more you mark the text, the more you’ll have to pull from when discussing in class and when writing about the material later. Here are some other helpful tips when annotating as you read:

·        Circle unfamiliar words, look them up, and then write the definition in the margins near the word,

·        Highlight or underline main points in the section; these work like clues to help you find the primary focus of the passage,

·        Talk to the text—write questions or comments in the margins, attempting to capture exactly what you were thinking while you read. These notes can be so helpful for when you write your Reading Response journals.

·        Write an exclamation mark (!) next to anything that excites you and gets you to begin thinking. This is how I identify “strong lines,” an especially memorable phrase that moves me.

·        If you find yourself getting lost and confused, take a break and attempt to summarize what you’ve understood so far. Then, start up again. This can help consolidate all the information you understand, and I can help with the rest the following day in class.

Readings on Readings

“Introduction to Poetry” by Billy Collins

I ask them to take a poem 

and hold it up to the light 

like a color slide 

or press an ear against its hive. 

I say drop a mouse into a poem 

and watch him probe his way out, 

or walk inside the poem’s room 

and feel the walls for a light switch. 

I want them to waterski 

across the surface of a poem 

waving at the author’s name on the shore. 

But all they want to do 

is tie the poem to a chair with rope 

and torture a confession out of it. 

They begin beating it with a hose 

to find out what it really means. 

“Learning to Read” by Malcolm X

               It was because of my letters that I happened to stumble upon starting to acquire some kind of a homemade education.

            I became increasingly frustrated at not being able to express what I wanted to convey in letters that I wrote, especially those to Mr. Elijah Muhammad. In the street, I had been the most articulate hustler out there. I had commanded attention when I said something. But now, trying to write simple English, I not only wasn’t articulate, I wasn’t even functional. How would I sound writing in slang, the way 1 would say it, something suchas, “Look, daddy, let me pull your coat about a cat, Elijah Muhammad—”

            Many who today hear me somewhere in person, or on television, or those who read something I’ve said, will think I went to school far beyond the eighth grade. This impression is due entirely to my prison studies.

            It had really begun back in the Charlestown Prison, when Bimbi first made me feel envy of his stock of knowledge. Bimbi had always taken charge of any conversations he was in, and I had tried to emulate him. But every book I picked up had few sentences which didn’t contain anywhere from one to nearly all of the words that might as well have been in Chinese. When I just skipped those words, of course, I really ended up with little idea of what the book said. So I had come to the Norfolk Prison Colony still going through only book-reading motions. Pretty soon, I would have quit even these motions, unless I had received the motivation that I did.

            I saw that the best thing I could do was get hold of a dictionary—to study, to learn some words. I was lucky enough to reason also that I should try to improve my penmanship. It was sad. I couldn’t even write in a straight line. It was both ideas together that moved me to request a dictionary along with some tablets and pencils from the Norfolk Prison Colony school.

            I spent two days just riffling uncertainly through the dictionary’s pages. I’d never realized so many words existed! I didn’t know which words I needed to learn. Finally, just to start some kind of action, I began copying.

            In my slow, painstaking, ragged handwriting, I copied into my tablet everything printed on that first page, down to the punctuation marks.

            I believe it took me a day. Then, aloud, I read back, to myself, everything I’d written on the tablet. Over and over, aloud, to myself, I read my own handwriting.

            I woke up the next morning, thinking about those words—immensely proud to realize that not only had I written so much at one time, but I’d written words that I never knew were in the world. Moreover, with a little effort, I also could remember what many of these words meant. I reviewed the words whose meanings I didn’t remember. Funny thing, from the dictionary first page right now, that “aardvark” springs to my mind. The dictionary had a picture of it, a long-tailed, long-eared, burrowing African mammal, which lives off termites caught by sticking out its tongue as an anteater does for ants.

            I was so fascinated that I went on—I copied the dictionary’s next page. And the same experience came when I studied that. With every succeeding page, I also learned of people and places and events from history. Actually the dictionary is like a miniature encyclopedia. Finally the dictionary’s A section had filled a whole tablet—and I went on into the B’s. That was the way I started copying what eventually became the entire dictionary. It went a lot faster after so much practice helped me to pick up handwriting speed. Between what I wrote in my tablet, and writing letters, during the rest of my time in prison I would guess I wrote a million words.

            I suppose it was inevitable that as my word-base broadened, I could for the first time pick up a book and read and now begin to understand what the book was saying. Anyone who has read a great deal can imagine the new world that opened. Let me tell you something: from then until I left that prison, in every free moment I had, if I was not reading in the library, I was reading on my bunk. You couldn’t have gotten me out of books with a wedge. Between Mr. Muhammad’s teachings, my correspondence, my visitors—usually Ella and Reginald—and my reading of books, months passed without my even thinking about being imprisoned. In fact, up to then, I never had been so truly free in my life.

            The Norfolk Prison Colony’s library was in the school building. A variety of classes was taught there by instructors who came from such places as Harvard and Boston universities. The weekly debates between inmate teams were also held in the school building. You would be astonished to know how worked up convict debaters and audiences would get over subjects like “Should Babies Be Fed Milk?”

            Available on the prison library’s shelves were books on just about every general subject. Much of the big private collection that Parkhurst had willed to the prison was still in crates and boxes in the back of the library—thousands of old books. Some of them looked ancient: covers faded; old-time parchment-looking binding. Parkhurst, I’ve mentioned, seemed to have been principally interested in history and religion. He had the money and the special interest to have a lot of books that you wouldn’t have in general circulation. Any college library would have been lucky to get that collection.

            As you can imagine, especially in a prison where there was heavy emphasis on rehabilitation, an inmate was smiled upon if he demonstrated an unusually intense interest in books. There was a sizable number of well-read inmates, especially the popular debaters, Some were said by many to be practically walking encyclopedias.         

            They were almost celebrities. No university would ask any student to devour literature as I did when this new world opened to me, of being able to read and understand.

            I read more in my room than in the library itself. An inmate who was known to read a lot could check out more than the permitted maximum number of books. I preferred reading in the total isolation of my own room.

            When I had progressed to really serious reading, every night at about ten P.M. I would be outraged with the “lights out.” It always seemed to catch me right in the middle of something engrossing.

            Fortunately, right outside my door was a corridor light that cast a glow into my room. The glow was enough to read by, once my eyes adjusted to it. So when “lights out” came, I would sit on the floor where I could continue reading in that glow.

            At one-hour intervals the night guards paced past every room. Each time I heard the approaching footsteps, I jumped into bed and feigned sleep. And as soon as the guard passed, I got back out of bed onto the floor area of that light-glow, where I would read for another fifty-eight minutes—until the guard approached again. That went on until three or four every morning. Three or four hours of sleep a night was enough for me. Often in the years in the streets I had slept less than that.

            The teachings of Mr. Muhammad stressed how history had been “whitened”—when white men had written history books, the black man simply had been left out...I never will forget how shocked I was when I began reading about slavery’s total horror. It made such an impact upon me that it later became one of my favorite subjects when I became a minister of Mr. Muhammad’s. The world’s most monstrous crime, the sin and the blood on the white man’s hands, are almost impossible to believe...I read descriptions of atrocities, saw those illustrations of black slave women tied up and flogged with whips; of black mothers watching their babies being dragged off, never to be seen by their mothers again; of dogs after slaves, and of the fugitive slave catchers, evil white men with whips and clubs and chains and guns...

            Book after book showed me how the white man had brought upon the world’s black, brown, red, and yellow peoples every variety of the sufferings of exploitation. I saw how since the sixteenth century, the so-called “Christian trader” white man began to ply the seas in his lust for Asian and African empires, and plunder, and power. I read, I saw, how the white man never has gone among the non-white peoples bearing the Cross in the true manner and spirit of Christ’s teachings—meek, humble, and Christlike…

            I have often reflected upon the new vistas that reading opened to me. I knew right there in prison that reading had changed forever the course of my life. As I see it today, the ability to read awoke inside me some long dormant craving to be mentally alive. I certainly wasn’t seeking any degree, the way a college confers a status symbol upon its students. My homemade education gave me, with every additional book that I read, a little bit more sensitivity to the deafness, dumbness, and blindness that was afflicting the black race in America. Not long ago, an English writer telephoned me from London, asking questions. One was, “What’s your alma mater?” I told him, “Books.” You will never catch me with a free fifteen minutes in which I’m not studying something I feel might be able to help the black man.

 

Post Reading Exercise:

Let’s practice an active reading strategy known as “Asking Questions.” Attempt to answer each of the following questions about Collins and X’s work. Each question needs to be reflected on only briefly before you can hopefully tap into a new level of understanding. Reflect back on the reading as you answer in order to best comprehend the work. Make sure you’ve also annotated as you read so that you’re ready for tomorrow!

1. What questions did you ask yourself as you read Collins’ poem?

2. What questions did you ask while reading Malcolm X?

3. What “big picture” questions do you feel these authors wanted you to ask?

4. Why do you think these texts were assigned?

Readings on Home

“Going Home Again” By Richard Rodriquez
               At each step, with every graduation from one level of education to the next, the refrain from bystanders was strangely the same: "Your parents must be so proud of you." I suppose that my parents were proud, although I suspect, too, that they felt more than pride alone as they watched me advance through my education. They seemed to know that my education was separating us from one another, making it difficult to resume familiar intimacies. Mixed with the instincts of parental pride, a certain hurt also communicated itself--too private ever to be adequately expressed in words, but real nonetheless.
               The autobiographical facts pertinent to this essay are simply stated in two sentences, though they exist in somewhat awkward juxtaposition to each other. I am the son of Mexican-American parents, who speak a blend of Spanish and English, but who read neither language easily. I am about to receive a PhD in English Renaissance literature. What sort of life - what tensions, feelings, conflicts - connects these two sentences? I look back and remember my life from the time I was seven or eight years old as one of constant movement away from a Spanish-speaking folk culture toward the world of the English-language classroom. As the years passed, I felt myself becoming less like my parents and less comfortable with the assumption of visiting relatives that I was still the Spanish-speaking child they remembered. By the time I began college, visits home became suffused with silent embarrassment: there seemed so little to share, however strong the ties of our affection. My parents would tell me what happened in their lives or in the lives of relatives: I would respond with news of my own. Polite questions would follow. Our conversations came to seem more like interviews. 

     A few months ago, my dissertation nearly complete, I came upon my father poking through my bookcase. He quietly fingered the volumes of Milton's tracts and Augustine's theology with that combination of reverence and distrust those who are not literate sometimes show for the written word. Silently, I watched him from the door of the room. However much he would have insisted that he was "proud" of his son for being able to master the texts, I knew, if pressed further, he would have admitted to complicated feelings about my success. When he looked across the room and suddenly saw me, his body tightened slightly with surprise, then we both smiled. 

     For many years I kept my uneasiness about becoming a success in education to myself. I did so in part because I wanted to avoid vague feelings that if considered carefully, I would have no way of dealing with; and in part because I felt that no one else shared my reaction, my story of cultural dislocation publicly, however, I found many listeners willing to admit to similar feelings from their own pasts. Equally impressive was the fact that many among those I spoke with were not from non-white racial groups, which made me realize that one can grow up to enter the culture of the academy and find it a "foreign" culture for variety of reasons, ranging from economic status to religious heritage. But why, I next wondered, was it that, though there were so many of us who came from childhood cultures alien to the academy's, we voiced our uneasiness to one another and to ourselves so infrequently? Why did it take me so long to acknowledge publicly the cultural costs I had paid to earn a PhD in Renaissance literature? Why, more precisely, am I writing these words only now when my connection to my past barely survives except as nostalgic memory? 

     Looking back, a person risks losing hold of the present while being confounded by the past. For the child who moves to an academic culture from a culture that dramatically lacks academic traditions, looking back can jeopardize the certainly he has about the desirability of this new academic culture. Richard Hoggard's description, in The Uses of Literacy, of the cultural pressures on such a student, whom Hoggard calls the "scholarship boy," helps make the point. The scholarship boy must give nearly unquestioning allegiance to academic culture, Hoggard argues, if he is to succeed at all, so different is the milieu of the classroom from the culture he leaves behind. For the time, the scholarship boy may try to balance his loyalty between his concretely experienced family life and the more abstract mental life of the classroom. In the end, though, he must choose between the two words: if he intends to succeed as a student, he must, literally and figuratively, separate himself from his family, with its gregarious life, and find a quiet place to be alone with his thoughts. 

     After a while, the kind of allegiance the young student might once have given his parents is transferred to the teacher, the new parent. Now without the support of the old ties and certainties of the family, he almost mechanically acquires the assumptions, practices, and styles of the classroom milieu. For the loss he might otherwise feel, the scholarship boy substitutes an enormous enthusiasm for nearly everything having to do with school.

   How readily I read my own past into the portrait of Hoggard's scholarship boy. Coming from a home in which mostly Spanish was spoken, for example, I had to decide to forget Spanish when I began my education. To succeed in the classroom, I needed psychologically to sever my ties in Spanish. Spanish represented an alternate culture as well as another language - and the basis of my deepest sense of relationship to my family. Although I recently taught myself to read Spanish, the language that I see on the printed page is not quite the language I heard in my youth. That other Spanish, the spoken Spanish of my family, I remember with nostalgia and guilt: guilt because I cannot explain to aunts and uncles why I do not answer their questions any longer in their own idiomatic language. Nor was I able to explain to teachers in graduate school, who regularly expected me to read and speak Spanish with ease, why my very ability to reach graduate school as a student of English literature in the first place requires me to loosen my attachments to a language I spoke years earlier. Yet, having lost the ability to speak Spanish, I never forgot it so totally that I could not understand it. Hearing Spanish spoken on the street reminded me of the community I once left and still cared deeply about. I never forgot Spanish so thoroughly, in other words, as to move outside the range of its nostalgic pull.

   Such moments of guilt and nostalgia were, however, just that -- momentary. They punctuated the history of my otherwise successful progress from barrio to classroom. Perhaps they even encouraged it. Whenever I felt my determination to succeed wavering, I tightened my hold on the conventions of academic life. 

     Spanish was one aspect of the problem, my parents another. They could raise deeper, more persistent doubts. They offered encouragement to my brothers and me on our work, but they also spoke, only half jokingly, about the way education was putting "big ideas" into our heads. When we would come home, for example, and challenge assumptions we earlier believed, they would be forced to defend their beliefs (which, given our new verbal skills, they did increasingly less well) or, more frequently, to submit to our logic with the disclaimer, "It's what we were taught in our time to believe...." More important, after we began to leave home for college, they voiced regret about how "changed" we had become, how much further away from one another we had grown. They partly yearned for a return to the time before education assumed their children's primary loyalty. This yearning was renewed each time they saw their nieces and nephews (none of whom continued their education beyond high school, all of whom continued to speak fluent Spanish) living according to the conventions and assumptions of their parents' culture. If I was already troubled by the time I graduated from high school by that refrain of congratulations ("Your parents must be so proud..."), I realize now how much more difficult and complicated was my progress into academic life for my parents, as they saw the cultural foundation of their family erode, than it was for me. 

     Yet my parents were willing to pay the price of alienation and continued to encourage me to become a scholarship boy because they perceived, as others of the working classes had before them, the relation between education and social mobility. Lacking the former themselves made them acutely aware of its necessity as prerequisite for the latter. They sent their children off to school with the hopes of their acquiring something "better" beyond education. Notice the assumption here that education is something of a tool or license - a means to an end, which has been the traditional way the lower or working classes have viewed the value of education in the past. That education might alter children in more basic ways than providing them with skills, certificates of proficiency, and even upward mobility, may come as a surprise for some, but the final cost is usually tolerated. 

    Only when I finished my course work in graduate school and went off to England for my dissertation did I grasp how far I had traveled from my culture origins. My year in England had actually my first opportunity t write and reflect upon the kind of material that I would spend my life producing. It was my first chance, too, to be free simultaneously of the distractions of course-work and of the insecurities of trying to find my niche in academic life. Sitting in the reading room of the British Museum, I no longer doubted that I had joined academic society. Ironically, this feeling of having finally arrived allowed me to look back to the community whence I came. That I was geographically farther away from my home than I had ever been lent a metaphorical resonance to the cultural distance I suddenly felt. 

    But the feeling was not pleasing. The reward of feeling a part of the world of the British Museum was an odd one. Each morning I would arrive at the reading room and grow increasingly depressed by the silence and what the silence implied –- that my life as a scholar would require self-absorption. Who, I wondered, would find my work helpful enough to want to read it? Was not my dissertation -- whose title alone would puzzle my relatives -- only my grandest exercise thus far in self-enclosure? The sight of the heads around me bent over their texts and papers, many so thoroughly engrossed that they wouldn't look up at the clock overhead for hours at a stretch, made me recall the remarkable noises of life in my family home. The tedious prose I was writing, a prose constantly qualified by footnotes, reminded me of the capacity for passionate statement those of the culture I was born into commanded -- and which I had now lost. 

      As I remembered it during those gray English afternoons, the past rushed forward to define more precisely my present condition. Remembering my youth, a time when I was not restricted to a chair but ran barefoot under a summer sun that tightened my skin with its white heat, made the fact that it was only my mind that "moved" each hour in the library painfully obvious.

     I did need to figure out where I had lost touch with my past. I started to become alien to my family culture the day I became a scholarship boy. In the British Museum the realization seemed obvious... I am not suggesting that an academic cannot reestablish ties of any kind with his old culture. Indeed, he can have an impact on the culture of his childhood. But as an academic, one exists by definition in a culture separate from one's nonacademic roots and, therefore, any future ties one has with those who remain "behind" are complicated by one's new cultural perspective.

     Paradoxically, the distance separating the academic from his nonacademic past can make his past seem, if not closer, then clearer. It is possible for the academic to understand the culture from which he came "better" than those who still live within it. In my own experience, it has only been as I have come to appraise my past through categories and notions derived from the social sciences that I have been able to think of Chicano life in cultural terms at all. Characteristics I took for granted or noticed only in passing -- the spontaneity, the passionate speech, the trust in concrete experience, the willingness to think communally rather than individually -- these are all significant phenomena to me now as aspects of a total culture (my parents have neither the time nor the inclination to think about their culture as a culture). Able to conceptualized a sense of Chicano culture, I am now also more attracted to that culture than I was before. The temptation now is to try to preserve those traits of my own culture that have not yet, in effect, atrophied. 

     Although people intent upon social mobility think of education as a means to an end, education does become an end: its culture allows one to exist more easily in a society increasingly anonymous and impersonal. The truth is, the academic's distance from his own experience brings the capacity for communicating with bureaucracies and understanding one's position in society.... 

     At this time when we are so keenly aware of social and economic inequality, it might seem beside the point to warn those who are working to bring about equality that education alters culture as well as economic status. And yet, if there is one main criticism that I, as a minority group student, must make of minority group leaders in their past attacks on the "racism" of the academy, it is that they never distinguished between my right to higher education and the desirability of my actually entering the academy -- which is another way of saying again that they never recognized that there were things I could lose by becoming a scholarship boy. 

    Certainly, the academy changes those from alien culture more than it is changed by them. While minority groups had an impact on higher education, largely because of their advantage in coming as a group, within the last few years students such as myself, who finally ended up certified as academics, also ended up sounding very much like the academics we found when we came to the campus. I do not enjoy making such admissions. But perhaps now the time has come when questions about the cultural costs of education ought to be delayed no longer. Those of us who have been scholarship boys know in our bones that our education has exacted a large price in exchange for the large benefits it has conferred upon us. And what is sadder to consider, after we have paid that price, we go home and casually change he cultures that nurtured us. My parents today understand how they are "Chicanos" in a large and impersonal sense. The gains from such knowledge are clear. But so, too, are the reasons for regret.

An American in Mexico by Alex Espinoza

When my father came to the United States to work as a day laborer many years ago, he intended to move back to the village in Michoacán where my mother and seven of my siblings lived. He wired my mother money, some of which she used to build a house there in El Ojo de Agua, on a parcel of land that has been in her family since before the Mexican Revolution. But at some point my mother had enough of waiting for my father’s return. She packed up what little she had and, with her children, traveled to Tijuana to be closer to him and to make visits easier. She stayed in Tijuana for several years — I was born there, the youngest of 11 children. Eventually we moved to the three-bedroom house outside Los Angeles where I grew up.

My childhood was different from the childhood of most of my siblings. I rode my BMX bike through vacant lots, watched cable and collected “Star Wars” action figures. They climbed mesquite trees, made handmade dolls from old rags and stole chicken eggs from a neighbor’s henhouse to sell for candy. They also shared hardships and misfortunes — hunger, long hours of working in the fields at young ages, the loss of two infant sisters.

Their connection to Mexico was close, deep and also painful, something I simply could not grasp. Growing up, I felt no ties to El Ojo de Agua. I traveled into Mexico with my family as a child a few times, but I felt disconnected and uninterested during those trips — and was always eager to return to my American life. But as I grew older, I began to want to see the place most of my family called home, the place my siblings had talked about with such complicated feelings. Two years ago, at 33, I finally decided to go. I took my mother along; it had been more than 25 years since she had returned.

We flew into Mexico City, where we stayed for one day — strolling through parks and museums and visiting the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe; there we watched the steady flow of devotees making their pilgrimages to the altar on their knees, their hands clasped in prayer. The next day, we traveled by bus to the city of La Piedad, where my uncle picked us up at the depot.

After many years in the U.S., my uncle had recently returned home to sell agricultural equipment to local farmers. He employed a maid named Chavela, who lived in one of the nearby villages. Chavela told me that her boyfriend had left for the United States about a month before, but that weeks had gone by without news of his whereabouts. She said she hoped to save enough money to be able to go and find him. It made me think of the trip my mother took more than three decades earlier, traveling by train to Tijuana with her children to be near my father.

It was threatening to rain the afternoon my uncle drove us out over unpaved roads to the old house. Many of the houses along the main road of the village were empty and dark, with overgrown weeds and broken fences. Now and again, I’d spot one with dim lights illuminating the small windows. Tricycles and toys might be scattered around the front yard, and a column of white smoke threaded out through a hole in the corrugated-metal roof.

Gradually the houses vanished, giving way to tall cornstalks, and we reached the wooden fence marking the entrance to my grandfather’s property. We drove up a short distance before stopping and getting out. I spotted a reservoir behind some trees, and the water glistened when the clouds broke enough to allow a few beams of sunlight to touch the surface.

The house my mother built was nothing more than four walls made of orange bricks surrounded by thickets of wild shrubs and grass. The windows had no glass, and the front door had been ripped from its hinges. My uncle said that the house was sometimes used as a stable for the livestock that grazed in the hills not far away. There were broken bottles on the dirt floor, and it smelled of urine and manure.

“I lived here,” my mother said to me, as if she couldn’t believe it herself. “Right here.”

This was a place that had, over the years, become mythic in my mind. But it was real. I touched the brick walls, and I saw the trees my siblings had climbed, the fields where they had worked. The soft mud gave way underneath my shoes. A clean set of my footprints remained.

I took many pictures, and after the film was developed I sat on the floor of my apartment back in California and took the photos out. I looked at each one and tried piecing them together, assembling a memory. I really wanted to connect to that land the way my brothers and sisters had — to get a better sense of our shared past. I thought I could understand things like sacrifice, the small traces of ourselves we are forced to leave behind. But all that the pictures showed were indistinguishable sections of walls, windows and dark doorways.

Post Reading Questions

Blue Book Writing—Answering these questions should take 1.5-3 pages of writing

1. What is the main point(s) of these two essays? 

2. Compare and contrast: How do the writers go about making these main point(s)? 

3. What are some visual details they employs to help the readers to “see” what they means?

4. How do they combine personal experience with a larger analysis of the outside world?

5. How did you feel about the readings?

Readings on African American Race Tension

The Price of Blackness

By Lanre Akninsiku on 08.17.14 in Gawker

In undergrad, I drove a '92 Ford Taurus that just hulked, tank-like, up and down the streets of Berkeley. The thing was conspicuous, an ocean liner. I was pulled over all the time, once or twice a week at one point. Often I'd see a squad car following me and just pull to the curb to get it over with. An officer would walk up to the car, one hand on that little button that secures the strap over his gun. He'd ask for my license and registration. Some inner voice would remind me that this was the time to point out I'd done nothing wrong; I'd ask for a badge number, I'd take a stand. But black boys are supposed to know better.
So what I would do was: I would slip my college ID over my driver's license. The officer's eyes would light up. Not your college ID, he would say, amused. Then he would go back to his car and dally a little, pretending to check on things, before handing my license back with some mock-heroic advice about staying out of trouble. The story ends right there. I remember feeling vague anger afterwards, although I was probably feeling something a lot closer to despair.
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Every time I used the college ID trick, it bred in me a kind of survivor's guilt, a guilt about a life that feels as if it's being protected weakly, through cowardice. Because what I was really doing was saying, Yes, some of us deserve to be shot in the street, but this ID proves that I'm not one of them. I used the little plastic card to secure my status as One Of The Good Ones^[1], and I always drove away ashamed, always. At best, I was reducing my humanity—my right to not get shot by a police officer—to a giveaway received during freshman orientation. At worst, I was just delaying what is now starting to feel inevitable.
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Mentally-speaking, what happens when you hear about another unarmed black teen killed by police/police-like officers? For me, it goes something like this: First, anger, a kind of 360-degree, completely unfocused, completely diffuse anger; but since anger is a fairly cheap emotion it fades, and sadness settles in; and then I get that familiar helpless feeling you get when you realize what you're doing is utterly rote, almost Pavlovian, but you don't know how else to deal. To put it another way: For reasons I'm still trying to parse out, I've realized that simply mourning the deaths of other young black men isn't good enough any more.
I don't mean for this to sound melodramatic, because my emotions don't really matter; or, they matter less than a murdered black boy whose body was left in the street. But what I'm trying to describe here is something real, a sinking-in-quicksand feeling familiar to anyone who is tired of the terror—which is the only really truly appropriate term—police officers exact on young black men. When an unarmed black boy is killed by a police officer, again, and some loud-talking reporter is interviewing the boy's mother, again, and you can see his mother's shoulders slumped until they can't slump any more, and she's been crying so much she's gotten to the point of simply not bothering to wipe the tears away, and you watch her as she tries to look into every camera and speak into every microphone, and watch her as she suddenly gets the spectacle of all of this, and starts listing all of the good things her boy ever was, so that everyone can remember him the way she's remembering him right then, in that moment—when will we decide this is not okay?
–––
This is probably a good time to backtrack a little and talk about fear. To be black and interact with the police is a scary thing. The fear doesn't have to come from any kind of historical antagonism, which, trust me, would be enough; it can also come from many data points of personal experience, collected over time. Almost all black men have these close-call-style stories, and we collect and mostly keep them to ourselves until one of us is killed. You know how the stories go: I was pulled over one day and the cop drew his gun as he approached my window; I was stopped on the street, handcuffed and made to sit on the sidewalk because the cop said I looked like a suspect; I had four squad cars pull up on me for jaywalking. We trade them like currency. And it almost goes without saying that these stops are de facto violent, because even when the officer doesn't physically harm you, you can feel that you've been robbed of something. The thing to remember is that each of these experiences compounds the last, like interest, so that at a certain point just seeing a police officer becomes nauseating. That feeling is fear.
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We all know there's nothing necessarily wrong with fear, since it's just a really effective survival mechanism, and there sure as hell isn't anything wrong with surviving. Legitimate fear can save your life; it makes sense that many of us are scared of heights and rattlesnakes. But a constant state of fear, being afraid, makes you a special kind of tired, in the same way a bully or bad boss makes you tired. This is no real way to live.
___
OK: Imagine you know of a guy who occasionally walks around your neighborhood with a gun. Imagine you don't really know this guy, so you don't know how he feels about you, whether he sees you as friend or foe. You do know that he holds his gun a little tighter when he walks past your house. You also know that if he shoots you, there's a good chance he'll get away with it.
That's how all of this feels.
––
What I've seen of the Ferguson Police Department and their tanks, AR15's, flash-bang grenades, tear gas, laser sights, helicopters, and military-style detachment makes me believe Michael Brown was tired. Maybe he'd been harassed by a police officer before, maybe he was tired of being tired. So when Darren Wilson tried to bully him, Michael Brown said no. And maybe it was the "no" of someone who's been pushed around, which is a more beautiful "no," since it is so clear and absolute. That a police officer then shot him dead and left his body in the street is, historically, the kind of thing police officers do when black men stand up for themselves.
And so for the last week I've been feeling that helpless feeling. All that's left after helplessness is fatigue, right? Aren't we all tired yet? We know that what happened to Michael Brown was not a unique incident but part of a larger phenomenon—and that it will happen again, soon. Which means we know an even deeper truth: that to be black in this country means constantly paying a tax on your life. Some of us pay in dignity, some of us pay in blood. What I'm trying to say is this: Never again will I pay with my dignity.

The Coming Race War Won’t Be About Race

By Kareem Abdul-Jabbar 17 August 2014

            Will the recent rioting in Ferguson, Missouri, be a tipping point in the struggle against racial injustice, or will it be a minor footnote in some future grad student’s thesis on Civil Unrest in the Early Twenty-First Century?

            The answer can be found in May of 1970. You probably have heard of the Kent State shootings: on May 4, 1970, the Ohio National Guard opened fire on student protesters at Kent State University. During those 13 seconds of gunfire, four students were killed and nine were wounded, one of whom was permanently paralyzed. The shock and outcry resulted in a nationwide strike of 4 million students that closed more than 450 campuses. Five days after the shooting, 100,000 protestors gathered in Washington, D.C. And the nation’s youth was energetically mobilized to end the Vietnam War, racism, sexism, and mindless faith in the political establishment.

            You probably haven’t heard of the Jackson State shootings. On May 14^th, 10 days after Kent State ignited the nation, at the predominantly black Jackson State University in Mississippi, police killed two black students (one a high school senior, the other the father of an 18-month-old baby) with shotguns and wounded twelve others.

               There was no national outcry. The nation was not mobilized to do anything. That heartless leviathan we call History swallowed that event whole, erasing it from the national memory.

And, unless we want the Ferguson atrocity to also be swallowed and become nothing more than an intestinal irritant to history, we have to address the situation not just as another act of systemic racism, but as what else it is: class warfare.

By focusing on just the racial aspect, the discussion becomes about whether Michael Brown’s death—or that of the other three unarmed black men who were killed by police in the U.S. within that month—is about discrimination or about police justification. Then we’ll argue about whether there isn’t just as much black-against-white racism in the U.S. as there is white-against-black. (Yes, there is. But, in general, white-against-black economically impacts the future of the black community. Black-against-white has almost no measurable social impact.)

Then we’ll start debating whether or not the police in America are themselves an endangered minority who are also discriminated against based on their color—blue. (Yes, they are. There are many factors to consider before condemning police, including political pressures, inadequate training, and arcane policies.) Then we’ll question whether blacks are more often shot because they more often commit crimes. (In fact, studies show that blacks are targeted more often in some cities, like New York City. It’s difficult to get a bigger national picture because studies are woefully inadequate. The Department of Justice study shows that in the U.S. between 2003 and 2009, among arrest-related deaths there’s very little difference among blacks, whites, or Latinos. However, the study doesn’t tell us how many were unarmed.)

This fist-shaking of everyone’s racial agenda distracts America from the larger issue that the targets of police overreaction are based less on skin color and more on an even worse Ebola-level affliction: being poor. Of course, to many in America, being a person of color is synonymous with being poor, and being poor is synonymous with being a criminal. Ironically, this misperception is true even among the poor.

And that’s how the status quo wants it.

The U.S. Census Report finds that 50 million Americans are poor. Fifty million voters is a powerful block if they ever organized in an effort to pursue their common economic goals. So, it’s crucial that those in the wealthiest One Percent keep the poor fractured by distracting them with emotional issues like immigration, abortion and gun control so they never stop to wonder how they got so screwed over for so long.

One way to keep these 50 million fractured is through disinformation. PunditFact’s recent scorecard on network news concluded that at Fox and Fox News Channel, 60 percent of claims are false. At NBC and MSNBC, 46 percent of claims were deemed false. That’s the “news,” folks! During the Ferguson riots, Fox News ran a black and white photo of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., with the bold caption: “Forgetting MLK’s Message/Protestors in Missouri Turn to Violence.” Did they run such a caption when either Presidents Bush invaded Iraq: “Forgetting Jesus Christ’s Message/U.S. Forgets to Turn Cheek and Kills Thousands"?

How can viewers make reasonable choices in a democracy if their sources of information are corrupted? They can’t, which is exactly how the One Percent controls the fate of the Ninety-Nine Percent.

Worse, certain politicians and entrepreneurs conspire to keep the poor just as they are. On his HBO comedic news show Last Week Tonight, John Oliver ran an expose of the payday loan business and those who so callously exploit the desperation of the poor. How does an industry that extorts up to 1,900 percent interest on loans get away with it? In Texas, State Rep. Gary Elkins blocked a regulatory bill, despite the fact that he owns a chain of payday loan stores. And the politician who kept badgering Elkins about his conflict of interest, Rep. Vicki Truitt, became a lobbyist for ACE Cash Express just 17 days after leaving office. In essence, Oliver showed how the poor are lured into such a loan, only to be unable to pay it back and having to secure yet another loan. The cycle shall be unbroken.

Dystopian books and movies like Snowpiercer, The Giver, Divergent, Hunger Games, and Elysium have been the rage for the past few years. Not just because they express teen frustration at authority figures. That would explain some of the popularity among younger audiences, but not among twentysomethings and even older adults. The real reason we flock to see Donald Sutherland’s porcelain portrayal in Hunger Games of a cold, ruthless president of the U.S. dedicated to preserving the rich while grinding his heel into the necks of the poor is that it rings true in a society in which the One Percent gets richer while our middle class is collapsing.

That’s not hyperbole; statistics prove this to be true. According to a 2012 Pew Research Center report, just half of U.S. households are middle-income, a drop of 11 percent since the 1970s; median middle-class income has dropped by 5 percent in the last ten years, total wealth is down 28 percent. Fewer people (just 23 percent) think they will have enough money to retire. Most damning of all: fewer Americans than ever believe in the American Dream mantra that hard work will get them ahead.

Rather than uniting to face the real foe—do-nothing politicians, legislators, and others in power—we fall into the trap of turning against each other, expending our energy battling our allies instead of our enemies. This isn’t just inclusive of race and political parties, it’s also about gender. In her book Unspeakable Things: Sex, Lies and Revolution, Laurie Penny suggests that the decreased career opportunities for young men in society makes them feel less valuable to females; as a result they deflect their rage from those who caused the problem to those who also suffer the consequences: females.

Yes, I’m aware that it is unfair to paint the wealthiest with such broad strokes. There are a number of super-rich people who are also super-supportive of their community. Humbled by their own success, they reach out to help others. But that’s not the case with the multitude of millionaires and billionaires who lobby to reduce Food Stamps, give no relief to the burden of student debt on our young, and kill extensions of unemployment benefits.

With each of these shootings/chokehold deaths/stand-your-ground atrocities, police and the judicial system are seen as enforcers of an unjust status quo. Our anger rises, and riots demanding justice ensue. The news channels interview everyone and pundits assign blame.

Then what?

I’m not saying the protests in Ferguson aren’t justified—they are. In fact, we need more protests across the country. Where’s our Kent State? What will it take to mobilize 4 million students in peaceful protest? Because that’s what it will take to evoke actual change. The middle class has to join the poor and whites have to join African-Americans in mass demonstrations, in ousting corrupt politicians, in boycotting exploitative businesses, in passing legislation that promotes economic equality and opportunity, and in punishing those who gamble with our financial future.

Otherwise, all we’re going to get is what we got out of Ferguson: a bunch of politicians and celebrities expressing sympathy and outrage. If we don’t have a specific agenda—a list of exactly what we want to change and how—we will be gathering over and over again beside the dead bodies of our murdered children, parents, and neighbors.

I hope John Steinbeck is proven right when he wrote in Grapes of Wrath, “Repression works only to strengthen and knit the oppressed.” But I’m more inclined to echo Marvin Gaye’s “Inner City Blues,” written the year after the Kent State/Jackson State shootings:

Inflation no chance

To increase finance

Bills pile up sky high

Send that boy off to die

Make me wanna holler

The way they do my life

Make me wanna holler

The way they do my life

What a Jewish Journalist Saw in Charlottesville

By Nathan Guttman , Forward 12 August 2017

I had come to Charlottesville, Virginia for the “Unite the Right” rally to gauge the level of Jew hatred, amid all the racism and bigotry. So when, after a night of hate-filled demonstrations and a morning of clashes, the mayor cancelled all permits and kicked the white supremacists out of Emancipation Park, I wasn’t sure what to do until I got wind of a rumor that one hard-core gang had decamped to another park in this idyllic college town.
I headed to McIntyre Park with a few other reporters and was glad — if that’s the right word — to find a crowd of about 100 flowing into the space. A few miles away in downtown, a driver had rammed his car into counter-protesters, killing one and injuring 19. But in McIntyre Park, a riotous group of men — one bare-shirted, the better to show off his swastika tattoo, another being treated for a deep gash in his head — was shouting angrily, at reporters, communists, socialists, bitches… and Jews.
“[L]ittle Mayor Signer — SEE-NER — how do you pronounce this little creep’s name?” asked Richard Spencer, a right-wing leader who dreams of a “white ethnostate,” as he stood on a bench under a tree to rally his troops, deprived of their protest.
The crowd knew exactly how to pronounce his name: “Jew, Jew, Jew, Jew” some shouted out. The rest burst out in laughter. And that was one of the only moments of levity the alt-right audience gathered under the tree enjoyed.
“The idea that I’d ever back down to such a little creep like Mayor Signer,” Spencer went on, “They don’t understand what’s in my heart, they don’t understand the ‘alt-right,’ they don’t understand this whole movement.” The term “alt-right” has many meanings, but Spencer’s mission is the salvation of what he sees as an oppressed white race.
After stepping down from the bench, I asked Spencer about the reference to the mayor and his faith. Signer, a Democrat who assumed office last year, is Jewish.
“I didn’t say that,” Spencer said. “I don’t know if he’s a Jew or not. Is he?”
A member of the group of supporters surrounding Spencer and the reporters volunteered an answer: “He is a Jew.”
“I actually don’t care. He could be Ethiopian,” Spencer added. “The way that he acted is absolutely outrageous. He looks like a fool and we’re going to make him look like an even bigger fool. That’s a lot of fun.”
When another reporter asked Spencer why he is using offensive language when speaking about a mayor who was democratically elected by residents of the city, Spencer responded: “Who cares? Hitler was elected. That’s what you guys always say.”
But then Spencer, a relatively young member of the American far right, was eclipsed by the arrival of an elder of the movement with even more name recognition and status.
 “Duke, Duke, Duke,” the crowd chanted, as David Duke, the former KKK leader and poster boy of modern American neo-Nazism, walked straight into the supportive audience and stepped up to the bench-turned-podium.
“The courage you showed today in Charlottesville,” he told his supporters. “This is a first step toward making a realization of something that Trump alluded to early in the campaign — this is the first step toward taking America back.” And he explained: “European Americans face massive discrimination. Truth is that we’re being ethnically cleansed in our own nation.”
Later in the day, President Donald Trump criticized the events of the day and said such hate had no place in this country. He put the blames on “many sides” and ignored reporters who asked him why right-wing leaders like Duke feel inspired and supported by Trump.
A young couple of counter-protestors approached and began to heckle Duke. A small group of his supporters engaged in a profanity-laced shouting match with the couple, as Duke tried to complete his speech.
A minute later, organizers whispered in his ear that “something was going on” downtown. Duke apologized for cutting his remarks short and warned that more counter-protesters were on the way. It was time to leave, but not before one last shot of anti-Semitism.
Supporters broke out spontaneously with calls “The goyim know, the goyim know,” voicing a common neo-Nazi meme that implies a Jewish conspiracy behind attempts to shut down voices of the “goyim” — Yiddish for gentiles.
The small group dispersed quickly as phones began to light up with the news alerts of the alt-right car attack against counter-protestors. The couple heckling Duke lingered on for another round of back and forth insults with the white nationalists as they made their ways to their cars, some carrying Confederate flags, others sporting bandaged fresh wounds from the day of battle.
They refused to talk to answer any more of my questions, even though I made sure my hand covered the old sticker in Hebrew on the back of my recorder.

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