RRR: Hendickson, "Talking in Color"

In the personal essay “Talking in Color: Collision of Cultures” (2013), Tiffany Hendrickson explains how your speech is not defined by your ethnicity but by the culture you were raised in. Hendrickson uses personal experiences as well as quotes from different authors to support her claim. Hendrickson tells the story of how it was for her being a white female who spoke with an African-American dialect in order to help people understand that your ethnicity doesn’t define your speech. The attended audience of this essay is for people who often believe that speech is ethnicity specific as well as people who are like the author and may be embarrassed because they feel they should talk a certain way because of their ethnicity.

I agree with the message Hendrickson was trying to teach in this article. I feel like her being a white girl experiencing the same struggle as black people was really different to me. However, I still liked the way she made it her own in a way  to not only appeal to African American people, while still speaking the truth about the struggle. She did a really good job getting her point across about coding.

In the article, "Talking in Color: Collision of Cultures", the author talks about how people used to judge her based off of what she sounded or looked like. So she learned how to code-switch in order to communicate without being judged. For example, "As I wait for the bus, the white faces rushing into school look at me quizzically because I am not walking into their school." (Hendrickson, paragraph 1) This shows that the other white kids used to judge her because she was white but she didn't go to a white school. According to the text, "I tried to hide my black voice or any accent that I might have. I would try to “code-switch” with the group I was talking to." (Hendrickson, paragraph 7)  This explains how she changed her way of speaking when interacting with other white people. This story is a great example of how some people who will be judged, on the way they speak, can change the way they speak to interact with different groups of people without judgement. Code-switching is a necessary skill that people should have no matter what race or ethnicity they are.

Work Cited
  Hendrickson, Tiffany. “First-Year Writers.” Queen City Writers, Queen City Writers, 15 Aug. 2014, qc-writers.com/2013/03/21/storming-the-gate-talking-in-color/.                                                 

RRR:Larson, "Watch Your Language: Teaching Standard Usage to Resistant and Reluctant Learners"

In the English journal "Watch Your Language"(1996), written by Mark Larson explores the idea that English teachers should come up with a more effective way to teach students language. He use personal experience to connect with the readers in a way that lets them know, he too know the struggle of non effective teaching methods. The purpose of this article is to get the attention of English teachers in order to reform the way English is being taught, and helping students improve their English skills. The attended audience for this article is English teachers, concerned students or parents, and people that experienced the same struggle as the writer.

I personally agree with Larson. In the story, he too struggles with the proper way to use English in writing. I can personally relate to this. As a kid writing was never my strongest area. I had my writing skills and knowledge drilled into me by my mother and the many books I've read over the years. I was also delighted to read that the author tried to correct his teachings in order to compensate for the same reasons he struggled with English. Seeing that my teachers never did this for me, I am both happy and intrigued in the ways he wanted to reform the way English and his class was taught.

In this article Larson uses personal experiences, both in his childhood and adult years, along with quotes from different sources to illustrate his point that teaching English should be more about the context of your writing over just teaching the “so called” rules of grammar. Larson states, “They know the rules, though they probably never think of them as rules” (Larson, 94). Here Larson explains how there are different rules to any language including “street slang” that we unconsciously learn without knowing. We talk this way to make our point to that audience. Larson does a great job in helping the reader relate to the point of the rules can be learned without teaching them.  He correlates learning grammar rules and being corrected on mistakes with fitting in to different groups and how constantly being penalized or corrected can make you feel more like an outsider. This hinders the learner process because the feeling would make you rebellious. He gives an example of this by telling a personal story about a dinner he attended where he felt like an outsider and how even someone trying to help me made him more uncomfortable and more willing to rebel. “Her well-meaning effort to help me feel “at home” only accentuated my status as an alien, as someone in need of guidance” (Larson,92). This story is a great example of how some feel in the classroom when they are constantly being corrected on grammatical errors it makes them feel like an outsider as if they don’t know language at all, which in turns causes students to focus to much on the rules and not enough on the context of their speech.  “I would like to take the primary focus off of prescriptive rules – what we “ought” to say-and place it on descriptive rules-what people do say” (Pinker,371). This was a great quote used by Larson to explain how he believes language should be taught. He believes learning how people speak and why the speak certain ways would be more beneficial than learning how we should speak. By reading works by different people we unconsciously learn the rules of language and how to speak to different audiences without being instructed directly. Larson does a great job with opening the eyes of the reader, by explaining his point that too much emphasize has been put on the rules of language and we need to focus more on the context of our speech.

Larson, Mark. “Watch Your Language: Teaching Standard Usage to Resistant and Reluctant

            Learners.” The English Journal, vol. 85, no. 7, 1996, pp. 91–95. JSTOR, JSTOR,

            www.jstor.org/stable/820518.

Pinker, Steven. 1995. The Language Instinct: How the Mind Creates Language. New York: W

            Morrow and Company.

RRR: Agrusa "We Didn't Know"

In the article "We Didn't Know" by Mary Agrusa (Oct, 7, 2016) shows the life of a soldier that people don't normally see and that struggle they face on a daily basis. The author in this story uses her father's personal experiences to support her story. The authors purpose of this story is to inform people of the soldiers true life and sacrifice. The way the story is set up, the audience is people that do not know about a soldiers life and duty.

While reading this personal essay I was reminded of the fact that soldiers have sacrificed their lives for the freedoms that we enjoy today. Sometimes we take for granted the freedom that we have and tend to forget the men and women who sacrificed themselves for their country, fighting for complete strangers. I enjoyed reading this essay about the authors fathers and it was interesting how she didn’t even know some of the things her dad went through while at war. I have always been interested in war stories but this essay was more personal than any of the other stories I have heard, because, it was about the authors father. She had firsthand experience of some of the effects war had on her father. Reading this I realize that there is a lot that we may not know about what soldiers endured while deployed because some of it they care not to talk about. We should be appreciative of the sacrifices soldiers have made because we may never now exactly what they had to go through for us.

The author use her father's war background to tell a story that reveal the hidden purpose of a solider not everyone know about. She use imagery and examples, to express her ideas in a way the reader can understand. One example, she use is at her fathers funeral when she question the honor guards reason for standing in the heat without moving.  She answer this question by saying,"Their presence was a way of honoring my father's service to the people he didn't know", because "the military understands its mission is to serve and protect and this includes strangers."(p.g127)This sentence was put in place to help sum up her fathers purpose in which, his war involvement was clarified, and she finally began to gain incite of him. In the last sentence she said,"Although his life would be deemed ordinary at best, when given the chance to make a difference in his world for the better, he didn't hesitate. And that much we do know."(p.g127) The last, sentence basically sum up everything and put the authors wondering a side, to finally help her accept and understand the fact that her father did serve in the war.

Works Cited

Mary,Agrusa. "We didn't know." Connections: Guide to First Year Writing @ Clayton State University.  Ed. Mary Lamb. 6th Edition. South Lake: 2016. 115-117 print

RRR: Chinyere Ohuoba "The Perception of Africa"

In the short essay “The Perception of Africa” (2016), written by Chinyere Ohuoba she explores how the media influences a certain perception of Africa as a whole and doesn’t represent each country individually. Ohuoba tells a story about a student from Africa who despises social studies class because of the negative perspective they have about Africa. Ohuoba also tells a story about her first trip to Africa in order to show the audience that even though she is the child of two Nigerian parents the perception that she received from media outlets of Africa was wrong. Ohuoba writes this to a global audience to clear up misconceptions people may have of Africa.
After reading the piece I felt it was very informational. The way the author used examples and elaborated on her ideas really stood out to me. It help me relate to many of the things she was talking about. One of them, being teachers butchering my name, and would make me feel bad. Another, was living in a society in which stereotyping is greatly accepted. Me being apart of the African American community I feel stereotyping is a really big issue for African Americans. In which we experience situations such as police brutality, the media only reporting the bad things, despite the amount of good, and all colored people being portrayed to be living in poverty, which is certainly not true  but commonly mistaken.
In this story, the author shows and explains how the use of mass media and stereotypes have shaped and procured an image of Africa that is true to anyone who has never experienced or been exposed to Africa. For example, "Everyone in Africa is starving and poor." (paragraph 3, page 172) This is an example from the text that shows the kind of false stereotypes that have been accepted by people and spread through the media. According to the text, "Whoever controls the media, controls the mind." (paragraph 5, page 173) This is another example of how the use of media affected so many with the false image of Africa that is widely accepted. Overall, this story showed how mass media and stereotypes can cause unintentional ignorance to things, in this case Africa, that people are

Work Cited

Chinyere,Ohuoba. "The Perception of Africa." Connections: Guide to First Year Writing @ Clayton State University. Ed. Mary Lamb. 6th Edition. South Lake: 2016. 203-213 print

RRR: Dorothy Allison "Context"

    

      In the short story  "Context" (1994), written by Dorothy Allison, she explores that  "context" can sometime be misleading and can make people form wrong opinions, or even ruin a relationship. Allison supports her thesis by telling stories from her past in which she experience situations that caused people to change their perception of her after different situations. Allison use flashback  in order to show that if context is perceived wrong then it can lead to false assumption. The intended audience for this article is people who need to understand that context is so little to share but yet so vital.
      In my personal opinion, I agree and relate to the story on a personal level. I also suffered from the same problem from the protagonist of this story. When people are exposed to new environments, they automatically shut down. So when you are exposed to so many new people at once that are important to your significant other, it becomes very daunting. I had this problem when facing my significant others family and was expected to blend in and get along. Having the fear of others judge me off of my background, heritage, and myself as a person was not easy to overcome.
      Dorothy Allison uses a short story to explain how context can sometimes shape the way people think of you, but also how important it is. In this short story about her and her lover, she gives an example of how fearful she was to introduce her family to her lover because of the “context” of her upbringing. Allison says, “I was afraid to take my lover home with me because of what I might see in her face once she had spent some time with my aunt, met a few of my uncles, and tried to talk to any of my cousins.” (Allison p.115) She feared his lover wouldn’t be able to relate or understand, and ultimately judge her from their actions. Allison shares a memory about an incident with her step father and a store clerk where her step father didn’t agree with the prices at the store and became angry and insulted the store clerk. The actions of her step father in the eyes of the clerk shed negative light on all of them even though she didn’t agree with her step father’s actions. This is what Allison was afraid would happen when her lover met her family. But Allison also reflects on how she felt when she visited her lover’s family and saw where she came from and how her lover's “context” helped her to understand her lover more. Allison says, “Seeing where she had grown up, meeting some of her family, I had understood her better, seen where some of her fear came from, and her pride.” (Allison p.117) These examples show the reader how “context” can be seen differently by different people. Some use it to be judgmental and some use it to learn.  Allison’s ends her story by saying, “Context is so little to share, and so vital.” (Allison p.117) Which tells the reader even though we may not think much of our “context” it is an important part of our lives and can have a dramatic impact on the way people view us.

Works Cited

Allison,Dorothy. "Context." Connections: Guide to First Year Writing @ Clayton State University.
                 Ed. Mary Lamb. 6th Edition. South Lake: 2016. 115-117 print

Rhetorical Reading Response: Mother Tongue

In the article "Mother Tongue" (1990) by Amy Tan she explains that language should not hinder people but instead be used as a tool or motivation for one's progress. Tan further supports this idea by telling us of the times she has noticed her own broken English. The author was showing how different kinds of  English can be used in order to progress. The audience receives this message, especially through her third person view.

I really enjoyed this reading, I could relate to a lot to what the writer was talking about. The author brought up many good points and gave great examples which made me think about my own life and upbringing. My primary language is English but, my family talks a lot of what people may call “slang” even though I never felt embarrassed about the way they talked as Tan was about her mother. I thought at times that the way they expressed themselves was inappropriate in certain settings. I believe there is a time and place for everything and that people need to be conscious of their audience to communicate effectively. Also, people talk differently around different people which is often determined by the relationship you have with that individual. The more intimate the relationship the more relaxed and unfiltered the dialogue will be. I know me personally, I talk to my family a lot different from the way I may talk to a co-worker or a teacher or even a stranger. That’s why it is important to know your audience. So you can communicate effectively in different situations. Thinking about my families speech at times makes me more aware of who my audience is, and helps me to speak appropriate no matter what the setting may be. 

 The article "Mother Tongue", by Amy Tan emphasizes the idea that we sometimes speak unconsciously and that we are categorized by the way we speak. She does this by giving us a glimpse of her experience growing up in a home where English was not the first language; where her mother spoke in what she called "broken English", or "limited English". Through the text we learn that in a way she was ashamed that her mother spoke in such a way. She was ashamed because people in department stores, banks, and restaurants did not take her mother serious, did not give her mother good service, pretended not to understand her mother, or they might even pretend they didn't hear her mother. Another example, would be when she was fifteen her mother realized the limitations of her English, in which her mother would  make her pretend it was her on the phone to get information, or even complain and yell at people who had been rude to her. Also, she give us another example of a situation where her mother goes to the hospital about her CAT scan results, but the doctors were being foolish and not wanting to help her due to her limited English, until she offer the idea of them speaking to her daughter in which they quickly give her information and apologize for their inconvenience. Tan then proceeds to say, "I think my mother's English almost had an effect on limiting my possibilities in life", " but I do think the language spoken in my family, especially immigrant families which is more insular, plays a large role in shaping the language of the child." However, in her conclusion she overcomes this thought because she ends with" Fortunately, I happen to be rebellious in nature and enjoy the challenge of disproving assumptions made about me", which lead her to change her major to English, and her becoming a writer.

Works Cited

Tan,Amy. "Mother Tongue." Connections: Guide to First Year Writing @ Clayton State University. Ed. Mary Lamb. 6th Edition. South Lake: 2016. 203-213 print