Month: April 2019

One of the pieces to be analyzed is a scholarly text by Kara Poe Alexander; “ Successes, Victims, and Prodigies: “Master” and “Little” Cultural Narratives in the Literacy Narrative Genre,” in which she focuses on defining narratives in a way that allows for further analysis. In initially defining literacy narratives and the goals thereof, she writes: “Ultimately, literacy narratives aim ‘to define who we are and what we want to become, both as individuals and as a community,’” (Alexander 609) Speaking to the fact that these narratives, when analyzed, one can pick up on even the most minute details of the narrative and construct themes and ideas in their own mind based on the experiences of another, and allow one to deconstruct these ideas to their origin. She also writes to define a commonality between narratives: “dominant, archetypal stories,” or that which “follow conventional patterns of narration and correspond to prevailing cultural representations of literacy perpetuated through literature, film, [etc]… They also help organize and configure reality, thus shaping our understandings of ourselves.” (Alexander 609) Understanding this can allow us to use the narratives to connect the individual story to society as a whole. These are the premisse that will be used in this piece mainly as a lens, simply for understanding how these narratives are important in the way that they allow us to capture what makes a person who they are in relation to the rest of the world.

With constructing this paragraph, I wanted to add a proper introduction to the ideas of Alexander. I used two of her quotes to get the information “straight from the horse’s mouth” to the reader, allowing the major ideas and definitions that I will be using to be properly introduced.

Sometimes the effects done on the narrative by sponsors can run deeper; In “Reading Gone Wrong” by Shaylee Amidan, she explores how the withholding of literacy from one by a sponsor can damage their views on their personal life and passions. She talks about how “so many people are shot down for being different by their own choice..” (Amidan) This is a key theme perception for the author, as she references frequently how literacy (or the lack of acquisition thereof), is perceived as a make or break for success in life. Her experience with a teacher not allowing her to participate shows how some sponsors are all too willing to ostracize a student or other narrator without a willingness to conform; effectively taking away their choice in the matter. The choice being, how one goes about their journey to literacy, and how too often some sponsors will withhold, or attempt to define this long and winding road for someone. But again, this lack of establishment of literacy can and did cause problems for Amidan, and as Kara Poe Alexander explores in her piece, “Costs include social, cultural, and permanent displacement which leads people to alienation, [and] despair.” (Alexander 610) In Amidan’s case, this despair goes hand-in-hand with the fact that she felt alienated from the rest of the class; that she was not on the same intellectual level as other students for her need for a tutor. This is derived from the far-too-common narrative that defines literacy as a success factor; that without it, you will fail and be a reject of society.

In reconstructing this paragraph, I opted to add more of my own voice to it and remove some of the quotes that took up the paragraph, as well as bridging the gap between the narrative and Alexander that previously existed. I also added a bit more to make it relevant to the rest of the piece.

1. My peers think that I should provide a little bit more evidence from the narratives, and to connect it to the articles. My narratives focus specifically on the withholding of literacy by sponsors and how that defines the perspective of the individual and how that impacts the way they view themselves.
2. I believe that I should improve my overall introductions to each text. I mainly attempted to combine the introductions to each inside of the normal analysis body paragraphs, but I find that the introductions I provided are not sufficient in fully encapsulating the specific work of the authors that we are using.
3. One idea I am looking into specifically is using an additional narrative to contrast with the ones I am already using so that I can build up both sides of the table and make it more effective. I think that my narratives and articles are fairly balanced in terms of evidence, I think my main issue is making a more concise, prominent claim in my paper.

Introduction: 

In my paper’s introduction, I had to clarify some of my sentences to make my claim a bit more clear overall. I did not change the opening sentences, as I felt it very clearly shows the reader where the paper starts and allows it to grow from there.

Evidence and Explanations: 

Moving from rough to final draft, I added quite a bit more evidence into the paper. My rough draft focused more on introducing and developing these authors and making their major claims visible, but moving into the final draft I took more time to provide more analysis-type evidence that would support my thesis even more. 

Reorganization: 

I added even more concise information to existing paragraphs and added some new ones to help better analyze the conversation between the authors. There wasn’t as much moving around between the original and the final, as I used the original as a strong basis for the final by building off of it. 

New Paragraphs: 

In my opinion, my new paragraphs established after the rough draft were essential to the success of my paper. For the rough draft I did a good job at establishing the pieces by function of their authors. This was the beginning of the final paper, as it was able to introduce each author and what they brought to the rest of the paper with their claims. I added the new paragraphs following this introduction so that the reader had a basis as to what these authors were talking about.