Rhetorical Responce to "Pidgin Politics" by Lois-Ann Yamanaka

This story tells of a young boy whose comfortable dialect in his Hawaiian life is Pidgin, the result of immigration from Europe and Asia to Hawaii. Each of the diverse cultures brought their own influence to the language, teaching their own children their native languages while these same children went to school to learn English, and eventually Pidgin came to be.

The story begins with a conversation between the young boy and his father, who answers the phone in English and then immediately after hanging up, falls back into Pidgin for several paragraphs of dialogue. The father had been asked to join the teacher at school for a conference regarding the young boy's sister. The teacher, Miss Owens, is one of the "haoles", as the father calls the people who "Think they so holier-than-thou with their fast-talking mouth and everybody mo' brown than them is dirt under their feet." The main purpose of the dialogue is to establish the style and perspective of the culture seen in the household of the young boy, especially in contrast to that of the religious school teacher--although this contrast is primarily established in the beginning through the opinions of the father and the young boy, who narrates this story. As the conversation goes on, the young boy knows his father is just angry because he is recalling past experiences, so he begins to try at convincing his father that "not all haoles [are] haoles". Yet the hatred of the teacher (both ways, it seems) is reaffirmed in the young boys mind in exaggerated comments, like one about what she would do to him in retaliation for swearing earlier: "For that, I know I would've been sent headfirst into the kitchen counter. Why didn't she tell? She's saving it to make the effect greater when she meets with Poppy in person."

Eventually, his "Poppy"(father) tells him that he is going to have to go to the conference in his place. Ivah, the young boy, proceeds the next day to the school and meets with the teacher. Whether it was seen this way from Ivah's perspective or simply was this way, the teacher treats him very poorly, questioning him alongside pointed comments. She mentions his sisters muteness not allowing her to ask to go to the bathroom, leading to accidents. "My [class]room smells like a janitor's nightmare", she comments to the young boy. The choice of words on part of the teacher and her comments, alongside Ivah's insightful narration as to what was behind the teacher's dialogue, paints the teacher as quite an inconsiderate person. She seems to fit well the description that Ivah's father gave on the "haoles".

By the end of the story, the rhetoric in general pictures Ivah and his family as innocent victims of a bias on part of the school employees.

Reading Response: Luc Sante

It's funny to think of the diverse associations we, as language-learning people, attach to words, phrases, and languages. Sante brings up random imagery, like the cross-hatched, frozen lake or his old family member, that just happened to coincide with thoughts and associations that he had while learning certain words. For the longest time (and still occasionally) I would always think of a swivel (one of those shiny things that spin on a fishing line when it's being reeled in in order to attract fish) whenever I heard the word "civil". I think it was because of the similarities between the two between the two words, or maybe because I mistook "civil" for "swivel" when I first heard the former, but it stuck.

Amy Tan Response

The reactions that "broken" English receives, like with Amy Tan's mother in the hospital, was interesting to me. I know that "broken" English speakers are typically at a disadvantage to "correct" English speakers, but the fact that this exists in settings where service and information is presumably vital, such as the hospital, highlights the unconditional and (I think) broadly social aspect of the double standard. Is it socially common to regard "broken" English speakers with less attention or pertinence? Does it come from a stigma that places "broken" English speakers alongside the uneducated, or does it come from the unwillingness of people to take the extra effort to help someone who is hard to understand? I really can't say--it's probably some combination of the two, mixed with a little racism--but it's interesting to consider.

Genre Analysis Choices

Genre: News-writing/AP style

Setting: The typical news-writing style goes across print, with magazines and newspapers, and is used on the corresponding Internet sites (often papers will have a website as well).
Subject: Life and its important or popular events.
Participants: Whoever's news or making it.
Writers: News companies, anyone who wants to publish a magazine or paper in the style, and even bloggers will often imitate or use the style.
Audience: Depends on the news source.
Motives: To completely, quickly, and truthfully communicate current events and sell.

Genre 2: "Tabloid" Writing

Setting: Tabloids are mostly print or magazine-based, but recently they've into the Internet in different forms.
Subject: Whatever's popular, "breaking news", or sensational.
Participants: People who buy this stuff or are featured.
Writers: Anyone who's hired or wants to write them.
Audience: People desiring entertainment with a little information.
Motives: To $ell and provide entertaining information.

Rhetorica Response

"Rhetorica" goes over the basic categories or types of appeals in argumentation, including Logos (the appeal to logic), Pathos (the appeal to emotion), and Ethos (the appeal to character), as well as the forms of an argument. I don't know how to respond to this other than to summarize it, so I won't say much else except that it outlines the basic function of an argument.

Reading Response for "Understanding Scenes of Writing"

Reading Response for "Understanding Scenes of Writing"

The whole description of life and social interactions being "scenes" was a little unnecessary, I think, but I suppose it worked fine as a context to describe the different ways in which we evaluate and react to our surroundings. The "scenes" description felt unnecessary only because scenes themselves are meant to emulate life, whether in a movie or a canvas, and if you then use that emulation as a substitute for the real thing, you're redundantly describing reality with its imitation. In other words, if you're trying to describe a setting, describe the setting, not the thing that's already trying to describe the setting (the scene). People aren't acting in scenes during social interaction (most of the time), they are choosing how to act and speak based upon what is around them: this is not acting, it's a reflection of the self. The "acting" description, like the "scenes" description, is redundant. Actors imitate their character, not the other way around--go to the source.

Of course, given that "Understanding Scenes of Writing" is relating reality to scenes in writing, the description isn't out of place. It just bothered me a bit. The actual meat of the reading was detailed and helpful, but even there I hate to break down something like a scene into miniature rhetorical choices like the reading does. The chemistry within a scene between its characters and actions loses too much meaning when you break it down. I find myself wondering why people do this because people naturally react to these situations appropriately without examining them in detail. We know simply from basic observation why a scene demands a certain response. People live reality, reacting without breaking the "scene" down, so if you're writing (trying to emulate reality), I see no reason to do so either. No doubt, a writer is not going to be able to emulate reality perfectly at first, but neither do we fully understand how to act when we are children. The fact is we learn through experience and rarely require a detailed break-down to do so. I think the process of understanding different scenes and how they should play out in order to be convincing within writing should be learned from experience, not a complicated break-down.

The genre of the Conniff piece seems to be the informative/opinion one. Conniff highlights some of the different opinions regarding the "Title IX" law, which sought to even the finding for men's and women's sports, where women's sports seemed to be at a distinct disadvantage. Passages like, "'sports is a natural comfort zone for men, and Title IX makes it a bridge to our daughters'", and, "the National Wrestling Coaches Association filed a law suit against the Education Department claiming that Title IX is discriminating men's college sports, forcing colleges to cut hundreds of wrestling programs...", show parts of both sides of the argument, but clearly under the opinion that Title IX is beneficial--or at least a step in the right direction.