Adult Literacy in America:

Claim: Literacy in America is lacking and a potential cause to economic and social problems.

Data: Twenty-one to 23 percent — or some 40 to 44 million of the 191 million

adults in this country — demonstrated skills in the lowest level of prose,

document, and quantitative proficiencies (Level 1 proficient), (Kirsch, 2002).

Warrant: The reason for this is due to an insufficient distribution of public funds to lower income public school institutions and the result is an uneven distribution in literacy rates between socio-economic classes.

Backing: Nearly two-thirds of those in Level 1 (62 percent) had terminated their education before completing high school. This is a trend seen much more frequently in lower income areas as there is not as much funding in programs that incentivize education, (Kirsch, 2002)

Counterclaim: Twenty-five percent of the respondents who performed in this level were immigrants who may have been just learning to speak English. While this does affect the integration of immigrants into American society it does not directly affect the literacy issue in America because all countries with immigrant populations face this issue.

Rebuttal: Nearly half (41 to 44 percent) of all adults in the lowest level on each literacy scale were living in poverty, compared with only 4 to 8 percent of those in the two highest proficiency levels. The fact that nearly half of the impoverished population shows a Level 1 literacy rate shows how there is a direct correlation between literacy rate and economic class in the United States.

 

 

 

Annotated Bibliography:

Kirsch, I. S. (2002). Adult Literacy in America. NATIONAL CENTER FOR EDUCATION STATISTICS. Retrieved from https://nces.ed.gov/pubs93/93275.pdf.

Summary/Description: This article summarizes the ways in which people in America are affected by their literacy rates. The result of the article showed a direct correlation between literacy rates and socio-economic position. Those who did not have high literacy levels were the citizens most likely to be impoverished, it also showed how little the National Literacy Act of 1991 did to actually make change within the realm of this issue.

Evaluation: If I were tasked to show how literacy rates effect the success of people in a capitalistic society I would definitely use America as the prime example of this issue. America is one of, if not the most, rich countries in the world so for the illiteracy in adults to be more than 15% of the adult population is very alarming. America is supposed to be a poster country for success and achieving success, but the institutions set up to protect the welfare of the nation’s future generations. Welfare is clearly created by earning capital and shown by this article it is almost impossible to do this without being literate.

 

Claim about Literacy:

Literacy in America is a big issue because citizens who are socio-economically positioned to not learn how to correctly read are generally inflicted by a life of poverty. Twenty-one to 23 percent — or some 40 to 44 million of the 191 million adults in this country — demonstrated skills in the lowest level of prose of reading skill (Kirsch, 2002). This twenty percent of the population is positioned in this area because of several reasons, firstly the government has done an insufficient job in distributing funds equally among public education boards nationwide. This has created a significant gap between the education received by the rich and that of the impoverished. The result of this gap is a disenfranchisement of the lower income community from the opportunities received and cherished by the richer community. Literacy in America is therefore a more economic issue that has turned into a social issue, the government and upper class need to step up to increase funding in lower income areas so that the benefits of the education system are met by more than just the upper class.

 

This advertisement is known as an “appeal to popularity” which gives people the false impression that by going along with a popular activity, or buying Axe, those who buy Axe will be much more able to attract girls.

This is a “slippery-slope” fallacy, the idea in this ad is that if you are an atheist then you’re also against American beliefs. Next, being anti-american makes you a traitor which leads to Civil War. Meanwhile, the US Civil War was caused over the issue of whether or not it was fair to abolish slavery. This ad makes no sense because if it did then it would call any person who believed in abolishing slavery a traitor as well.

 

Appeal to emotion- this fallacy is an appeal to emotion, the context of the advertisement in this case is that by donating to ASPCA there will be less animal abuse. This is not true because animal abuse is an independent variable. While the effectiveness of the ad should be based on the idea of animal abuse, the effectiveness is achieved by playing sad music and showing videos of sad dogs.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Code-Switching: Quantitative Data Analysis

English 215

November 3, 2017

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Learning about language is a self-reflective process, it requires humans to go back to realizing how they are able to communicate with one and other. Personally, I do not think about language all that much, however, language impacts all our actions and the way we practice those actions. This can be known as discourses; a discourse is the thing in our rhetoric that has an effect on the way we ultimately communicate. Discourse can be seen as the intricacies of language, such as tone, mood, body language, environment etc. (Swales, 1990). In learning about the ways, I spoke I discovered how I am a code switcher, code switching is when we go from different forms of tone without even consciously realizing that we are making a switch. I thought that I was able to see this by just simply thinking of how I speak with my sister and how I speak with my friends. In examining the differences in the way, I speak in both of those situations, I knew there was a big difference. It not only showed me how I speak and how different my tones can become, it showed me how I am also subconsciously reserved around certain people when it comes to personal details. The same can be said for anyone, but I never made the connection to language and setting, which makes a lot more sense now. My goal is to show how setting impacts the way I speak to others. The data collection revealed I have 4 main discourses (types of speech) that I use daily, first is the formal English I use around family. Second is the slang English I use around my friends. Thirdly, a more formal but not totally formal form of English in school. Lastly, I am introspective when on the train as I do not feel the need to reach out and introduce myself to “strangers”. The thing that separates my form of speech is the formality that I exercise depending on the environment and that is my main hypothesis from my data collection.

Figure 1: Languages of a Discourse Community: The bar graph shows the difference between the frequency of the 4 codes I use to communicate based on setting and who I am talking to.

Methodology:

Over a period of four days, I recorded the instances where I was socializing with other people in order to further understand the various discourses of my personal rhetoric (Garcia, 1992). This was done in order to see whether I spoke the same when around different people, ex. is my rhetoric the same around my friends and my family. The four days in which I recorded my conversations were Saturday, Sunday, Thursday and Friday. When I was having conversations, I would look for things in my train of thought that dictated the way I spoke. For instance, when I was with my friends my rhetoric was a lot more “slang” and my cussing was more frequent. However, in school and around my family my rhetoric was a lot more conservative and reserved. I found that my awareness of my own code switching without this project was very limited, however since paying attention to these types of things I see what makes me speak the way I do, and setting are mostly to point to. I told my family about the project as I was recording the conversations. They felt that they too did not notice their own code switching, however they agreed that it could play a bigger role in their life than they thought previously.

 

I think that my research revealed a lot to me about code-switching, while I felt that at times it was difficult to be in a situation where I was not talking or around people I was not comfortable with, those moments made it easier to reflect on why I was silent. There were times when I was traveling on the train and when I was surrounded by people I did not know, I found myself totally silent in these times, I would have reflections about how attached I am to my phone like everyone else on the train. Next, I felt that my findings were important to showing me how I formulate decisions on my language choice based on who I am around. The data showed me that I do not care about how I talk in front of my cousins, but that in front of immediate and elderly family discretion is present. I think that individualistically it’s important to keep different facets of life in different levels of “code” in order to have the best possible reciprocation of respect. Meaning if you do not code switch and have one form of speech around everyone, then how will you know the difference between the value of people to your life? The third point I learned is that discretion shows how much you care about a person. If you use language that is deemed disrespectful by most of society around your family do you truly respect yourself? The answer is no, and respect is something I think is tied to family relationships.

 

 

Bibliography:

 

1. Lowi, R. (2005). Code Switching: An Examination of Naturally Occurring Conversation. University of California Berkley. Retrieved 2017

 

2. Lysicott, J. (Writer). (2017). I am Articulate. Live performance in New York, New York.

 

3. Gee, James P. “Literacy, Discourse, and Linguistics: Introduction. “Journal of Education” 171.1 (1989): 5-17. Print.

When I think of body paragraphs I think of two things, obviously the first thing is that it is one of the core elements to essay writing. A body paragraph serves as a vice for expressing what the subtopic or main topic of the essay is in detail. I feel like the introductory and conclusion paragraphs are meant to generalize the whole paper, while the body breaks down the important details in how they support that “generalization”. The core elements of body paragraphs are evidence that backs up the narrative being expressed and commentary that relates the evidence back to the main idea of the paper.

 

The Dialogue Method

1. What is your point?
2. I do not get it.
3. Prove it.
4. So what?

A body paragraph is a paragraph that is needed in the completion of an essay, both structurally and idealistically. Body paragraphs are meant to support the thesis and show the reader the way in which, you the writer, are aiming to express the point made. Body paragraphs do this by allowing the writer to systemically plant evidence throughout the paragraph and support that evidence’s relevance to the thesis through commentary. A body paragraph is significant because its an instrumental tool in organizing an essay in a way that makes the idea conveyed more clear.