- One detail that stood out to me in X’s narrative was his last line, when he said “In fact, up to then, I never had been so truly free in my life.” It felt a little weird to me for someone in the setting he was in to be able to say that, but that feeling of weirdness quickly changed into a thought of beauty. It was beautiful that X was able to be in prison and still have the determination and drive to make a routine out of reading and writing. It’s like witnessing someone finding their calling in life because you could imagine how hard it must be to be able to feel freedom while being incarcerated. That statement suggested that just because he was a part of this discourse community didn’t mean he couldn’t have the same, or at least very similar, experience as someone who wasn’t. It showed that apart from stereotypes made about this discourse community, there is opportunity for real growth and education. His relationship to writing and reading shifted from one that you could describe as limited and frustrating, to freeing. It’s inspirational.
- I would love to imitate Manson’s structure of description. This style grabbed my attention because when reading this essay it helped me as a reader understand what the writer was feeling. In my literacy narrative I believe that I am going to have a lot to say about how I feel about my experiences and things of that sort but fear telling without showing enough. Manson’s way of describing, I feel, would be very beneficial to me because in the middle of these thought processes there would be short examples and stories incorporated in to show the reader what Manson felt. I always learned in the past the skill of showing not telling in writing, but I believe Manson’s way of doing both is something that I would definitely want to adopt. When explaining my desires of fitting into the black community at a younger age, I can use Manson’s technique by showing times in my life where I felt like I had to do such.
ENG 2100: Writing 1 with Jay Thompson
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