Reflection For Essay # 2

Completing this essay overall was a little challenging for me. It presented a challenge because I have honestly never really thought about issues such as who should have the power to control access to literature and literacy. I found that I had to critically think and research extra before I decided my opinion on the issues. The essay involved more thought than usual because the matters discussed had a lot of grey area that, in my opinion, was challenging to decipher. In the majority of the essay, I argue that the government should not have the right to control what people read or watch, despite the message they think it is trying to send. If I could fix my first draft, I would likely make it a little longer. I wanted to write more but I felt that if I did it would be hard to transition to the close of the paper. There are so many facts on the internet about government bans and why they do certain things, that it just felt a little overwhelming. Since I could only write so much, I included, which I believe to the most important to discuss. However, despite being presented with a challenge, I liked the fact that I got to learn about something new. It was extremely fascinating to learn about why the government bans certain things because they believe it promotes some concept in too "radical"  a fashion. Also I really enjoyed watching the movie Trumbo in class and felt it geared me in the right direction for the paper.

Response to Vershawn Ashanti Young's essay, "Should Writers Use They Own English?"

After reading  Vershawn Ashanti Young's essay, "Should Writers Use They Own English? In this essay Young makes an interesting claim that we should be more open to use of various linguistic styles. While I do see his point that we should increase cultural language in papers and be more open to variety, I do not see this method ever being fully implemented in an academic paper. He makes interesting points as well, "I'm sho not try- ing to say here that Black English don't have some rhetorical and gram- matical features that differ from what is termed standard English.(62) What I'm sayin is that the difference between the two ain't as big as some like to imagine." While I did think that his language made the essay more intriguing, I did find it a distraction in the point he was trying to get across. He then tries to persuade the reader of a matter in the workforce, "But if you look at it from my view, it most certainly don't mean that. Instead, it mean that the one set of rules that people be applyin to everybody's dialects leads to stereotypes that writers need "remedial training" or that speakers of dialects are dumb." (65) I think that this is a good point yet I also believe that in papers it it just better to have a certain standard to meet, which definitely could use a little more wiggle room than there is today. One of his most interesting propositions I thought was when he wrote, "Instead of prescribing how folks should write or speak, I say we teach language descriptively. This mean we should, for instance, teach how language functions within and from various cultural perspectives. And we should teach what it take to understand, listen, and wnte m mulnple dialects simultaneously." (66) I do believe after reading this that when it comes to a personal essay such as a literacy narrative, people should be able to write how they speak. Yet when it comes to writing such as a research paper, I think it might be best for formal language, keep in mind however, that everyone comes from different places with different speech and style of language.