I remember a time when I was in the hair salon with my mother, sitting in those grayish tan, cold metal chairs waiting my turn to sit in the bigger, more comfortable chair to get my hair done. A friend of my mothers who I knew through affiliation  was usually there around the same time we were, but always before us, was getting her hair braided with small, gold pieces of hair jewelry at the ends of every braid. “Aw, she's just so proper! Look at how cute she is.” “Thank you!” I said. “Listen, she talks so white!” I hated this. I hated this meaningless banter that had a lot more meaning to me than it did to her. What does speaking white even mean? In the moment i wanted to just walk out of the salon into the warmth of the summer day, since the salon was in a basement and was very cold, especially while sitting on those metal chairs. I felt so different when she said that i “speak white” because it just wasn't me at all. I have never been white, so i didn't know how it felt or how speaking white was any different from speaking black. I always felt that i spoke differently from the other kids in my school and neighborhood and i felt it even more when people pointed it out. Her statement made me feel out of place, like in this room of black females, it was as though I was not one. Even in school, i didn't exactly feel like i belonged there but being in a hair salon with my mother, sitting on those grayish tan, cold metal chairs somehow made me feel at home with my gender and race because everyone here was like me. But in that moment, i wasn't anymore.

In certain situations, people code switch so that they can relate better with the people they are talking to. This also depends on the area they are in. Matt Thompson brings up the important point in,”Five Reasons Why People Code-Switch,” he writes “We want to fit in: Very often, people code-switch — both consciously and unconsciously — to act or talk more like those around them. While this can be effective, it can also be perilous...” . This quote relates to my theme by giving a reason as to why people code switch. In my scene,  I consciously know now that my behavior then was different from how I would act around my friends or in a school setting. The word perilous in this quote helps me see how code switching could be dangerous in real life situations as well as helpful.

In middle school, i felt that i was different from the other kids in my class. This feeling did not start or go away in one grade year, it was continuous through my entire middle school experience and i still feel it today. The kids in my class would talk and laugh and the way they communicated, i just did not understand. I couldn't read them and i felt illiterate in a sense, even though majority of my school was black and we were all the same age. I got the same emotion when i crossed a big word in a new book that i didn't know. When i was with my family, I knew what to say, how to speak, and how to act. It was just natural. This relates to my code switching theme by me changing how i talk and the specific things i said depending on what group i was with.

In this quote, there is a great example of how code switching is used in a way, specifically in a workplace. Most people can relate with this given you don't talk to your friends in the same tone or use the same words as when you speak with your boss. “Your mom or your friend or your partner calls on the phone and you answer. And without thinking, you start talking to them in an entirely different voice — still distinctly your voice, but a certain kind of your voice less suited for the office…” the writer proceeds to give examples of different accents that come forward when talking to family such as Southern drawl, New York accents, etc.  “When you're attuned to the phenomenon of code-switching, you start to see it everywhere, and you begin to see the way race, ethnicity and culture plays out all over the place.” This entirely relates back to code switching by showing how it is used and even talks about how you see the difference between race, ethnicity, and culture.

Thompson, Matt, Mr. "Five Reasons Why People Code-Switch." NPR. NPR, 13 Apr. 2013. Web. 03 Nov. 2016.

Writing this essay I want the reader to understand the struggles I went through by my favorite sport, basketball. Throughout this essay I’m telling the readers the transition between my streetball life and my organized basketball life. Telling them how my first practice experience went. I think I did well explaining my how my first practice went and how I was determined to improve on my skills as a organized basketball player.

The whistle blew, everyone stopped and everyone looked at who caused the coach to blow the whistle. “Addison!” the coach yelled “What are you doing? Pass the ball. The other team's ball” I didn’t say a word, I just stood there and shook my head.

The day I realized that streetball and organized basketball is different. As a kid all I knew was streetball. Always playing at my schoolyard and the playground trying to embarrass your defender, showing of your handle and all these fancy passes. I thought I was the best streetball player in my neighborhood. As months goes by my friend introduced me to the Philadelphia Suns an all Asian organization. But jumping from that to organized basketball I noticed that it was a completely new atmosphere. Knowing that the play style is completely different, knowing that it’s a team sport, not selfish sport.

So my first practice there, oh boy was it difficult. Getting yelled at every minutes, “travel, turnover, walk, run!”  Frustration began to grow upon me, I never thought it would be this difficult. I whisper to one of my teammate, “yo, what are we doing?” He just gave me a look shook his head and continued to do the drill. I thought to myself was it even worth coming here. I’m a just a boy who got the streetball skills, who loves playing ball with friends and not caring about the rules. I don't have the NBA like skills like everyone in here. Throughout practice I made mistakes after mistakes. My coach came up to me, while everyone was taking a break and said to me. “Addison, don’t worry. I know this is your first practice and you’re still getting used to everything. I see you're getting mad at yourself, don't be. Just learn from your mistakes.” I just sat there with my head down. “Thanks coach”  I replied. As the coach blew the whistle telling everyone to get ready. He said “just sit here and watch everyone first.” As I got the concept of the drill that everyone is doing, i hopped in and tried doing it. Guess what… I made the wrong decision. 10 seconds into the drill, I picked up my dribble. “Addison! Don't pick up your dribble!” The coach yelled across the court. I looked around and saw people shaking their heads, saying “oh my god” underneath their breath. I tossed the ball at the coach and headed back to the bench. Throughout the whole practice I sat there and looked at everyone practice. “If you keep coming to Friday and Saturday practice I promise you, you’ll get better.” Said a teammate sitting right above me, startling me. “You really think that?” I said back. “I mean I’ve been coming to practice for months and I got so much better. not trying to sound cocky or anything.” He replied. “Alright” I chuckled  and shook my head. As practice comes to an end, I walked up to my coach and asked him when is practice. “Monday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday”. I told him that I’ll be coming every Friday and Saturday. “Great! See you then Addison. Remember learn from those mistakes you made today.” He said. “I will coach.” I said back.

As I got home, I went straight to my laptop. Type in “NBA highlight plays.” Hoping that I could learn something from the video. After watching videos after videos I thought that I could be just like everyone in the NBA. Lebron James, Rondo, Wade, and so many more. The next day, I went straight to my old middle school and started to practicing by myself. I started doing all these drills that I learned from yesterday's practice, dribbling drills, footwork drills, shooting drills, and running drills. Getting mad at myself because I couldn’t make a basket, slamming the ball onto the ground. As I continued to go to practices , I continued to get better.

Hayley Barci                                                                                                                     Oct.26.2016

I remember being bullied, because of the way I looked, the way my body was shaped, I was different. I was always trying to fit in with the the popular kids, with their huge groups of friends.  Meanwhile, I had one true friend, Abby. She meant the world to me. We would always play in the big backyard of her house, and have teddy bears wrapped up in between our arms. I could be whatever I wanted to be around my best friend. I can still remember all of the times we would get in trouble for silly things and how we would play witches in her bedroom, with brooms in between our thighs, flying in the magical skies.

The bullies would always bring me down, I fall, and I would stay on the ground. I would end up home, with my face, showing no emotions of the pain I suffered Every single goddamn day. I would always think of myself as an ugly person, or better yet, a thing. It was as if I were an alien, people poking at me with their sharp tools, drawing pain throughout my veins. An unbearable,  stinging, burning pain, attached to my soul. I would never tell my parents about my troubles. I kept every word inside my tight throat, it was suffocating.

“These stories changed me deeply”, the narrator admits in the beginning of A Place to Stand. I began to open my eyes, and realize that dominance is a way of life in our communities, and in our culture. It’s always the goal to be on a higher standard than everybody else, in different manners. Some nationalities have more knowledge than others, so therefore they use that supply of knowledge in order to gain more power in our nation.

I began to get older as I was starting the realize what I have and didn’t have, I was lucky enough to have all of my needs. I knew I couldn’t get everything thing that I wanted like a milion dollars, or a huge house, or a fancy car. My mother had many struggles with money, pay bills, or insurance, or medical bills. “We were poor by most standards, but one of my parents usually managed to find some minimum job or another, which made us middle class by reservation standards,” as claimed in Superman & Me. That’s that situation that certain people have to deal with in our society.    It has always been a heartache watching her struggle, meanwhile some people have all of the money in the world and have a lot of things that we need. The dominance that people of higher class posses is extremely powerful. Using it in order to receive more money from those who don’t really have it.  

This society that many people including myself are exposed to, has impacted the way we live. The amount of money that someone has can be relatable to how much knowledge you have. Sometimes people take advantage of the amount of knowledge they have against others, saying that they have more than someone else. That’s how a lot of people are today, trying to be more dominant than everyone else. That’s  what our society has become, and sadly, that the way it will be.Some people are not known for their knowledge, because others may think that it’s not as informative as their own, or not as important.

Well, after all, “if you want to be American, speak American”, stated in How to Tame a Wild Tongue.That’s often the case when it comes to knowledge, it’s like many people have expectations of you, the way to act, the way you read, write or speak. You are meant to have a higher stand when it come to literacy, and in how you interpret it. How you use the knowledge, and how much impact it will have on others.

These kinds of impacts can be positive for someone who wants more dominance when it comes to literacy and knowledge. For instance, in the United States we have the PSSA’s, PSAT’s, etc in order to measure how much structured learning they obtain. These sorts of situations occur in schools, colleges, jobs, and in multiple different accommodations. Children in many schools get bullied because maybe they don’t understand something in class, or maybe because they learned about literacy at a slower pace.

People of many backgrounds, also receive judgements for what kind of knowledge their families, or ancestors possess. In which can be an issue because you are not exactly your family members, you are not your ancestors, you have a life, and a mind of your own.

Introduction

Writing this essay has affected me in a positive way as a writer. I feel as though my writing  became better and my vision for literature had been expanded. My goal for this essay was to change the way people think what it means to be educated in literacy. I’m very proud of this essay, I think it was very well written. I’m also proud of myself for finding a larger idea to touch on in this essay. In my last essay, I didn’t really accomplish this. To improve myself as a writer, I think I should remember to not write too many unecessary words. I tcan end to write extrenuiously. Overall, I’m proud of my work and I hope you will be too.

Essay

During the good ole days of my adolescence, probably 14 or 13 years old, I was watching TV and came across a show called, “Parks and Recreation”. It was my first time watching the show, and I just jumped into the random episode that was on. I didn’t know anything about the characters, so I had to “read” them to sort of understand what they were about. For example, one of the characters on the show, named April, has very dark and I-don’t-care-about-anything attitude about her. I learned this from intensely “reading” the way she spoke, acted and carried herself. Another example from the show is a character named Leslie. After “reading” the details of the way she talked, acted and did things, I understood that this character is someone who is constantly determined to get things done, wants everyone to be happy and can be way over the top at times.

I see this moment in my life as a form literacy. As you may know, literacy is a form of education. While watching “Parks and Recreation” for the first time, I was educating myself on who the characters were by “reading” them. Most people would say that I’m not educating myself; they’d say that I’m doing nothing more than watching non educational TV. But they are wrong. By “reading” these characters, I’m educating myself on who they are and what they’re about. There is more to education than just school curriculum.

In the Apartheid of Children’s Literature, Christopher Meyers finds out how old a child is just by examining his features: "I’m talking with a boy. He’s at that age when the edges of the man he will become are just starting to press against his baby-round face." Although Meyers doesn’t state the actual age of the child, his description of him entails that he is at a maturing age such as 12 or 13. In this quote, Meyers demonstrates the exact same thing that I performed when I first watched “Parks and Recreation”. In order to better understand who this little boy was, Meyers educated himself by “reading” the boy. Literacy has many forms, and being able to read people is one of those forms. This would classify as cultural literacy because culture symbolizes identity, and identity is what I was looking for when educating myself on the characters of “Parks and Recreation”.

Knowing how to “read” people, and or situations, is a great way to educate one’s self; especially if you don’t know how to read. In today’s society, high officials set the standard that being literate means just knowing how to read words. If you can’t read words, then you would be considered slow minded and unable to be educated. The fact that this is happening is unacceptable, especially when it comes to race. They are basically making them dumb by ignoring the intelligence they already possess. Just because a person isn’t literate in one way, doesn't mean they aren’t literate in another. Like I mentioned before, literacy has many forms. When Sherman Alexie was just a young, Indian boy in his story, Superman and Me, he was unable to read the words in the Superman comic book that he had. But, that doesn’t mean he was unable to read the story: “In one panel, Superman breaks through a door. His suit is red, blue and yellow. The brown door shatters into many pieces. I look at the narrative above the picture. I cannot read the words, but I assume it tells me that ‘Superman is breaking down the door.’ Aloud, I pretend to read the words and say, ‘Superman is breaking  down that door.’” (Pg 12-13) This quote emphasizes my idea that there is more to education than schooling because Sherman reads the comic book without reading the words. By “reading” the actions and situations in the comic book, Sherman then taught himself how to read. Looks like people who don’t know how to read words aren’t so slow minded as some people assume they are.

In fact it was from this point, of educating  himself on how to read, that Sherman was on the path to a bright future. Near the end of Superman and Me, Sherman grew up to become a very successful and well rounded adult: “Despite all the books I read, I am still surprised  I became a writer. I was going to be a pediatrician. These days I write novels, short stories and poems. I visit schools and teach creative writing to Indian kids.” (Pg 14)  This quote doesn’t really exemplify my claim, but it does support it. The quote points out that other forms of education, such as “reading” the world, can lead you to success just as much as schooling education.

The fact that Sherman grew up to be such a successful writer is a major feat, especially since he taught himself how to read. Like Sherman, not many minority youth are given the opportunity to get educated in literacy. So they would either learn about it in another way or not learn it at all. The high officials of today’s society, who are pre-dominantly white, set the standard as to what literacy is and who can be educated in it. When these high officials see minorities who don’t know how to read or write, they write them off immediately or give them very low quality education on literacy. Back in 2014 in an essay called The Apartheid of Children’s Literature, a man named Christopher Meyers saw the potential for greatness in young minorities, particularly black ones. He decided to educate them on a consistent issue with children’s book that is still a little relevant today. This exchange is between Meyers and a young, black boy: “‘So you’re telling me these are all the books published last year for kids?’ they ask me. ‘That’s a lot of books. That’s more books than I could read in a year.’

‘Yep, it’s a few thousand.’

‘And in all of those thousands of books, I’m just not in them?’

‘Well...um...yes.’

‘Are there books about talking animals?’

‘Oh, sure.’

‘And crazy magical futures?’

‘Absolutely.’

‘And superpowers? And the olden days when people dressed funny? And all the combinations of those things? Like talking animals with superpowers in magical futures ... but no me?’

‘No you.’

‘Why?’

‘ Because you’re brown.’”

Meyers educated this child, and most likely others, on this topic by having them “read” over the world of children’s literacy. This agrees with my idea that there is more to education than just schooling because these black kids were educated on an issue that most schools wouldn't even touch on. These kids were being taught how to be aware of the diversity issues going on in the world of children's literature.

In conclusion, the education of literacy is very diverse topic. In this essay, I focused on the literacy of “reading” people and situations; which would fall in the category of cultural literacy. Most people would say that this type of literacy is not needed or unimportant, but I beg to differ. By being able to “read” people and or situations, you acquire a skill set that is very much used in politics. Which is “reading” issues/ situations and coming with ways to improve or fix the situations. So we, as a society, need to reevaluate how we view education. Because we could just be dismissing our future politicians and presidents.

Bibliography

Meyers, Christopher. "The Apartheid of Children’s Literature." New York Times. N.p., 15 Mar. 2014. Web. <The Apartheid of Children’s Literature>

Alexie, Sherman. "Superman and Me." Los Angeles Times. Los Angeles Times, 19 Apr. 1998. Web. 30 Oct. 2016. <http://articles.latimes.com/1998/apr/19/books/bk-42979>.

Intro: In this writing piece I concentrated on the time I found out I had dyslexia and how is was an eye-opener for me.  I also talk about how without my dyslexia, I would not be the same person.  My literacy is through my creativity.  I may not be strong in my reading and writing but I am strong in my theater and artistic activities.  My goal in writing this piece was to make people understand the different levels of literacy.  Something I like about writing this piece was I went into more detail than my last advanced essay, about what my main point was.  Something I can still work on is my grammer.  I think I did better than the last time, but that has always been a struggle.

There’s Identity in My Literacy

I was sitting in a testing room in a giant house.  Unfamiliar surroundings made me overthink all the obstacles that could happen as I sat in a chair for 7 hours in a room with glass walls.  Being asked question after question and being told to read and write this or that.  Mind slowly being winded up as the questions got harder to answer and my eyes started to stumble over the words.  I was a 7th grader with a twisted tongue while reading.  I was first told by the student council at my school that I might actually have dyslexia.  For most of my time in that school they said that dyslexia is not even a thing. Being a kid not having any knowledge of why it took me two times longer to do homework was definitely pressing.

After years of my parents fighting for the student council to realize I might actually have dyslexia, I finally ended up in a testing room.  I sat there in silence twisting my mind over the concept that I am going to finally figure out what is going on with me. I got to find out who I am and why I struggled so much.  With every question the person testing me asked, I felt like I was discoverying my identity. The only time my mind got a break was during a small lunch hour that my dad and I took.  The same time hoping I can get back to testing just so I can have that piece of my identity defined. After the break I went right back to work.

Finally after hours of testing it was finally time for results. I waited on the other side of the glass door as my dad went to meet with the instructor. I sat there thinking, finally, I get to find out what’s going on and I will be able to see a little clearer.  It felt like I was just getting my first pair of glasses.  Once I put on the lens, the blur goes away even though you know you still can’t see.  After waiting over 30 minutes, they both came out, my dad sat next to me and the lady who tested me sat across the table. The lady told me there was one good news and one bad news.  I ask her to tell me the bad news first just to get it out the way.  She told me I had dyslexia.  Even though this was supposed to be bad news, I felt a sigh of relief.  I no longer have to search for what’s going on.  I can also tell my dad was relieved too, that we no longer had to wonder and fight.  She then went on to tell me the good news... I did not have a very high diagnose and that I can get help.  She gave us options and we decided to go with a tutor that came to my school twice a week and taught me.  I would say that this moment in my literacy was a big changing point.

Literacy in my life has taken the place of my identity.  I always searched for the answer to why I am the the way I am through my literacy.  Without my dyslexia I would not be the same person.  Even though I struggle in my reading and writing, I still am very strong in my creative side.  I am able to act, sing and do art because of my lack of expertise in reading and writing.  I would say a struggle that schools have is not knowing how to let kid’s true talents and literacy shine through.  For instance my literacy is through my creativity, schools are just so into subjects such as reading and writing.  The story, I Just Want to be Average, mentioned how it is a  problem that teachers don’t know how to engage the imagination side of a child: “But mostly the teachers had no idea of how to engage the imaginations of us lads who were scuttling along at the bottom of the pond.” pg 164  This should not be a problem, the teacher should look at the strengths of the kid and let them show their true literacy.  If the teachers do this, the student will grow as a bright individual and show their true colors.  This will also help the kid not be ashamed if they are not the best at the main subjects at school like math or reading because the teachers will be bring light to there true literacy and helping them grow in that.

I think that my dyslexia shows that I am a strong person, who no matter what, I am able to tackle the tough times and get through struggles in my life.  Literacy to others is something that is meant for school but there are so many different levels of literacy.  There is literacy in the way people talk to one another, there is literacy in the way people act, write, and learn.  We need to realize these levels of literacy before we shut someone down for not knowing the “basics” in school.  Growing up being told by my teachers that my learning disability isn’t even a thing, was hard for me.  I can tell you that my confidence level in myself was not that strong when they kept denying me.  Once I was able to figure out what was going on with my reading and writing was the day I became more confident.  That is the day I was able to look at myself in the mirror and say, “I know what I struggle with. I know where I have flaws. With this knowledge of my identity I will become more than what others expect.”

                                           Introduction

 This essay helped me develop a better writer. My goals for this essay was to show that language isn’t just Spanish and English. I wanted to show that their are more pieces to it . I wanted  for my audience to be able to connect these pieces through my essay and understand the bigger picture of language and why we need. Need. My goal was to be able to connect my experiences to a major theme and I think i succeeded. I’m proud that i was able to make an essay that people from all over can relate too, no matter your age,gender, or race. It’s a universal thing. The thing i could improve on though would be just making it a bit more in detail .

                 The Art of Language

 Literacy comes in all shapes and forms from political literacy, to media literacy to even visual literacy but the one literacy  that we all have in common even when we don’t know what it is, is cultural literacy. Cultural literacy “is the knowledge of one’s culture” stated by the website digital Is. There are a lot of things that surround culture from the music you play, to the clothes you wear, to the food you eat but overall language is one of the most important because language is the way you communicate with the culture. It’s the way connect within in your culture A lot of people think language is just Spanish,English,Chinese,French, Vietnamese, Italian, and so much more but truthfully language is so much more than that. You could be speaking the same language but not the same language at all. Let me explain clearly what I mean. If you speak  modern english and I speak old english, we may be both speaking English but not the same language. When I was about ten years old I actually had my very first experience with cultural literacy.

 I hadn’t seen my niece, Destiny  in a long time. I only got to see  her every 3 years ,maybe and I know a lot has changed since then. I packed so much stuff that day, unnecessary stuff. I was only going to be at her house for a weekend but I packed like I was going to be there for  two weeks.My mom unpacked some of the clothes and gave me the stuff that was actually nessary. “Take a jacket” my mom said. I  looked at my mom “Why? It’s summer” . My mom gave me a look back “Because I said so. It’s going to rain. Now take the jacket. If you don’t need it then don’t wear it.”  She said as she walked out of the room. I put my jacket inside of my bag and soon as I did I I heard the doorbell ring. She’s here I said in my head then out loud. My mom came down the steps with me . I said Hi to Destiny and her mom. My mom and hers had a little chat before we left. We were off to quakertown. This was my very first time ever going to quakertown but i thought it be fun. When we arrived the very first thing I noticed was all the snow and i’m not  talking about actual snow. I was wondering if there were any black people?I never seen so much white people in my life but I wasn’t closed to making some white friends. My elementary school  had been with all African American students so I was looking for some diversity. Most of the day we spent watching disney movies, eating chinese food, and walking across the train tracks. It was slow but i was having a bit of fun. When nightfall came i thought  we were going to play games in the house and relax since it was 10 o'clock at night but my niece Destiny had other plans. Her and I were going to go see her friends. We left out without her saying really anything to her mom but we will be back. We went behind this shed where she met her group of friends who were smoking weed. They were a wild group of kids who all basically did whatever they want when they wanted but  that  was really none of my business if they listened to their parents or not but things got weird when i tried to talk to them and make some friends.  “Wassup?” I said to one of the white girls. “Hi she said.”  flipping her blonde hair. I tried to start conversation. “U always lived here or nah?” I was bad at it at 13 but it was my attempt. She stared at me for a while before she actually spoke “I don’t understand what you are talking about?”  she said.  “I’m  saying have you always lived quakertown.” I said rolling my eyes. She laughed with her friends. “Oh yeah” she answered.  “That’s cool I lived in Philly my whole life, that jawn sorta poppin” I said awkwardly laughing. She looked at her friends once more as if i was speaking another language or something but to them i probably was. “Why do you talk like that?” she asked. “Talk like what?” I answered. “Like a gangster” she said. I didn’t know how to respond so I didn’t At this point I  honestly thought she was trying to be racist and maybe she was  but without the knowledge I have now I wouldn’t have ever thought that maybe we just weren't speaking the same language.

 Language will always be crucial to cultural literacy, it makes up most  of the definition and whether we like it or not when we step into diverse situations we experience what it feels like and without  speaking the same language we won’t be able to understand what each other is saying. If we can’t understand what people are saying then we can’t connect  as humans and as humans we long to connect with another person that’s why Language is so important.  Language bonds us together , Language   helps make us a culture. Language is beautiful. A quote in How to tame a wild tongue reminds us of  this  it states “Who is to say that robbing a  people of their language is less violent than War? “Pg (53) Ray Gwyn. My response is  that it’s not.  If you rob a group of people of their language then you rob them of their culture.