Month: September 2017

In Graff and Birkenstein’s book of They Say, I Say, the author argues about how to “put yourself in their shoes” (Graff). In order to write a good summary, we must try to understand what environment does the author stay in. Furthermore, we have to put ourselves in their shoes and come up an assumption of what we would do in that circumstance. In chapter two, the author quotes from Peter Elbow’s theory “believing game” (Graff).

The “believing game” is a method to project yourself in the author’s point of view. This process can help me to increase my critical thinking skills and enhance my ability to understand articles. Another great point that the author claims in chapter two is when we write a summary article, we cannot be subjective and analyze it from our own perspective. In high school, when I write a summary of an article I usually like to pick a side (either agree or disagree) to summarize it. Now I understand that in that way, my summary may distort the author’s intention. Later in chapter two, author provides an example summary for David Zinczenko’s article “Don’t Blame the Eater”. The example summary fills up with “angry tone”, which the original does not have. In this situation, the writer changes the original meanings that is delivered by the author. Overall, through the reading in the book of They Say, I say, I am refreshed with the idea that we need to prevent reading the articles subjectively but analyze it with our own understanding in addition to the author’s interpretation.

Graff, Gerald, and Cathy Birkenstein. “They say / I say”: the moves that matter in academic writing. New York, W.W. Norton & Company, 2017.

picture sources

www.haikudeck.com/the-believing-game-education-presentation-oLf5wko3lg

mrhappytummy.wordpress.com/reading-response-2/dont-blame-the-eater/

 

 

After reading They say I say in the past few days, I felt refreshed in the field of English writing, thinking and reading. The title gave me a great impression when I first took it in my hand. When I begin reading it, I realized that the author uses few simple words to summarize the main contents of the whole book. From the title, the author delivers the idea that people need to understand what other people think before we give out the responses. At the beginning of the book, the author quotes a story to point out how important it is to make a point. “A writer needs to indicate clearly not only what his or her thesis is, but also what larger conversation that thesis is responding to.” (Graff 20).The author illustrates that when we write something, we can not only just rely on our thesis statement, but also need to explain the meaning behind the thesis. At the middle of chapter one, the author provides some templates for different circumstances. The readers can benefit from these templates. We can apply these sentences to our daily communication. The templates can reduce over thinking and feeling of anxiety. At the end of chapter one, the author put exercises for readers in order to help them use the template adroitly. The author claims that pointing out that your view is different from others’ is significant. To achieve that, writers should listen carefully to what others said. In general, the author uses a lot of quotes, stories, and templates to help readers understand more easily.

 

Graff, Gerald, and Cathy Birkenstein. They Say / I Say: The Moves That Matter in Academic Writing. New York: W.W. Print.

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