Month: January 2018

In the second season episode 20 of the show Fresh off the Boat, the protagonist Even struggles to decide if he is going to use his Chinese name or English name as the signature on the bank account paperwork. Even found out that the name that his parents gave him is a random nearby nurse’s name. He is wondering that if he should keep using the random American nurse’s name, which makes everything easy for him but it is not actually his name or should use his given Chinese name that may cause endless struggles to him.

When he goes to the restroom to decide what name he going to use, he sees his grandma. His grandma said “Your name doesn’t make you. You make your name.” The point that Even’s grandma makes here is the name does not give value to him. Rather, she is encouraging Even to give value to his name by doing well and doing big. For instance, Nobel Prize is named after Alfred Nobel. It is not the name “Alfred Nobel” defined him as a successful inventor, but it is himself and his works give remarkable value to his name.

From this episode, I remember when I first came to America, I had a hard time to choose to sign my English name or Chinese name. Since in America, there is hardly anyone call me in my Chinese name. Even my mom only calls me in my Chinese name when she gets mad. Also, even when I am with my Chinese friends, we barely know each other’s Chinese name. We are more comfortable with the English names which is the nickname to call each other.

Image link

http://www.chemistryviews.org/details/news/10639511/Whos_Next_Nobel_Prize_in_Chemistry_2017__Voting_Results_22_September.html

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.chine_informations.chinesename

In the essay “Stop Doing That” by Aneta Pavlenko, the author discusses the bilingual or multilingual families and the reason why they speak one language instead of the other ones.

Nowadays in the United States, bilingual households start to become more and more common. Imagining a kid growing up in a family that speaks two different languages, they will have a hard time choosing which and when they speak one rather than the other one. For me, my first language is Chinese. However, after five years of living in united states, I felt like I am getting used to speaking English more. Sometimes when I talk to my mom, I use English words in the Chinese sentence. I feel like it is easier and more precise to use English words to express my thoughts. However, when I am in the mood or when I want to express something thing really quick, I will find it to be more comfortable to use my first my language. Like the author states in the essay, people who “are using the second language reluctantly and are unable to establish an emotional connection with it” (180). Using the first language is more clear and easier for people to express emotional content, but even with that when I try to express my thoughts emotionally with people who do not speak my first language, I would have to get my words organized in Chinese and then translate into English.

Overall, people will choose any languages they feel comfortable with to express themselves and their thoughts. In the most case, they will use their first language to communicate emotionally. People’s brain can respond faster in their first language than the second, and also it is easier for them.

picture cited

https://www.theodysseyonline.com/10-bilingual-people-true

https://www.aft.org/ae/fall2015/goldenberg_wagner

In Chapter 3 of The Craft of Research by Wayne Booth, Gregory Colomb, Joseph Williams, Joseph Bizup, and William Fitzgerald, the authors talk about how to pick topics and write about. I learned that how to find interest from any topic.

In this quarter of the critical thinking and writing class, when we were assigned to write an analysis paper about a poem, I felt unconfident about the materials I was going to write about. The method in chapter 3 helped me a lot, the authors show that writers need to list out any interest points for them before they start writing it. Also, authors illustrate “Don’t limit yourself to what you think might interest a teacher or make you look like a serious student”, (Booth 761(Kindle Version)) which mean writers need to think out of the frame. It is necessary to be more creative, innovative, and passionate. It is important for writers to realize they are not writing to fulfill their responsibility. Rather, they are writing for what they passionate about. Like us, we are writing for our grade, we need to write something that we actually learned from it and what is interest for us.

Later in the paragraph, authors show us few ways on how to explore our topic. From that, I can apply those ways to help me write my paper. For instance, I did some background history check on the poem, which triggered my interest to write this paper. At last, authors show how to narrow down to one topic from a broad topic by using action words to demonstrate the meanings of the topic. Looking back into last quarter, some of the paper I wrote was too broad to define the message.  From this, I am able to narrow down my thoughts and to compose writings with more details.

Work Cited

In the second chapter of The Craft of Research by Wayne Booth, Gregory Colomb, Joseph Williams, Joseph Bizup, and William Fitzgerald, I learned about how to relate my context more to the reader. The biggest mistake I have in my papers is the readers cannot quite catch the meaning that I try to establish. “Yet even experienced researchers sometimes forgot to keep their readers in mind as they plan and draft” (Booth). During the first quarter, I sometimes wrote something only make sense to me. After read through Chapter 2, I understand that I need to converse my work with the reader. In order to do that, I need to put myself in the readers’ shoes to view my work.

Later in the chapter, authors illustrate that writers need a better way to address their work in order to establish a better relationship with readers. Authors made an example of constructing sentence in two different ways. One of them uses technical terms, which may cause confusion to the readers. Being a good writer should always consider themselves as a reader in the first place, providing simple information or more relative knowledge to help the readers to understand the context.

In order to develop a solid relationship between writers and readers, they need to come up with an interesting idea for both ends. “You have to create a relationship that encourages them to see why it’s in their interest to read yours” (Booth). Fewer people read researches for fun. In order to make readers keep track on what writers say, writers have to pick a unique angle. The readers will find joy while they read through the paragraph. Meanwhile, they will generate their ideas about the message the writers delivered.

Overall, I hope that I can develop better relationship with my readers through my paper. It should not only have a strong argument point but also keep readers engage in the context.

Work Cited