Home and Away: The Tensions of community, Literacy and identity
In this well-constructed discourse, “Home and Away”, Brownyne Williams, emphasizes on how the discourses that we learn from our home and community shape us in into who we are as a person, how we view the world and how we approach different discourses including academic writings. Williams’s main purpose is to convey the idea that, how being brought up in a well-educated and scholarly family influenced his way of thinking and perceiving things, and what he eventually came out to be in his life. A successful college professor with a PhD.
Williams begins with the introduction of his scholarly ancestry. He states, “I do come from a family of teachers – not just my parents, but many …show more content…
Literary and academic discourses was what he had already learned at the dinner table. And that made his academic achievements no surprise but a mere part of family business that he and his siblings were to take over. “No big deal, my mother tells them, it’s just the family business.” he exclaims. Williams forwards this idea of learning discourses from Gee’s “what is literacy”, which mentions that our discourses, identity and academic writings are correlated. “…a sort of identity kit which comes with appropriate costume and instructions on how we talk, and often write, so as to take on a particular role that others will recognize.” (2). He implies, that the way students write and respond to a particular text depends on their mastery of the academic discourse. And furthering the idea, this mastery of the academic discourse isn’t as natural for students who have not been reared up in the same environment where discussions of the discourse of academic culture are not part of the dinner table talk. Not that, those students might not be as successful, but they …show more content…
I was born in a working-class family, in a refugee camp in the distant Himalayan country. Expectations were really high. Living without hope for almost two decades, quite unsure of what the future held, my parents saw me as the only hope. Moderately educated and both of them as dedicated teachers in the camp-based schools, knew and believed that a good education was our only hope to a better future. So, every day was a new challenge for me to do well and learn something new. There was no way that I could not do well at school. The significance of education, was always emphasized to me in every walk of my life. In the evening when we would gather for dinner, my parents made sure that I had learned something new. The significance of education and learning was the main discourse that was always discussed. Thus, it has always been my utmost priority and determination to continue to thrive on that principle that my parents hard-wired in me since childhood. The very tension has always pulled me deeper into furthering my
In this well-constructed discourse, “Home and Away”, Brownyne Williams, emphasizes on how the discourses that we learn from our home and community shape us in into who we are as a person, how we view the world and how we approach different discourses including academic writings. Williams’s main purpose is to convey the idea that, how being brought up in a well-educated and scholarly family influenced his way of thinking and perceiving things, and what he eventually came out to be in his life. A successful college professor with a PhD.
Williams begins with the introduction of his scholarly ancestry. He states, “I do come from a family of teachers – not just my parents, but many …show more content…
Literary and academic discourses was what he had already learned at the dinner table. And that made his academic achievements no surprise but a mere part of family business that he and his siblings were to take over. “No big deal, my mother tells them, it’s just the family business.” he exclaims. Williams forwards this idea of learning discourses from Gee’s “what is literacy”, which mentions that our discourses, identity and academic writings are correlated. “…a sort of identity kit which comes with appropriate costume and instructions on how we talk, and often write, so as to take on a particular role that others will recognize.” (2). He implies, that the way students write and respond to a particular text depends on their mastery of the academic discourse. And furthering the idea, this mastery of the academic discourse isn’t as natural for students who have not been reared up in the same environment where discussions of the discourse of academic culture are not part of the dinner table talk. Not that, those students might not be as successful, but they …show more content…
I was born in a working-class family, in a refugee camp in the distant Himalayan country. Expectations were really high. Living without hope for almost two decades, quite unsure of what the future held, my parents saw me as the only hope. Moderately educated and both of them as dedicated teachers in the camp-based schools, knew and believed that a good education was our only hope to a better future. So, every day was a new challenge for me to do well and learn something new. There was no way that I could not do well at school. The significance of education, was always emphasized to me in every walk of my life. In the evening when we would gather for dinner, my parents made sure that I had learned something new. The significance of education and learning was the main discourse that was always discussed. Thus, it has always been my utmost priority and determination to continue to thrive on that principle that my parents hard-wired in me since childhood. The very tension has always pulled me deeper into furthering my