Write a story of a time you struggled to learn something in a particular discourse community
Notice that this assignment asks you to tell a story- this is a different kind of writing than the usual “academic research essay.” You are not *researching* and *citing sources* about your chosen discourse community, you are using creative writing to make your audience *feel* what it was like for you to learn in this new community. Take the examples we read last week- they told a you story with a clear beginning, middle, and end with such vivid detail that you *felt* what they felt. This is your goal.
Literacy Narrative Genre Features
A story is an account or description of people and events that has
a beginning, middle, and end. As with most narratives, those about
literacy often set up some sort of situation that needs to be resolved. That need
for resolution makes readers want to keep reading. Where is there
conflict, tension, or action in your story? What are some events or
situations that you have been part of that you can use to dramatize your
story?
Some literacy narratives simply explore the role that reading or
writing played at some time in someone’s life—assuming, perhaps, that
learning to read or write is a challenge to be met.
(from the Norton Field Guide to Writing).
Vivid detail.
Details can bring a narrative to life for readers by giving them vivid
mental images of the sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and textures of the world in
which your story takes place. For example, in your first draft you may have
written “he was angry at me” but now you can take the chance to revise it
to be more concrete and explicit (as opposed to abstract and vague).
What does “angry” look like? “As he narrowed his eyes and clenched his
jaw, a vein began to pulse on his temple. I gulped audibly when his
wrathful gaze turned in my direction.”
Also, the details you use when describing something can help
readers picture places, people, and events; for example, instead of writing
“at the beach, we saw a dog run by us,” be more specific: “an overexcited
Border Collie strained against her leash, dragging a cursing owner onto
the sandy beach.”
Lastly, using dialogue can help your audience hear what is being
said and can help bring a narrative to life. Dialogue should be used to
convey information to your reader about your characters and to help
move the plot forward.
Some indication of the narrative’s significance.
By definition, a literacy narrative tells something the writer
remembers about learning to read, write, or communicate within a
discourse community. In addition, the writer needs to make clear why the
incident matters to him or her.
You may reveal its significance in various ways; this assignment
asks you to use this story as a chance to reflect on how some aspect of
your history as a reader/writer/language user has shaped your identity,
values, beliefs, behavior, or world view. How has participating in a
particular discourse community shaped you as a person? Why should
people care about writing, language, and communication?
The trick is to avoid tacking onto the end a statement about your
narrative’s significance as if it were a kind of moral of the story.
Someone’s narrative would have far less power if he’d simply said, “Thus
did my father teach me to value books of all kinds.”