Some Thoughts about Literacy

Literacy is so abstract word that none of us can define it accurately. As Sylvia Scribner mentioned in "Literacy In Three Metaphors", "Each of these efforts has identified important parameters of literacy, but none has yet won consensual agreement." It is hard indeed to give a absolute definition of this word, Sylvia told us something about the word by analysing it in three different ways.



Literacy has neither a static nor a universal essence, but it is a "many-meaninged thing". For individuals, literacy is a kind of skills they should obtain to grasp, explain and express. Just like a adaptation, we should use this skill to account the goals and settings of people's activities with written language. In my opinion, the literacy which we gained from our life is basic skill for us to survive in this world, you have to think and talk to make others know your feelings and ideas. That is the realistic significance for individuals.



There is also a relationship between literacy and group or community advancement. That is what the author talked about in "Literacy as Power". Community mobilized the members to use the literacy in order to take part in the social movements. In this way, all the community members will be connected together and achieve more goals for the unity.



Many kinds of literacies are used by people everyday. The author gave us a lot of opinions about the different literacies in the third part of the article. Even some rude words is a kind of literacy, but what we pursue should be the ones that are intelligent and polite also effective.



Literacy is a very important thing in our life. We should learn it and how to use it to help us live better in the society which is full of misunderstanding and controversy

Response of the Assignment #2 -- What Do You Left When You're Gone?

Above is a music video of the song "When I'm gone" by Eminem.

Because of too much emphasis on the reputation, Eminem neglected of his wife and daughter, even repeatedly deceived them. His daughter followed him all the way from home and his wife tried to suicide, Eminem flied back, the plane he took crashed on the way back. But later Eminem found that it was only a dream and his wife and daughter were still alive. Until then, he found that how much his family meant to him.

It is a moving MV. The little girl who appeared in the video is Slim's daughter Hailie. Silm was busy working all day just as he sang in the song, "Daddy’s writin’a song, this song ain’t gon’ write itself", and his wife was addicted to drugs at that time, so little Hailie became lonely and depressed. In the video, Hailie was asking for their love but was ignored by them. Actually, we can know that Slim loves his daughter pretty much by watching this video.

What impressed me most were the expressions in Hailie's beautiful eyes. She was so helpless that she tried to do something bad to attract Slim's attention. I also saw the ordinary paternal love from Slim who was thought to be punk and unruly by the public.

The lyric "when I’m gone, just carry on don’t mourn" is what Slim said to his daughter times and times to comfort her when he was away from her. Actually, it is just a kind of self-comfort, Hailie would not feel better by hearing this. At the end of the video, Slim was with his family and he finally found that being together, giving Hailie one underdog and watching her swinging by herself are the things that will bring the happiness to the family.

People often focus on the daily affairs dealing with the living but forget what we want to cherish. Slim was gone with his little daughter left, what do you left when you are gone?

Do you forget your children's birthdays because of the abustle work? Do you alienate your best friend because you are busy dating? Do you lose your temper to your parents because you are stuck in your study? Do you regret not to share the limit time with the people you love after you lost them forever? Those most important things in our life gradually go away from us when we are looking for the excuses. Not so much that they are far away from us, better to say that we abandoned them.

Slim has woken up before he lose all, is that also a reminder for us that we should take some actions to perfect our lives? Think about it, there should be many important things in one's life, but do not left someone you love when you're gone, they must be your power and sharer of the happiness.

Response of the Assignment #2 -- Louder than Anything You Can Say

Here is the article which I am going to analyse:

Louder Than Anything You Can Say

I teach economics at UNLV three times per week. Last Monday, at the beginning of class, I cheerfully asked my students how their weekend had been. One young man said that his weekend had not been so good. He had his wisdom teeth removed.

The young man then proceeded to ask me why I always seemed to be so cheerful. His question reminded me of something I'd read somewhere before: "Every morning when you get up, you have a choice about how you want to approach life that day," I said. "I choose to be cheerful."

"Let me give you an example," I continued, addressing all sixty students in the class. In addition to teaching here at UNLV, I also teach out at the community college in Henderson, 17 miles down the freeway from where I live.

One day a few weeks ago I drove those 17 miles to Henderson. I exited the freeway and turned onto College Drive. I only had to drive another quarter mile down the road to the college. But just then my car died. I tried to start it again, but the engine wouldn't turn over. So I put my flashers on, grabbed my books, and marched down the road to the college.

As soon as I got there I called AAA and arranged for a tow truck to meet me at my car after class.

The secretary in the Provost's office asked me what has happened. "This is my lucky day," I replied, smiling.

"Your car breaks down and today is your lucky day?" She was puzzled. "What do you mean?" "I live 17 miles from here." I replied. "My car could have broken down anywhere along the freeway. It didn't. Instead, it broke down in the perfect place: off the freeway, within walking distance of here. I'm still able to teach my class, and I've been able to arrange for the tow truck to meet me after class. If my car was meant to break down today, it couldn't have been arranged in a more convenient fashion."

"The secretary's eyes opened wide, and then she smiled. I smiled back and headed for class." So ended my story.

I scanned the sixty faces in my economics class at UNLV. Despite the early hour, no one seemed to be asleep. Somehow, my story had touched them. Or maybe it wasn't the story at all. In fact, it had all started with a student's observation that I was cheerful.

Deepak Chopra has quoted an Indian wise man as saying, "Who you are speaks louder to me than anything you can say." I suppose it must be so.

This is a short story about attitude. In my school times, my teachers always say that, "Attitude is everything", this sentence is from the then Chinese national soccer team coach Bora Milutinovic who first led the Chinese soccer team to enter the World Cup finals. Milu instilled this core thought to all team members, stressing the importance of attitude, which just happens to coincide with the author's thought of this article. Indeed, we may not have the right to choose what kind of things will happen, but we can choose to go with the attitude of how to face them.

In the article, the author described a small matter in his life, just like what we have written in "A Day in my life", an extraordinary sense which comes from the ordinary life. When the author found that the young students he taught were always bothered by various "troubles" in their lives and not happy, he gave the class a vivid lesson by telling a real experience in his life: facing the anchor of his car halfway to school, the author did not complained about his bad luck, but was grateful that the car did not break down far away from the school so that he did not delay the normal job. The author used real dialogues, as well as first-person narrative, making readers feel more about the author's positive and optimistic attitude towards life, especially the obstacles in life.

People all have their own positions in society, they struggle to pursue their dreams, but sometimes what they pursue may not meet the material requirements.They have to do it for some practical reasons though it may be something that they do not want to do. We must work hard, study hard for a foothold in society, we are constantly on the run, it is easy to get tired of the it and become querulous. Reality is not that cruel and frightening as it said. If we face everthing with a roseate attitude, life will show the most brilliant side to us.

The author used concise language to express the central idea of the article cogently, the title of this article is Louder Than Anything You Can Say, the author wrote the source of the title at the end of the article, so readers can have a better understanding of the further main idea based on the impression they got from the former part of the article. The mode--emphasis on narrative - refining on the core which the author applied in this article often appears in such kind of educational articles. We should not only understand the importance of the attitude which the author wanted to reveal to us in the article, but also learn something about this mode of writing in order to apply it into our writing.

Louder than anything you can say, be louder and louder.

Response of the Assignment #2 -- Picture World Made By Leica M

Here is a classic picture taken by Leica M camera:

On February 1968, a plain-clothes police captain - Lou, shot at a suspected member of Communist Party of Vietnam without court permission on the street in Saigon.

The "CPV shot" pictures which were taken by the well-known Associated Press correspondent Edith Adams have become the most famous news photos in the history of contemporary photography, they covered all the 1970 world press photo awards. This picture was an represention of those kind of reports which made people to think about why the United States got involved in the Vietnam War and Southeast Asia Affairs. It also changed the attitude of the American people of the Vietnam War and led to a nationwide anti-war movement in the United States.

The background hue and graphics of this picture are both gloomy, which should be due to the characteristics of the Leica M camere. Because of the portability, durability and excellent lens quality of Leica M machine, the journalists and photographers all over the world use it to shoot a lot of valuable lens. As a witness of the times, Leica M camera recorded human sufferings, also lay its immortal status in the history of photography by these valuable historical photos.

One of the most famous and popular pictures in the world should be the portrait photo of the Cuban revolution hero Guevara.

The following is the original image:

In the picture, Guevara was wearing a beret, his eyes were intently watching from afar; At that time, Guevara was taking part in anti-American rallies, in memory of the victims of the Cuban crew. As a symbol of freedom and ideals, this Guevara's portrait is popular for a long time in the East and the West, it was widely printed on posters, T-shirts and souvenirs.

Photography is a traditional way to record. Since the camera was invented, people have used it widely in all kinds of events. Among all the cameras, Leica M plays an significant role in the history, it was first used as military photographic equipment. We know from the two pictures above that Leica M has its own quality of pictures, it reflects the scenes as a kind of historical and serious issues,compared to other types of photographs. The camera actually saved the moments which show the war, turmoil, poverty, revolution and polarization in the 1980s.

By seeing these old photos, reading the story behind the photos, we finally realize that photos of the history and the history of human, are both so precious.

A Day in My Life

Woke by an alarm clock, I got up at 8:10 while my roommate was still sleeping deeply. It is indeed a challenge for me to get up so early everyday. With my eyes half closed, I put on my clothes and brushed my teeth. Suddenly noticed that it was already 8:40, I rushed out to the cafeteria for my breakfast, sometimes this was the only meal for the whole day. A 15-minute breakfast was already perfect for me. It was bitterly cold today, fortunately, I arrived at my classroom before I was froze in the snowy wind. Having classes made me feel happy and dependable. The discussions held in WRA course made me high and the math problems also made me excited.

Lunch, sometimes becomes impossible for me, because I need to sleep for a while in order to support myself for the rest of the day. After 40 minutes' sleep, I struggled from my bed and went to class again. Facing the screen in the lab, I couldn't describe how sleepy I was. But I had to force myself to concentrate on it, because as a foreigner once I didn't catch up with the class, I would perhaps never catch on it again. It seemed so long before the end of this class. I walked back to my dorm, opened my computer, replied my mother's message, checked the homework for today and began to do it. Luckily, there was not much work to deal with, I watched TV series online after finished doing my homework. That was the most joyful time I had for the day, some juice, some chips and the series I loved.

Time turned to 9:00, it's time to prepare for my work in the cafeteria. I would be working at dish room for 4 hours until 1:30 in the morning. Does it hear weird? It does! A little talk with my workmates, just looked at the clock and waited for the mid-night. Sometimes there are not enough people, I have to handle all the things by myself. Every time when I finish my work at cafe, I feel exhausted and dying. Finding that my roommate had already fallen asleep, I quietly closed the door and went bed quickly. With all the things done, I felt so happy at this moment. Even though tomorrow would also be a busy day, after all, tomorrow is another day.

That's a day in my life, maybe Monday, thanks for watching.

A photo to make us stronger

This photo was taken by an English photographer and first published on The Daily Telegraph after the 5.12 Wenchuan earthquake in 2008.

In the picture, a middle-age man sat on a motor bike and a woman lay on his back. Actually, the woman had died for couple days in the earthquake. The man was her husband, named Jiafang Wu. As Wu described, when the earthquake came, he was working outside while his wife was at home, he ran back home the first time after the earthquake and found their house had already been ruined. He strongly insisted his wife was in the ruin and began to dig, having been working a whole day, Wu finally found his wife, but sadly, already dead. He felt a deep pain inside and decided to bury his wife himself. He digged out his wife's favourite clothes and headwear and put them on for her. Because the transportation was cut down and no one yet to help, he tied his wife to his back and rode to the burial ground. During their way there, this photo was taken by a photographer on the road.

We all see the full-filled love in this picture. The deceased have to, towards the heaven, where there will be no more disasters, there will be no more tears, but for those who survived the disaster in the compatriots, alive to become a challenge, let them in an instant disaster separated from the experience of live and death, once the husband and wife had loved each other for 20 years, but now they had to be apart. The horrible disaster not only led to the flesh wounds but also the detructions of their souls. We can ever build their home more beautiful, but for us, the most important is how to bind up their soul-deep scars.

Pay our respect to the deaths, is more than recalling, but a way to make us stronger!

25 Random things about me

1.I will feel like vomiting when I smell the scents of onions, gingers and Chinese toon tree.
2.I set up a band in high school with my friends and performed throughout the campus.
3.I started to learn electronic piano when I was 4 years old and continued it for 7 years.
4.I'm very much into spicy food and hate sweet food except for chocolate and ice-cream.
5.I enjoy extreme sports and all kinds of roller coasters.
6.I love bungee jumping and once jumped from a 62-meter-high mountain.
7.I eat a lot, even some boys can't eat as much as I do.
8.I don't have brothers or sisters,but I really want to have one or two.
9.I can drink a lot even though it's illegal in United States.
10.I collect all kinds of letter papers and stickers, also some stationeries.
11.I cut down some weird pictures on books or newspaper and put them into another magazine.
12.I once got Temporo-mandibular Joint Dysfunction Syndrome and couldn't chew for 2 weeks.
13.I fought with my friends in the snow and was buried by her.
14.I was once afraid of water and learned to swim at age of 12.
15.I like window-shopping.
16.I'm fond of rings and bracelets cos I have two beautiful hands.
17.I prefer washing to cooking.
18.I really want to learn Japanese.
19.Florence and Tokyo are the places I'd like to go most.
20.I hate science fiction films and those kinda fake things.
21.I have a big interest in the ancient Chinese emperor's life in Tsing Dynasty.
22.I'm addicted to hip-hop music.
23.Noodles with soybean paste, Beijing Roast Ducks are my favorite food.
24.I hope I can be skinny someday.
25.I'm quick-tempered and I need to be patience for everything.

Analysis of Stan

This is a song .sung by Eminem. It was made from a true story of a Eminem's fan.

The man in the video is called Stan, he was a allegiance fan of Slim and he found himself can't help falling love with Slim. However, his girlfriend had already had a baby for him. Stan felt so spellbound and conflictive. So he decided to write a letter to Slim and pour out all his sorrow and suffering. Dramaticly, his letter was left on the road to Slim, Stan thought that maybe Slim didn't care about him or even laugh at him. With more pressure on his mind, Stan wrote again to Slim, trying to explain himself and get some help from Slim. Unfortunately, the letter was missed again. After a long time waiting, Stan finally lost all the hope and wanted to end his life for relieving. But he thought he couldn't face his girlfriend and the unborn baby, so he chose to end their two's lives, too. In the end, Stan squezzed his girlfriend in the car and drove to the seashore, on the way there, he recorded the last words for Slim to unburden his love to Slim.

It's a sad story. We all don't want to see this miserable ending. When a person faces lots of pressure and difficulties, just like at the heritage of the video, Stan couldn't sleep at night and worried about the cruel reality, he needed someone to support him. But the letters toyed him and the whole world refused him, he had no choice but death.

As an audience, we read the emotions of the video by extending the details in it and the scenes set by the director. Considering the necessity of ideological criticism, can those people who are really in trouble receive the help from the others, even in the area such as United States? I deeply remember Robert's last sentence in the text, he said," We must start with our most beloved icons, not hte ones we profess allegiance to, but those that really have the power to move and shake us. The song "Stan" is really one like that. The first time I watched it, I was moved or even shocked by the story. I felt really sorry for Stan and his family, also for the world we live in. By watching this video, let us think about the lack of emotions between us and evoke the love of every social members.

We shall overcome

----My Slogan

It's the best of time, world becomes peaceful, people's lives become better.
It's the worse of time, a horrible disaster hit us.
On 12 May, 2009, a 8.1-level earthquake shaked over a beautiful tourism place--Sichuan, China. Just several seconds, many cities were ruined, even some were gone. Thousands of people--children, youths, elders, died of it. Two mountains got closer, the city between them and people lived there would never come out again. Millions of people lost their homes, they're lacking of food, water, medicine and love.

However, I think we shall overcome, as everyone from chairman and little baby is for the whole nation. We shall overcome, as so much help comes from those warm-hearted people in the world. We shall overcome, as the strong spirit of human is still night there. Such disaster will only strengthen us, we shall overcome!

“I have a dream”

“I have a dream…” what famous and familiar sentence it is. Since the moment Martin Luther King, Jr. spoke with a passionate strenuousness at Lincoln Memorial, Washington in 1963, this speech is bound to become the landmark of liberal and radical movements of Negroes.

The great speech stirred thousands people’s hearts. I think the most important reason is his abundant diction. His sentences were long and well structured, interwoven with parallel words and phrases. At the beginning of almost every paragraph, he started with the sentence “I have a dream…” which made the speech a whole. MLKJ also spoke in the first person, which strengthened the power of the words. In the lecture, he mentioned many states and feathers of those states, to make his speech more believable. He used simile to express his complex emotions. Such a vivid and active speech absolutely depended on its content, plenty of short true story appeared in this lecture, even if they are concise and short, they influenced the tone of the entire speech indeed. Some beautiful and peaceful scenes draw by MLKJ in the speech, for example, the paragraph “I have a dream that one day down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification, one day right there in Alabama little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.” had a strong quarter as well.

By studying this famous speech, we really can learn some vital writing skills to make our articles logical and persuasive.

Link to "I have a dream" http://www.cycnet.com/englishcorner/speech/dream.htm