Language, Gender and Culture

Young “Prelude: The Barbershop”Lorde “Transformation of Silence into Language & Action”

After turning in your homework, please talk with your table group about what you observed about conversations. Be prepared to share 4 insightful comments with the class.

Discuss Conversation Observations

Using the vocabulary chart, review the list of key vocabulary words for each author, checking off any words and/or their synonyms you know (meaning you would recognize and understand these words if you saw them in another context). Then, working individually or in pairs, brainstorm an additional fifteen synonyms in the far right column. You can find synonyms using a number of resources: ask a classmate, use your cell phone to find definitions, or use electronic or print dictionaries.

Activity 1: Vocabulary Chart

Read and annotate: “Prelude: The Barbershop” paying close attention to different strategies the author is using to indicate his opinion on communication within different cultures. As you make your four annotations per page, mark the areas that are of interest to you, words that seem to be important to his message, or any formatting that is noticeable.

Reading Young for Understanding & Annotating

We are going to do a close reading of a passage from Young’s prelude. To do a close reading you select a passage and analyze it in fine detail. You comment on points of style and reflect on the passage as a reader. The more closely you can observe, the more original and exact your ideas will be.

A prelude is an action, event or comment that comes before something else. Although this is the prelude to a book, it sounds very lyrical and almost like poetry. I will read this passage aloud to you so you can hear the weight of his message and possibly how he meant this to sound.

Activity 2: Close Reading Activity

Now, taking the information from your close reading, imitate Young’s style by writing a 5 sentence paragraph in the spirit of his voice, maintaining his sentence length and structure, but writing about yourself and your own experiences with language, gender, culture, race, masculinity, femininity, or identity.

Activity 3: Spoken Word Activity

You will now get together with other people (groups of 2-4) who wrote about a similar topic (ex: gender, race, silence, etc.). Together you will craft a group writing (1-2 paragraphs) that addresses a specific aspect of the area you wrote about. For example: If I wrote about being a woman, my group would write a piece that is about stereotyping women in media or women in sports. Your writing should emulate Young’s style again maintaining his sentence length and structure.

In these groups you will perform this writing as a spoken word text for the class next Monday/Tuesday. What is a spoken word performance you ask? Watch the following examples to get an idea of what we’re asking you to do. We know that these are professionals, but you will get the idea. You must perform them. You will have some class time on Thursday/Friday to practice. Your group writing is due today.

Activity 3: Spoken Word Activity continued

Activity 1: Vocabulary chart Annotated Young prelude Activity 2: Close reading activity Activity 3: Spoken Word writing both

individual and group

Due Now

Language, Gender and Culture

Young “Prelude: The Barbershop”Lorde “Transformation of Silence into Language & Action”

Read Audrey Lorde’s speech, annotating any particular points of interest or noting any places that need clarification; then answer the following questions about it:

1. Thinking back to the predictions you made in the Pre-Reading Activities, which of your predictions turned out to be true? If your prediction was inaccurate, what words or phrases in the text misled you?

2. Write a single sentence in your own words that states Lorde’s argument.

3. Write a 5 sentence response to her main argument. What do you agree with, and what do you disagree with? 

Activity 1: Reading Lorde for Understanding

Compose a rhetorical précis that analyzes the content, purpose, and rhetorical strategies of Lorde by following the 4-sentence pattern below:

Sentence 1: The name of the author, the genre, and title of the work, and the publication date in parentheses; a rhetorically accurate verb; and a clause containing the major assertion or thesis statement in the work.

Sentence 2: An explanation of how the author develops and supports the thesis, usually in chronological order.

Sentence 3: A statement of the author’s apparent purpose, followed by an “in order to” phrase.

Sentence 4: A description of the intended audience, the relationship the author establishes with the audience, or both.

Activity 2: Rhetorical Précis

Activity 1: Responses to Lorde Activity 2: Rhetorical précis Annotated Lorde speech

Due now