Reading Assessment.

Elaine Richardson's "My Ill Literacy Narrative: Growing Up Black, Po and a Girl in the Hood"

Why does Richardson identify this narrative as an "ill literacy narrative"? Which events does she share to support the concept of "ill literacy"?

            At the end of “My Ill Literacy Narrative: Growing Up Black, Po and a girl in the Hood” Elaine Richardson defines the word ill.  She says, “In today’s vernacular one of the meanings for ‘ill or sick’ means skilled, so that ill literacy refers to skilled literacy.” (page 58).  The use of ill in its slang form in a way correlates to all of the events she writes about.  Ill is known by many to mean skilled.  When Richardson is raped as a young girl she explains that this is all apart of the role of the male and the role of the female in the African American society.  A man needs to feel dominant whereas the woman is supposed to submit to him.  During the time of this rape this was seen as normal, just as using the word ill to describe something as skilled is perceived as normal.

David Sedaris' "Me Talk Pretty One Day"

What role does dialogue play in the way that Sedaris makes sense of the challenges associated with learning French? How does it support/not support the purposes of this essay?

            David Sedaris uses dialogue in his essay, “Me Talk Pretty One Day” to express the challenges of learning a new language.  In this case he is learning French.  The teacher he is learning from is a cruel woman who enjoys ridiculing her students.  Sedaris does not understand everything she is saying though.  He writes what the teacher is saying in English (so the readers can understand it) and throws in the occasional gibberish word when he doesn’t understand something in French.  For example, on page 65 he writes, “’If you have not meimsllsxp or lgpdmurct by this time, then you should not be in this room. Has everyone apzkiubjxow?’”  The gibberish words in italics are the things he can’t quite understand.  If I for example, a native English speaker knowing very little French were to go to France I might hear something similar.  There might be a few words I would understand but everything else would be foreign to me.  This supports to the essay quite well.  It immerses the reader into Sedaris’ head.  We hear what he hears when he writes the dialogue in such a manner.