Rodriguez, Aria

Rodriguez, Collier and Delpit all touch on similar issues but how do their central ARGUMENTS differ?

Giving up his Spanish took away some of his personal identity (PRIVATE IDENTITY).

Is this a cautionary tale?
The stories he tells show something is lost:  can't speak in depth with parents, doesn't have names for his parents anymore, misses the sound of spanish, loss of "conveniently private sounds", intimacy

In the end, he says the loss is NECESSARY.
"makes possible" --

Rodriguez wrote Hunger of Memory in 1982
R says you HAVE TO LEARN the rules and codes of power in order tobe successful.
D also says that you have to learn the rules and codes of power to be successful
vs.
Collier (2004) says 3. Don't teach in a way that seeks to eliminate the first language...

Class Notes on Kozol

Class Discussion on Kozol

What is Kozol's argument in this piece??

The culture of power provides temporary fixes to the problems of poverty  in Mott Haven which keep the cycle of power in its place, and put a "bandaid' on the "broken leg" which never really fixes the problems.

Kozol blames INSTITUTIONS not INDIVIDUALS.

Kozol disagrees with Mead who says,  "If poor people behaved rationally they would seldom be poor for long in the first place" (21).  

People with LESS PRIVILEGE have FEWER CHOICES.
Power offers people choice and freedom to make decisions for long term success rather than short term survival.









AGREES:
"Evil exists...  I believe that what the rich have done to the poor in this city..."(23)
Kozol tells us this to show us that RICH PEOPLE have power but don't use it. 

How do we know that Kozol agrees?

DISAGREES:
Mead: "If poor people behaved rationally they would seldom be poor for long in the first place" (21)

EVIDENCE:
cockroaches
hand out blankets instead of heat
all about fixing the problem temporarily...
incinerator
dumping trash
putting so many poor people in one place with "nothing to grow on"

Jonathan Kozol, Amazing Grace

About 5 or so years ago, Jonathan Kozol came to speak at RIC.  I was honored to be asked to participate in a small group session with him and some students from ALLIED, the mentoring group I run every Wednesday. I was so excited to meet him that I became ridiculous in my anticipation.  Every day I would remind my classes that he was coming and every day that would laugh at my giddiness and glee.

On the day he spoke, I collected all of my Kozol books from my office...  Amazing Grace, Savage Inequalities, Shame of the Nation, Letters to a New Teacher, Death at an Early Age.  Probably others.  A colleague of mine saw me heading to the talk with a heavy bag in tow.

"What are you doing with all those books?" she asked.

"I just really want him to sign them!" I exclaimed.  I wanted him to know that I was his Number One Fan and somehow I had decided that the armload of books would be evidence to my loyalities.

"Maybe you should just bring one," she said.  "You know.  Just one to sign."

"Oh no!" I declared. "I really want to bring them all!"

Being told explicitly the rules and codes of power makes acquiring power easier.  Delpit was shaking her head somewhere out there in the universe.

The talk was great.  I took notes and smiled and nodded emphatically.  I brought all of the books. After the talk, Kozol signed them all.  Begrudgingly.  Apparently it is bad form to ask an author to sign ALL of your books.  As if one special autographed copy is cheapened by sitting next to many others on one person's bookshelf.  Instead of impressing Kozol, I kinda irritated him.  Ooops.  Another place where Delpit and Kozol have collided for me!

Welcome to our blogosphere!

Welcome to this FNED 346 blogging adventure!

Sometime before September 14, you will set up your own blog to use this semester for all of your Talking Points assignments, and to keep track of your thoughts about any of the issues we cover.

A blog is your very own, personal online journal. It is public, in that I and your classmates can read it and comment on it, but it is your space and you can control most everything about it. (If you want to make it private so that *only* members of this class can read it, I can show you how to do so).

In the context of this course, your blog has two purposes:

1) Your blog will provide a space for you to keep all of your assignments over the course of our semester together. You will not hand in written assignments to me each week; rather you will post them on your blog. In this sense, your blog is merely your assignment notebook that you will use as you read and prepare for class each week. You will also be posting any additional thoughts you have: responses to class discussion, after thoughts, things you forgot to say in class, relevant experiences you have, etc.

But importantly, your blog is a public space and as you post (and comment on others'), you will gain a much richer understanding of everything we read and discuss in class. I want you to think of it as interactive and intertextual in that way.

2) Creating your own blog will also introduce you to the blogisphere if you don't know this place already. I hope that you will discover creative educational uses for this online medium. You will see how easy it is to use blogger.com, and perhaps it will inspire you to bring blogs into your own classroom someday.

To start your own blog, you will go to:

www.blogger.com

SET UP AN ACCOUNT:

If you do not already have a Google account, you will need to create one.  If you do have a Google account, sign in in the box at the right. 
  

Click the button that says NEW BLOG (you will see this even if you have blogged before) and follow the instructions to get started.  Don't forget your Username and Password!! You will need them to login everytime. Please write them down on the top of your syllabus so you don't forget!  

NAME YOUR BLOG:

As you fill in the info, you will be asked to name your blog. This title will appear at the top of your blog. (Mine is called "FNED 346 Fall 2014")

CHOOSE AN ADDRESS:

Every blog has its own URL, or web address.

http://_______.blogspot.com

This will be the web address associated with your site. you can call it anything you like. Be clever or simple (or both) -- it is up to you.

CHOOSE A TEMPLATE:

You will also need to choose a design template for your blog. Look through the options listed and see what appeals to you. You can change this later so don't worry too much about it initially... 

START POSTING:

Once you have the account set up, you can start posting. A “post” is an entry on your blog. (For clarification, you have one blog, but many posts). Give the post a title and then compose as you would any journal entry. When you are finished, hit the button that says Publish. It will not appear on your blog until you publish it. You can always go back and edit old posts and create new ones.

Your First Post:

Your first post should be a short introduction to you: who are you, what you did over the summer, why you are taking this class, what do you do when you are not in class, etc. (Just a short paragraph — no big deal).

POST A COMMENT WITH YOUR ADDRESS:

When you are done creating your site and posting your first entry, please come back to this blog and post a comment at the end of our first post (scroll down) that includes your blog address so that we can post it in the blog list to the right.

Some Tips and Helpful Hints:

• Once you are in your blog, look at the top right corner of the screen. If you click on the word DESIGN, you will be able to make design changes, create new posts, edit old posts, etc. (You can only do this if you are logged in to your blog.)
• Once you are in the DESIGN screen, you can do all kinds of things to make your blog a bit more interesting. Change your fonts and colors, edit a post, change your settings. See the tabs at the left side of the screen for all kinds of options.
• Poke around online and make a list of websites related to gender, social justice, feminism or anything else relevant and post them on your blog. You can add all kinds of things by ADDING A GADGET from your LAYOUT screen.
• Just do the best you can with this. If you get stuck, don't fret... I am happy to help you anytime as you work on getting this started. And remember: you can't break it. It is just a blog. Everything can be changed if need be!

Good luck!!

LB :)