And Still We Rise Chunk #1

The first chunk of Miles Corwin's And Still We Rise illustrates how students attending Crenshaw High School in South Central maintain superb grades with all the hardships they endure at home. Prmarily using anecdotes and description Corwin explores the lives of gifted and talented students. Many of the students who attend Crenshaw are forced to deal with situatons beyond ther maturity level. Characters such as Oliva are faced with abusive parents,full tme jobs, and chaotc foster homes.Others such as Sadikifu have went from being a mischiveous teenager, to a gang banger, to a gifted and talented student.Toya has to sacrafice her good education to take care of her child while Venola wrks to jobs to help her mother pay the bills. Miesha on the other hand only has her brother to lok up to for support. With all of these mishaps students are additionally forced to deal with bickering between teachers, constant gang violence, and the end of affirmative action.

Discussion Questions
If the bok was not primarily anecdotal, would it be as interesting?
How would you deal with the situatons these kids go through?

But What Do You Mean

Deborah Tannen’s “But What Do You Mean” examines how men and women miscommunicate. Using anecdotes Tannen breaks down the biggest areas of miscommunication. Women, for example tend to overly give apologies even when there is nothing to apologize for. They will say they are sorry and in return expect the other person to take the blame as well. When the other person doesn’t take the blame as expected the woman will look entirely at fault even if she is not. Men usually do not apologize as much making the apologetic woman look incapable of doing what a man does. It “masks” a woman’s competence. When a man and a woman criticize each other the woman will soften her criticism and expect the same in return while a man will clearly give his opinion oblivious to the fact that he instead should have gave an compliment to keep the woman satisfied. In many cases a woman will say thank you even if there is no reason to thank the person. Comparing a woman’s feelings to an unbalanced seesaw Tannen explains that when women say thank you, if they don’t get a thanks in return they feel “abandoned” in the conversation and regret saying thank you to them at all. When men discuss their ideas they tend to simply argue and challenge their opponent’s ideas but women take this as a personal attack rather than an exchange of ideas. Men and Women also praise one another differently. Women expect to be flowered with praise when doing well while men remain silent to show that they are pleased. If a woman begins to complain she is simply relieving her self and expects someone to tell of their troubles as well. When men hear these complaints they take it upon themselves to try and solve the solution. The last area of miscommunication is during the exchange of jokes. Women usually feel more comfortable joking with women but when they around men who are joking and they do not laugh men think they are too serious and have no sense of humor.

Discussion Questions:
Does the authors gender build on to her credibility?
Do you find yourself participating in miscommunications as discussed?
As a woman do you agree with the things Tannen says women do?

A Gay Marriage Sloution: End Marriage

Michael A .Lindenberger’s “A Gay Marriage Solution: End Marriage” elucidates the controversial issue of homosexual marriage .Using anecdotes Lindenberger argues that the government cannot incorporate religious ceremonies into the law. Experts say the way to avoid theses legal battles over gay marriage is to take marriage out of the hands of the government. The author argues that the best way to end the controversy is to take the word marriage away. The only problem is that many will feel as though you are taking something away from them. Instead of calling it marriage, gay and straight couples should be issued licenses announcing them as a union. If their religious beliefs support their conj ointment then they can refer to themselves as married. Justice Ming Chin argues that allowing some to join hands in matrimony and not others disobeys the constitution which is supposed to guarantee equal protection under the law. If the government is not stopped from controlling matters like this they will remain effecting our personal decisions.
Discussion Questions
Is it really fair for the government to control ones personal beliefs?
If logical appeals were not used would the author’s argument be credible?

Nickel and Dimed Evaluation

Barbara Ehrenreich's self evaluation emphasizes that wages are too low and the cost of living is extremely high. A job will not necessarily get a person out of poverty. Many of the poor work two or more jobs and still find it difficult to live comfortably.Ehrenreich's feels that America looks down on those who are forced to get on welfare and are seen as lazy people who need to get it together. She believes America should be ashamed, because many of those who are on welfare work extremely hard and do the the jobs that many would not dare do but they are forced to get on welfare because the cost f living is simply too high.Overall, through out her experiment she feels that she did exceptionally well. She made a few mistakes but for the most part her job performance was good.


Discussion Questions
Barbara states that America should be ashamed for looking down on those who are on welfare?Do you believe that many people look down on welfare recipients and see them as lazy and people who need to get it together?

After evaluating herself Barbara believes that her overall performance was good? How do you feel that Ehrenreich did? Did she perform at the best of her abilities?

Chunk #3 of Nickel and Dimed: Selling in Minesota

Part three of Barbara Ehrenreich's novel Nickel and Dimed titled Selling in Minnesota emphasizes that trying to live off of a low wage job and rent an apartment is almost impossible. While in Minnesota Barbabra decides that she will not be a waitress, maid, or nurse. She plans to work in retail. The search for a place to live was extremely hard in Minnesota. Everywhere is either too expensive or there aren't any rooms available. Barbara soon realized that she is beginning to make some mistakes. Her first mistake occurred when she decided not to take a room because it did not have a kitchenette. Many, including herself, wind up living in...............motel rooms, renting by the week. Her second mistake was when she decided to work at Wal Mart earning only seven dollars a hour instead of a hardware store called Menard's where she would earn ten dollars a hour. While working at Wal Mart she realizes that workers are not paid enough for what they have to do. They are required to do so much to please the "guest". Throughout her stay in Minnesota Barbara also notices a change in her attitude. She finds herself getting upset with the Wal Mart atmosphere-from the customers not putting things back to her nagging boss . Before resigning from Wal Mart Barbara tries to encourage some of her coworkers to start a union. If she could have stayed a Wal Mart employee any longer she believed she would have been able to help the start the union they deserved.





Dscussion Questions



Barbara says " I think we could have done something, she and I, if I could have afforede to work at Wal Mart any longer." Do you think she could have afforded to stay? If she wanted to help so bad, don't you think she would have made a better effort to stay and help?



Barbara declined the job at Menards because of her lack of plumming terminlogy. Menards didnt seem concered with that fact so do you believe it was wise for her to work at Wal Mart instead?

Chunk # 2 of Nickel and Dimed: Scrubbing Maine

Part two of Barbara Ehrenreich's novel Nickel and Dimed titled Scrubbing Maine illustrates how those who have jobs that require janitorial work, work excessivley, yet they are looked down upon and are seen as outcast.Barbara chose the reside in Maine because it is mainly populated by Caucasians , so finding a low wage work force would be accessible. In this section of the novel Barbara takes a job as a maid and a dietary aide for Woodcrest Residential Facility(not the real name). She works at Woodcrest on the weekends and is responsible for serving the elderly their meals and doing janitorial work such as vacuuming and washing the dishes. Her second job consists of being a maid. It requires a lot of physical work and is extremely tiring but its necessary that she works both jobs to make ends meet. She soon comes to realize that maids for the most part are ignored. For example,one day while at a dinner she tried to order an iced tea but the waitress continued with her conversation and simply ignoired her as if she was superior to a maid. Barbara endured more that just stares and being ignored though, at one point she was forced to call for some source of help mainly for food. It took about a hour of calling but she recieved the food that was neccessary. While staying in Maine Brabara began to feel defeated and became frustrated. She even found herself sticking up for a coworker to their boss. Surprisingly, it earned her a raise and a praise of approval from their boss. As the end of the month approached Barbara revealed her true identity to her fellow coworkers and questioned "How do they feel, not about Ted(their boss) but about the owners whohave so much whle others, like themselves barely get buy?" One woman looked at it as motivation, while the other felt that she did not need all that they had.





Discusson Questions

In Scrubbing Maine Barbara states that maides are ignored and are outcast.Do you agree with her? Do you see yourself looking down on those who do the jobs that most of us could not imagine dong such as janitorial work?


In one secton of the chapter Holly says"If we're cleaning their house they're wealthy." Do you agree with this? Is everyne who has someone clean ther house wealthy? Is this saying that many wealthy people are too lazy to clean their own homes?