In the movie "The Replacements," expression-challenged Keanu Reeves delivers a pretty memorable speech about the nature of adversity. He is sitting in a locker-room, pre-football game, while the coach try to talk a team up from the previous week's defeat. The coach, played by Gene Hackman, asks his players, "what scares you?" After a fun interchange about spiders and bees, Keanu pipes up. "Quicksand," he says. The team is confused so the coach has him explain:
"You're playing and everything is going fine. And then one thing goes wrong and another and another. And you try to fight it but there's nothing you can do. You're in over your head. Like quicksand."
I think this fear is more legitimate for high school students in 2016 than it is even for professional football players. Because here's the reality of your lives: things were going well. You had good grades, you worked pretty hard, everything seemed pretty smooth. Then BANG. You suddenly weren't moving forward. You were stuck. But hey adversity was nothing new so you doubled back and tried something else. BANG. You started to feel trapped. Classes used to be so easy. But this junior year thing, this college writing thing. It seemed like a trap. Wait, you said without saying it, I have to tackle a complex, truly difficult prompt, organize a response on a level I've never encountered before, all while getting held to a rubric that feels way over my head?
At this point in the year, AP Lang can feel a bit like quicksand in that regard. Vocabulary, rhetorical tools, sentence styles, tone, audience... so many things to keep track of all at once. So what if instead of adding to the overwhelming complexity of it all we try to simplify things? What if we reduced the pressure instead of turning it up?
If we reduce an RA to its simplest component it's really all about purpose. Why did the author put these words on paper? Why? Once you can answer that you can tackle corollaries: why is it effective? what tone is created? how does that tone convey the purpose to the audience?
In the wonderful animated movie "Despicable Me", Gru (voiced by Steve Carrell) runs into a man at the Bank of Evil (formerly Lehman Brothers) who calls himself "Vector". It's another spendid cinematic exchange. But Vector's name is symbolic, he says, because he (like the word itself) has direction and magnitude. ("Oh yeah!")
Vector is an interesting idea to apply analysis too. Authors, with their words, have direction (purpose) and magnitude (tone). They are headed somewhere; they have a goal. They can also convey a certain immediacy about that journey. We have seen evidence of different tones in almost everything we read. In "Usher", Poe knows that his dark and chaotic tone will ultimately help him achieve the wonderfully introspective purpose of his short story. In "Young Goodman Brown", Hawthorne skewers the overly judgmental Puritans to achieve his ends. Even in "Candide" today Voltaire effected a tone - sardonic, sarcastic, slightly inappropriate - to drive his frustration home.
So what if tomorrow instead of worrying about how many rhetorical tools you can find you asked yourself a simple question: what is the "vector" of this passage? Where is it going? Can I articulate the goal here? And once I can how is it trying to get there? Am I supposed to feel something along the way?
Because here's what you already know: quicksand thrives on people flailing about reaching in any direction for literally anything. It's chaotic and unfocused. They sink faster. So to avoid it you need to reach out with a deliberate effort for a specific goal and pull yourself toward the answer.
That's your vector.
Monday, November 28, 2016
Monday, November 14, 2016
Deeper Obligations
Politics leaves us all a little broken.
But bitter, earth-shattering politics isn't all the new to our species. In 1170, King Henry of England committed one of the most politically-motivated murders this world has ever borne witness to. He incited his confidants to take the life of his former-best friend Thomas Becket. The TL;DR version of this story (although the whole story is well worth your time) is that Becket was Henry's right hand many for many years. Then in 1168 Henry names Becket Archbishop of Canterbury, the most important religious post on England. Henry did this in an attempt to make the church subservient to the English crown. He was sure that Becket - his friend, his informant, his bodyguard, his everything - would bring the rebellious elements of the church in line for the good of the whole country.
Becket did no such thing. Almost immediately Becket challenged the King's authority in a whole host of controversial issues. In short, he became King Henry's worst nightmare. And the King - not for the last time in English history either - moved to have this man killed.
One line from Becket's writings remains with us to this day. When the King, in writing, asked his friend why he was suddenly so resistant and objectionable, the Archbishop replied, "With this new position you have introduced me to deeper obligations."
That's an interesting phrase and I think it pertains to you this year.
We've talked before about how writing used to be for school or for the teacher or for the grade. Some of you claim you still feel that way, even in AP Lang. I think that's legitimate and honest feedback. But I want more than ever for your writing to be something that you express because you believe in it. YOU believe in it. The prompt might be a bit mundane in your eyes but something in the text galvanizes you in a way that is unshakable. The words you produce, then, become not just the things you think you ought to say to get a good grade but things that you no longer have the power not to say because they are eating you from within.
Becket was placed before a man he counted as his friend and still he found within him the unquenchable desire to do the right thing. To stand up for people he believed in, for a world view that mattered to him. And we all have those moments. Things that push us to finally write and communicate in a way we wish we always had. Sometimes those things are huge (elections, family changes, friends) and sometimes the reason we cannot contain our words start with the smallest crack in the foundation of something we thought was rock solid (a la House of Usher).
Last week Leonard Cohen died (youtube him... seriously) and I thought a great spark of literary genius had gone out from this world. The air is colder today and darker. For some of you, this is true for other reasons. How many of you have sat with me after school and said, I always thought I wrote just fine? I put some words on the page and that was "good enough"? Then along came this scrawny pompous white Lang teacher who said, "why did you use that word?" and "what do you mean by this phrase?" and you were forced to explain and clarify in ways that you hadn't really had to before. And your grade suddenly wasn't what it always was and your world was darker and colder.
We both have outlets though. We put words on the page and it begins to ameliorate us. We say the things we want to say the way we want to say them. And in doing that - our style, our voice - we discover that we had the words all the time. It just took jarring us from our place to make us realize it.
You see, the thing that King Henry never understood was the Thomas Becket opposed him not because he had the power to but because with great power come great responsibility. To stand in the most powerful position of a country without any checks or balances is the most dangerous situation of all. You have some of that power: you are educated and articulate and your voice in both your class and school resonates, whether you know it or not. So here and now we shape it: we make your words a force for good, ones that can be eloquent and perceptive about the world around you. Pathos. Logos. Ethos. It's not random, do you see?
When Becket was murdered all of England was aghast. A shrine was built to commemorate him and for centuries people made pilgrimages to honor his memory. It has lasted The shrine you construct tomorrow with your words and tone will last as well. So be sure every brick in the foundation is strong enough to support the depth of your "obligations".
We've talked before about how writing used to be for school or for the teacher or for the grade. Some of you claim you still feel that way, even in AP Lang. I think that's legitimate and honest feedback. But I want more than ever for your writing to be something that you express because you believe in it. YOU believe in it. The prompt might be a bit mundane in your eyes but something in the text galvanizes you in a way that is unshakable. The words you produce, then, become not just the things you think you ought to say to get a good grade but things that you no longer have the power not to say because they are eating you from within.
Becket was placed before a man he counted as his friend and still he found within him the unquenchable desire to do the right thing. To stand up for people he believed in, for a world view that mattered to him. And we all have those moments. Things that push us to finally write and communicate in a way we wish we always had. Sometimes those things are huge (elections, family changes, friends) and sometimes the reason we cannot contain our words start with the smallest crack in the foundation of something we thought was rock solid (a la House of Usher).
Last week Leonard Cohen died (youtube him... seriously) and I thought a great spark of literary genius had gone out from this world. The air is colder today and darker. For some of you, this is true for other reasons. How many of you have sat with me after school and said, I always thought I wrote just fine? I put some words on the page and that was "good enough"? Then along came this scrawny pompous white Lang teacher who said, "why did you use that word?" and "what do you mean by this phrase?" and you were forced to explain and clarify in ways that you hadn't really had to before. And your grade suddenly wasn't what it always was and your world was darker and colder.
We both have outlets though. We put words on the page and it begins to ameliorate us. We say the things we want to say the way we want to say them. And in doing that - our style, our voice - we discover that we had the words all the time. It just took jarring us from our place to make us realize it.
You see, the thing that King Henry never understood was the Thomas Becket opposed him not because he had the power to but because with great power come great responsibility. To stand in the most powerful position of a country without any checks or balances is the most dangerous situation of all. You have some of that power: you are educated and articulate and your voice in both your class and school resonates, whether you know it or not. So here and now we shape it: we make your words a force for good, ones that can be eloquent and perceptive about the world around you. Pathos. Logos. Ethos. It's not random, do you see?
When Becket was murdered all of England was aghast. A shrine was built to commemorate him and for centuries people made pilgrimages to honor his memory. It has lasted The shrine you construct tomorrow with your words and tone will last as well. So be sure every brick in the foundation is strong enough to support the depth of your "obligations".
Monday, October 3, 2016
Pep Talk #2
Second Pep Talk Email for AP Lang Students 2016-17
This is the story about a boy, a bowl of black eyed peas, and a revelation.
Imagine, if you, will a youth who spent the first sixteen years of his life in Florida. Not inner-state Florida where the ocean breezes can't penetrate. I'm talking about the gulf coast. The water is calm and a consistent 84 degrees. The breezes blow in and the salt in the air sticks to every exposed surface of your skin. So close to the water that the sounds of shrimping boats meant it was almost lunchtime. A place where children have read about this thing called snow the way you've read about this thing called the Revolutionary War. Words on the page. But in reality? It never falls below 60 degrees. And such a temperature calls for a fairly sturdy jacket.
This boy though has a strange fear. Call it irrational or unjustified or whatever. But he fears, deep down inside, the taste of lima beans. He's eaten them on occasion, when he was forced to eat them. He follows rules after all. And maybe "eat" is too loose a word. He places them in his mouth and chews the organic matter knowing that it's important to someone that he do this. But he doesn't like it. Not one bit. Might as well be green eggs and ham.
One day during the last year he lives in Florida he's invited over to dinner at a friend's house. The family is much more affluent: open air Florida house on the shore. There's a boat dock out back. There's wealth here. And this boy knows that an uncontestable rule when one eats over at another's house is that one is expected to eat the food put before him. Much of the dinner is wonderful: chicken, corn, a side dish that he's never had before. But also... there they are. A bowl of them. The bowl is beautiful china, like the rest of the dishes on the table. It's off-center on the table, closer to the boy than the rest of the food. The black eyed peas that fill the bowl practically stare at him. Black EYED peas after all. And they're not just looking at him; they're staring. With that one beady EYE. They know - THEY KNOW - he can't refuse. When his friend's mother offers a spoonful the boy will say yes because it's understood. It's custom. And to transgress custom is unthinkable.
So he accepts and spends most of the meal eating around them, hedging his bets. What can he do? Is there a way out of this? Maybe the host parents will leave the table early and he can ditch them in the trash when no one is looking? No such luck: they stay and talk the entire time. Soon his plate nearly is empty of everything else except the one-eyed devil creature of absolute doom. So here it goes. Time to bite the pea, as it were.
This isn't a Dr. Seuss story. The boy didn't suddenly develop an improbably love for this strangest of all vegetables. He didn't take a bite and rise from his seat ready to engage in impromptu song and dance. But here's what did happen: he ate the black eyed peas. And as he combined them with the other foods on the plate (admittedly to dull the flavor and texture) he discovered that in a tiny way they complemented some of the taste of the chicken and the corn and the unidentified other side dish that at this point will probably never be named. The point is that while it wasn't suddenly ice cream and cake it also wasn't really that horrible.
What's more is that the boy learned combining foods that he hadn't previously considered combining paid dividends. Years later he would recall this incident as he tried his wife's beans and rice and found, to his surprise, they were magnificent together. It was risk-taking and creative combining all in the same sweep.
Tomorrow I will place something on the desk in front of you that will probably simulate the feeling I had all those years ago when I saw those black eyed peas before me. Maybe the prompt will be easier than you expect; maybe harder. Maybe it will be a unique combination of rhetorical flourish that allows you to see something about the author or about good writing that you know you have read about but hadn't really seen with your own eyes. But like this Florida boy who moved north when he was sixteen and discovered, whoa, snow was, like, real you might find that good writing pops up in the most unexpected of places.
The point of this email, though, is this: good writing involves risk taking and creative combining. Should you build a paragraph about just tone? Or just diction? Or just pathos? I won't say that's a bad idea but what if you did something more interesting? What if you wrote about diction by emulating the author's style? What if instead of calling it ethos you called it an appeal to conscience? That's what it is, isn't it? Maybe the writer of the prompt doesn't have a conscience at all and you're horrified by the argument he or she makes. Can you call that out? Here's the better question: who has the power to STOP you from calling that out?
Tomorrow has not been written. Your ability to craft an articulate and meaningful analysis of an author's work does not depend on the score you got two weeks ago. It doesn't even depend on what you think you knew yesterday.
Your score will be a result of opening your mind wide and creatively combining all those rhetorical tools. And then?
Take a bite. You might be surprised at the result.
This is the story about a boy, a bowl of black eyed peas, and a revelation.
Imagine, if you, will a youth who spent the first sixteen years of his life in Florida. Not inner-state Florida where the ocean breezes can't penetrate. I'm talking about the gulf coast. The water is calm and a consistent 84 degrees. The breezes blow in and the salt in the air sticks to every exposed surface of your skin. So close to the water that the sounds of shrimping boats meant it was almost lunchtime. A place where children have read about this thing called snow the way you've read about this thing called the Revolutionary War. Words on the page. But in reality? It never falls below 60 degrees. And such a temperature calls for a fairly sturdy jacket.
This boy though has a strange fear. Call it irrational or unjustified or whatever. But he fears, deep down inside, the taste of lima beans. He's eaten them on occasion, when he was forced to eat them. He follows rules after all. And maybe "eat" is too loose a word. He places them in his mouth and chews the organic matter knowing that it's important to someone that he do this. But he doesn't like it. Not one bit. Might as well be green eggs and ham.
One day during the last year he lives in Florida he's invited over to dinner at a friend's house. The family is much more affluent: open air Florida house on the shore. There's a boat dock out back. There's wealth here. And this boy knows that an uncontestable rule when one eats over at another's house is that one is expected to eat the food put before him. Much of the dinner is wonderful: chicken, corn, a side dish that he's never had before. But also... there they are. A bowl of them. The bowl is beautiful china, like the rest of the dishes on the table. It's off-center on the table, closer to the boy than the rest of the food. The black eyed peas that fill the bowl practically stare at him. Black EYED peas after all. And they're not just looking at him; they're staring. With that one beady EYE. They know - THEY KNOW - he can't refuse. When his friend's mother offers a spoonful the boy will say yes because it's understood. It's custom. And to transgress custom is unthinkable.
So he accepts and spends most of the meal eating around them, hedging his bets. What can he do? Is there a way out of this? Maybe the host parents will leave the table early and he can ditch them in the trash when no one is looking? No such luck: they stay and talk the entire time. Soon his plate nearly is empty of everything else except the one-eyed devil creature of absolute doom. So here it goes. Time to bite the pea, as it were.
This isn't a Dr. Seuss story. The boy didn't suddenly develop an improbably love for this strangest of all vegetables. He didn't take a bite and rise from his seat ready to engage in impromptu song and dance. But here's what did happen: he ate the black eyed peas. And as he combined them with the other foods on the plate (admittedly to dull the flavor and texture) he discovered that in a tiny way they complemented some of the taste of the chicken and the corn and the unidentified other side dish that at this point will probably never be named. The point is that while it wasn't suddenly ice cream and cake it also wasn't really that horrible.
What's more is that the boy learned combining foods that he hadn't previously considered combining paid dividends. Years later he would recall this incident as he tried his wife's beans and rice and found, to his surprise, they were magnificent together. It was risk-taking and creative combining all in the same sweep.
Tomorrow I will place something on the desk in front of you that will probably simulate the feeling I had all those years ago when I saw those black eyed peas before me. Maybe the prompt will be easier than you expect; maybe harder. Maybe it will be a unique combination of rhetorical flourish that allows you to see something about the author or about good writing that you know you have read about but hadn't really seen with your own eyes. But like this Florida boy who moved north when he was sixteen and discovered, whoa, snow was, like, real you might find that good writing pops up in the most unexpected of places.
The point of this email, though, is this: good writing involves risk taking and creative combining. Should you build a paragraph about just tone? Or just diction? Or just pathos? I won't say that's a bad idea but what if you did something more interesting? What if you wrote about diction by emulating the author's style? What if instead of calling it ethos you called it an appeal to conscience? That's what it is, isn't it? Maybe the writer of the prompt doesn't have a conscience at all and you're horrified by the argument he or she makes. Can you call that out? Here's the better question: who has the power to STOP you from calling that out?
Tomorrow has not been written. Your ability to craft an articulate and meaningful analysis of an author's work does not depend on the score you got two weeks ago. It doesn't even depend on what you think you knew yesterday.
Your score will be a result of opening your mind wide and creatively combining all those rhetorical tools. And then?
Take a bite. You might be surprised at the result.
Tuesday, September 20, 2016
Fishing for Grades
Dear AP Lang Students,
Henry David Thoreau once said, "Many men go fishing all their lives without knowing that it is not fish they are after." You'll hear a lot more from this man over the next few months. Suffice it to say: he is an important figure in American literary history. But today he has a single message for us: when you are in pursuit of a goal, be clear about what that goal is. I think it's easy as a student to be blinded by the academic arms race that most high schools generate. You get caught up in comparing scores on tests and GPAs and interim grades and you sometimes lose sight of the thing we're supposed to be about. That learning thing. Discovering knowledge that we didn't previously have; uncovering skills that you hadn't tapped before. My hope this year in Lang is that you and I find a way to make learning more important than the points and the grades and the "rat race," as it were.
Many of you have already sat down and had writing conferences with me; more of you are scheduled to do so in the future. And a hefty number of these conferences evolve into a version of the following question: "Mr. Reid, how do I get an A in this class?" I completely understand what motivates this question. I entertain no doubt that the pressures sitting behind (or above) you are formidable: parents, teachers, guidance counselors, peers. But maybe we can redesign this question with the act of learning in mind. So the question then becomes: how do I become a better writer. Because really the greater you flex your writing muscles (is that a thing?) the closer you will get to that A you covet so dearly.
So how does one do this "good writing" thing? We've explored that the past couple of days in class. But perhaps we can construct a more practical list. Let's try:
1. Do you have a hook? Find 4 or 5 quotes (online or otherwise) that you like that could be used in multiple situations. Make a copy of them and bring them tomorrow. Maybe they won't be useful but if you find yourself writing a bland intro, one of those quotes could be the thing that kicks your "lower half" intro in an "upper half" one.
2. Resources. Tonight, make a list of the resources you plan to have in class tomorrow. Remember, space is a premium. Do you want the example essays from today? Or maybe the analysis packet? Or the 9 point rubric? All are good choices. But you need to decide what you want to bring.
3. Time. How do you plan to keep track of time tomorrow? Maybe your back is to the clock in the room so that doesn't help. Want to set up your phone so you can see it when you need it? Don't let it be a distraction but as a time keeper it might be helpful.
4. Prepare. How do you prepare for a skills-based test? In English? You want the truth? The honest, no-nonsense truth? Read good writing. Do you have a favorite author or columnist or blogger? Go read something by them. I love reading Paul Krugman from the NYTimes. You can read more by that Erik Lundegaard guy who wrote the "Why I Hike" essay if you want (www.eriklundegaard.com). Find your author; find the person that speaks to you.
At the end of the day, we don't do this for the grade (not really). What does that grade stand for anyway? What does it mean to earn an A? That you're smart? That you've worked hard? That you've made progress of some kind? In an essay, it probably boils down to this simple thing: you've said something interesting in an interesting way. That's really all it is. 70+ students are going to write about the EXACT. SAME. THING. on tomorrow's test. So here's the real question: how will your essay, your voice, your words stand out?
Because it's not really fish you're after when you look deep in those waters. The thing looking back at you... is yourself.
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