Page 128 - The Language of Composition 4e Teacher Edition Sample.indd

Understanding and Interpreting
4
TRM Suggested Responses
Suggested responses to the questions for Identity proudly to represent the rural, working-class experience.” What are these tropes? Why do
this reading can be found in the Teacher’s
Resource Materials.
CHECK FOR UNDERSTANDING
Copyright (c) 2023 Bedford, Freeman & Worth Publishers. Uncorrected proofs have been used for this sample chapter.
Understanding Q1. Students might not be
familiar with the meaning or connotations
of the word “tropes.” If so, you might ask
them to use context clues to speculate
on its meaning and ask them if they think
Smarsh is using the word in a positive or
Distributed by Bedford, Freeman & Worth Publishers. Strictly for use with its products. Not for redistribution.
negative sense, especially in relation to the
phrase “trotted out.” Then, you could have
them look up the meaning and see how
close they were in their speculations.
DIFFERENTIATION
Connections to Self
Understanding Q6. You could ask stu-
dents to reflect, in a short journal entry or
quickwrite, on a time when they may have
felt they were the victim of a stereotype
and if the experience made them “fortify in
opposition to it.” As an alternative, you
could have students reflect on the validity
of Smarsh’s claim about the effect of
stereotyping.
DIFFERENTIATION
Connections to Text
Analyzing Q4. To extend the discussion of
e
this essay and author and to further explor
this essay and author and to further explore
Smarsh’s attitudes, you might have stu-
dents read another of her essays. Sarah
Smarsh writes often for the New York
Times, the Guardian, Harper’s, and else- 234
where, and she links her work on her web-
site. You might have students choose one
of her other articles, and ask them to define
of her other articles, and ask them to define
her thesis and to compare her voice and
style and purpose to this one. She often 05_sheatlc4e_40925_ch04_170_315.indd
writes about issues (and misperceptions) of
identity in the Midwest. Students might
enjoy “From Kansas, with love: like it or
not, my home defies stereotypes,” from the
Guardian in March 2022, which mentions
Heartland and discusses the HBO show
Somebody Somewhere. Her site also
includes links to video and audio inter-
views. You could have students choose
different essays and then report back to
their classmates on them.
234
05_sheatlcte4e_46921_ch04_170a_315_2pp.indd 234
1. Claims and Evidence. In paragraph 2, Sarah Smarsh mentions the “tropes trotted out
they make Smarsh “suspicious”?
2. Rhetorical Situation. How does Smarsh establish her ethos in this essay? Why is this
ethos so important to the argument she makes? Consider the audience for the Guardian, a
British-based newspaper, in your response.
3. Claims and Evidence / Reasoning and Organization. What definition of “country” does
Smarsh provide in paragraph 8? How does this definition relate to her claim in the first
sentence of the essay about how the meaning of country “has changed in the few decades of
[her] lifetime”?
4. Claims and Evidence. What evidence does Smarsh use to illustrate “the depth of the rift
that is economic inequality” (par. 15)? How does her evolving understanding of this rift affect
her perspective on her own family and experiences?
5. Rhetorical Situation / Claims and Evidence. What does Smarsh mean when she
says, “There was no language for whatever I represented on campus” (par. 17)? What
made her time at college “the hardest years of [her] life” (par. 19)? Why, according to
Smarsh, is the “distance between my world and my country’s understanding of it”
(par. 29) so wide?
6. Claims and Evidence / Reasoning and Organization. According to Smarsh, what is the
potential harm in being “cast as a stereotype enough times” (par. 42)? How does this result
contribute to a larger “disconnect” (par. 41)?
Analyzing Language, Style, and Structure
1. Vocabulary in Context. How does Smarsh use the word “derision” when she writes, “In
those moments I saw that mine wasn’t as much a sad story as it was a rare one, that better-
off people’s fascination was not just derision but, sometimes, honest awe” (par. 29). How
does the word “derision” contrast with her use of “awe”?
2. Rhetorical Situation / Style. Throughout this essay, Smarsh repeatedly references the
concept of “story.” What are the implications of using the word “story” to describe one’s life?
What does she mean in paragraph 25 when she says she was embarrassed by a situation
until she realized it was one “I could control by telling the stories myself”?
3. Rhetorical Situation / Style. In paragraphs 23, 36, and 43, Smarsh puts certain words and
phrases in quotation marks. How does this affect her tone? What relationship does it help her
establish with her audience?
4. Rhetorical Situation. What is Smarsh’s attitude toward her family? Her upbringing? Her
college classmates? How does she portray where these attitudes overlap and diverge? How
do her attitudes connect to the argument of her essay?
5. Rhetorical Situation / Claims and Evidence / Reasoning and Organization. Why,
according to Smarsh, is there “no more hurtful word” than “lazy” (par. 36)? How does this
concept figure into Smarsh’s perspective on the political divides in the United States?
6. Reasoning and Organization. Throughout the essay, Smarsh draws heavily on comparison
and contrast. How does this method of development serve her overall argument in this
essay? What makes it an effective rhetorical strategy?
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chapter 4 / Identity
1/20/23 7:48 PM