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The Plural Individual
4
TRM ELL Essential Guide Handout Vivek Ramaswamy
An ELL Essential Guide for this reading Identity
can be found in the Teacher’s Resource Vivek Ramaswamy (b. 1985) is an entrepreneur and political
Materials. commentator. The son of immigrants, Ramaswamy was born in Ohio Lisa Lake/Getty Images Entertainment/Getty Images
and graduated from Harvard University with a degree in biology
before attending Yale Law School. He founded a biopharmaceutical
TRM Vocabulary Handout company that applies new technologies to the development of
Copyright (c) 2023 Bedford, Freeman & Worth Publishers. Uncorrected proofs have been used for this sample chapter.
Vocabulary in Context exercises based on pharmaceutical drugs and authored the book Woke, Inc.: Inside
challenging words from this reading can be Corporate America’s Social Justice Scam (2021).
found in the Teacher’s Resource Materials. KEY CONTEXT This article appeared in November 16, 2020, in the print edition of
the National Review. It is an adaptation of a speech he delivered at the annual meeting
of the Philanthropy Roundtable, an organization with the stated vision to “build and
BUILDING CONTEXT sustain a vibrant American philanthropic movement that strengthens our free society,”
Distributed by Bedford, Freeman & Worth Publishers. Strictly for use with its products. Not for redistribution.
for which he serves on the board of directors.
To help them understand the rhetorical
situation, you might have students look
up the history of the National Review, the ho are we as a people? I can’t remember a board of directors ought to be measured on
periodical founded in 1955 by William F. W a time in my life when we more badly the basis of gender and color, rather than on the
Buckley Jr. They might take a look at cur- needed an answer to that question. basis of diversity of thought or experience. It’s the
rent articles on its website and at its “About Rediscovering our American identity begins idea that if you’re a member of a particular race,
r
ent articles on its website and at its “About
Us” description. You might ask students to with understanding who we are as individuals. you are committed to a particular ideology —
consider, as they read the essay, whether According to some, we are each defined by the summed up well last year by Representative
Ramaswamy is reinforcing or challenging characteristics that we inherited on the day we Ayanna Pressley (D., Mass.), who famously
his audience’s values. You might have were born. For example, I am a man, not a declared: “We don’t need any more brown
them do the same activity for Philanthropy woman. I am brown, not white. I am straight, not faces that don’t want to be a brown voice. We
Roundtable, and compare the audiences gay. For proponents of this view, we are each don’t need black faces that don’t want to be a
in the two rhetorical situations. You could defined by the innate and immutable, by the black voice.”
also have them do some background visible and superficial. According to this philosophy, I am merely
research into Ramaswamy. His most recent This is essentialism — the idea that the char- a fault line at the intersection of the tectonic
book is Nation of Victims: Identity Politics, acteristics we inherit at birth define who we are, plates of group identity. It denies my status
the Death of Merit, and the Path Back to what we can achieve, and how we should be as a free agent in the world by limiting my
Excellence (2022), and his website includes viewed and be treated by others. It’s the idea that, choices to strictly those that advance the
clips of recent TV appearances. Some for example, a scientist’s application for an NIH interests of my “group.” I am reduced to attri-
students might value seeing a strong con- [National Institutes of Health] grant should be butes such as the color of my skin, my gender,
servative voice within your unit and need to judged not only on the basis of its scientific and my sexual orientation. As Congress-
be reminded to play “the doubting game”; merits, but also on the basis of the race or gender woman Pressley would have it, my race isn’t
others might need a reminder to play “the of the applicant. It’s the idea that Ruth Bader just about my skin color — it’s about my voice,
believing game” and be open to his per- Ginsburg’s successor on the Supreme Court had my ideas, and my way of thinking. When you
spectives (Chapter 3, p. 113). Since his first
spectives (Chapter 3, p. 113). Since his first to be a woman, just as Thurgood Marshall’s look at me, you’re expected to see not an
paragraph refers to a particular time, you successor had to be black. It’s the idea that American, but an Indian American. When I
might have students look at the context of Joe Biden’s pick for vice president had to be a look at my neighbor, I am expected to see not
November 2020: during the turmoil of the “woman of color.” It’s the idea that the diversity of just my neighbor, but my black neighbor, and
Trump–Biden election cycle, on the heels of
Trump–Biden election cycle, on the heels of
the summer of Black Lives Matter protests, 254
during the pandemic. As students explore
these contexts, you could ask them to con-
sider how some of them might factor into
Ramaswamy’s exigence.
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CHECK FOR UNDERSTANDING
DIFFERENTIATION You might help students work through
Ramaswamy’s argument in paragraph 3
Connections to Text since it is a central claim that he will counter
You might ask students to consider other through the rest of his essay. Some of the
essays they have read in this chapter and sentences, such as the first two, may chal-
consider if the writer could be considered lenge students. You could have them work
an “essentialist,” by Ramaswamy’s defini- with partners to go through the sentences
tion. Hurston and Baldwin would be excel- in the paragraph, paraphrasing them and
lent choices to debate, but many of the tracing the line of reasoning by looking at
others would be apt, too. You could do this the connections. You could add close read-
as a brief class discussion or you could ing work by having them highlight words
turn it into a more extended activity, with and phrases that convey his criticism of the
students finding evidence to support their essentialist perspective (such as “denies,”
claims. “limiting,” “reduced”).

254 chapter 4 / Identity

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