Unit 10TEXT ISTRAIGHT-A ILLITERACYJames P. DegnanObjectives: to understand what straight-A illiteracy means and define it;to make a comparison between ordinary illiteracy and straight-A illiteracy and comments on it;to discuss the appropriate diction in writing.Pre-reading Questions1. What does ‘straight-A illiteracy’ mean?A straight-A student is one who gets A’s for all the courses he takes. He is generally admired for his excellent scholarship.It seems paradoxi cal to call someone a ‘straight-A illiterate’. What does the author mean by it? Read the article and try to understand and define what straight-A illiteracy means.In-reading ComprehensionPara. 11. as often as not: at least half the time; frequently2. How many kinds of illiterate according to D.?Two kinds: ordinary illiterates who are unable to read or write. There are quite a lot of this kind of illiterates in schools.straight-A illiterate who is typically a Ph.D., a successful professor and textbook author, and who is more influential.3. Why does D say that a straight-A illiterate is more influential? (comp. 3-2)He is usu. one who occupies a position at the top of the academic hierarchy; the way he writes is considered exemplary, and his judgment of what is appropriate is directive.4. What do people do with these two kinds of illiterate?More concern has been shown for the ordinary illiterates. People even make fuss about this kind of illiteracy. However, little attention is aroused to straight-A illiterates. So, the purpose of this article is to give them as much attention as has been paid to ordinary illiterates. (ll. 6-7)Para. 21. What is this para. about?D’s treatment with a disease of straight-A illiteracy in his office.2. Do you think D’s comparison of straight-A illiteracy to a disease is appropriate? Explain. (comp. 3-3)Yes. Like a disease, it victimizes healthy persons; it has its symptoms, and its agents.3. Who is the straight-A illiterate?a college senior ... outstanding graduate schools.He is extremely clever and highly talented in language. He has done an excellent job in his studies, so he has been awarded an opportunity to further his study in one of the nation’s best graduate schools.4. How does the treatment go?They have been going over the student’s paper sentence by sentence, word by word for an hour, prying and probing for its meaning.‘Prying and probing’, the repetition of the same structure, is to emphasize the extreme difficulty of the task.5. Are there any other words to highlight the extreme difficulty in understanding Mr. Bright’s paper? (comp. 3-4)interrogating, cross-examining, pause to catch my breath, on earth, his brow furrowed, tries mightily, finally ... finally, another hour, decode ....6. Try to explain why the following pairs of sentences are the same in meaning: ll. 15-17, ll. 23 (comp. 3-8)As intended by the student, ‘The choice ... multi-colinearity’ corresponds to ‘demand’ while ‘... the derivations ... coefficients’ corresponds to ‘supply’.This is a very abstruse sentence to unravel.7. Why does D insert the word ‘allegorically’ in ‘... whom I call, allegorically,Mr. Bright’? (comp. 3-5)‘allegory’ in Lib. Work.When the author calls his student Mr. Bright allegorically, he does not mean to refer to this particular straight-A student only. He is using the term to cover all those students, college seniors, and Ph.D.’s who may seem bright when judged by their academic records, but who nevertheless fail to detect gibberish in their own writings or in those of others.The student given the name Mr. Bright thus becomes a symbol.Is he really bright? No, here in an ironical sense.Para. 31. It attacks best minds, ... in that of others.It does harm to the most intelligent individual and, by and by, wears away his ability to judge, eventually reducing him to being unable t Para. 3o detect nonsense either in his own writing or in that of others.This is the harm that straight-A illiteracy does to people.2. Reword the following sentences so that they are more easily understood: ll. 34-35, ll. 37-41 (comp. 3-9)ll. 34-35: The shop assistants had better have in stock what our customers need, or we won’t be in business long (=This is said or written by an ordinary illiterate, who is poor at spelling (them), pronunciation, punctuation, grammar (had + better, stock -up on, ain’t gonna be). So he makes many mistakes, and so he is kept out of institutions of higher learning. (l. 33)ll. 37-41: You must focus your attention on what your customers need so that you are able to tell what is necessary from what is unnecessary when you replenish your stock.This is written by a straight-A illiterate, who would never make spelling, grammar, punctuation mistakes, but who is incapable of making his ideas simple and clear in his writing. However, it is for writing this gibberish that he can be awarded straight As on his papers and the opportunity to continue his study, receiving higher and higher education until he has successfully got the Ph.D.The higher education one receives, the more serious his disease of straight-A illiteracy becomes. (ll. 27-28)3. Make complete the elliptical sentence ‘Not our man’. What is the function? (comp. 3-6)‘This is not what our man would say’. This ellipsis contrasts the two types of illiteracy, and with it D turns back from one type to the other.Para. 41. What is the major cause of straight-A illiteracy?the stuff - the textbooks and professional journals that the straight-A illiterate is forced to read during his years of higher education.He reads gibberish, and gradually he forms a habit of writing gibberish himself, which he has been instructed to learn an exemplary writing of sophisticated taste. (ll. 46-47)2. Give the examples of gibberish D quotes from professional journals.jargons as ‘ego-integrative action orientation’ and ‘orientation toward improvement of the graficational-deprivation balance of the actor’‘homologous’ or ‘isomorphic’, meaning ‘alike’‘allotropic’, meaning ‘different’‘dichotomize’ or ‘bifurcate’, meaning ‘divide anything3. D concludes his article by using quite a number of unintelligible words and expressions in place of clear and simple English. Is it effective? Why?This usual arrangement has undoubtedly enabled the reader once again to feel even more the absurdity of the practice to express simple ideas in an almost incomprehensible way, adding more weight to the point he intends to make. (Analysis)Post-reading Discussion1. Makeａdefinition of ‘straight-A illiteracy’. (comp. 1-A)2. What is the purpose of D’s writing? (comp. 3-1)to find the cause of straight-A illiteracy.to give straight-A illiterate equal time with his widely publicizedcounterpart. (para. 1)to expose and condemn the use of professional jargon, which fills the reading materials that highly educated people are forced to read as they pursue their education. (Analysis)3. Comp. 24. Group work: Compare briefly the two types of illiteracy. Which type in your opinion presents a graver problem to society? (comp. 3-10)TEXT IITHE QUALITIES OF GOOD WRITINGJacqueline Berke1. This is an excerpt from Twenty Questions for the Writer, a widely used writing textbook, the kind of which we need to read to further our learning by ourselves. What do you usu. do when you read this kind of book by yourselves? Underline or highlight the important words or sentences, or make notes of your own so as to get the gist of it. Suppose you have borrowed this book from the library and come to read this part. What will you do with it? Study the text individually before class and do what you usu. do to catch the gist.2. Have group work for about 20 mins., exchanging what you have learned after reading it, and preparing for a presentation of this text. Your presentation can be based on Questions 1, 2, & 4 on p165.3. Presentation: Ask 4 groups to present the three qualities and human nature of writing respectively.4. As college seniors, we need to choose those more specific, exact, meaningful words in our writing rather than those common words as ‘good’, ‘nice’, etc. Do you consider using those more specific, exact, meaningful words as a kind of straight-A illiteracy? Give your opinions.。