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ENG 101 -- Class Notes 
Session 2 
Thu. 9/15 
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**Two World’s Fairs (10 min.) 

"The Writing Process" (10 min.) 
 
**Kinds of Writing (30 min.) 

*** 
 
**Amy Tan's "Mother Tongue" (55 min.) -- Including 15 min. reading time

eng101.lagcconline.com --> Session 2 --> Amy Tan’s “Mother Tongue”
 
Our first 'personal essay' on 'living between two cultures.' 

Many students choose to write on this essay for Essay #1!

(You can also use this essay for source on the Midterm.)

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 Kinds of Writing:  
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TEXTING 

 (1) Most informal / fewer rules <------>  (5) ​Most formal / more rules 
        1 - 2 - 3
 
(1) Least personal                      <------>  (5) Most personal 
 
        3 - 3 - 5
 
Depends on the person your texting (AUDIENCE)

 
BLOGGING
(1) Most informal / fewer rules <------>  (5) ​Most formal / more rules 
3

(1) Least personal                      <------>  (5) Most personal 

4

Audience still applies -- blogging (Reddit)
 
FACEBOOK POSTS IG+  (SOCIAL MEDIA) 
 
(1) Most informal / fewer rules <------>  (5) ​Most formal / more rules 
      2

(1) Least personal                      <------>  (5) Most personal 
 
      4 - 5

Audience is important for social media -- friends, family, professional colleagues....  

A Linkedin post (for a job) will be very different than a post on FB. 

PAPERS FOR SCHOOL (FORMAL ESSAYS) 
 
(1) Most informal / fewer rules <------>  (5) ​Most formal / more rules 
        4
 
(1) Least personal                      <------>  (5) Most personal 
 
        2

For formal papers, we try not to use I or personal experience. 
 
WRITE FROM SOURCES! 
 
Use quotes and evidence to build an argument. No one just knows how to do this -- you have to learn it in a class like this one. 

JOURNAL WRITING 
 
(1) Most informal / fewer rules <------>  (5) ​Most formal / more rules 
         3
 
(1) Least personal                      <------>  (5) Most personal 
 
         5

E-MAIL

(1) Most informal / fewer rules <------>  (5) ​Most formal / more rules 
         4
 
(1) Least personal                      <------>  (5) Most personal 
 
      1 - 2

E-mail not used for peers and friends. E-mail is more for serious messages -- professors, employers, etc.  
 
DEPENDS ON THE AUDIENCE. 
 
DEPENDS ON THE READER.

You’re going to write differently in an e-mail to your boss vs. a friend or family member. (More formal / more impersonal vs. more informal / more personal.)

Good writers know how to mix it up -- when to be formal / when to be personal.

Today we are very comfortable with the personal voice -- a lot of I -- and we can build away from that in a class like this one on ‘formal’ writing.

 

CREATIVE WRITING 
 
(1) Most informal / fewer rules <------>  (5) ​Most formal / more rules 
         1 or 4
 
(1) Least personal                      <------>  (5) Most personal 
 
         5 

 
Creative writing can experiment -- but there are rules for poetry, fiction, creative nonfiction.... (different forms / genres or categories have rules). Writing crime fiction vs. horror fiction vs. sci-fi vs. ‘literary’ fiction. There are LOT of rules for screenplays for TV/movies (formatting / structure).

As we said in class, some kinds of (older) poetry have a LOT of rules: rhyming, # of syllables and beats (called prosody). For a long time, poetry was VERY formal -- not freeform (more like classical music than jazz / improvised music).

 

 

 
 
(1) Least personal                           <------>  (5) Most personal 
 
4 
 
You don’t have to write about yourself -- but you often do when you start out -- memory, personal experiences. 

 

***Some possible ideas about personal writing vs. formal writing.... 

Most of us are comfortable writers (with texting / Facebook / etc.) ​but maybe less comfortable with formal writing (for​	 school / work.) 

"Write with sources" -- quote and cite the words of others DON'T USE 'I' -- He said, she said, I say 

College essays = More formal / less personal 

AUDIENCE!!!  = Your audience (readers) often determine whether a piece of writing is more formal / less personal or not. 
 
An email to your boss or an older family member would probably be more formal than an email to a friend. 

Texting can be highly personal, but there are still 'rules' (like abbreviations and 'textspeak.'  Older people may not understand these abbreviations, for example.) 

Some rules? Generalizations? 

The more personal a kind of writing is, it is probably more informal. 
 
The more formal a type of writing is, the more impersonal it can be (usually). 
 
Informal writing is correlated with personal writing. 

Formal writing is correlated (goes with) with impersonal writing. 

 

 

 

 

 

NONFICTION 
 
Personal	Impersonal 
1st person account of an illness    --    Clinical study 
more personal 	1000s / millions  	
MY STORY!!!	objective / scientific 	
n = 1	n = 10000 	
memoir	scholarly essays 	
autobiography	journalism 	
personal essay!!!  
 
Amy Tan (Shirley Lim / John Edgar Wideman, next week) 
Personal experience used to comment on the wider world. 
  
FICTION
 short stories novels graphic novels 

 

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Amy Tan’s “Mother Tongue” (Course Pack, pp. 9 - 13) 
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READ AMY TAN’S ESSAY (pp. 9 - 13) ONLINE
 
1) 1 or 2 incidents (based on personal experience!) that seem original or effective? 

The hospital -- with the lost CAT scan (Tan 11).

Gangster story told in the mother’s voice (Tan 9 - 10).

**Sample of her mother's way of speaking -- describing the wedding -- 1st person dialogue 

*Stockbroker didn’t have her check on time (Tan 11). 
** 
**Prices of new furniture (Tan 9). 
 
She writes, “No waste money that way” (Tan 9). 

‘Switching codes’ -- We speak differently depending on whom we’re speaking to -- different Englishes (even languages) esp. in NYC / QNS. 
 
Because of stereotypes, Standard English sometimes gets more results in professional and medical situations. 

2) What is Amy Tan’s ​main argument​? There are several possible choices. Explain it. 

Immigrant English vs. Standard English

There’s place for different Englishes in American literature -- inclusivity.

 argues that we speak differently, but we shouldn’t judge people on the way they speak. 
 
**Speaking “Standard English” gets different treatment. 
 
**The author calls out stereotypes about Asian Americans and choice of majors.  
 
**Speaking differently -- she felt with her mother’s language she could understand it perfectly. Other people  
 
**

Standardized tests don’t measure creativity (Tan 13). 
 
(From previous classes) 
 
*Main argument is about ‘broken’ English -- and how people are treated…. 
**If people don’t speak Standard English, they may get discriminated against. 

 
3)	What evidence does Tan give to show she ​grew as a writer? (Even bestselling authors can work on their writing.) 
She started getting better at writing.

At first she wrote over-formal sentences 
*She grew because she was able to write a novel that was understandable to her mother.
**Being able to write fiction starting from her mother! The Joy Luck Club​ -- -- captured her mother's voice. 
 
4) Amy Tan generalize (= apply her experience to a wider problem/issue) fairly? ​ What is the tone​ (=​	 emotional flavor) of the ending?​ 

**She was optimistic about her writing -- her mother’s voice was captured in her fiction.  
**She did apply the issue fairly.  
 
Although Tan’s mother doesn’t speak Standard 
English, her way of speaking is simple, creative, imaginative, filled with imagery, in a voice of real person….  IT’S CREATIVE! 
 
*Tan generalized fairly because we can apply her story to other families. 
**She spoke on the issue and didn't hide her mother's voice.... 
***Her mother's English isn't really 'broken.' It's more creative than 'Standard English.' 

 

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  NEXT TIME -- TUE. 9/20 
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1)​ Read Shirley Lim, “Two Lives,” Course Pack, pp.15-18. 
POSTED ONLINE
 
2) If you missed our first class, you should make up the Writing Sample (Diagnostic Essay)  (1 hour). 

SEE Course Documents Session 1 eng101.lagcconline.com

Writing Samples returned with comments on Tuesday!