Analyzing the Thesis of the Book “The Skin that We Speak”
For The Skin That We Speak, one review reads:
At a time when children are written off in our schools because they do not speak formal English, and when the class- and race-biased language used to describe those children determines their fate, The Skin That We Speak offers a cutting-edge look at crucial educational issues.
For your next five page paper, please evaluate the thesis of the book The Skin That We Speak and how editors, Lisa Delpit and Joanne Kilgour Dowdy, supported or failed to support their thesis throughout this anthology.
It might be helpful to think about the book in terms of content, form and tone.
*When analyzing the content, you will see if the claim (thesis) is logically linked to reasons and supported by evidence provided by the various authors the editors chose to include in this anthology.
*When analyzing the form of the book you will look at how the editors chose to include information What does the book open with? How do the essays build off of each other as the book progresses? Does the ending of the book encourage us to believe the thesis? In summary, does the book's structure encourage the reader to accept the book's message?
*The tone deals with language or word choice. Did the essays that Delpit and Dowdy include use a tone that was playful, earnest, satirical, disgruntled, sincere, hopeful or passionate? Did the tone or tones contribute to the overall effectiveness of the thesis?
Remember that for every point you make, you want to provide textual support by way of summaries, paraphrases and direct quotes.
The following is a list of questions you might use to guide your creation of a thesis for this paper.
How does the book, as a whole, reveal the potentially harmful power of language and language attitudes on children in the classroom?
How do the authors "explore the links between language and identity, between language and political hierarchy, and between language and cultural conflict"? (xiv)
How does the arrangement of the book, divided into three sections (including personal essays, linguistic analysis, case study, and policy analysis) help further the goal of understanding the ongoing debates surrounding Ebonics and the education of African American students?
How does the book encourage educators to analyze their own linguistic blind spots and see language as an ongoing process of discovery?
Papers should be five pages double-spaced and word processed in a 12-point standard font (Times New Roman, Garamond, Arial, etc.); follow the MLA manuscript format. I will expect you to use MLA style in-text citations and a works cited page. Here is a check list for a paper that uses source material.
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Analyzing the Thesis of the Book “The Skin that We Speak”
The book “The Skin that We Speak” by Lisa Delpit and Joanne Dowdy offers one of the best critical analyses of the dangers of the power of language and language attitudes on children in the classroom. The thesis of the book is spelled out in the introduction, whereby the editors express that the purpose of the book is to explore the links between language and identity, language and cultural conflict, and language and political hierarchy. However, the lines that follow this statement are the ones that seemingly contain the actual thesis that also encompasses the position or stand taken by the book. The editors express that language use in school is volatile as it is used to make assumptions about an individual’s intelligence, family life, moral fiber, and future potential once an individual utters words (Delpit xx). The focus of this essay is to evaluate how the editors have supported or failed to support their thesis throughout the book. This is achieved by examining the book’s form, tone, and content. Considering the amount and source of evidence, the editors have successfully supported their thesis by outlining the explicit and implicit relationships between language and social injustices.
The most obvious mechanism that the editors use to support their thesis lies in the content of the book, which comprises personal essays, policy analysis, case studies, and linguistic analysis. Even though the thesis is introduced in the introduction, it can be observed that the preface succinctly expresses what content to expect in the book. By paying homage to Hilliard III, a scholar who left a voluminous body of work in psychology, history, and education, the editors reveal to the reader that the book’s content is built around other works in the field. Indeed, many of the chapters in the book are presented as a form of tribute to key scholars on the discourse of language. The author of each chapter is introduced, and their stance and contribution to both the book and the thesis are outlined. For example, Joan Waynne was an educator who explored the pervasive myth of language supremacy after witnessing bright students and their parents refuse to speak publicly because they did