Blog Entry Three

The expression “The American Dream” is a frequently used expression. The content of the expression is that in the USA everyone can achieve their goals and reach the top if they work hard enough. There have been periods of time in history where large groups of immigrants have come to the country and people still come in order to achieve the American Dream. The immigrants dream of individual freedom with the content of freedom as mentioned above. The negative aspect of “The American Dream” was that there was high competition in USA because everyone wants to succeed. While many immigrants who settle improve their situation and accomplish their goals, there are also people who come to America and end up struggling for a living.

In this sample paragraph I tried to have a brief explanation about “The American Dream” to understand what it is all about, and to make a thesis. This could have been a introduction to an essay, since I argue for and against the American Dream and I am talking about positive and negative aspects. So the technique I tried to use is simile. The technique impacts the audience in the way it makes you think about why people left the place they call home and everyone they knew, to go to a place where they got a new opportunity to build a new life and success. The last part about becoming successful is not something everyone will achieve so going over the sea and leave all safe and familiar was a risk to take and I was no guarantee for success.

Blog Entry Two

The book “Bendit Like Beckham” written by Narindi Dhami is about the problems living in another culture. Being an Indian girl living in England can be hard, because of the differences in costumes and culture between Europeans and Asians. Jesminder Bahmra, called Jess for short, is an Indian girl who lives with her family in Southall, London. Southall is a part of the town where many families of Indian origin live. She, as many other children from other parts of the world, talks English and is born in England. Jess has a very good talent for soccer, and dreams to be a professional soccer player like her “hero” David Beckham. But her family is very against her playing soccer and doesn't allow her to play. The book is mostly about how she is still playing, without her family knowing and her relationship with her coach, Joe.

The book addresses learning outcome three. The book shows us how different the two cultures are how their view on different matters comes through. It is not only the language that is different with the two cultures. Her language is shaped by her culture and the context, and you can clearly understand the culture differences between the Indian people and the British in the book which is the reason she is not allowed to do what she wants to do.

“Jess: That's not all. She called me a Paki. But I guess that's something you wouldn't understand. Joe: Jess, I'm Irish. Of course I understand what that feels like.”

“Jess: I'm sorry I missed that penalty, coach. Joe: It's okay, losing to the Jerries on penalties comes natural to you English. You're part of tradition now!” These two quotations address the learning outcome because as in the first quotation, she is being called something in Indian and she knows that this word in her culture is bad. The second quotation is more about now when she is a part of the British people, she has to adjust to their language and their culture.

Blog Entry One

In Chapter 2 of Bill Bryson's "Made in America an informal history of the English language in the United States”, he is talking about how the American language has developed and changed since the pilgrims came in 1620. It discusses specific changes in the American language and how word changed in different areas of America. The text addresses learning outcome two, because throughout the whole chapter of the book, the main theme is how the language changed over time and how it affected the culture and the people. The American language grew and words were added to the language and other words disappeared out of the language because of the new words. Not only more word was added, but pronunciation and spelling also changed.

“The old practice of making plurals by adding –n was rapidly giving way to newer convention of adding –s, so that by 1620 most people were saying knees instead of kneen, houses instead of housen, fleas instead of flean. The transition was by no means complete at the time of the pilgrims” This shows how both pronunciation and spelling of words changed in the language after the pilgrims came, but it was not something that changed over a day. The pilgrims had the impact to the changed the language, because the way the talked were different than the Americans.

The other quote I decided to use is “Just in the century or so that preceded the Pilgrims' arrival in the New World, English gained ten thousand additional words, about half of them sufficiently useful as to be with us still.” The impact of the pilgrims was huge, since more than ten thousand words were added to the language and we are using those words today. It made such an impact that parts of the language changed.