Critical Inquiries
Readings on Culture and Community
Published on 5. December 2002
Book
Paperback/Softback
624 pages
978-0-321-01586-0 (ISBN)
Description
Critical Inquiries intends to spark discussion and response with seven focused explorations of cultural themes that provide contexts and occasions for college writers to develop a stance and voice.
Edited by noted composition scholar Jacqueline Jones Royster, Critical Inquiries, unlike many readers, does not attempt to present a "balanced perspective." Instead, each of the seven major topics-identity, home, nation, immigration, education, health, and technology-is framed by a sequence of readings that disrupt and unsettle conventional thinking. Students are challenged to move beyond simplistic pro-con argumentation to explore connections between personal and public life in their own essays and responses.
Readings in Critical Inquiries include historical as well as contemporary voices, going beyond traditional essays to include poems, letters, position and policy statements, and literary nonfiction. This multi-genre approach brings issues of language awareness and rhetorical strategy to the forefront, offering students a rich engagement with the deliberate choices made by responsible writers.
Edited by noted composition scholar Jacqueline Jones Royster, Critical Inquiries, unlike many readers, does not attempt to present a "balanced perspective." Instead, each of the seven major topics-identity, home, nation, immigration, education, health, and technology-is framed by a sequence of readings that disrupt and unsettle conventional thinking. Students are challenged to move beyond simplistic pro-con argumentation to explore connections between personal and public life in their own essays and responses.
Readings in Critical Inquiries include historical as well as contemporary voices, going beyond traditional essays to include poems, letters, position and policy statements, and literary nonfiction. This multi-genre approach brings issues of language awareness and rhetorical strategy to the forefront, offering students a rich engagement with the deliberate choices made by responsible writers.
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Content
Preface for Instructors.
Acknowledgments.
Introduction: A Framework for Rhetorical Decision Making.
1. Claiming Identity.
Framing the Topic.
Where I Lived, and What I Lived For, Henry David Thoreau.
Readings for Inquiry and Exploration.
Life As We Know It, Michael Berube.
The God of Small Feasts, Shoba Narayan.
Phenomenal Woman, Maya Angelou.
Eleven, Sandra Cisneros.
Genealogy: Quacks, Cures, and Ancestors, Myra Vanderpool Gormley C.G.
Black, White, and Jewish: Autobiography of a Shifting Self, Rebecca Walker.
Calls to Action and Response.
C.P. Ellis, Studs Terkel.
2. A Place Called "Home."
Framing the Topic.
Homeplace, bell hooks.
Landscape and Narrative, Barry Lopez.
Readings for Inquiry and Exploration.
Taking a Visitor to See the Ruins, Paula Gunn Allen.
The Memory Place, Barbara Kingsolver.
Just Past Shiprock, Luci Tapahanso.
Chicago, Carl Sandburg.
From A Small, Jamaica Kincaid.
The Quare Gene, Tony Earley.
From Jazz, Toni Morrison.
Calls to Action.
The Obligation to Endure, Rachel Carson.
Putting the Earth First, David Foreman.
3. We, the People.
Framing the Topic.
What Is an American? J. Hector St. Jean de Crevecoeur.
What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July? Frederick Douglass.
Readings for Inquiry and Exploration.
The Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson.
1848 Declaration of Sentiments, Elizabeth Cady Stanton with Lucretia Mott.
The Port Huron Statement, Students for a Democratic Society.
A Black Feminist Statement, The Combahee River Collective.
I Hear America Singing, Walt Whitman.
I, Too, Sing America, Langston Hughes.
America, Claude McKay.
"My Name Is..." Arlene Mestas.
Lakota Woman, Mary Crow Dog.
The New World Man, Rudolfo Anaya.
Calls to Action and Response.
A Polyglot Nation, Diego Castellanos.
Why No Official Tongue? Shirley Brice Heath.
The Confusing State of Minority Language Rights, Bill Piatt.
4. Migration, Immigration, Nation.
Framing the Topic.
The Changing Face of America, Barbara Vobejda.
The Laws, Maxine Hong Kingston.
For My American Family, June Jordan.
Readings for Inquiry and Exploration.
The New Colossus, Emma Lazarus.
The Unguarded Gates, Thomas Bailey Aldrich.
Ellis Island Interviews, Germany, Friedrich Leipzig.
Kazuko Itoi: A Nisei Daughter's Story, 1925-1942, Monica Sone.
Migrations, Abena Busia.
Melting into Canaan, Samantha Dunaway.
The Melting Pot, Dudley Randall.
Overland Diary, 1847, Elizabeth Smith Dixon Geer.
Letter to Her Daughter, Mary Jane Megquier.
The Later Journeys, 1856-1867, Lillian Schlissel.
Calls to Action and Response.
My Education, Carlos Bulosan.
The Homeland, Aztlan, Gloria Anzuldua.
5. Education Matters.
Framing the Topic.
The American Scholar, Ralph Waldo Emerson.
Fishing Among the Learned, Nikki Finney.
Readings for Inquiry and Exploration.
Analogy as the Core of Cognition, Douglas R. Hofstadter.
Indian Education, Sherman Alexie.
Learning in the Shadow of Race and Class, bell hooks.
Battling Bigotry on Campus, Kenneth S. Stern.
Affirmative Action and Stigma: The Education of a Professor, Judy Scales-Trent.
Blinded by the White: Crime, Race, and Denial in America, Tim Wise.
Not Enough Girls, John Gehring.
Calls to Action and Response.
Transforming the Federal Role in Education, George W. Bush.
Other People's Children, Jonathan Kozol.
6. Our Bodies, Our Selves.
Framing the Topic.
What Are the Leading Health Indicators? U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
Readings for Inquiry and Exploration
The Alchemists Linda Hogan.
Race and Health Care in the United States, David Barton Smith.
The Disease of Young Women, Brett Silverstein and Deborah Perlick.
Confessions of an Eater, Kim Chernin.
From Dear Dr. Menninger, Karl Menninger.
Hands, Oliver Sacks,
From The Cancer Journals, Audre Lorde.
The Clan of One-Breasted Women, Terry Tempest Williams.
Facing AIDS, Rae Lewis-Thornton.
What I Did on My Summer Vacation, Nels Highberg.
How to Watch Your Brother Die, Michael Lassell.
AIDS and the Responsibility of the Writer, Sarah Schulman.
Visiting the Sick, Elliot N. Dorff.
Calls to Action and Response.
Stem-Cell Speech, George W. Bush.
The Coming Plague, Laurie Garrett.
7. Digital Frontiers.
Framing the Topic.
Framing Conversations about Technology, Bonnie A. Nardi and Vicki L. O'Day.
http://www.when_is_enough_enough?.com, Paul de Palma.
Readings for Inquiry and Exploration.
Identity in the Age of the Internet, Sherry Turkle.
Space Is Numeric, Ellen Ullman.
The Next Brainiacs, John Hockenberry.
The Good Deed, Susan McCarthy.
"Is This the Party to Whom I Am Speaking?": Women, Credibility, and the Internet, Laura Gurak.
Women and Children First: Gender and the Settling of the Electronic Frontier, Laura Miller.
Commodifying Human Relationships, Jeremy Rifkin.
Calls to Action and Response.
The Digital Citizen, Jon Katz.
Racial Digital Divide, Logan Hill.
Credits.
Index.
Acknowledgments.
Introduction: A Framework for Rhetorical Decision Making.
1. Claiming Identity.
Framing the Topic.
Where I Lived, and What I Lived For, Henry David Thoreau.
Readings for Inquiry and Exploration.
Life As We Know It, Michael Berube.
The God of Small Feasts, Shoba Narayan.
Phenomenal Woman, Maya Angelou.
Eleven, Sandra Cisneros.
Genealogy: Quacks, Cures, and Ancestors, Myra Vanderpool Gormley C.G.
Black, White, and Jewish: Autobiography of a Shifting Self, Rebecca Walker.
Calls to Action and Response.
C.P. Ellis, Studs Terkel.
2. A Place Called "Home."
Framing the Topic.
Homeplace, bell hooks.
Landscape and Narrative, Barry Lopez.
Readings for Inquiry and Exploration.
Taking a Visitor to See the Ruins, Paula Gunn Allen.
The Memory Place, Barbara Kingsolver.
Just Past Shiprock, Luci Tapahanso.
Chicago, Carl Sandburg.
From A Small, Jamaica Kincaid.
The Quare Gene, Tony Earley.
From Jazz, Toni Morrison.
Calls to Action.
The Obligation to Endure, Rachel Carson.
Putting the Earth First, David Foreman.
3. We, the People.
Framing the Topic.
What Is an American? J. Hector St. Jean de Crevecoeur.
What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July? Frederick Douglass.
Readings for Inquiry and Exploration.
The Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson.
1848 Declaration of Sentiments, Elizabeth Cady Stanton with Lucretia Mott.
The Port Huron Statement, Students for a Democratic Society.
A Black Feminist Statement, The Combahee River Collective.
I Hear America Singing, Walt Whitman.
I, Too, Sing America, Langston Hughes.
America, Claude McKay.
"My Name Is..." Arlene Mestas.
Lakota Woman, Mary Crow Dog.
The New World Man, Rudolfo Anaya.
Calls to Action and Response.
A Polyglot Nation, Diego Castellanos.
Why No Official Tongue? Shirley Brice Heath.
The Confusing State of Minority Language Rights, Bill Piatt.
4. Migration, Immigration, Nation.
Framing the Topic.
The Changing Face of America, Barbara Vobejda.
The Laws, Maxine Hong Kingston.
For My American Family, June Jordan.
Readings for Inquiry and Exploration.
The New Colossus, Emma Lazarus.
The Unguarded Gates, Thomas Bailey Aldrich.
Ellis Island Interviews, Germany, Friedrich Leipzig.
Kazuko Itoi: A Nisei Daughter's Story, 1925-1942, Monica Sone.
Migrations, Abena Busia.
Melting into Canaan, Samantha Dunaway.
The Melting Pot, Dudley Randall.
Overland Diary, 1847, Elizabeth Smith Dixon Geer.
Letter to Her Daughter, Mary Jane Megquier.
The Later Journeys, 1856-1867, Lillian Schlissel.
Calls to Action and Response.
My Education, Carlos Bulosan.
The Homeland, Aztlan, Gloria Anzuldua.
5. Education Matters.
Framing the Topic.
The American Scholar, Ralph Waldo Emerson.
Fishing Among the Learned, Nikki Finney.
Readings for Inquiry and Exploration.
Analogy as the Core of Cognition, Douglas R. Hofstadter.
Indian Education, Sherman Alexie.
Learning in the Shadow of Race and Class, bell hooks.
Battling Bigotry on Campus, Kenneth S. Stern.
Affirmative Action and Stigma: The Education of a Professor, Judy Scales-Trent.
Blinded by the White: Crime, Race, and Denial in America, Tim Wise.
Not Enough Girls, John Gehring.
Calls to Action and Response.
Transforming the Federal Role in Education, George W. Bush.
Other People's Children, Jonathan Kozol.
6. Our Bodies, Our Selves.
Framing the Topic.
What Are the Leading Health Indicators? U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
Readings for Inquiry and Exploration
The Alchemists Linda Hogan.
Race and Health Care in the United States, David Barton Smith.
The Disease of Young Women, Brett Silverstein and Deborah Perlick.
Confessions of an Eater, Kim Chernin.
From Dear Dr. Menninger, Karl Menninger.
Hands, Oliver Sacks,
From The Cancer Journals, Audre Lorde.
The Clan of One-Breasted Women, Terry Tempest Williams.
Facing AIDS, Rae Lewis-Thornton.
What I Did on My Summer Vacation, Nels Highberg.
How to Watch Your Brother Die, Michael Lassell.
AIDS and the Responsibility of the Writer, Sarah Schulman.
Visiting the Sick, Elliot N. Dorff.
Calls to Action and Response.
Stem-Cell Speech, George W. Bush.
The Coming Plague, Laurie Garrett.
7. Digital Frontiers.
Framing the Topic.
Framing Conversations about Technology, Bonnie A. Nardi and Vicki L. O'Day.
http://www.when_is_enough_enough?.com, Paul de Palma.
Readings for Inquiry and Exploration.
Identity in the Age of the Internet, Sherry Turkle.
Space Is Numeric, Ellen Ullman.
The Next Brainiacs, John Hockenberry.
The Good Deed, Susan McCarthy.
"Is This the Party to Whom I Am Speaking?": Women, Credibility, and the Internet, Laura Gurak.
Women and Children First: Gender and the Settling of the Electronic Frontier, Laura Miller.
Commodifying Human Relationships, Jeremy Rifkin.
Calls to Action and Response.
The Digital Citizen, Jon Katz.
Racial Digital Divide, Logan Hill.
Credits.
Index.