Passing in Literature (synthesis paper)
There are some similarities between Fan Shen’s and David Bartholomae’s articles, although they are different. But before talking about similarities and differences I will summarize both texts including my own thoughts. Fan Shen in his text talks about how language shapes an identity. He tells us about his own experience as a new immigrant from China, presenting the problems he encountered while he was learning how to write compositions in English language. Using the word “I” in his essays was difficult for him and this problem was more serious then we can imagine. As Shen explains, “I” in Chinese has a meaning of “self” or “individualism”. These words have negative connotations in a country where individualism is considered to be bad and contradicts the collectivism and Marxist philosophy. So, instead of using “I” and expressing his own opinion, he used the word “we”, telling what other people think (he saw himself as one of them). It seemed weird to his teachers, of course, and they encouraged him to change his way of writing. In order to do this he had to create a n
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Some common words found in the essay are:
Fan Shens, Fan Shen, According Bartholomae, David Bartholomaes, pictorial logic, fan shen, language shapes identity, , chinese pictorial logic, english self, language shapes, shapes identity, chinese pictorial, english language, accepted american, fan shens,
Approximate Word count = 733
Approximate Pages = 3 (250 words per page double spaced)
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