Short Takes - Playing House

1.      The question in the first paragraph is “Do the chances of a successful marriage improve by cohabiting?” Leight’s answer to this question is “Not necessarily true”

2.      The characteristics of a cohabiting couple and a married couple are very different. Cohabiting couples lack both specialization as well as commitment in their relationship. They generally live more financially and emotionally independent of one another to allow themselves the freedom to leave. On the contrary, married couples pool their money, time, and other resources, creating a higher quality lifestyle.

3.      Leight thought that cohabiting does not necessarily lead to a successful marriage or a tragic end of a relationship. In the last paragraph, Leight said “If a couple wishes to have a successful marriage, they should show their commitment to each other from the beginning. If they trust each other enough not to cohabit before marriage, their marriage already has a higher probability of success.”

4.      I think it is very sufficient, because those references did support what the writer said in this essay and her ideas about cohabiting.

5.      I haven’t thought of any loopholes yet.   

Short Takes - Living on Tokyo Time

1.      The examples that Butler gave are very effective to support her statement. Butler said that Japanese people are unbelievably busy by saying they work ten hours a day, and often come in even on days off. Also, the Japanese rarely take a vacation of more than three of four days. A straight week is a hedonistic luxury. Students in Japan have less than a month for summer vacation, and they have all kinds of assignments to do.

2.      Butler raised a question that why doesn’t this cradle-grave, manic scheduling bother the Japanese people. The answer to this question is that the Japanese people grow up with a sense of time as a communal resource, like the company motor pool.

3.      The Japanese attitude toward time is that time is a communal resource, like the company motor pool. However, the American toward time is that time belongs to individuals.

4.      I think Butler prefers the Japanese attitude. Because in the last paragraph she said all the convenience of life and the richness of culture are invaluable that she would not trade for a lifetime of free hours.

5.      She pointed out that most of the Americans take it for granted that their spare hours are none of their teachers’ or bosses’ business.

Short Takes - The Handicap of Definition

1. Paragraph 1-4: The major assertion in paragraph 1-4 is a tragically limited definition of blackness, and it isn't only white people who buy it.

Paragraph 5-7: The major assertion is that the harm that comes from too narrow a definition of what is black.

Paragraph 8-11: The major assertion is what I am talking about is the importance of developing positive ethnic traditions.

2. In paragraph 12, Raspberry points out the achievement of economic are almost reached by the white, not the black. The preceding paragraphs are about the prejudice that the black only good at singing and sports.

3. Raspberry’s thesis is that the young generation can be able to do whatever they put their mind to and make it in the American mainstream, not just in a black subculture.

4. I don't think there is any evidence to support the view that Raspberry is trying to make blacks "better" by making them white. Raspberry is just trying to change the existing stereotypes of the black and make them more positive. 

5. I don't think there is any evidence or point that a feminist could argue it is sexist in this essay.

Short Takes - Getting Angry Can Be a Good Thing

1.      The writer uses a personal narrative to give the readers a more specific situation to relate her feelings. In paragraph 3, the writer generalizes that her outrage became kind of fuel which drives her straight to the civil rights movement and changes her life for good.

2.      In paragraph 1, the writer tells the readers that her opinion about outrage. From paragraph 2 to 3, she tells a life story that occurred when she was seventeen years old and its meaning and influence in her life. From paragraph 4 to 6, she shares some of her working experiences and feelings about this job. In the last paragraph, she examines the negative and positive aspects of outrage. 

3.      When I think of outrage, the first word appears in mind was furious. According to the online Cambridge Dictionaries, the definition of outrage is “a feeling of anger and shock” or “a shocking, morally unacceptable and usually violent action.”

4.      I think her points are very believable to me. Because she clearly describes how outrage change her as a person and her whole life.  

5.      I think the opening sentence is the essay’s thesis because the writer tells the readers that outrage sometimes can be turned into propellant as well as power to accomplish something.

Short Takes - I Was a Member of the Kung Fu Crew

1.     From paragraph 1 to paragraph 8 are about the writer’s memories and experience of his early life in Chinatown. From paragraph 9 to 13 are about the recent life of the writer’s.

2.     The first category is pale-faced nerds who study all the time to get into the Ivies. Another category is the recent immigrants with uncombed hair and crooked teeth who sing karaoke in bars. The third category is the punks with high-lighted hair who cut school, and the gangsters, whom everyone else avoids. Then there is the K.F.C. They work hard like the nerds, but they identify with the punks.

3.     He wants to point out the life experience which he and the young people had in Chinatown before.

4.     I think this community cherishes everyone and everything they know or share together.

5.     Lau’s thesis is a little implicit at the beginning but it becomes very clear at the end of his essay.

Although Chinatown is ghetto, it is the home Lau used to be and his world.

Short Takes -Chocolate Equals Love

1.     I think the description of chocolate is very successful. Those images are interesting and vivid which tells the readers that people all around the globe enjoy eating chocolate.

2.     Those paragraphs point out that people have started eating chocolate for a long time and people gradually fell in love with it.  

3.     Paragraph 10 does surprise me because I had no idea that chocolate contains more than 300 chemicals. The fact that chocolate contains thimbleful anandamide, theobromine and phenylethylamine also shocks me.

4.     Chocolate is something magical that can influence both your body and mind.

5.     Diane Ackerman’s descriptions of chocolate, including the history of chocolate, the scientific view of chocolate and her own memories of chocolate all impress me very much.

Short Takes - A Black Fan of Country Music Tells All

1.      I think paragraph 3 and 4 introduce this essay.

2.      For most of Williams’ adult life, she was a closet country music fan who had to surreptitiously listen to country music and buy tapes in a music store. It’s all because she’s black who was not supposed to like country or classic music at that time.

3.      First, blacks’ contribution to American music was in jazz, blues and funk. Country music was dismissed as poor white folks’ blues and associated with regions of the nation that symbolized prejudice and racial bigotry. Even mainstream white America viewed country music as lower class and less desirable. Then, white America also demonstrated a cultural backwardness toward black music, be it gospel, ragtime or the blues. However, the 1980’s saw country became mainstream and very popular, too. Black and white artists sang duets and clearly admired on another’s music.

4.      Compare to some pop music, Lena Williams still likes country music the best. She would no longer make excuses for her musical tastes, and just listens to those country music that she loves.

5.      Williams proved a lot of examples to support her assertion that country music has become mainstream which is very detail and accurate.

                                                         

Short Takes - Stop Ordering Me Around

1.

(1) The narrator is complaining about the customers in the restaurant where she works for, and she is a little impatient, too.

(2) From paragraph 5 to paragraph 12, Stacey Wilkins expressed her feelings after being insulted by a male customer. As she drove home, Wilkins was crying and at her breaking point and tired of being a waitress. She thought that most people eat in the restaurant have no respect to the servers at all.

(3) I think they unify this essay well.

(4) The tone of Wilkins’ essay is constant because Stacey Wilkins narrated this essay with many of her own working experiences and observation. This can make the readers understand her circumstances and realize how rude as well as insolent people treat the servers in the restaurant.

2.

(1) It started from paragraph 5. Wilkins began telling how most people act when they are eating in the restaurant.

(2) I think the general part gets the most emphasis.

3. The problem in this essay is some customers in the restaurant see themselves in a position far superior to the servers. The solution that the writer provided is if people could look at themselves from a different perspective; they might see how wrong and impolite they are.

4. I haven’t had this kind of experience so far and I don’t know weather my friends have this kind of experience or not, either. 

5. I think Stacey Wilkins’ thesis is every waiter and waitress deserves respect. I found Wilkins’ placement in this essay is effective because she begins this essay with her experience then speaks to the rude customers, and ends up with the dreams of hers as well as other fellow workers.            

      

Short Takes - Sweatin' for Nothin'

1.     Modern people tend to do exercise to stay in shape. They are in fitness clothes, shoes and drive their cars to gym, not willing to climb up stairs. They are wasting both energy and money.

2.     People in the past might chop down wood or run a long way because they needed fuel or wanted to get somewhere. On the other hand, in this modern society, people do such things just to fit into new pants or to develop the biceps. Also, we have different kinds of exercise equipment, and we labor at them while gong exactly nowhere.

3.     Michael Barlow has a solution that she wants people who works out on exercise equipment create useable energy. As they burn off their calories, and hook up engines as well as drive shafts that will rotate turbines and generate electricity. Let those exercisers light the health club itself. In addition, she thinks that the clubs can store excess energy and sell it to nearby shop owners at low rates. What’s more, the health clubs could have energy nights where singles get together to pedal, chat, and swap phone numbers.

4.     I think “Entropy” is the main subject of this essay. Barlow thinks something wrong with the fitness mania that has swept the Western World is “Entropy.” In this essay, the writer is trying to figure out why there are so many people do exercise while polluting the planet earth. In the last paragraph this essay, Barlow also mentions that we cannot afford much more entropy, if we forget that, we might as well be rodents in cages, running into the night. 

5.     I agree with Barlow’s thesis. I think it is a cool idea because as people exercise, they can produce the energy by themselves. It’s not only good for healthy but also eco-friendly.

Short Takes - Footprints on the Flag

1.      She is an immigrant from China, working as a gallery attendant.

2.      Another conflict is between Anchee Min and the viewers in the gallery. The third conflict is between Anchee Min’s idea of freedom and American society.

3.      Among those conflicts, I think the conflict between Anchee Min’s idea of freedom and American society is the most important one in this essay. Because this conflict goes through this essay, Anchee Min’s own idea of freedom is very different from the point of view of American society which makes this essay full of intenseness.

4.      Anchee Min learned that everyone should be loyal to their own country when she was very young and she thinks that there are too many American who takes freedom for granted.

5.      Although Min does think that everyone has to be loyal to their country respect any symbol of their country, I think Min is a little too emotional toward the artwork.

Short Takes - Time to Look and Listen

1.   Magdoline Asfahani recreated her experiences by giving many examples with details to describe those experiences and her feelings at that time.

2.   I think “discrimination” is the most important subject in this essay. Paragraph 3-6 are all about the discrimination Magdoline Asfahani faced when she was a young kid. In the last two paragraphs, Magdoline Asfahani shares her opinion that the situation of discrimination is less serious in the world now.

3.   Magdoline Asfahani said “Anyone who is unlike the majority is looked at a little suspiciously, dealt with a little differently.” and “Education is the key to understanding.”

4.   The writer tries to tell the readers that we should treat everyone equally and we cannot judge anything without knowing.

5.   Thanksgiving is one of the most and meaningful holidays in America. The essay was published right after Thanksgiving which reminds all American that the reason makes their nation unique is because there are a lot of different cultures in their nation.

Short Takes - Learning, then College

1.   Meg Gifford stated “taking time off before college.” I can tell that the following paragraphs are about her life before college and how this changed her life forever.

2.   Meg Gifford was seventeen years old in the first paragraph and she decided to take a gap year before going to college. The second to the ninth paragraph are about Gifford’s life in the gap year when she is eighteen. The last two paragraphs, Gifford has attended two years of college and experienced a lot of things.

3.   I think that Meg Gifford used her time very effectively because by her age of twenty she had had many special experiences such as traveling, midwifery and teaching an old man alphabet.

4.   Pros: Meg Gifford wrote this essay in the chronological order and she also gave many supporting details. Cons: There are too many paragraphs in this essay which can be simplified a little more.
      Thesis: The decision of taking a gap year before college changed her life forever.

5.   After reading this essay, I think it is a good idea of taking a gap year before college. A gap year can let young people understand themselves and this real world more. 

Short Takes - A Fowl Trick to Play on a Lawn Tractor

1. Peter Dexter portrayed the peahen which came into his garage by telling the readers that how concentrated this exotic bird was standing in front of the trash compactor and staring at a small red light of the compactor.

2. I think Dexter was a little overreacted to the broken lawn tractor and his imagination of himself and the peahen is very interesting. Dexter characterized his lawn tractor as a living thing which makes terrible noises and was killed by him.     

        3. There are three conflicts in this essay. The first conflict is between Dexter and the peahen, the second one is between Dexter and the tractor and the last one is the tractor and the peahen.

4. I think the last paragraph is a successful resolution because the readers can clearly understand what the real problem of the lawn tractor is. 

5. If this narrative were in the form of a fable, I think this story tells us that what we think or believe is not always right and real.