"Me Talk Pretty One Day" by David Sedaris
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1 Me Talk Pretty One Day – By David Sedaris
The title alludes to what comes in the following paper. Sedaris is a language learner, and a langue learner often mixes their grammar up. This also details what Sedaris might want-to talk pretty one day in his learned language.
David Sedaris is not only the one writing the text, he lived the text. That makes this piece David’s narrative, about a certain situation that he went through in his life.
When I first read the title I felt it gave off the idea that we were about to read a piece about an immigrant who would one day be goo at speaking English. Instead the piece was about a fluent English speaker who was trying to learn French at a much higher level than before, and was quite terrible at such.
This title definitely was misleading, with the incorrect English. You would not expect this to be a fluent speaker of English. It was actually really interesting.
When I read the title, I was not expecting to read text about an English speaker who is learning French. I thought it would be about someone who is learning English. The title set up the text in a way that made me unaware of the actually story behind the text. However, I found this text quite interesting.
I agree with what you are saying about the title. At first, by reading the title, I was not for sure what this story was about. After reading the text, it began coming together. The text was very intriguing!
The title brings off a sense of confusion for the readers. With the title not having proper English,one can infer that the author is learning a new language whether it is English or another language.
I think this article is specifically directed to those who are learning a new language. No matter the age or gender, just people who are attempting to learn and understand a language different from their first language.
Although the title is misleading in some ways based on the grammar usage, you would think he is learning English. I see the purpose of the title though, because many people consider French and Spanish the two love languages. I personally tie French with love because of Paris and the romance in the city, so to me the language is pretty.
I think the tone begins with the authors humility and humor. The author is aware of his inability to speak French, and is humble in the way he understands he isn’t immediately going to be good at speaking French. He uses comedy to keep the reader interested and involved in the text he is conveying.
David Sedaris, the author, followed by details about him in paragraph 3 – as this is written in first person.
2 From his book Me Talk Pretty One Day
3 At the age of forty-one, I am returning to school and have to think of myself as what my French textbook calls “a true debutant.” After paying my tuition, I was issued a student ID, which allows me a discounted entry fee at movie theaters, puppet shows, and Festyland, a far-flung amusement park that advertises with billboards picturing a cartoon stegosaurus sitting in a canoe and eating what appears to be a ham sandwich.
Sedaris finds himself as a non-traditional student working within a subject with which he has little experience.
He is not a “true debutante” by way of the implication of the word. This is the way he sees himself.
The author, which is Davis, is also the grownup who lived this story. He wrote it, as he lived it.
This is the introduction of the speaker of the piece, giving details about the character.
An early theme that may be taken away from this first paragraph is that he starts the writing by telling the reader how out of place he feels.
I feel like the purpose of this paragraph is to be a narratio. This paragraph gives a lot of information. Another thing to note about this paragraph is the early development of a tone. The early tone seems to be comedic.
David’s audience could be people with a similar situation as David, whether that be being in a language class and not understanding it or going back to school as an older adult and feeling intimidated at first.
David’s context is, he has gone back to school at the age of forty-one in Paris, as an American,to deepen his knowledge of the French language. Before Covid-19 at this school we had foreign exchange students from Germany. I made friends with one of them named Naomi, sometimes it was hard for us to communicate because even though she understood English she did not always have the words to get her point across. Just like David mentions in his text.
The phrase “a true debutant” refers to someone who is a “new adult”; a person making a debut into whatever they’ve wandered into. Sedaris sets himself up here to be a newbie.
The tone begins with the first paragraph. It’s humble and comedic, with the author not quite understanding the words coming out of the teacher’s mouth and listing his perceptions with levity. At the end of the passage, the tone does become more uplifting while still being comedic.
In this part right here I feel David Sedaris is setting up his appeal to his audience. He shares details about himself that many can sympathize with. He is a student, which is already one thing, but he is also forty-one. An age I can imagine most would not want to be while still being in school as a student.
David Sedaris uses imagery when talking about the billboard of the stegosaurus in a canoe eating a sandwich.
Sedaris is setting the scene of the essay by explaining what he was doing and what he was issued. It is showing that he is a student, about to embark on his educational journey.
4 I’ve moved to Paris with hopes of learning the language. My school is an easy ten-minute walk from my apartment, and on the first day of class I arrived early, watching as the returning students greeted one another in the school lobby. Vacations were recounted, and questions were raised concerning mutual friends with names like Kang and Vlatnya. Regardless of their nationalities, everyone spoke what sounded to me like excellent French. Some accents were better than others, but the students exhibited an ease and confidence that I found intimidating. As an added discomfort, they were all young, attractive, and well-dressed, causing me to feel not unlike Pa Kettle trapped backstage after a fashion show.
One way into analysis of a text is to ask yourself, “What is happening within this paragraph? If it were a room, how is it arranged? What is its overall purpose within the whole of the ‘house’ of the essay?”
Here, it seems the author separates himself from the rest of the student group, by way of appearances.
David uses this paragraph to paint the picture of a school environment very different from what we would originally imagine. His experience is so completely new to us as a reader, so it’s necessary for him to help us to understand. He sets the scene of being in a new country to learn their native language, of being older than most others in his school, of not knowing a single other person. We’ve all felt like outsiders, but I argue most have never been to this extent of being alone. Him setting the scene like this is to benefit his audience and to draw out some early sympathy points from them.
Background knowledge is essential for setting the scene for a writing. This background knowledge will likely connect to a piece somewhere in the future.
David lays out the details of the school. He talks about his early arrival to see what it was like and how he was intimidated because of everyone’s well-spoken French and how much younger they were. He paints a clear picture of the students talking and his feelings to help the reader imagine the scene.
In paragraph 4, the author seems spontaneous to me. He also seems like he pays attention to detail. With relation to the tone of the text, it seems to be attentive to detail, a little careless, overwhelming, all based on his emotions.
In this paragraph, David explains the context of this essay. He explains that he is going to a school in Paris for the first time, while other students are returning. He says that his school is a ten minute walk from his apartment and that it seemed like everyone was speaking perfect french. He also says that he felt intimidated because they were all “young, attractive, and well-dressed”.
Sedaris has moved from New York all the way to Paris, France so that he can learn the French language. This is a huge commitment for someone to do, especially because the only French he knows is that which he picked up in Normandy and in his month long French class in New York.
Moved to a foreign country that predominantly speaks a language you are less than fluent in? Goodness. That’s certainly a difficult situation to put yourself in, but I do hear that immersive learning is quite effective.
This is a valid point. I do not think people realize how stressful and out of place people feel when they cannot speak the same language as everyone else.
I agree. Leaving what you are used to, and what you have previously been comfortable with is extremely difficult. It makes it even more difficult when you do not feel welcomed in the place you are coming to whether it be due to language barriers, or cultural differences.
I think the main audience for this piece are those learning a new language, just like David was. Throughout the whole piece his main focus is on learning how to speak French fluently and what he did not know. Even the title of the piece has to do with speaking and speaking correctly
To want to move to a different country to learn the language seems difficult and stressful. I would just want to take a different language class in my school or hire a tutor. You would probably learn the language quicker and want to study as much as possible so then you can understand people though. It would also be like studying that language 24/7 since everyone is speaking it. It seems to be more effective in the long run but very stressful.
This sentence relates well to the theme that is state of mind. Moving in to Paris, the narrator comes in with the mindset of adapting to a new land. This shows a lot about his character.
All the students in the school recounting their summers makes Sedaris feel alone at the school, as he has no companionship, not only due to his nationality and language, but also due to the age difference between himself and his peers. This sense of belonging will come later, as the students band together to make it through the class.
The quote “and on the first day of class I arrived early, watching as the returning students greeted one another in the school lobby.” David speaks that he watched the others around him greet each other. However, he did not know anyone. This can be a moment of fear for him. I can personally connect to this situation. When I was in the fourth grade I moved to a school in northern Indiana for 6 months. On my first day of school I was very nervous. I did not know anyone around me. But everyone around me knew each other. For me this was a haunting moment, which reading this piece brought back that feeling as a scared 10 year old. Thankfully someone reached out to me and invited me to join them for lunch. It is good to be kind to others, even if you may not know them. I will never forget that moment.
People can have a full grasp on a lot of things while not looking like they know these things. I know some people who are Scandinavian who are perfectly fluent in Spanish. People’s looks have absolutely nothing to do with their skills.
Many people have stigmas and stereotypes towards random people without having spoken a word to that person. This says a lot about humanity and how we, as humans, have common stereotypes for language, demeanor, and personality.
Sedaris says how the other students mastery of the language intimidates him because he has yet to achieve it.
I think that it would be very intimidating coming to a new place and not knowing the language that good and knowing all the other students are more advance then you are. This can relate back to other students in today’s day because not everyone learns the same way and some subjects are harder to others.
Sedaris is speaking of something most people have gone through at least once, lack of confidence, specifically on the first day of school. He is stating something that most people can relate to and have experiences of their own to compare to.
He is also setting up for a major contradiction when these same confident French speakers express their struggles.
See how a reference can actually have multiple descriptors?
Ma and Pa Kettle: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ma_and_Pa_Kettle?scrlybrkr=b3738e0d
The audience can be about anyone who finds this story interesting. This book would be good for someone who interested in learning french and would like an interesting story to go along with it.
Paragraph 4 describes the author’s feelings of mental distance from his peers. He relies on the audience’s experiences of alienation and embarrassment to sell that he feels incompetent. It also makes later scenes where everyone is struggling with the language more poignant, because there is no longer a divide between the author and his fellow students.
Sedaris is showing his vulnerability in this sentence by explaining the discomfort he has by being the oldest student there. He is showing how he is nervous for his new course and expressing why.
5 The first day of class was nerve-racking because I knew I’d be expected to perform. That’s the way they do it here – it’s everybody into the language pool, sink or swim. The teacher marched in, deeply tanned from a recent vacation, and proceeded to rattle off a series of administrative announcements. I’ve spent quite a few summers in Normandy, and I took a monthlong French class before leaving New York. I’m not completely in the dark, yet I understood only half of what this woman was saying.
Sedaris is setting up a scene in this paragraph and what follows is a suggested transcript of that moment that teacher says something to the group.
The author is explaining his first experience in a french classroom and how he only understand half of what the professor is saying due to the language barrier. It would be a tough situation to be in. I also remember taking Spanish and not knowing a single word of what the teacher was saying.
He knew he was going to have to be ready for the first day because this was when people stood out. Which made him nervous but he had to be prepared for anything.
This paragraph demonstrates the purpose of this excerpt. The purpose of the excerpt is showing life as a non-fluent individual in a new country, along with the hardships they might face.
Whenever I know I have to present something in front of my class or perform I get nervous as well
Sometimes teachers do not wait for students to get a clear grasp on what they’re learning. They often leave others behind who end up never fully catching up. One bad grade on a quiz or test and they could fail the quarter, or even the semester.
I think it is very interesting here how David says you either “sink or swim”, because that is how life is. The comparison can likely be related with other things rather than just school. He could be saying this to show that to be able to swim you have to be successful in your everyday life or you could choose to sink, which would mean you would fail.
This thought process is commonly enforced by teachers and feared by students. Students who “sink” are viewed as failures and those who “swim” are seen as overachievers. It is battleground in a challenging class, not only with the material being taught, but also facing the opinions of others.
The usage of ‘sink or swim’ is a powerful representation of what any class, or life in general, is like. If individuals to not come up to par with what is needed of them to succeed they will indeed ‘sink’.
I can not imagine how difficult learning would be when you can only understand half of what your teacher is saying. He is taking a big risk by coming into live in this new place without knowing much of the language that people speak.
Despite his prior education and experience Sedaris has still found himself in a new environment that he was not completely prepared for. This can be a common experience for people taking a foreign language course that they are not previously knowledgeable in. The teachers will often talk and expect a response from the students who are somewhat clueless as to what is being said or what the teacher wants them to do.
I agree, especially in foreign languages classes that encourage you to only speak the newly learned language, as well as classes in which the teacher only uses said language. If the student is fairly new to the language, they may not understand what is being said. This leads to stress, and anxiety from the student who now does not understand the directions. This is not an effective method for learning a language, and is only effective for remembering one.
I can relate to David struggle here when i first started Spanish I knew a few words and phases so i could guess as to what was happening
I agree with Riley,
I did not do super good when I began learning English. It always sounded like gibberish and unintelligible garbage.
I can relate to this because of how my Spanish class mostly communicates in Spanish and sometimes I don’t know what they’re saying and feel lost.
I have a connection to this sentence of the excerpt because I have taken almost 4 years of Spanish class and there were definitely times where, in the beginning, I had no idea what was being said. Now that I have four years of experience I know understand some of the language, which will eventually happen for David Sedaris.
6 “If you have not meimslsxp or lgpdmurct by this time, then you should not be in this room. Has everyone apzkiubjxow? Everyone? Good, we shall begin.” She spread out her lesson plan and sighed, saying, “All right, then, who knows the alphabet?”
David Sedaris uses incomprehensible languages to describe him knowing some of the language being said but there are some words that are not being comprehended in his brain. He does this in his article to show the audience the misunderstanding he experienced in his new school. I can relate to this in my Spanish class; there are sometimes I understand some of what the teacher is saying but other times I don’t. I cannot imagine living in a whole new country without knowing the language fluently like David did.
Sedaris’s usage of gibberish words within this text truly depicts what it feels like to listen to an individual speak in a language separate from your own. I remember feeling this way numerous times within my Spanish class too as you mentioned.
Here we find one of Sedaris’s first rhetorical choices, as he chooses to include the words of the teacher that had been unintelligible to him, and he signifies this with jumbled letters and italics. This choice helps to make this stand out as a piece of his tone, reiterating the idea that he is not so comfortable, and will face some struggles soon.
The author uses jumbled letters to represent words he is unable to understand. This choice not only sets a more comedic tone, but it allows the readers to understand at least slightly how difficult it was for him being unable to completely understand. This is a scenario not everyone has undergone, so this choice allows us to better relate to the story he is portraying.
The decision here to convey words that Sedaris didn’t understand as pure unfiltered gibberish reflects really well how lost hearing those foreign words must’ve felt.
That sigh is a little detail that says a lot about the teaching experience for this particular educator in the essay.
The garbled language here seems pretty important to the preparation for this course which means that this paragraph is situated to present Sedaris in early peril.
7 It was startling because (a) I hadn’t been asked that question in a while and (b) I realized, while laughing, that I myself did not know the alphabet. They’re the same letters, but in France they’re pronounced differently. I know the shape of the alphabet but had no idea what it actually sounded like.
From the text I would think author is persistent and tough with all the abuse he puts up with, I also would think he is optimistic and is why the character sticks around after the teacher attempts to belittle her students.
This comment stuck out to me. He is in the works of leaning how to speak french. Usually, the alphabet is the first thing you are taught when learning a language.
I’m not sure if this was intentional, but I find it amusing that he used a) and b) in this line. Sedaris has revealed that he doesn’t know the alphabet and then uses it in his response. If it was intentional it’s a pretty clever way of throwing it in there.
I think this is suppose to lighten the mood a little because he says everyone else is laughing but he does not even know how to say each letter of the alphabet.
I agree, in the real world some of the funniest events are funny because of confusion.
I really like this line, because it goes hand-in-hand with the feeling in the last paragraph. Seeing the letters but having no idea what’s being said.
This also goes along with the idea of being in a foreign place. We are all human, a yet another place on earth can be the most unfamiliar.
8 “Ahh.” The teacher went to the board and sketched the letter a. “Do we have anyone in the room whose first name commences with an ahh?”
9 Two Polish Annas raised their hands, and the teachers instructed them to present themselves by stating their names, nationalities, occupations, and a brief list of things they liked and disliked in this world. The first Anna hailed from an industrial town outside of Warsaw and had front teeth the size of tombstones. She worked as a seamstress, enjoyed quiet times with friends, and hated the mosquito.
It is a choice to label each person in the class by their name and nationality. It gives the true scope of how diverse the class is, and how, despite their different origins, face the similar struggle of learning a language. It’s not easy for anyone.
I like the fact that the professor makes them say their nationality because it’s a part of who we are, but I also don’t like it because sometimes people tend to base their opinion on what nationality you are. It can go both ways.
While Sedaris’s inclusion of this hyperbole, “front teeth the size of tombstones”, may not seem vital to the piece itself, it actually helps set the tone and establish a style for the rest of Sedaris’s piece. He includes the hyperbole because of the way it fits his style and aids the audience in maintaining attention throughout by employing such rhetorical choices.
10 “Oh, really,” the teacher said. “How very interesting. I thought that everyone loved the mosquito, but here, in front of all the world, you claim to detest him. How is it that we’ve been blessed with someone as unique and original as you? Tell us, please.”
This line has a suggestion of sarcasm to it. Which could lean towards the fact that Sedaris is a humorist and could connect to the readers because everyone has atleast some form of sarcasm, or has heard sarcasm before.
Notice how Sedaris allows this scenario to play out without his own commentary. He merely reports the interaction and reaction to the moment.
Here Sedaris chooses to merely explain the interaction he observed, without commentary or bias. This is a rhetorical choice of Sedaris,allowing the audience and reader to come to their own belief and feelings about the teacher. Sedaris could have chosen to share his own views on the teacher, potentially describing how difficult it will be for him due to her personality and expectations. However, he does not do this, because he would have run the risk of losing audience members who may have felt that he sought out the pity and wanted the audience to feel bad for him. Instead, he simply notes the conversation, allows the reader to make their determination, ultimately resulting in many readers already being on the side of the students.
I also think it was important for him to put in a conversation rather than put his opinion in about the teacher. This gives the reader more interaction and keeps them interested in the article that they are reading.
Sedairs is fully aware of the conclusion readers will come to about the teacher, input or no input. The teacher’s sarcasm is blatantly obvious. The “Oh, really” and the “Tell us, please” really sell it. The teacher is unashamedly embarrassing her students, and it is obvious to the point that Sedaris can bring more comedic value to the piece without adding a word.
11 The seamstress did not understand what was being said but knew that this was an occasion for shame. Her rabbity mouth huffed for breath, and she stared down at her lap as though the appropriate comeback were stitched somewhere alongside the zipper of her slacks.
12 The second Anna learned from the first and claimed to love sunshine and detest lies. It sounded like a translation of one of those Playmate of the Month data sheets, the answers always written in the same loopy handwriting: “Turn-ons: Mom’s famous five-alarm chili! Turn offs: insecurity and guys who come on too strong!!!!”
This line highlights the humor and sarcasm throughout the piece. These students have little knowledge of French so you can’t get a sense of the whole person. It adds humor to a moment when students are being ridiculed over things they like and dislike.
I found that David compared the simplicity of his classmates descriptions to something that children in early school might use to describe others. They obviously all have unique interests, but lack the nuance to describe or share them.
13 The two Polish Annas surely had clear notions of what they loved and hated, but like the rest of us, they were limited in terms of vocabulary, and this made them appear less than sophisticated. The teacher forged on, and we learned that Carlos, the Argentine bandonion player, loved wine, music, and, in his words, “making sex with the womans of the world.” Next came a beautiful young Yugoslav who identified herself as an optimist, saying that she loved everything that life had to offer.
Throughout the whole essay, Sedaris describes each student, that is present in the classroom, by where they are from. Some examples are “two Polish Annas”, “Argentine bandonion player”, and a “beautiful young Yugoslav”. Seradis most likely included these descriptors to grab the readers attention throughout the essay or it could be something of a bigger picture
As someone who also wishes to learn multiple languages, this I feel is certainly a common fear among multi-linguists. Most people don’t want to feel stupid, but when you’re limited to only a small pool of words, you feel cheated. You know an entire language already. Even if you’re good at said language, you second-learnt will probably not be your strongest.
The same thing happens to me in Spanish when I’m writing I know what I want to write but I don’t know the words for what I’m trying to write in Spanish
This is the second time that the author described the Anna’s as Polish instead of an image description of what they look like. This is interesting because it makes me wonder the intention the author is trying to convey. Repetition? is it intentional?
14 The teacher licked her lips, revealing a hint of the saucebox we would later come to know. She crouched low for her attack, placed her hands on the young woman’s desk, and leaned close, saying, “Oh yeah? And do you love your little war?”
David Sedaris’s use of verbiage to describe the disrespectful way his Professor addresses her students is interesting. Throughout the story one can see that the professor insults them in French, but it appears that students, such as David Sedaris, have insults of their own for her, French or not.
The teacher does not seem to be actually interested in what her students have to say, and more of how she can find all the loopholes in their words and tear open to publicly ridicule them.
perhaps to weed out the weak links and leave only the ones who are cut out for the class.
I totally agree with you here. The teacher seems to take every moment she can to knock her students down. It seems odd that a teacher would want to get rid of students, but it might just be how she is. I wonder if her ridiculing had any effect on the students learning and understanding.
I found it interesting that Sedaris chose to describe the teacher like she is a predator waiting to strike on unsuspecting students. This seems to be another choice made to allow readers to relate back to the text. Setting up the teacher as a villain against the students allows readers to relate via teachers they dislike, since most have had at least one teacher they do not exactly mesh with.
The teacher is fully aware that the student did not mean to communicate her least favorite thing in the manner that she did. It simply came out incorrectly because the student did not have the vocabulary in the foreign language to say it correctly. Instead, the teacher used this slip up against the student; to ridicule and make fun of her.
15 While the optimist struggled to defend herself, I scrambled to think of an answer to what had obviously become a trick question. How often is one asked what he loves in this world? More to the point, how often is one asked and then publicly ridiculed for his answer? I recalled my mother, flushed with wine, pounding the table top one night, saying, “Love? I love a good steak cooked rare. I love my cat, and I love …” My sisters and I leaned forward, waiting to hear out names. “Tums,” our mother said. “I love Tums.”
Sensing that his turn to speak is coming next, he begins to “rehearse” what he might say. This is a moment many students experience when the “take turns” approach is used (think “round robin.”
Here Sedaris makes appeals to both ethos and pathos by revealing the questions that he asked himself, which due to this choice, also provokes the thoughts of the reader. In doing so, he appeals to pathos when asking, “How often is one asked what he loves in this world?” This elicits an emotional response from the audience as they themselves ponder such a deep question. He then appeals to ethos by asking about how often is one publicly ridiculed for his response to such a question. In doing so, the reader is again considering their feelings, not only on what they love, but also how wrong it would be to be publicly ridiculed for speaking how one feels. From this, Sedaris has appealed to both the ethos and pathos of the audience at the same time.
I think how David describes this part about trying to answer the question goes to show how much fear he felt at the time. I think that most students have gone through this experience David went through, trying to come up with an answer because they didn’t want to feel dumb or stupid for getting the question wrong.
16 The teacher killed some time accusing the Yugoslavian girl of masterminding a program of genocide, and I jotted frantic notes in the margins of my pad. While I can honestly say that I love leafing through medical textbooks devoted to severe dermatological conditions, the hobby is beyond the reach of my French vocabulary, and acting it out would only have invited controversy.
This is sentence is helping set the tone of article from the authors perspective. It is showing the sense of urgency and worry presented as he is jotting down notes, as an attempt to try and have a successful interaction with the teacher.
Sedaris is limited in what he can share for he lacks the experience of the language. This reminds me of my daughter’s once writing that she liked to “bake cakes.” We don’t bake cakes often. When I asked her about her writing, she responded: “I couldn’t spell cookies.”
17 When called upon, I delivered an effortless list of things that I detest: blood sausage, intestinal pates, brain pudding. I’d learned these words the hard way. Having given it some thought, I then declared my love for IBM typewriters, the French word for bruise, and my electric floor waxer. It was a short list, but still I managed to mispronounce IBM and assign the wrong gender to both the floor waxer and the typewriter. The teacher’s reaction led me to believe that these mistakes were capital crimes in the country of France.
In most languages there is gender attached to objects. For people that speak English it is very easy to misgender the item in text, because we do not do this. But, making this mistake in France seemed like a crime when Sedaris did it.
That is because, in other languages one word can mean a different thing if you simply use the wrong label in front of the word you think is right and then the sentence comes out totally different. It’s not just in France, but in many countries as well.
As someone who was in a french class before, I connect with his errors. It’s confusing to learn a new language, especially when the language had feminine and masculine meanings for the same word
I agree with this statement. As someone who is in french class currently, mistakes are made especially on the stuff that seems simple but really is not. When David talks about the wrong gender or the words and how he was getting them wrong I had a connection because a lot of french students make this mistake. it is very common when learning the French language.In the following sentence it says “The teacher’s reaction led me to believe that these mistakes were capital crimes in the country of France.” These are not crimes but having the slightest error to a word can change what you’re saying in a very drastic way.
18 “Were you always this palicmkrexis?” she asked. “Even a fiuscrzsa ticiwelmun knows that a typewriter is feminine.”
On the first day of classes, the teacher keeps mixing in French words with English words. Part of this could be that she wants to intimidate the students to see who is going to stay in her class.
Though we can’t know exactly what Sedaris’s teacher says here, we can infer that it is not the friendliest comment towards him.
Being that English is not my first language, I can understand their experience being called something but not understanding it. The teacher was quite rude insulting someone, but it hurts a little more when you do not know what it means and how it is used in the language.
Not only do these garbled words represent the lack of understanding, but I think they can also capture some of the anxiety in the moment. While David’s tone is very sarcastic, it’s very descriptive of the emotions felt.
What is being said? Is it good or bad? How do I respond to this?
This is exactly what I thought when I read this part of the article. What could the teacher have been saying? It would be hard to defend yourself if you were insulted with words you did not know.
19 I absorbed as much of her abuse as I could understand, thinking – but not saying
20 – that I find it ridiculous to assign a gender to an inanimate object which is incapable of disrobing and making an occasional fool of itself. Why refer to Lady Crack Pipe or Good Sir Dishrag when these things could never live up to all that their sex implied?
Throughout the entire piece, Sedaris uses humor in his writing. This sentence is one of those examples, he takes a somewhat serious matter, and turns it into a joke that we can laugh about.
David personifies the dishrag and the crack pipe here by referring to them as if they were actually people with sexes and clothes that could be taken off. This furthers his idea of applying gender to words in French to be ridiculous. He sees no sense in it, so he pokes fun at the idea itself.
Sedaris making fun of other languages(in this case, French) after being called out on making the mistake of assigning the wrong gender to an object that—among all the other objects in the French language, hold, I think is just his own embarrassment coming out through bashing the rules of the language that have been in place since forever.
21 The teacher proceeded to belittle everyone from German Eva, who hated laziness, to Japanese Yukari, who loved paintbrushes and soap. Italian, Thai, Dutch, Korean, and Chinese – we all left class foolishly believing that the worst over. She’d shaken us up a little, but surely that was just an act designed to weed out the deadweight. We didn’t know it then, but the coming months would teach us what it was like to spend time in the presence of a wild animal, something completely unpredictable. Her temperament was not based on a series of good and bad days but, rather, good and bad moments. We soon learned to dodge chalk and protect our heads and stomachs whenever she approached us with a question. She hadn’t yet punched anyone, but it seemed wise to protect ourselves against the inevitable.
Sedaris recourts more abuses and takes the reader over a longer period of time that does not get developed here.
The rhetorical choice of suggestive further abuses would be evident here.
The students had tactics to try not and get attacked by their teacher. My question is was this all worth the class? And also why did they not drop the class?
When I first read over this, I felt the same way, but after thinking about it I believe that the reason that they did not drop the class is because they thought that the teacher was doing this to them as a way of pushing them so that they would retain the information that she was giving them.
I think they were scared of turning the teacher, she might of threatened them if they were to turn her in. Maybe she forced them to stay in her class.
Upon arriving early to class, David began to feel intimidated by his fellow classmates who were “young, attractive, and well-dressed.” Writing how “everyone spoke what sounded to me like excellent French.” However, when experiencing his class for the first time, David realized, him and his classmates had a lot in common. All of the student “left class foolishly believing that the worse was over.” Ever student was torn apart when telling the teachers their likes and dislikes.
The author indirectly compares the class to weeds after their troublesome first class. The “deadweight” refers to the people who will not successfully learn from the class, and the teacher is making her tough outer shell visible from the beginning. The choice to employ metaphor here shows that this class is not for the weak-minded.
In the next line, the author compares the teacher to a wild animal, and describes how an experience with an animal with an aggressive temperament and one with a French teacher can be similar.
To get a better clarification (perhaps an exaggeration) Sedaris uses an analogy to compare his professor to a wild animal. He states that “…something completely unpredictable.” Which leads the reader to a better understanding that her mood could change in an instant and each class was a different experience
Having an unpredictable teacher in a class you don’t fully understand has to be extremely stressful especially if you are attacked for answering questions wrong.
I think when David says their teacher hadn’t punched anyone YET, implying that she might, might be a little extreme. I believe he is playing into the humorous joke that she is crazy and unpredictable; anything could happen when she’s around. I think the goal here was to emphasize her spontaneous behaviors.
22 Though we were forbidden to speak anything but French, the teacher would occasionally use us to practice any of her five fluent languages.
This is contradictory and somewhat hypocritical. The students are taking a French course which makes it reasonable that they only speak that language in the hopes of improving their abilities to speak it; however, this should not provide allowance for the teacher to speak other languages. Also it is the idea that she is not just speaking for the benefit of the students but almost as a sort of bragging about how well she can speak so it should be easy for the students too. She is supposed to be teaching them and encouraging their learning and improvement rather than constantly insulting them.
I agree with the fact that she is hypocritical to the students. She doesn’t let them speak anything that isn’t french, but its completely okay for her to practice her other language? I also agree with where you said it was bragging. She almost seems to be flaunting her ability to speak other languages while her students struggle to learn
Although this tactic of only speaking the learned language could be good practice for the students, it is not right for the teacher to do something different. Sometimes, adults have the control, which means it is okay for them to do as they please. The teacher in the story draws the line multiple times. Her ways and tactics are rude, and even cruel to the students. Her tone is negative and brings a dark light to her character.
I completely agree with Isabel.
When learning a language you must be able to associate words. So using your native tongue when learning a new one, give commonalities between both languages. Use a syllable count, pronunciation, or even how it’s spelled.
I agree that her tone is negative and covers her character in a dark light. I find the hypocrisy in the fact that she can speak any language she wants but the students can only speak french to be really unfair especially when the teacher is a master at the language.
23 “I hate you,” she said to me one afternoon. Her English was flawless. “I really, really hate you.” Call me sensitive, but I couldn’t help but take it personally.
24 After being singled out as a lazy kfdtinvfm, I took to spending four hours a night on my homework, putting in even more time whenever we were assigned an essay. I suppose I could have gotten by with less, but I was determined to create some sort of identity for myself: David, the hardworker, David the cut-up. We’d have one of those “complete this sentence” exercises, and I’d fool with the thing for hours, invariably settling on something like, “A quick run around the lake? I’d love to! Just give me a moment while I strap on my wooden leg.” The teacher, through word and action, conveyed the message that if this was my idea of an identity, she wanted nothing to do with it.
Another Rhetorical Choice employed by Sedaris witin this essay is called a “vignette.” This work literally means like a small scene or something that might be seen through a window. Here the reader sees Sedaris wanting to recreate himself in the eyes of an instructor who “hates him.”
Paragraph 23 flows very smoothly into paragraph 24, tying the teacher’s belligerence to the author’s attempts to please her. It works as a contrast and as an appeal to pathos, as the reader appreciates his work and does not appreciate for whom he does it.
This sentence from the text just shows how hard Sedaris is working so that he could better his understanding of the French language. He then goes on to say that he wanted to make an identity for himself. Sedaris wanted to be a standout student that worked hard every day to better himself in the field that he is studying.
Sedaris is showing that he will put in the work to achieve his goal.He is willing to work hard just like you said. His dedication an hard work will move him closer to becoming a stand out student and learn a new language.
David desires to be knows as something more than a “lazy kfdtinvfm.” He wants a new identity as the “hardworker” or the “cut-up.” His determination and passion for the french language drove him to dive into his studies, even when he felt as if his french was not improving, he carried on. His work payed off in the end when David was able to understand his teacher, even though she were insulting him. “It’s a small step, nothing more, yet its rewards are intoxicating and deceptive.” David Sedaris is showing us the rewards for not giving into defeat. How learning a language was challenging, but rewarding. David conveys to readers to believe hard work pays off.
Flora, the theme you have presented of “hard work pays of” was not one that I would have immediately pickup up one from this excerpt, but now that I have read your thoughts, I see that your theme is more prevalent throughout the excerpt than any of the ones I picked out.
In this paragraph this kid is trying to suck up for the teacher so he can be on her good side. I feel like everyone has done this before. He wants to be known as the hard worker.
David wants to be known as more than “lazy kfdtinvfm.” he wants to be acknowledged as a hard worker. Through his passion for the french language drove him to continue to get better even when he felt that he wasn’t. David Sedaris shows the reader the rewards for not giving in to defeat, which is what I believe the purpose of this essay is.
When David says, “I suppose I could have gotten by with less, but I was determined to create some sort of identity for myself” it really shows his character. He is willing to work very hard to show himself and his teacher that he is competent and able.
25 My fear and discomfort crept beyond the borders of the classroom and accompanied me out onto the wide boulevards. Stopping for a coffee, asking directions, depositing money in my bank account: these things were out of the question, as they involved having to speak. Before beginning school, there’d been no shutting me up, but now I was convinced that everything I said was wrong. When the phone rang, I ignored it. If someone asked me a question, I pretended to be deaf. I knew my fear was getting the best of me when I started wondering why they don’t sell cuts of meat in vending machines.
The effect of the inner working of the classroom is now affecting Sedarish outside-the-classroom interactions. This is an important consideration of the essay and may be a good reason for its inclusion within an EDUCATION text set for the course (textbook).
David expresses that he is becoming very comfortable in the classroom and is always talking, but when he is in public he is nervous to have simple conversations. I think a lot of this comes from trying to prove to his teacher that he can do it. However, David also needs to apply what he’s learning outside the classroom as well.
Most of us can relate to this, we start to fail in one subject, maybe one we were particularly good at, and start to doubt ourselves in others. Sedaris is living in Paris and from his earlier anecdotes, it is apparent he knows at least basic French. Therefore, his doubt does not spring from a failure in the area he mentions, like asking for directions, but from a different, but related, sphere of his life.
At this point, Sedaris shows how one person can make someone else doubt themselves. This is a part of life that most, if not all, people can relate to. As an appeal to Pathos, this works very well, as Sedaris pulls at the readers emotions, causing the reader to fell bad for him, while also getting a negative reaction towards the teacher.
Sedaris, through the near-constant torment hes been enduring through his French instructor, has appeared to have almost developed a fear—or at least a heavy dislike of talking, whether it be in English or not. And obviously, the teacher is to blame, and while slightly unrelated, I think that her method of teaching, although certainly following through on the ‘tough love’ model, is still going about it horribly wrong.
In short! she’d doing more harm than good; Sedaris is learning French, but at the cost of his confidence and almost ability to function.
Before this class Sedaris was somewhat confident in his abilities in communicating in French but after the class he no longer believed what he was saying was correct. This resulted in him not socializing with people, even outside of class for the fear that he would say something wrong.
Walking in he was very confident but after class he shut down he had no confidence. He was afraid of saying the wrong thing which no kid should have to worry about.
I picked up on this too, how he was so confident at the beginning of school but as the day went on he became to feel defected. When he started to feel like everything he said was wrong he started to worry about saying the wrong things. It goes to show you that this happens to a lot of students and most don’t speak up and say they need help, they just sit back.
Imagine how difficult it would have been to move somewhere and be scared to respond to people. I feel like it would have been excruciating. Just more Pathos added to the pile.
This appeals to the readers emotion by referencing how afraid he is to talk to others. This resonates with many people with social anxiety, or just generally shy. And those who aren’t like this would feel pity.
The idea of avoiding common social interactions due to fear is something I imagine as extremely horrifying. Going around pretending to have disabilities is on a different level of fear, in this case it’s severe. This is an appeal to pathos because it is drawing in a connection between him and the audience.
26 My only comfort was the knowledge that I was not alone. Huddled in the hallways and making the most of our pathetic French, my fellow students and I engaged in the sort of conversation commonly overhead in refugee camps.
By comparing the conversations had by Sedaris and the other students to those that were heard in refugee camps, Sedaris drives home to the reader the idea of just how miserable this experience was. The comparison is nearly a hyperbole, though it depicts a vivid scene in the mind of the reader, one that forces the reader to consider the mumbling, the fear, the discomfort, and the true feelings of these students who were bonding over the fact that they were miserable. This rhetorical choice helps to again help the reader consider the classroom in a dark, awful sense, just as he does throughout the piece.
Lucas, I agree with you very much with the idea of Sedaris making the classroom a dark place. What Sedaris goes on to do, in addition to your point, is shows the light that comes from that darkness, the light being the interaction with his classmates, making for a very compelling addition to Sedaris’s memoir.
Just this singular phrase can be relatable to the audience. This also causes a pathos affect in the reading. Most of the time, we find comfort in knowing we are not alone. For example, say a student forgets their homework. They are worried all day knowing they forgot their assignment. Later their friend tells them they forgot the homework too, and there’s a moment of relief, knowing they are not alone.
In this paragraph, Sedaris tells us that he is not alone with this struggles. He is not the only one who is having these issues when going out into the streets of France. Even though they were all learning French, they managed to hold a decent conversation even though it was filled with broken phrases. This is a comforting feeling for Sedaris seeing as he was scared to go out to do a simple task such as ordering a coffee.
The phrase " My only comfort was the knowledge that I was not alone." is excellent for establishing pathos due to the fact most people feel comfort knowing others are going through the same thing they are. The vast majority truly detest being alone, so they automatically will pity anyone who seems totally alone.
27 “Sometimes me cry alone at night.”
Here we gain sympathy for Sedaris and his fellow students. They are trying very hard, but have begun to doubt themselves immensely. In this doubt, they have created a new social group, one where half-formed sentences and jumbled grammar are understood and accepted.
This statement bleeds Pathos. It makes you feel so bad for the poor students. It gets your mind thinking about how hard it would be to live in Paris alone while barely being able to understand French.
This small sentence has Pathos exploding from it. It was made to make you feel bad for those who are in a place where everyone speaks a different language than they do.
We say these little sentences like this all the time wanting people to feel bad for us or maybe even just show that they care. It makes you feel guilty and that’s exactly what the goal of his was to do.
Even though the sentence is not grammatically correct, we understand his pain and the use of pathos.
28 “That be common for I, also, but be more strong, you. Much work and someday you talk pretty. People start love you soon. Maybe tomorrow, okay.”
A reference to the title of this piece,within this paragraph David Sedaris is gathered with his fellow French students outside of their classroom discussing their fear of speaking French now due to their teacher. As Sedaris and his classmates complain of the stress and fear of speaking this teacher has caused them, they all come together to state that the more time they practice and continue to work at learning the language the more confident and less ashamed they will be to actually talk in the new language. This goes to show how even though this French teacher seems rude and disrespectful, she has inspired her students to want to learn in spite of her.
By showing this interaction between his fellow students, David Sedaris shows something that is one of the most common experiences that people can experience when in a difficult situation: finding hope with the ones you are with. Sedaris takes time to point this out because if it were not for is fellow classmates, it is possible that less of them would have made it through the course, without help from each other.
The use of broken language or unknown words gives the piece a laid back sort of feel. The piece sounds as if David is sitting in the room with you or telling his story around a campfire.
I think the use of the real quote helps the reader understand what is really going on. We see how broken his language is, but he is trying his best to work on it. I think this is an important aspect to the story, as it gives the reader a real sense of David’s language.
I completely agree, its seems as if David is trying to allow us to connect with the text and understand the challenges and obstacles one can face when learning a new language. David has changed the tone of his story from a more humor,silly tone to now a more earnest tone.
I am currently taking Spanish 5, and sometimes I fear this is how I sound when I attempt to form sentences.
The tone here implies that he knows if he keeps working at learning french, then he knows one day he will be able to talk “pretty”. One can tell that he really wants to be successful in learning french, but for now he is using the words that he knows to make the best sentences that he can.
Here we see where the title for the essay might have come. Much like listening for that lyric that comes up in a song on an album that informs the title of the album.
We can also see from this exchange that the syntax is off between these people within a shared experience.
29 Unlike the French class I had taken in New York, here there was no sense of competition. When the teacher poked a shy Korean in the eyelid with a freshly sharpened pencil, we took no comfort in the fact that, unlike Hyeyoon Cho, we all know the irregular past tense of the verb to defeat. In all fairness, the teacher hadn’t meant to stab the girl, but neither did she spend much time apologizing, saying only, “Well, you should have been vkkdyo more kdeynfulh.”
There is some context to be seen here; the difference between what the class was like in France as opposed to the class Sedaris had taken when he was in New York. This reminded me of the fact that in different countries and cultures there are different responses to things as well as different ideas or actions that are more acceptable or unacceptable depending on the location, culture, and society.
I do think there is a vast difference between American and French culture. Americans live fast paced lives and in Europe they slow down and go with the motions. Do you think there was no competition because they were all struggling? There also might not have been competition because they were scared of their teacher and scared to be wrong.
Our narrator makes a comparison here, between the class in New York he took before and the class he is in now in Paris. He is using this tool of comparison to show how vastly different the classes are, how strongly the environments vary from each other. It also shows the differing cultures. This comparison makes sense because how we Americans would teach French here is so incredibly different from how a native French speaker would teach to a foreigner.
30 Over time it became impossible to believe that any of us would ever improve. Fall arrived and it rained every day, meaning we would now be scolded for the water dripping from our coats and umbrellas. It was mid-October when the teacher singled me out, saying, “Every day spent with you is like having a cesarean section.” And it struck me that, for the first time since arriving in France, I could understand every word that someone was saying.
This whole paragraph shows just how cruel the teacher must have been. Making a comment to a student such as the one the teacher made in this paragraph is unacceptable.
Although the teacher being described in this paragraph seems cruel, it was a moment for realization for Sedaris. I do not think the things that this teacher says are okay. Although these statements helped him understand, I do not think it was right for the teacher to say these things.
“Over time it became impossible to believe that any of us would ever improve.” This is the first sentence in paragraph thirty, and then three small paragraphs later the author is jumping for joy at the fact he can understand what the teacher is saying. By doing this, the author has strengthened the join, or Pathos, the reader will feel when getting the satisfaction of the character finally understanding.
In this sentence, Sedaris believes that he is not going to get anywhere with his French. What he doesn’t know is that he is improving day by day as he keeps attending class. Eventually in this piece, we see him open up and start to understand more things that are being said to him.
Here he begins to show that he is starting to lose hope. He has worked so incredibly hard and it seems as if it is all pointless which sends him into a state of despair. This state of despair is the reason for his later excitement over being able to understand his teacher. He had lost all hope and saw his hard work as pointless, and he finally was able to see the fruit of his labor.
Who would make a comment on the water dripping off their coats and umbrellas? The students have no control over this.
The teacher most likely scolded them about the rain water dripping off their coats and umbrellas to teach them about some incident that could possibly occur in public with real life people. There are different types of people who believe different things.
This is just one of the times that the author makes a joke to give the audience comedic relief
The line before this humorous quote is very harsh. “Fall arrived and it rained every day, meaning we would now be scolded for the water dripping from our coats and umbrellas.” This line sounds as if there is somewhat of a sense of humor covering up the tension. Going from such an intense line to a humorous joke is a way to cover up real emotions.
“Everyday spent with you is like having a cesarean section” This is a pretty bold statement for the author to include because it is a very far fetched comparison, but is done with the purpose that all figurative language is meant to do: Moving the audience.
This sentence in the text points out an “aha moment” to Sedaris because all of a sudden, he can finally understand everything that his teacher said to him. It is moments like this that we live for, to have sudden clarity of what is at hand. For Sedaris, he did not care that the teacher was insulting him, but he did care that he could understand every single word of it.
this sentence shows that even though the teacher treated David and the other students poorly David has now started to understand her mostly due to if he did not she would insult him
I agree with what you stated. To add to your response, if it weren’t for her insulting him, he probably wouldn’t have remembered as much. The repetition of her insults helped the words stick and not just go in one ear and out the other
I think there is a purpose to be found in this section. I think the purpose of this is that even through the bad and awful it will eventually get better. David writes of the pain his teacher brought upon him and his fellow students, but then everything clicks and he understands everything his teacher is saying and he asks her to say more. I think that is what the purpose of this piece is. To share how good can come from some bad.
Sedaris realized in the mist if being insulted by his teacher that he understands every word she is saying while he can’t speak the language yet understanding is the first steps towards his goal.
This sentence made me wonder, was it really the teacher and her ways that allowed him to understand more French, or was it the shared struggles of Sedaris and his classmates that allowed him to make the push forward?
This proves that all of his hard work and extra studying has payed off and that he is improving. In the first sentence of this paragraph he said, “Over time it became impossible to believe that any of us would ever improve.” He then said this and showed that he had proved himself wrong.
31 Understanding doesn’t mean that you can suddenly speak the language. Far from it. It’s a small step, nothing more, yet its rewards are intoxicating and deceptive. The teacher continued her diatribe and I settled back, bathing in the subtle beauty of each new curse and insult.
When looking through this piece of writing, and reading about what David Sedaris has to teach us about, you can see that in his past experiences he has been judged and has been ridiculed based off of the way he spoke. I think that this quote is an important thing that should be worked into and understood in society, and that can especially be used outside of just language. It is saying that just because you have an understanding of something does not mean that you can do it. For example a young kid may have some understanding about cars, how they work, how their parents drive them. However, if a 10 year old boy gets in the driver seat of his moms Suburban, its not going to end well. This, in Sedaris’s case, refers to how he knows some English and understands it and how it works, but just because he can do that does not mean he can speak perfect English.
Mentioning the rewards of understanding “every word that someone was saying,” David Sedaris is enthusiastic about understanding anything even if it’s just a small sentence. As David writes, “it’s a small step,” he doesn’t fully understand, and still struggles, but, it’s better than nothing. David is passionate about learning the French language, which leads the readers to see an ardent tone.
This may also be tied into a more PSYCHOLOGICAL thematic category, in dealing with having the right mindset when working hard to achieve something. Without determination or enthusiasm, there is no way we would be able to stick to something challenging like learning a new language. This is exactly what David does, his passionate spirit drives him to become a better student, which is what he achieved when he was finally able to understand a sentence in french.
The entire mood of this excerpt is one of hopelessness, fear, anger and desolation. Then, at the end of this excerpt, we get a small flutter of hope. The whole time, David wants to be seen in a good way by his seemingly malevolent teacher, and he wishes to learn the language of French proficiently. But here, we see in a quote from David the joy and relief he feels when he finally realizes that he understands what his teacher is saying to him. “It’s a small step, nothing more, yet its rewards are intoxicating and deceptive.”
I think that as students, we can deeply relate to this feeling. It’s good to know that we have achieved what we have been aiming for. And it’s pretty cool to see how his attitude toward the class shifted once he realized that he understood what she was saying to him. His ability to finally understand was rewarding to him, and funnily enough, so were his professor’s insults.
His choice in using the word intoxicating really interests me. The definition of intoxicating is " cause someone to lose control of their faculties or behavior." The fact that being able to understand what his teacher is saying made him so incredibly excited and happy really seems to set the mood of this essay. No matter how much his teacher yelled or insulted him he continued to work incredibly hard to get better and his hard work ultimately payed off.
This sentence makes me smile. It seems absolutely wild that the teacher would be able to get away with insulting the students so much, and even harming them. The author also said there were more “good and bad moments” as opposed to good and bad days, by saying this it shows that the teacher wasn’t always a “wild animal.” BY going off this it becomes clear it was the authors choice to portray her as absolutely terrifying, but still as a good teacher.
To have the words “subtle beauty” and “curse and insult” be written so closely together feels like an oxymoron. My first thoughts of beauty have nothing to do with curses or insults, but I think it says a lot about David’s teacher. She teaches in such a way that is so different from what I would be used to. It shows that even though her ways are so strange, they work in beautiful ways that David wasn’t expecting.
32 “You exhaust me with your foolishness and reward my efforts with nothing but pain, do you understand me?"
The tone is more or less serious except for a couple moments of comedic relief. A example of a comedic relief moment is when they were talking about the alphabet and he thought to himself that he did not know the sounds of alphabet.
It’s kind of ironic how Sedaris was once the student who knew but very little of what was occurring in his environment, let alone a different language, and then all of a sudden, he fully aware of everything.
This sentence depicts a certain tone in the dialogue between the teacher and David. The tone in this sentence seems to be harsh, annoyed and intimidating.
33 The world opened up, and it was with great joy that I responded, “I know the thing that you speak exact now. Talk me more, you, plus, please, plus.”
I think this piece of text appeals to ethos because it made me feel bad for the students having a teacher like that and it does not even seem like her method of teacher is helping them.
“The world opened up.”
In this line we can truly see the comic tone that Sedaris has intended for this essay. Despite the insults of the teacher he was still joyed that he could now understand what she was saying. It was his realization of learning the language that overshadowed the negativity that the teacher had and the rude remarks she made.
I agree, but while I believe the tone is supposed to be comedic, I also believe it comes unintentionally at times. When he says “plus, please, plus”, he is referencing his inability to say “please speak to me more” and “plus” represents more. While this is funny, I think it comes unintentionally when referencing his inability to form a french sentence.
This line shows that Sedaris may understand French, but his speaking is not the best. He says " Understanding doesn’t mean that you can suddenly speak the language.", so this acts as foreshadowing for what’s to come. He tries to show his teacher he understands and still messes up.
As previously mentioned, Sedaris had spoken about how he had essentially lost his ability to speak with confidence in French. Once the realization hit him that he could comprehend his teacher, all of that insecurity seemed to melt away in that moment, and immediately spoke out despite his clear inaccuracies. He was only excited to show her that she could be understood.
I think this is one last hit at emotion. A couple lines earlier we see a conversation between students and the working title. “Much work and someday you talk pretty.” Learning to talk pretty from ugly insults.
34 Sedaris, David. “Me Talk Pretty One Day.” Me Talk Pretty One Day. New York: Little, Brown, 2000. 166-173.
36 Discussion Questions
- 37 Have you, like the narrator, ever had a difficult experience in a language classroom? Or, have you ever had a difficult relationship with a particular teacher? Tell your group about one of these experiences.
- 38 In the language classroom, as the narrator mentions, we are often asked to talk about things that we would never in reality talk about:
39 “How often is one asked what he loves in this world? More to the point, how often is one asked and then publicly ridiculed for his answer?”
40 Have you ever had a similar feeling in a language classroom?
- 41 Although the teacher in this story is associated with feelings of fear and dread, do you think this kind of teacher could also have positive effects?
43 Language Exercises:
- 44 “… a far-flung amusement park that advertises with billboards …” paraphrase:
- 45 “… the students exhibited an ease and confidence that I found intimidating.” paraphrase:
46 *Use the structure found + adjective to rephrase the following sentence:
47 I thought the movie was inspiring, but my friend thought it was silly rephrase:
- 48 “The first day of class was nerve-wracking because I knew I’d be expected to perform.”
49 paraphrase:
- 50 “The teacher proceeded to rattle off a series of administrative announcements.” paraphrase:
51 *Use the structure proceed + verb to rephrase the following sentence:
52 Then my girlfriend started to list all of my shortcomings.
- 53 How would you characterize the tone of the following comments from the teacher? “‘Oh really,’ the teacher said. ‘How very interesting. I thought that everyone loved the mosquito, but here, in front of all the world, you claim to detest him. How is it that we’ve been blessed with someone as unique and original as you? Tell us, please.’”
- 54 “The teacher killed some time accusing the Yugoslavian girl of 1masterminding a program of genocide, and I 2jotted down notes in the margins of my pad.”
55 (a) paraphrase 1:
56 (b) paraphrase 2:
57 (c) Is the tone of the phrase “kill some time” (a) informal and light or (b) formal and serious?
59 (d) Is the tone of the phrase “masterminding a program of genocide” (a) informal and light or (b) formal and serious?
60 (e) What is the effect of this difference in tone?
- 61 “The teacher proceeded to belittle everyone from German Eva … to …” paraphrase:
General Document Comments 6
As Sedaris typically writes in a satirical style, we would expect a lot of the TONE descriptors to sound just like the writing itself.
Synonyms for Sarcastic: https://www.thesaurus.com/browse/sarcasm?scrlybrkr=d0f6d260
75 More Words to Describe TONE: https://examples.yourdictionary.com/tone-examples.html
I believe the catalyst for writing is the behavior of David’s professor towards the students during the first class. The students believed it would stop but it did not. The actions of David’s professor left him confused and intimidated, leaving him to join in on boosting classmates confidence in the hallway after class in the broken French that they knew.
I noticed several different tones throughout this piece. David starts the piece with a tone of excitement to be in a new place to learn something he wants to learn. As it goes on though his tone starts to become that of sadness and fear as he starts to feel more and more alone and fearful to speak due to the harshness of his teacher. Finally towards the end of the piece the tone of excitement returns when he realizes he could fully understand what his teacher was saying to him.
As I read through this piece, I noticed this too. I really like how the author made the tone of this work stand out. There was a moment of happiness, sadness, and excitement. There were also many pathos throughout this piece that had to do with the tone.
I think the exigence, like the purpose, has to do with overcoming hardships for the reward that waits for you at the end. This is exactly what David does as he overcomes, through pain and fear, the constant abuse that his teacher brings, and makes a big leap to achieving his goal of speaking fluent French, by being able to fully understand what his teacher is saying.
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