My trip down Literacy Lane (Final)

There have been times in a person’s life where they were dead set on doing one thing for the rest of their life, but then they push it aside to do something completely different. Have you ever felt like that? Well in the case of Literacy, that’s how I felt. When I was younger, my whole life was set on becoming a great musician, or a storywriter. Then I was introduced to the intricate world of technology, and I haven’t turned back.

My road down Literacy Lane, as was everyone else’s, started when I was a toddler. The mother figures in my life, my grandmother especially, figured from birth that I was destined for great things. It was evident to them when I started reading my first children’s book at around four years old. In kindergarten, I was always the first person to raise my hand to answer a question. It impressed a lot of teachers that had me as a student. I would write some scribbles on paper and show them to my mom saying, “Look, mommy! I wrote a book!” At the time I didn’t know what it meant, but people kept telling my mom I was very literate at a young age. A lot of women in my life think they know these things about me.

Turns out they were right, just not in the way they thought. When I got a little older, I was introduced to what was known as Super Mario Bros., the video game that probably did a 180o on my life. At the time I was so interested in the game I almost couldn’t put it down. Then I went to my Uncle Richard’s house and he let me play some games on his computer. It was then that I was inspired to get a computer of my own. Unfortunately for my mother I took it apart one time and she hasn’t been able to put it back together since.

During my middle school years I decided I wanted to get into music for a while. I looked around through different instruments before I found the drums as my favorite instrument. I still remember going through a music store one day. The store had a drums set display put up for people to play on. I went up and played something I had in my head. I must’ve been good because I was so into it, the next thing I knew I had a crowd around me who were listening to me playing. When I was done, I had an applause waiting for me. I played along and bowed to them. I’ll never forget that day. Though I didn’t really go into music for a long time, I’m still playing the drums every time I play Rock Band or Guitar Hero. ^_^

But even so, I can't help but avoid hearing some people say that people who mess around with computers don't have a social life. I hate it when people say that, because it is not true. Sure, I may sit around the computer when I'm done with all my work or if I'm just bored. However, I still have time to kick back with friends or play some games for a while.

Then when I got to high school I was so interested in computers it almost got me expelled from school. I won’t go into details as it is too embarrassing to talk about, and because of it I stayed away from computers for a while. I wanted to figure out how the people who made computers were able to design it to make it so addictive to kids. Then I found a book about designing and repairing computers. I thought I could go into something like that since I was good with computers, but I realized it was a whole bunch of stuff I couldn’t understand at the time to worry about it then.

Then I figured I could get a job being a video game designer. I was already really good at playing video games all my life, so I thought “Why not make a living out of playing video games?” My parents didn’t really approve of my decision after all the things that happened in my life to just drop it all to do this. However, they did accept the fact that this was what I wanted to do, and they said they would help me any way they could.

Now, in the present time. I am still reading books and writing stuff; just instead of history books and English papers, it’s more manga/graphic novels and video game plots. As I was going into video games, I got most of my inspiration from different anime and manga that I watch and read. That’s why I have a huge collection of Shonen Jump© and GameInformer© Magazines in my room.

And there you have it folks. My entire story of how I went from this











to this








all throughout my life. (You may applaud now.)

My trip down Literacy Lane

There have been times in a person’s life where they were dead set on doing one thing for the rest of their life, but then they push it aside to do something completely different. Have you ever felt like that? Well in the case of Literacy, that’s how I felt. When I was younger, my whole life was set on becoming a great musician, or a storywriter. Then I was introduced to the intricate world of technology, and I haven’t turned back.

My road down Literacy Lane, as was everyone else’s, started when I was a toddler. The mother figures in my life, my grandmother especially, figured from birth that I was destined for great things. It was evident to them when I started reading my first children’s book at around four years old. In kindergarten, I was always the first person to raise my hand to answer a question. It impressed a lot of teachers that had me as a student. I would write some scribbles on paper and show them to my mom saying, “Look, mommy! I wrote a book!” At the time I didn’t know what it meant, but people kept telling my mom I was very literate at a young age. A lot of women in my life think they know these things about me.

Turns out they were right, just not in the way they thought. When I got a little older, I was introduced to what was known as Super Mario Bros., the video game that probably did a 180^o on my life. At the time I was so interested in the game I almost couldn’t put it down. Then I went to my Uncle Richard’s house and he let me play some games on his computer. It was then that I was inspired to get a computer of my own. Unfortunately for my mother I took it apart one time and she hasn’t been able to put it back together since.

During my middle school years I decided I wanted to get into music for a while. I looked around through different instruments before I found the drums as my favorite instrument. I still remember going through a music store one day. The store had a drums set display put up for people to play on. I went up and played something I had in my head. I must’ve been good because I was so into it, the next thing I knew I had a crowd around me who were listening to me playing. When I was done, I had an applause waiting for me. I played along and bowed to them. I’ll never forget that day. Though I didn’t really go into music for a long time, I’m still playing the drums every time I play Rock Band or Guitar Hero. ^_^

Then when I got to high school I was so interested in computers it almost got me expelled from school. I won’t go into details as it is too embarrassing to talk about, and because of it I stayed away from computers for a while. I wanted to figure out how the people who made computers were able to design it to make it so addictive to kids. Then I found a book about designing and repairing computers. I thought I could go into something like that since I was good with computers, but I realized it was a whole bunch of stuff I couldn’t understand at the time to worry about it then.

Then I figured I could get a job being a video game designer. I was already really good at playing video games all my life, so I thought “Why not make a living out of playing video games?” My parents didn’t really approve of my decision after all the things that happened in my life to just drop it all to do this. However, they did accept the fact that this was what I wanted to do, and they said they would help me any way they could.

Now, in the present time. I am still reading books and writing stuff; just instead of history books and English papers, it’s more manga/graphic novels and video game plots. As I was going into video games, I got most of my inspiration from different anime and manga that I watch and read. That’s why I have a huge collection of Shonen Jump^© and GameInformer^© Magazines in my room.

What is a Literacy Autobiography?

An autobiography is a story of a person's life that is written by that person, describing their early childhood, educational years, everything. A literacy autobiography is basically the same thing, just tuned in to something a bit more specific. My definition of a literacy autobiography is how a person's writes about their life according to how they read, write and speak in their life. They use how they communicate with other people to describe themselves as a literate being.

In the three readings, there were some examples of them being literacy autobiographies. Take Gloria Anzaldua's "How to Tame a Wild Tongue." This is a literacy autobiography because it tells and informs us about how she had to deal with people talking about how her Chicano Spanish was different from any other variation of the Spanish Language. She explains how stereotypical people can get sometimes when they hear something they can't understand fully.

In Amy Tan's "Mother Tongue," Tan talks about how her mother talks to other people through her. She also tells how she speaks to other people one way, and to her mother another way. Although it certainly is not telling us that we should communicate with our parents the same way, but that it is telling us about we all talk to most people differently than how we talk to our families. It was just how we were raised to do so.

Keith Gilyard's "First Lessons" was an autobiography, but I don't really think that it was a literacy autobiography. It tells us about his childhood days, sure. However, I don't remember it saying anything about how he spoke, read or wrote during those years. Although he did express the story with very vivid details, such as the fire scenario, that can catch a reader's attention pretty quickly. So I guess it does have some connection to literacy when you think about him and the details of his work.

"Mother Tongue" Response

This article talks about the differences between perfect and "broken" English. Because of her mother's language, she feels ashamed at first. However, as time goes on, she realizes that this is the way that she and her mother talk to each other, or her "mother tongue."

"How to Tame a Wild Tongue" Response

An interesting story from an interesting author. It is how she speaks about everyone having their own native accent to a language that makes readers think for a second, "How would I feel if someone tried to stop me from talking the way I do?"

In the story, Anzaldua also talks about "Linguistic Terrorism." She says that a language must be used if it is to remain alive. The thing about it is that learning a new language is tough if you do not find ways to steer it so that you understand it better.

My opinion in all of this is that language is just another tool used for communicating with others. If you are able to speak another language, be proud of it. No one should force anyone to change their accent just because they don't like it. That language is their culture. You tell someone to change their accent, and it's like stripping that person of everything he/she learned as a child.

Literacy Pictures Part 1

Introduction

My name is Jeremy Mitchell. I was born and raised in Detroit, Michigan. I'm a Media Arts and Technology Major. I am a big video game fanatic, but then again, who isn't nowadays? XD

My main hobbies are, of course, playing video games, being on the computer and any kind of sports. My favorites are bowling, football, tennis, and soccer in that order.