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The Joy Of Reading And Writing Sherman Alexie Superman And Me Summary

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Summary & Reaction to “The Joy of Reading and Writing: Superman and Me.” Born in 1966, Sherman Alexie was raised by a lower class family, who had little to no money. Alexie was inspired to write “The Joy of Reading and Writing: Superman and Me” after teaching himself to read by using pictures from a Superman comic book. Alexie uses strong emotion throughout this slight essay to engage the reader. Alexie starts off his slight essay by going into background information about his childhood, family financial status, and his first discovery of learning how to read. In the last sentence of the first paragraph Alexie ties the reader in by saying “We lived on a combination of irregular paychecks, hope, fear, and government surplus food.” Beginning …show more content…

He finishes up the paragraph by saying “In this way, I learned to read.” The next two paragraphs link together. In paragraph five Alexie refers to himself in third person. In paragraph six Alexie informs the reader why he refers to himself in third person in the previous paragraph. He tells the reader it is because Indians are raised to be dumb, and fail. A smart Indian was considered a threat, and was widely feared among the non-Indian community. He also ties in that Indians don’t show their full potential due to being too afraid to one day leave home, and fear of change among the Indian community. Alexie’s second to last paragraph does a major turn-around from the previous two paragraphs. He no longer refers to himself in third person, he now refers to himself in first person. He knew he was smart, and wasn’t going to let anybody diminish that. He tends to use short, powerful sentences. “I am smart” “I was lucky” “I refused to fail” Alexie says. In the last sentence of the seventh paragraph “I was trying to save my life.” In the closing paragraph of this slight essay Alexie talks about his present day life, and about he visits many schools and encourages other Indian students to reach their full

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Paragraph Two Near the middle of the passage the narrator’s point of view of his family’s lack of education changes from thinking they are not that smart to thinking they are smart in a way. Paragraph

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Alexie, Sherman, “Superman and Me: The Joy of Reading and Writing.” Los Angeles Times, 19 April 1998. Sherman Alexie shared how his childhood of reading helped him become a better reader and a leader for others. He first read a Superman comic and then went on to bigger and better books. Alexie explains that in his Native American reservation it’s okay for children not to excel in school.

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1. The line “We lived on a combination of irregular paychecks, hope, fear, and government surplus food” is a hyperbole and zeugma. The word that creates the zeugma is the word lived, as the narrator uses the word lived to mean different things in the same context. The narrator actually lived off of paychecks and government food, but did not literally live off of hope and fear like the line suggests. The line is also a hyperbole because the author did not literally live off of the hope and fear, as you cannot sustain yourself with emotions.

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In the essays, “The Joy of Reading and Writing; Superman and Me” and Frederick Douglass’s “Chapter 7: Learning to Read and Write”, Sherman Alexie and Frederick Douglass write about their hardships and challenges they faced while learning how to read and write due to their social economic status. Despite the fact that Alexie and Douglass are incredibly different people, they both use education for freedom and a sense of self-worth. Alexie and Douglass both struggled to receive education and struggled mentally and physically because of their social economic status. Although, Alexie and Douglass both experienced these hardships, they saw the world through a totally different perspective. Alexie saw the world in a more positive manner than Douglass

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In the essay Superman and Me, Sherman Alexie uses plenty of information as to how he became a writer, how he learned to read, and what he did to get others to learn. One quotation used in the end of the essay was this one: ” I throw my weight against their locked doors. The door holds. I am smart. I am arrogant.

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In the essays, “Reading to Write” by Stephen King, “The Joy of Reading and Writing: Superman and Me” by Sherman Alexie, “Learning to Read” Malcolm X, and “Learning to Write” by Frederick Douglas have three things in common. In each essay Reading has contributed towards the authors life leading to benefit from learning to read, allowing them to leave a legacy behind. In each essay the authors has thought their self how unlike Frederick Douglass. For Stephen King, reading has done a lot for him. King stated, “Every book you pick up has its own lesson or lessons, and quite often the bad books have more to teach than the good ones” (221).

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This explains the why the narrator initially refers only to himself. The reader is then

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The short autobiography titled Superman and Me written by Sherman Alexie really made me think about the way people grow up. Some people who grow up in a lower end family find ways to complain about it. Alexie was different though. He was poor and his family lived off of irregular paychecks and government surplus food. Alexie made the best of situations and I applaud that.

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In the story the joy of reading Superman and me Sherman Alexie tells an emotional story of both hardship and success. He shares his struggles of being a poor Indian kid destined to fail, but he had a desire to be persevere he wanted to be more than the stereotypical uneducated Indian on a reservation and was determined to do so. He was inspired by his father to love books, and with the love for books came the ability to escape from the boundaries of the reservation and the dream to be more. Alexie shares how he taught his self to read with a superman comic book and with his witty metaphors how it shaped his life. I found Alexis story to be emotional, but yet very interesting.

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Sherman Alexie writes the story “Indian Education” using a deadpan tone to build and connect the years of the narrator 's life together in an ironic way. Alexie is able to utilize irony through the use of separate, short sections within the story. The rapid presentation of events, simple thoughts, and poetic points made within the story enable the reader to make quick connections about the narrator’s life to draw more complex realizations. The art that Alexie uses to write this very short story is poetic in nature through the meaning and structure of his writing. By the fact that the reader can draw deeper conclusions about the narrator 's life from Alexie’s writing is evident that his writing is poetic.

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In the seventh paragraph, 98% of Alexie’s sentences started with the word “I”. This emphasized all that he had done, everything he did to become a writer. It showed how persistent he was and how he had refused to give up. In most of these sentences the “I” was followed by “read”. This shows the extent of how much reading he did; how committed he was to reading.

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When his second grade teacher calls him “indian, indian, indian,” Victor says, “Yes, I am. I am Indian. Indian, I am” (Alexei 173). The conversation portrays parallelism in that Victor’s repetition echoes the way his teacher repeats “Indian”. Alexei’s use of a capitalization change portrays Victor’s desire to identify as Indian while the white community tries to assimilate him.

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In the essay “Superman and Me”, the author, Sherman Alexie recalls the time he first learned to read. He talks about his Indian culture and the perception of people like himself. He also discusses his childhood and the outcome of learning to read. The reoccurring theme of the essay is the love of reading. The author used various literacy devices to express the feelings of empowerment, happiness and the necessity that came with learning to read.

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Despite the negative stereotype of American Indians, the objections and disapproval of fellow Natives, and the criticism of others, Sherman Alexie went on to become a successful writer that has inspired many. Alexie overcame many obstacles that would have deterred him from his goal, but he was able to remain steadfast and continue on in his pursuit of writing. As a result, he has published many literary works that include several short stories, poems, and a variety of novels. He allows his culture to seep into his writing, and continues to inspire young American Indians who also desire the path of knowledge.

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“Superman and Me” by Sherman Alexie In Sherman Alexie’s autobiographical essay, he uses an extended metaphor to compare and contrast himself and a fictional character Superman. Illustrations that was used by Alexie made a huge impact on this essay. It helps the readers better understand what is being said in Alexie’s “Superman and Me”. On this essay, Alexie mentions how he can see his family being a paragraph. Also, one of an extended metaphor that was used is how Superman and Alexie broke down the doors.

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