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Umar Malik

Professor Gardiakos

ENC1101

28 September 2021

Reading Response for Umar Malik

Deborah Brandt, in her piece, “Sponsors of Literacy” makes mention the idea of

how sponsorship is more limited when it comes to people of certain ethnic, racial, and

class backgrounds. She makes it important to mention how “[a] majority-race

membership, male gender, and high-end socioeconomic family profile [fosters]

commercial supports that cultivates and subsidizes…acquisition of a powerful form of

literacy.” (Brandt 250) Summarily, she also goes on to mention how people of affluent

backgrounds tend to be part of circles of the affluent, and those connections instantly

bring them into a fold of working with high caliber literary sponsors. This type of

networking is seldom found in those of lower classes or non-white racial backgrounds.

A good real world case study of what Brandt was trying to communicate is a

great way to strengthen her rhetoric on the issue with empiricism. This case study

consisted of the parallel experiences of white man, Raymond Branch, and a Mexican-

American woman, Dora Lopez, both of whom were born in 1969 and moved with their

parents to the same university town in the mid-west. As made clear my Brandt’s

previous assertion, Ms. Lopez time gathering sponsors and aids to help her succeed in

the future was quite difficult compared to someone like Raymond. A good example of
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this is how Raymond’s parents were both affluent individuals already and his father was

professor and his mother a real estate executive. These types of sponsors are obviously

high quality. Ms. Lopez, on the other hand, had a mother that worked at a bookstore,

and a father that was an accountant. Her family had to drive over 70 miles just to collect

groceries. Her struggles seemed harder, but she still made manage of her time to

language learn, learn to read better, and improve her technical skills. Her and Raymond

both seemed to self-learn, but the accessibility afforded to Raymond was multiple folds

greater than that afforded to Lopez. The more obstacles there are in the path of a goal,

the more likely one is to falter in their reach of that goal, and it is obviously apparent that

Raymond has a far easier time at accomplishing his tasks than Lopez does. For

example, Raymond would have had easier access to the facilities to make his work far

easier while Lopez had “to [use a] word processing machine that a student had

advertised for sale on a bulletin board in the building where [Lopez’s father] worked.”

This is an unfortunate reality of the world we live in today. (Brandt 251)

I personally agree with some of Brandt’s claims. I think those with easier

accessibility to learn are lucky individuals, because accessibility itself is a major

deterrent. I have seen plenty of friends of mine, anecdotally, lose hope to trying to

further themselves because of lack of accessibility to the skills they want to gain. It is

also much easier to spend time learning a skill when you have more free time to

yourself like Raymond, rather than having to juggle so many duties like Lopez.

I do disagree with Brandt’s insinuation that literacy can be achieved by all. She

made it seem as though Robinson’s literacy gains were near equivalent to Lopez’s

when in reality that Is far from the truth.

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When it comes to Sondra Perl’s article pertaining to her case study on Tony.

There were a couple mannerisms of Tony that resonated with me. For example, when

Perl writes that “Tony rarely produced a sentence without stopping to reread either a

part or the whole.” (Perl 103) I felt the same way. I consistently go back and reread my

sentences to make sure there is a substantiable and consistent coherence in what I am

writing down. Another tactic undertaken by Tony was that when “during intervals

between drafts, Tony read his written work, assessed his writing, planned new

phrasings, transitions or endings, read the directions and the question over, and edited

once again.” (Perl 103) I resonated with this because I constantly try to edit my work as

soon as possible after being written, and try to add more sophisticated language to it in

the process. Another mannerism of Tony’s was that when “[he] produced more words

with less planning and generally in less time in the reflexive mode, suggesting that his

greater fluency lay in this mode.” (Perl 103) I also tend to write way more fluently and

with more poise when I am writing in something I am passionate and interested in,

rather than writing in an extensive mode.

A tactic Tony used that I do not entertain, and would not utilize, is when “ most of

[his] time was spent proofreading rather than changing, rephrasing, adding, or evaluating

the substantive parts of the discourse.” (Perl 105) I personally do not proofread that much

after the fact because leaving incorrect spelling in the middle of my passages is a major pet

peeve of mine. Also, proofreading is just grammar correction, while rephrasing can lead to

more specific meanings to words. In a way, rephrasing can add greater context. I leave word

replacement and rephrasing as higher priority tasks and leave them towards the end. While
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I will proofread on the go when writing myself so that the reader can comprehend the

words I am writing.
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Works Cited

Brandt, Deborah. “Sponsors of Literacy.” Writing About Writing,

edited by Elizabeth Wardle and Doug Downs, Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2014, pp.

244-266. Print.

Perl, Sondra. “The Composing Process of Unskilled Writers.” Writing About Writing,

edited by Elizabeth Wardle and Doug Downs, Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2014, pp.

93-119. Print.