Textual Analysis of Obituary/Sense of Myself—Outline
Choose either Obituary or Sense of Myself.
I choose to write about ______Obituary __________________
Tentative thesis: Tell what you think your chosen text is about. What themes are present? Make an argument about how your text helps you to think differently about 1 of those themes. Write your argument here:
Some themes are: 1. Standard English and dialect 2. Shame and inferiority 3. A teacher’s influence for students 4. Suicide 5. Different ways to learn language In this paper, I will argue that __As a student, Lovey can speak Standard English if she focuses on, but she does not like to say it when she talks to friends because she thinks it is not necessary. Even though she felt ashamed about her family, she loves more._
Examples from the text that help to prove the thesis (provide page #s):
1. “No one will want to give you a job. You sound uneducated. You will be looked down upon. You’re speaking a low-class form of good Standard English. Continue, and you will go nowhere in life…” (9)
2. “And nobody looks or talks like a haole. Or eats like a haole. Nobody says nothing the way Mr. Harvey tells us to practice talking in class…” (10)
3. “yeah,” says Wilma Kahale. “ I thought all Jays suppose for be smut. But you cannot even reduce one stupid fraction….” (14)
4. “ I think about dying every night. Sometimes I want to die at strange moments in the day. Sometimes every day….” (17)

Introduction: What will you talk about in your introduction?
As we all know, Standard English is very important for one person to live. Just like the teacher said, we must talk and learn Standard English. But the best way to learn it may not be the way which the teacher said. Too strict to students just make them nervous and ashamed. Everyone will have the drawbacks and others should not laugh them to cover up their own inferiority.

Topic sentence 1: Dialect is also a way to communicate, it is unnecessary to forbid talking dialect even though Standard English is very important. Point/Example 1: “No one will want to give you a job. You sound uneducated. You will be looked down upon. You’re speaking a low-class form of good Standard English. Continue, and you will go nowhere in life…” (9) Discussion: Speaking Standard English is good to survive in the future and it is helpful for students. But it needs a process and environment to change. Forbidding dialect just made students unconfident and ashamed.

Topic sentence 2: Ashamed to the family and relatives is because the environment of the class and teacher. Point/Example 2: “And nobody looks or talks like a haole. Or eats like a haole. Nobody says nothing the way Mr. Harvey tells us to practice talking in class…” (10) Discussion: No matter what language the family speaks, it is their own way and needs to be respected. Lovey felt ashamed about her grandmother, cousins and aunties and uncles was because they were not like the teacher said. The teacher can influence a student in different ways. If the teacher did not say the strict words, Lovey may not feel so ashamed.

Topic sentence 3: There are some different ways to learn language such as multiplying the interests. Blame is not the best one. Point/Example 3: “Jerry stands up very, very slowly and holds on to the edge of his desk. “My name is Jerome.” His voice, weak and shivering, his fingers white. “I in. Okay, wait. I stay in. No, try wait…..” (11) Discussion: the practice made everyone feel afraid and feared. It proves that it was not a proper way to learn Standard English. Learning should be happy and interesting. In other words, there should be some different ways to learn languages.