Alexie's Superman And Me

Sherman Alexie the author of the essay "The Joy of Reading and Writing: Superman and Me" was born and raised on a Spokane Indian Reservation. Growing up, his family did not have a lot of money, yet today Alexie is known as one of the most prominent Native American writers. Alexie reminisces on his childhood when he first taught himself how to read. In the essay "The Joy of Reading and Writing: Superman and Me" Sherman Alexie suggests, that for Native Americans reading is the key to education and education is the key to prosperity in life.

“Superman and Me” by Sherman Alexie is a brief passage describing a personal experience of the author’s childhood – specifically, how he learned to read and the impact it has had on his life. He discloses that he is of Indian descent from his father. Sherman speaks of his father in admiring tones, of how he devoured books and was an educated Indian, of how his house was always full of literature and how he chose himself to attend catholic schools (he was one of the very few Indians who purposely did). According to Sherman, he learned to read through the use of a Superman graphic novel by imagining his own meaning to the different panels and deducing what the words meant by doing this throughout the story. Eventually, he ends up reading more and more, and he is signaled out in his

Growing up as a Native American boy on a reservation, Sherman Alexie was not expected to succeed outside of his reservation home. The expectations for Native American children were not very high, but Alexie burst out of the stereotype and expectations put by white men. Young Native Americans were not expected to overcome their stereotypes and were forced to succumb to low levels of reading and writing “he was expected to fail in a non-Indian world” (Alexie 3), but Alexie was born with a passion for reading and writing, so much so that he taught himself to read at age three by simply looking at images in Marvel comics and piecing the words and pictures together. No young Native American had made it out of his reservation to become a successful writer like he did. This fabricates a clear ethos for Alexie, he is a perfect underdog in an imperfect world.

“Superman and Me” involves the author, Sherman Alexie as an adolescent boy. Alexie lived in Washington on a Spokane Indian Reservation where he grew up with parents who were poor most of the time. Although, his parents “usually managed to find some minimum-wage job or another” (Alexie). The father of Alexie went to a Catholic school where he read whatever he came into sight with. Alexie looked up to his father; therefore, he wanted to be an avid reader just like his dad. Before he could even read, Alexie picked up many books. Although words look foreign to Alexie, he understood the purpose of a paragraph, and “realized that a paragraph was a fence that held words” (Alexie). Everything he looked at, he referred to it as a paragraph. Living a life inside of a paragraph, Alexie one day picked up a Superman comic book. This day became the day he learned how to read American literature. Looking at pictures in the comic book, Alexie assumes what he sees. This method eventually taught him the way of reading English. In the essay, Alexie states, “I was smart. I was arrogant. I was lucky. I read books late into the night, until I could barely keep my eyes open…” Not the typical student, Alexie would be told to be quiet in the classroom. Never did he expect being smarter would come with consequences. Is this the kind of American Dream Alexie wanted? Despite all the learning and being an outcast, the author became a writer, as well as

Last week we wrote a blog and one of the questions was “How did you learn to read and write?”  I found this question interesting because I never had really thought about the moment when I actually learned how to read and write. My mom was the first person to expose me to reading and writing. A popular tactic she did to make sure I was staying engaged was to read aloud stories and make me follow along with her. My mom would read me many different stories like Tarzan, Bambi, Aladdin, Peter Pan, Lion King, The Jungle Book, and Hercules. whatever I wanted to listen and follow along with, she would read with me. This really helped with my want to read. The books contained a lot of adventure, which made it easy as a kid to follow along with. I became to gain an imagination and then all of a sudden reading was easier.

As he grew up to become a writer, we see pain in the story he tells. “I loved those books, but I also knew that love had only one purpose. I was trying to save my life” (pg.18). Alexie wanted to be someone greater than what others expected him to be. People would put him down constantly, but he fought back just as much. He tried to save himself from the stereotypes of being just another dumb Indian. He had more determination to prove others wrong when it came too exceeding in reading to further excel in his daily life.

To improve literary skills, lower class citizens should take the initiative outside of the education system to increase the likelihood of breaking through their class’ economic barrier. In the essay, “The Joy of Reading and Writing: Superman and Me”, Alexie says that he grew up as a part of the lower class on a Native American reservation. His parents often had to find different jobs that only paid minimum wage, which made it difficult for his family to live comfortably. Even though his family was part of the lower class, his father continuously read books. Alexie began reading to follow his father’s passion. He looked at novels and eventually understood their composition. Alexie’s firsthand experience allowed him to learn how to read in a much more efficient manner than if he learned through the reservation’s mediocre schooling system. Outside reading also motivated him to learn more. Alexie loved the feeling of gaining more information on how to have a positive impact on society. If he did not dedicate time for reading outside of his

Sherman Alexie the author of the essay "The Joy of Reading and Writing: Superman and Me" was born and raised on a Spokane Indian Reservation. Growing up his family did not have a lot of money, yet today Alexie is known as one of the most prominent Native American writers. Alexie reminisces on his childhood when he first taught himself how to read. In the essay "The Joy of Reading and Writing: Superman and Me" Sherman Alexie suggests, that for Native Americans reading is the key to education and education is the key to prosperity in life.

The short story “Superman and Me,” by Sherman Alexie is a look back into his childhood to point out how and when he began to read. He also uses it as an outlet to show where reading took him in life. In this paper, I will attempt to give an overview of his thoughts and experiences, while also sharing my thoughts on it. In doing so, I hope to point out how reading guided him throughout his childhood, and into adulthood. He explains that his love for reading was his way of trying to save his life (Alexie 3). Reading is an essential function, that when used can help anyone excel into a growth far from what is expected.

In contrast, “Superman and Me “ by Sherman Alexie tells the story of Alexie, as a young Indian boy, fighting his way through life. Alexie’s autobiography tells a story of how tough life can be as a Spokane Indian boy. He lived in Eastern Washington State on the Spokane Indian Reservation, this is where he and his brother and sisters resided. Alexie stated that, “ We lived on a combination of irregular paychecks, hope, fear, and government surplus foods”(Alexie 1). Poor, below the poverty point, but managed to find a job here and there making them middle-class. With the money Alexie’s father makes he provided them with their every needs. Additionally his father buys books because he is an

How did I become literate? My earliest and fondest memory of reading was in second grade. Certainly I remember reading time in preschool and kindergarten when we read Brown Bear or the Hungry Caterpillar, but my love for reading came to me in second grade. I was slacking in English class and my parents and teachers didn’t know what to do. So they came up with a plan to put me in an extra reading class that would help me learn and keep up with the other students. I didn’t love the idea at first, but I did it because my parents wanted me to. In this extra reading class they made us read short stories that I thought were very boring. Then we began reading longer stories and eventually we read an entire book. I can’t remember exactly what stories we all read, but eventually I

Just like many other children, I was taught to read and write by my parents. As far as I can remember, I was easily taught the alphabet and how to put words together. They got me letter blocks so I can put them

Many different events in my life lead up to my ability to read. There are words all arounds no matter where we go, so not learning how to read was never an option for me. My mother got me interested in reading first because as a child she would sit me on her lap and read short children stories to me. At night time, she would tuck me in and read me a bed time story. Her voice flowed so smoothly through each word and she even mad the sound effects to make the story come alive. It became a point in time where I would no longer wait for my mother to read to me, I would take out a book and attempt to read on my own. Not knowing what any of the words meant or what they were saying I would try my best to read them still. That was only the beginning for me, when I enrolled in kindergarten and my teacher would assign homework to us there was always some form of reading that was required. I would sit at the kitchen table struggling to

I started reading at about 3 and a half years old. I would constantly have my parents tell me the sounds each letter made, pointing to fridge magnets, magazines, and anything else with words. I began to memorize the sounds that went with letters, which led me into being able to put the sounds together when the letters were strung together into a word. I learned how to speed read in 3rd grade, and would even annotate in the margins as if I was conversing with the characters and the author before I knew it could help me academically. I would challenge myself to see how fast I could get through a book. Despite my love for reading, I do not do it nearly as much as I would like nowadays. I do not have enough time to devote to a book, and when I am reading I like to be very involved in the story.

Many different events in my life lead up to my ability to read. There are words all around no matter where we go, so not learning how to read was never an option for me. My mother got me interested in reading first because as a child she would sit me on her lap and read short children's stories to me. At night time, she would tuck me in and read me a bedtime story. Her voice flowed so smoothly through each word and she even mad the sound effects to make the story come alive. It became a point in time where I would no longer wait for my mother to read into me, I would take out a book and attempt to read on my own. Not knowing what any of the words meant or what they were saying I would try my best to read them still. That was only the beginning for me, when I enrolled in kindergarten and my teacher would assign homework to us there was always some form of reading that was required. I would sit at the kitchen table, struggling to pronounce each word.