Personal Experience In Sherman Alexie'sSuperman And Me

Alexie's father was the reason he began to read which later became his passion. His father loved to read, and even though they did not have a ton of money, his father went out of his way to stock up on books. One-day Alexie decided to pick up one of his father's books and taught himself how to read. Before that, he had never read a book and could not even understand the words. A paragraph intrigued him; each house on the reservation was a paragraph, and each member of his family was a paragraph. The family members were separate people; however, there were still related making all of them together an essay. Then there was the Superman comic book he picked up one day. Although he could not read the panels of words the illustrations told the story. He would make up a story to go with the pictures and pretend to read the panels. Looking back at these times Alexie realized how lucky he was growing up with all these resources to teach

In the short story “Superman and Me” which was written by Sherman Alexie, details the autobiography of Alexie’s life when he grew up on the Spokane Indian Reservation. In the beginning, Alexie introduces his audience with a bundle of information and vigorous conflicts that he had learned to overcome. Alexie’s first confrontation came the very day he was born, when someone discovered “he was born with water in his brain and not expected to survive.” Once Alexie conquered this deadly situation, he discovered this unique passion towards reading. At the age of 3, he became very peculiar about a certain comic book called Superman, and that’s when he opened it up, analyzed it and became deeply affectionate about the power knowledge. Alexie also seemed to pick up this intelligence through his father, as he was one of the only Indians to attend a catholic school, and obtain an education. Alexie’s next additional challenge began the day he started school. He was teased by his classmates, degraded by his teachers and abandoned by his fellow community members all because he’s smart Indian. Also, the author begins to explain how the Indians on the reservation saw failure as this normal thing, they accepted the fact that they weren’t supposed to get a decent education. Alexie seemed to always find a way around diversity even when it looked like the whole world was against him because he didn’t follow the stereotypical “dumb” Indian boy. Peoples arrogance and crude remarks towards him is

In the passage, “Superman and Me” Sherman Alexie explains to the readers the life of an Indian and how he defeats and tries to help others defeat the stereotype of an Indian. As a kid, Sherman Alexie dealt with stereotypes about reading and writing based upon the values of his tribe; however, he taught himself how to read from Superman comic books. Throughout the text, he uses figurative language, and quotes that mean way more that what they look like when you read them. One quote that really stood out was, “ I throw my weight against their locked doors. The door holds.

After having read the essays by Sherman Alexie and Stephen King, it is fair to say that there are a fair amount of similarities given that the context is different in each. Alexie’s piece was on how the writer saved himself and aims to do so for those around him. While King’s Piece gives advice on the benefits of reading, especially for a writer and doing something one loves. One notion mainly expressed in both essays is one should read as much as possible, whatever is possible, wherever and whenever.

Alexie goes on to demonstrate how his passion for reading influenced his childhood. He describes that, before he could even read, he would recognize what a paragraph was. Alexie explains, “I realized that a paragraph was a fence that held words” (Alexie 279). Then, Alexie further explains how he correlated other things in his life as paragraphs, such as the reservation in respect to the United States or the individual members of his family. He goes on to clarify how he found the Superman comic and viewed each panel, with text and illustrations, separately as its own paragraph. Alexie states that while reading the comic he says, “Aloud, I pretend to read the words” (Alexie 280). He knew these paragraphs together told a story and even though he could not read, he used the pictures to assume what the narrative was saying. With these details of his early beginnings of learning to read, the reader can further establish that his family’s economic status had no

Sherman Alexie recalls his childhood memory of learning to read, and his teaching experience in “The Joy of Reading and Writing: Superman and Me”. He devotes his interest to reading. By this way, he breaks the stereotype that Indian boys are expected to be stupid and dumb, and later on he becomes a successful writer because of his endeavor to read. Alexie vividly narrates his younger life by using metaphor and repetition with a confident tone, in order to strengthen his description of his reading talent, his influence to the other Indian boys and how he struggles in poverty to change his life.

Throughout this essay, Alexie uses an extended analogy. Alexie’s analogies help the reader understand the purpose of a paragraph. He realized that “a paragraph was a fence that held words. The words inside a paragraph worked together for a common purpose.” He compares a paragraph with a fence which brings clarity to his understanding of a paragraph. From this understanding, he began to think of everything in terms of paragraphs. For example, “Our reservation was a small paragraph within the United States. My family’s house was a paragraph, distinct from the other paragraphs of Labrets to the north, the Fords to our south and the Tribal School to the west.” He uses this idea that each paragraph is an identity and inside those identities are smaller ones. Alexie even says that his family is like a seven-paragraph essay, each different but linked by genetics and common experiences. This allusion allows the audience to see Alexie’s point of view on the world.

Alexie’s narrator describes a story of assumption and discrimination through not only the thoughts of the narrator and his life, but also how the narrator explains his thoughts and the diction he uses as he recalls certain moments. Throughout the passage, the narrator demonstrates how isolated he is, not only in the country where hia people are shunned, but also with others that are in a situation similar to his. Not only is there a feeling of loneliness and isolation, but also guilt of relation to how Indians are being treated today. Through stories of realistic fiction, Alexie addresses serious issues that others fail to.

The occasion of the story is a crucial advice about critical reading: one has to “read between the lines” to fully understand an idea. According to the speaker, he not only wants the readers to “read between the lines” but also to write between the lines to effectively enhance one’s critical reading skills. The speaker encourages readers to take notes inside a book to fully retain one’s knowledge about the book and make it a

This rhetorical analysis will bring you through the "How to Fight Monsters" chapter of Sherman Alexie 's story : An Absolutely True Diary of a Part Time Indian. This book is a semi-autobiography that won the 2007 U.S. National Book Award For Young People 's Literature. This story is about an Indian boy from a poor reservation with an alcoholic father, who wishes for a better life. In order to achieve this better life, Junior decides to move to another school in order to have " hope" for his future. During this transition into his new school Junior is marked as a traiter and looses the one close friend he had on the reservation. At the opening scene of the story Junior is asking his parents "who has the most hope?" In his desperate

The story explains how he had severe mental and physical abuse and how they treated him like an animal while serving his sentence. The only way he was able to hold himself was through reading and writing poetry, stories, and art. What made his story so special is that he is able to not only overcome so many obstacles, but he also is able to better himself and get educated. He shows us readers how even if you’re in a bad situation like his, nothing could stop you from accomplishing your dream and educating yourself to become a better version of yourself.

The mind is a powerful thing. This is a theme that is shared among the five short stories we have read in class (Happy Trails) (Christmas at Grammas) (The Mimis) (Crazy) (The Boy Without a Flag). This theme talks about how peoples minds are very influential on your decisions whether you realize it or not and how peoples emotions and beliefs change over time.

In “Superman and Me”, Sherman Alexie shows that low expectations rarely lead to success. Sherman says about himself, “He reads Grapes of Wrath in kindergarten, while other kids are struggling with Dick and Jane.” This shows that at a young age Sherman was excelling at reading and at school. Sherman did not set low expectations for himself, which many high school students do, and went beyond what was expected. Another quote is when Sherman says, “We were Indian children who were expected to be stupid.” Sherman never cared about the stereotypes other people thought of him. He always set the bar high for himself, which many high school students and teenagers do not do. As he kept setting his expectations higher and higher he achieved greater and

Alexie remembers picking up his father’s books before he could read, and how unfamiliar the words looked. He remembers the first time he realized the purpose of a paragraph and referred to it as “…a fence that held words” (583). He started recognizing things as a paragraph; his family, the reservation and the surrounding houses. This emphasizes that he connected everything he saw to what he learned from reading.

There has been a long pattern of mistreatment of people of color over the course of American History, including the forced relocation of the majority of the Native American population onto reserves. In Superman and Me, Native American author Sherman Alexie writes about his experiences growing up on an Indian Reservation in Washington, and how breaking away from the norms of his culture affected his life. The people around him celebrated their culture, but hid it in the presence of white people, actions presumably formed from years of discrimination to avoid drawing attention to themselves. However, instead of remaining quiet and reserved in the presence of white people, Alexie chose to be different. He states that they were “Indian children who were expected to be stupid”, and “expected to fail in the non-Indian world”, but Alexie refused to be constrained by these expectations (Alexie 17). He was an avid reader, with a purpose. Alexie says, “I was trying to save my life” (18). For him, a life on an Indian Reservation was one where he would never be able to reach his full potential. He had to get out to save