Delpit/Gee Blog

Gee and Delpits ideas and opinions on the overall study of discourse and how it defines you as a person really interested me and helped my understand why we change in different situations. Honestly, I didn't know what a discourse was and meant at first. I just knew and had experienced having to shift your personality around different people to fulfill the need to "fit in." Then reading Gee initially I realized that I have experienced this type of Discourse he taught of. Reading the entire article I didn't really analyze, I mostly just took in what Gee had to say and soaked it in. Then knowing I would have to read Lisa Delpit's "The Politics of Teaching Literate Discourse" I knew that there would be some objections having to do with Gee's ideas and opinions. So knowing this I thought about all of the things I didn't agree with in Gee's article. The number one thing that stood out to me was his idea that he stated his notion that people who have not been born into dominant discourses will find it exceedingly difficult, if not impossible, to acquire such a discourse. Which I totally disagree with, isn't this the whole point of a discourse? Shifting yourself to fit into different discourses? I also disagree with his idea that, "To learn the 'rules' required for admission into a particular dominant discourse, individuals must already have access to the social institutions connected to that discourse--if you're not already in, don't expect to get in," (Delpit 546). I think that if you are born middle class or some other social standard, it may be hard, but you can connect to another place and class. That is the whole point of discourse, mastering it may be impossible, but nobody will ever know because you never 100% know if you are really on the same level as someone else. Only that person knows what it's like be in their own shoes.

Another part, that I find even more troubling is the idea that "An individual who is born into one discourse with one set of values may experience major conflicts when attempting to acquire another discourse with another set of values," (Delpit 546). I was born into one discourse, and I have my own set of values but this doesn't limit me one bit in attempting to acquire other discourses with the friends and peers around me. Especially the fact that I wish to become a teacher, I can't limit myself to just to connect with kids who "have the same ideas" as me and look like me with my skin color. I as a teacher need to be on the same level with all of my students and even parents. This causes me to acquire several discourses so that my students and parents can feel that they can relate to me. From the outside looking in, I don't think that either writers have their ideas as to where I can 100% agree but I can for sure wee where both of them are coming from.