Annotation Blog #12: What Should Colleges Teach? Part 3 (Fish)

1) Summary/ Main Points
Fish starts with three important questions that are remain answered; he focuses mostly on question 3. He begins talking about the school systems in middle and high school (except Catholic schools) saying they "are not teaching writing skills in an effective way, if they are teaching them at all" (pg1). Throughout the article he talks about his own students and methods he teaches to them. Exercises he emphasizes on are about sentence structure. When reading his article I also noticed Fish mentions "standard English" and "formal" into discussions of education and how everyone should learn English. I also noticed that he uses a ton of big, sophisticated words to sound smarter which I can tell why Young argued with him.

2) Quotes & Reactions/ Responses
-"Unfortunately, however, reading is not the favorite pastime of today's youth and debate societies don't have the cachet they once did; so my insistence that a narrowly focused writing course be required for everyone stands" (pg2).
I agree with the first part of this quote, although I don't think having a strict writing course will help the youth's reading. I don't like reading for fun, and I definitely won't like it more if English class gets stricter about it. I think we should make some things about class broader so it grabs students' interests not teaching them knowledge they don't care about and are forced to learn.
-" Im still trying to work them out" (pg2).
I kind of smirked when I read this because he asks good questions that are a counter argument to his thoughts about classroom education and he doesn't even know the answers to them. This makes it sound like he isn't credible .
-" You're not going to be able to change the world if you are not equipped with the tool that speak to its present condition. You don't strike a blow against a power structure by making yourself vulnerable to its prejudices (pg3).
This quote caught my eye because I distinctively remember Young arguing again this statement. Young brought up that people who judge others for their dialects/ language are at fault because of their attitude. Fish is saying that they are making themselves "vulnerable to its prejudices". Which makes no sense and he is obviously referencing standard English.

3) Questions for Discussion
-Why is he using such sophisticated/ big words? It makes it as hard to read as someone who writes in all slang; I have to read it 5 times over still
- How is it a "disaster" "having conversations with students about linguistic systems and democratic values"?? (pg3)
-Why does he keep saying "and then get on with it" or just "get on with it"?? sounds very rude in his article when he is talking about other people's languages.