Assignment 1.1
Summary and Personal Response – Draft Version

By:
STUDENT NAME: Truong Quang Le

TO:
Professor: Atia Yasmeen

COURSE NAME:
ENG 115 – English Composition

STRAYER UNIVERSITY
ARLINGTON CAMPUS
2013
1. Identify the source (writer and title of essay) and state his or her most important point in your own words. Suki Kim is the author of the essay “Facing poverty with a rich girl’s habits” which is contained in her autobiography book, namely “Interpreter”. The origin of this title was stemmed from her real life experience. The most important point in this essay is her life changing. Suki Kim emphasizes that she was grown up in the rich family. Unfortunately, her family suffered from her dad’s bankruptcy which was considered to be criminal problem, causing of going to prison in Korea. In order to avoid this legal responsibility, her dad decided to move the whole family to New York, United States. The story of her life changing is an interesting experience for Kim when she was transformed from high class person to lower class as a poor kid. In this circumstance, she began a trip of new life forever. Her essay points out the way of handling to the life differences and what was called new generation, namely 1.5. Also, it emphasizes that transferring to new life circumstance is not easy for teenagers in 1980s. 2. Summarize the other main points and their supporting details in separate paragraphs. One of the important points is the difficulties Kim met in new life. As she mentioned, adapting to US is not easy when learning English is always her big trouble, especially for her case of confronting “poverty with a rich girl’s habits and memory” (Kim, 2004, pg 63). The essay points out that Kim tries to watch “Three’s Company” in order to absorb English (Kim, 2004, pg 63). Additionally, changing social status from rich class to poor in terms of switching life is also a big obstacle for those who never paid their attention to financial situation. In the case of Kim, she suffered from losing financial assistance as well as her tutors. Furthermore, getting used to new education environment also gave her a huge challenge when there is a disparity of US and Korea in terms of student’s attitude. In US at that time, student showed less respective behavior by doing bad things such as painting on school walls. The other crucial point is that because of changing life, Kim get used to lots of minor stuff which she had never tried before. When she was 13 years old, she began to learn how to use the public transportation. In the time stay in Korea, Kim’s homework was always assisted by her tutors and her chores such as laundry were not her duty. However, in her new life circumstance, she learned how to do all of these stuffs independently. In the period of learning in middle class, Kim used public transportation to go to school and finished all chores by herself. Additionally, Kim has tried to keep original culture no matter where she stays, what she does, or who she will become. In the essay, in the time of adapting US environment, Kim demonstrated that she was going to accept who to become new person. However, she recognized that she still kept her original lifestyle in her soul even she was staying in new geographic region. Kim points out that, her beliefs and culture are still the same no matter where she lived. 3. Discuss the (1) writer’s purpose, (2) genre, (3) audience, and (4) tone (attitude). In the essay, Kim’s main purpose is to demonstrate to audiences that she has lots of experience to confront the changing of life status and adapting to live in other region, namely United States, with new beliefs and cultures. She wants to emphasize that there is a big challenge for adapting new culture, custom, or belief because of original concepts which she already get used to. Kim’s genre can be identified in some ways. However, narrative seems to be the best alternative for her genre with lot of explanations throughout the essay. It can be considered that she wrote her essay based on her childhood memory. In my opinion, Kim tries to convey her story to those who also stay in trouble or same challenges. One of audience’s groups should be teenager girls who confront and experience of changing life. By relating her true story, her essay may get attention of not only the people staying in same challenges but also those who want to understand her life. There are variety of tones used in her writing such as sadness, confusing, or frustrating etc. Also, at the end of the essay, the tone of achievement was applied to encourage reader’s feeling. Furthermore, her tone showing to readers is sometimes calm down when making decisions in order to demonstrate the success of adjusting herself in new circumstance which leads to her whole life changing. 4. Describe your emotional response to the essay. Based on the essay, I wonder what I will do if I put myself under Kim’s shoes. And in that situation, how I am able to face to same challenges is also an intricate question for me. It is hard to figure out the way to confront lots of difficult obstacles such as residing in other regions, learning other languages, adapting new lifestyle in terms of belief or culture, or facing many small things that have never been taught. That is the reason for me to admire those who successfully face to these same challenges. As an international student, I came to US when I am mature enough. However, there are still lots of troubles for me to handle in new environment. In Kim’s case, she initiated her life changing when she was 13 years old. Therefore, her story shows the great effort of conquering challenges.

Reference

Kim, S. (November 21, 2004). Facing Poverty With a Rich Girl's Habits. nytimes.com. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/21/nyregion/thecity/21kim.html?_r=0
In Roen, D, (Ed.), The brief McGraw-Hill guide: Writing for college, writing for life: (2nd ed.). (pp. 62 – 64).
Suki Kim. (2013). wikipedia.org. Retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suki_Kim.