1.) Gee defines Discourses (capital D) as “saying (writing)-doing-being-valuing-believing combinations”. This means that one cannot just simply learn a certain discipline, they must be involved in it. One must engulf themselves in the culture of what they are trying to become. In Amy Cuddy’s TED Talk, she says, “Where are you being evaluated, either by your friends? For teenagers, it’s at the lunchroom table. For some people it’s speaking at a school board meeting. It might be giving a pitch or giving a talk like this or doing a job interview.” In these situations, someone is put into a public relation and has to act a certain way. One is enveloped in the culture, almost just dropped into it. Gee says that one must “apprentice” a master in the Discourse in order to truly become a master themselves. They must be connected to the people around them and act the way that they do (e.g.: viewing a linguist and how they act in order for someone to become a linguist themselves)

2.) A primary Discourse is a Discourse that is not taught at all. It is obtained by being a member of a “primary socializing group”. These groups can be a family, tribe, clan, etc. This Discourse is the foundation of who you are along with for Discourses while you grow up and live and learn. Secondary Discourses are Discourses that involve non-home based social interactions. They need one or more Discourse.

4.) Amy Cuddy describes nonverbal communication as body language, how you present yourself to others. This nonverbal behavior is important to those who would be in the Discourse of business because you need to be able to present yourself in a confident manner. If you show up to a business deal shrunk down into your chair while holding your arms, you most likely will not close the deal; you do not seem to know what you are doing since you are not very confident in what you need to present. But if you confidently stand in front of your clients stretched out, you seem as though you know what you are doing and seem to be able to take initiative; this would most likely help you to close the deal with your client. When Cuddy talks about the interviews that were set up in the lab, the people who took more confident and powerful poses were the ones who got the job. But those who did not pose confidently did not get the job.

5.)

I added this annotation because I was really wondering if it was such a good thing to be forced to do something you are uncomfortable with. Yes, I agree that it is go to go out of your comfort zone, but when you are forced to do something you do not like and to do it for a prolonged period of time… is that really good for everyone?

I chose to make this annotation because I wanted to connect Cuddy’s words to my own life. In my statistics class, there are a bunch of football players on the right side of the room. Whenever they walk in the room they are loud and confident and try to take up as much space as possible (as Cuddy has talked about). I found this passage relatable to my own life.

This is just a simple annotation, but I wanted to include it because I wanted to be able to make more connections to life. A commonly used phrase says something along the lines of “returning to one’s roots”. This line from Gee reminded me of that phrase. When I am able to connect things to real life situations and phrases, it helps me to learn better.

I decided to make this annotation because I was confused. Gee had said that primary and secondary Discourses were like learning a new language. But before he had said that the way you learn a second language is a bad thing. I wrote this down to possibly bring up during the class discussion to help clarify this a little bit more.

 

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