Posted: February 28th, 2023

english

Home Run: My Journey Back to Korean FoodAuthor(s): roy ahn

Source: Gastronomica , Vol. 9, No. 4 (Fall 2009), pp. 12-15

Published by: University of California Press

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1525/gfc.2009.9.4.

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gastronomica: the journal of food and culture, vol.9, no.4, pp.12–15, issn 1529-3262. © 2009 by the regents of the university of california. all rights reserved. please direct all requests for permission to

photocopy or reproduce article content through the university of california press’s rights and permissions web site, http://www.ucpressjournals.com/reprintinfo.asp. doi: 10.1525/gfc.2009.9.4.12.

Savings Plans chief among them. But as a Korean-American,
I was also worrying about our son’s cultural identity. I espe-
cially looked forward to introducing him to my culinary
heritage. That task would be solely up to me—Amy is from
a multiple-generation Wisconsin family with European
roots, and our culinary union is best described as Land of
Rice meets Land of Cheese. Consider some of the foods
you might see in her parents’ house near Madison: pepper
Jack, butterkasse, and Limberger cheeses, along with sauer-
kraut, pickled Brussels sprouts, and wursts of all kinds.

As for my parents, they won’t be around to introduce my
son to their native foods, teach him how to bow properly to
his elders, sing Korean nursery rhymes, or explain to him
that the number four represents bad luck for Koreans. Both
of them died in a car accident when I was twenty-four.

I was born in Seoul in 1972. My parents, a physician and
an elementary school teacher, were concerned about raising
children in South Korea at a time when military conflict
with North Korea seemed imminent, so they immigrated
to the United States with my older sister and me when I
was four. My official, stamped Korean passport noted that
I was “90 cm” tall and weighed “11 kg”—about the equiva-
lent of a twenty-five-pound bag of rice. But soon enough I
began to grow, my chubbiness a testament to my successful
American acculturation.

As a kid living in suburban Detroit, I loved two things
above all else: Baskin-Robbins and the Detroit Tigers. (I
still think the ice-cream-inside-miniature-batting-helmet
remains one of the industry’s greatest inventions.) Inside
our apartment I would mark out my own baseball dia-
mond, sprinkle the floor with talcum powder, and, using
my father’s thick medical textbooks as bases, slide my way
across the room as though I were Lou Brock. Like many
American boys, I dreamed of becoming a professional
baseball player but lacked the athleticism to play beyond
high school. My dream of pro ball quashed, I once told my
mother that I wanted to become president of a Fortune 500
company. She laughed. A Caucasian businessman would

Home Run
My Journey Back to Korean Food

culture | roy ahn

Last winter, I dined with my then-pregnant wife, Amy,
at a Korean restaurant in a suburban strip mall, where all
good Korean food establishments seem to be. This hole-
in-the-wall, located on a stretch of highway outside Boston
flanked by retail plazas and ranch houses, was filled with
Koreans like myself, plus a Caucasian or two, Amy being
one. The proprietor sat us in a spot away from the section
with barbecue-grill tabletops, but the smell of seared beef
mixed with garlic, soy sauce, and brown sugar still perme-
ated our clothing. (Pop quiz: How long does the smell of
beef bulgogi linger in a pair of blue jeans? Answer: Until it
gets thrown into a washing machine.)

The waitresses spun like dervishes from table to kitchen
to table, bringing out vegetable and fish banchan dishes
in one pass and clearing them away in another, with little
respite between customers to wipe their beads of sweat. I
took particular notice of the diners’ white bowls, which
reminded me of outsized pieces from Go, my late father’s
favorite board game.

After a cup of tea and our own banchan, we awaited the
main courses. Mine would be galbi-chim—braised short
ribs—served with rice. I imagined pulling the meat off
the bone and the flecks of burnt sesame seeds staining the
white rice a deep brown, so I was understandably shocked
when the waitress placed before me a bowl of oxtail soup.
Had she misunderstood? No, I quickly realized. I had
ordered the wrong dish.

On the surface, confusing galbi-tang with galbi-chim would
seem an innocuous lapse. Both are beef dishes whose names
share the same Korean-language prefix. But the two couldn’t
be more different. Imagine a Bavarian confusing knockwurst
with bratwurst! As I lowered pieces of kimchi into the beef
broth to give it a spice kick, and as Amy sipped her way
through her bowl of bean-curd-and-vegetable stew, I won-
dered whether my slipup was an omen: could I be losing
my ethnic bearings? If so, there could hardly be a worse time.

I was harboring all sorts of yuppie anxieties about first-
time fatherhood—the unit cost of diapers and 529 College

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fries with greasy chili that turned the paper wrapper orange.
It’s worth noting that two Korean-American boys were
among my circle, but we rarely went out for food from the
homeland. Whatever the reason, they were much more
comfortable than I was with being Korean-American. Still,
when my circle of guy friends went out, we’d usually opt
for fried zucchini with ranch dressing at Carl’s Jr., chicken
burritos at a Mexican food chain on Ventura Boulevard, or
pasta at the Cheesecake Factory in Beverly Hills, all the while
rocking out in our cars to the Beastie Boys and Run-dmc.

When I got home, I chased down all that American
food with Korean fare. My mother, who spoke to me
almost exclusively in her native tongue, cooked it herself or
stocked up on prepared foods from our local Korean super-
markets. Variations of kimchi abounded: red-pepper-flecked
radish cubes, cucumber slices, bellflower root, and cabbage.
Occasionally, too, there was yellow daikon, which paired

never allow a Korean to have that job, she said, steering me
into the sciences instead.

My childhood love of ice cream notwithstanding, my
favorite Korean dish was a bowl of rice drizzled with soy
sauce and topped with a raw egg. I learned to crack the
egg over the rice while it was still piping hot, so the egg
would cook a little. Sometimes my mother would add
some sliced daikon to this silky porridge that glided so
easily down my throat. Over time, I began to add my own
flourishes—a handful of cooked ground beef and a pinch
of dried red-pepper flakes.

During my teenage years, after we moved to Los
Angeles, I chose to downplay my ethnic roots. I was a Ralph
Lauren–clad American teenager living in “The Valley,” and
my Korean heritage was an inconvenience. This applied to
my culinary traditions, too. When I went out, I ate all the
things my friends did—pizza, hot dogs, enchiladas, and

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knew, she watched a lot of Korean soap operas on the vcr
and seemed content to have a vicarious American experi-
ence through her children.

Little Korean boys do not take formal cooking lessons
from their mothers; the kitchen is considered a woman’s
domain. Nonetheless, I made excuses to spend time with
her there. Cooking Korean dishes means a lot of sautéing,
boiling, grilling, and frying. She rarely baked. I considered
my mother a great cook, although she always told me she
was only so-so, modestly claiming there were other women
at church who possessed skills far superior to her own.

I don’t recall that we did a lot of talking while I watched
her cook. She did not share with me the latest in church
gossip, nor did she try to impart wisdom in the form of
hackneyed analogies about food and life. Such things are
better left for movies involving white people and karate.
Instead, I recall marveling at the way she so deftly used a
paring knife to peel fruit, her thumb applying pressure
until the skin unfurled in a continuous ribbon. She had
good hands for peeling, with strong fingers, neither long
nor stubby. I watched her make simple dishes that, later
on, when my parents both went to work, became my
latchkey-kid staples.

There was one American experience my entire family
did enjoy: eating steamed crabs at the Redondo Beach Pier.
The dining experience was far from formal. We’d place our
order, lay several pages of the Los Angeles Times atop one of
the many communal tables, and wait for the crabs to steam.
I remember how excited I was to buy lemons (for clean-
ing our hands afterward) and rent crab mallets. I’d crack
my crab with authority, as though I were a judge lowering
a gavel. Using my hands to eat, I tried my best to avoid
touching the mustard-colored crab guts. Afterward, I played
Skee-Ball until I drained my parents of ones and fives. As
a family, we walked off our meals along the beach, some-
times until the sun set. My parents seemed so contented
there. My mother was at ease at the beach, less concerned
about fitting in, and she laughed a lot.

For a few years after my parents’ deaths, I lived in a
weird fog, unable to focus on my future or reconcile my
past. I lost interest in all things Korean, including food.
When my mother was alive, she would ask me questions
in Korean and I would respond in English. After she was
gone, my grip on the language loosened.

I began to work summers as a cook at an artists’ colony
café in a resort town in the Rocky Mountains. There,
under the best of all possible circumstances—cooking
for, and being inspired by, the master printmakers, wood-
workers, painters, and ceramic artists who came through

well with ground beef, spinach, and rice. Or she would
make ginseng chicken stew and japchae, a stir-fry of glass
noodles, sliced carrot and onion, slivers of beef, and pink-
and-white fishcake in a soy and sesame-oil sauce. Food to
fuel the brain for studying deep into the night: a mother’s
loving manifesto for her son. I never had the heart to tell
her that the food had the opposite effect—the sugar crash
put me to sleep atop my school papers.

I should mention that our house in California had two
refrigerators: one in the kitchen for American food, and
one in the garage for the Korean food. I’m not sure why my
mother was willing to go dual-fridge. I imagine she’d had
enough bellyaching from me about the garlicky stench of

“Mom and Dad’s food” and complaints of how embarrassing
it would be if my friends ever got a whiff of the real stuff we
ate. She must have decided it wasn’t worth the aggravation.

My father, for his part, took my resistance to Korean
food poorly. He’d wanted me to be proud of his homeland.

“Italian food smells, too,” he once told me. But Korean
dishes flavored with garlic smell different than Italian ones,
and I imagined the odor exuding from my every pore.
Leftover Korean food was even worse, announcing itself like
a flatulent guest at a wedding. Never mind that a diet of
smelly fermented vegetables, stews, noodles, and meats has
nourished Koreans for generations.

You may imagine that my father disapproved of
American ways. On the contrary, he immersed himself in
the culture of his adopted country. Interstate road trips
to amusement parks, Kentucky Fried Chicken, bowling.
While he loved being Korean, he was fascinated by cultures
other than his own and especially enjoyed commingling
them. To this day, I can’t picture a bucket of kfc extra-
crispy without adjacent bowls of white rice and kimchi.
My father’s stacks of Japanese novels were piled right
alongside Westerns by Louis L’Amour, and he listened to
instructional language tapes on Spanish and Mandarin in
his spare time. He often serenaded us on road trips with his
rendition of “Tears on My Pillow,” a number he’d learned
from the soundtrack of Grease. Once, I watched him eat
a bowl of white rice with ketchup, straight up. Another time,
he used chopsticks to pluck Vienna sausages out of their
tin. He was so pleased with his concoctions, so original in
his wackiness, that I believe I inherited my own willingness
to improvise from him.

My mother, by contrast, was never comfortable in the
States. She struggled to pick up English and didn’t make
many friends outside her Korean church. A short woman
with permed black hair, large brown eyes, and caramel-
colored skin, darker than that of most Korean women I

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Amy and I live near a Korean supermarket that sells a
lot of foods from my youth: perfectly circular Shingo pears,
each one cradled in its own Styrofoam nest, and too-sweet
candies made from sweet bean, jelly, and agar-agar. I think
how cool it will be to have these foods at Charlie’s first
birthday party. For that celebration I can imagine cook-
ing dishes that capitalize on my knowledge of Korean and
non-Korean cuisines. I will sauté fiddleheads with leeks and
reserve the leek fronds for garnish. I will make potstickers,
doing my best, just as my mother did, to get that even seal
on the wrappers, which is so critical to keeping the ground
pork and vegetable filling moist. I will put creative spins on
Korean classics. I will wrap bibimbap ingredients—sliced
beef, spinach, carrot slivers, bean sprouts, fried egg, rice—
in nori straightjackets, drizzle them with wasabi aioli, and
present these oversized, funnel-shaped hand rolls in metal
Belgian frites stands. For dessert, I will experiment by bak-
ing sweet red beans en croûte.

Of course, I am getting ahead of myself. At the moment,
Charlie’s diet is limited to two options—fresh breast milk,
or thawed-and-warmed breast milk.

Another way Charlie will learn is through language.
At the peak of one of his nighttime crying fits last week, I
found myself soothing him with calming words—“It’s okay,
it’s okay”—but in Korean, the way my mother might have.
Amy is learning the language, too. She has taken classes in
Korean through an adult-education center. In fact, she can
read and write Korean far better than I can. I intend to join
her in these classes, or at least sit in front of a laptop with
Charlie and complete our Rosetta Stone exercises together.
I mean, who wouldn’t benefit from learning the Korean
word for elephant (koo-kee-ree)? Perhaps this way I will
register even farther east on the Korea-meter.

Recently, we had a family dinner at a Korean restaurant
in Cambridge. It was a more formal, or, at any rate, more
urbane place than the one where I had made my ordering
mistake. The host put us in a private room where we had to
take our shoes off. During dinner, as Amy nursed Charlie
beneath a cotton shawl, I dissected the ingredients in the
banchan I ate, the proper method of constructing our ssam
(lettuce wraps), using rice and meat and red kochujang
paste. I pronounced aloud the Korean names of as many
dishes as I could. And this time I remembered most of
them accurately.

Amy fears that our son won’t get a sufficient dose of
Korean culture. It’s a familiar refrain. But I will make sure
to offer Charlie Korean food and, as my parents did with
me, exercise patience if he doesn’t want any. We will stick
to one fridge in our house.g

the colony—I learned to make crème brûlée, venison
stroganoff, and other European dishes. In that nurturing
atmosphere, as my confidence in cooking grew, so did
my expressiveness through food. (Within limits, of course:
my idea for a “healthful” sugar cookie made with lemon
Ricola cough drops never made it onto diners’ plates.) But
something even more unexpected occurred: latent Korean
influences began to insinuate themselves into the food I
prepared. I fried rectangles of tofu in vegetable oil. I ten-
derized flank steak in garlicky kalbi marinades. I slipped
scallions into whatever dishes I could. Sesame oil found its
way into my sauces.

I can’t say that I channeled my parents by cooking
Korean food, or that food reinvigorated my innate sense of
Korean-ness. I’m not at all certain about the synapses that
get fired when human beings experience emotions from
cooking and eating the foods of their childhoods. All I can
say for sure is that something sublime happened in that
mecca of Korean cuisine—the Rockies—where I rediscov-
ered my native food heritage. My mother left behind no
recipe cards. Instead, I created dishes based on my recol-
lections of watching her cook, imagining her in that café
kitchen with me, telling me to add a few more red-pepper
flakes or dial down the sesame oil.

I still harbor mixed feelings about my parents’ move to
the United States. Would they still be alive today if we had
stayed in Korea? It is, of course, a fool’s errand to speculate
about something like that. What I do know is that, because
of their sacrifice, I have had terrific experiences and oppor-
tunities, and that our son, Charlie, will inevitably have the
same. One day, if he so chooses, he may even become a
corporate ceo—a Fortune 500 one at that. Or a professional
baseball player, if I have any say in the matter.

As I write this, Charlie is just three months old. He
has my mother’s skin tone and big eyes, but otherwise no
physical features that specifically remind me of either of my
parents. He has my faint black eyebrows and Amy’s broad
smile. And because he does not cry when I play songs—
well, not as much as usual, anyway—I’ve come to believe
that Charlie likes music, especially party music, as much
I do. Just last week, he and I danced in our living room to
the Commodores’ “Brick House.”

Meanwhile, food remains a primary conduit through
which I hope to instill in him the lessons of one half of his
ethnic roots. I’m sad that my parents aren’t around to help
indoctrinate him into their culture. Even though it might
be naive to think that by teaching him to eat and cook
Korean he’ll also learn about who they were, my gut tells
me this is so.

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Incorporating Evidence Into Your Essay

When Should You Incorporate Evidence?

Once you have formulated your claim, your thesis (see the
WTS pamphlet, “How to Write a Thesis Statement,” for
ideas and tips), you should use evidence to help strengthen
your thesis and any assertion you make that relates to your
thesis. Here are some ways to work evidence into your
writing:

• Offer evidence that agrees with your stance up to a

point, then add to it with ideas of your own.

• Present evidence that contradicts your stance, and then

argue against (refute) that evidence and therefore
strengthen your position.

• Use sources against each other, as if they were experts

on a panel discussing your proposition.

• Use quotations to support your assertion, not merely to

state or restate your claim.

Weak and Strong Uses of Evidence

In order to use evidence effectively, you need to integrate it
smoothly into your essay by following this pattern:

• State your claim.

• Give your evidence, remembering to relate it to the

claim.

• Comment on the evidence to show how it supports the

claim.

To see the differences between strong and weak uses of
evidence, here are two paragraphs.

Weak use of evidence

Today, we are too self-centered. Most
families no longer sit down to eat
together, preferring instead to eat on
the go while rushing to the next
appointment (Gleick 148). Everything
is about what we want.

This is a weak example of evidence because the
evidence is not related to the claim. What does the claim
about self-centeredness have to do with families eating
together? The writer doesn’t explain the connection.

The same evidence can be used to support the same
claim, but only with the addition of a clear connection
between claim and evidence, and some analysis of the
evidence cited.

Stronger use of evidence

Today, Americans are too self-
centered. Even our families don’t
matter as much anymore as they once
did. Other people and activities take
precedence. In fact, the evidence
shows that most American families no
longer eat together, preferring
instead to eat on the go while rushing
to the next appointment (Gleick 148).
Sit-down meals are a time to share and
connect with others; however, that
connection has become less valued, as
families begin to prize individual
activities over shared time, promoting
self-centeredness over group identity.

This is a far better example, as the evidence is more
smoothly integrated into the text, the link between the
claim and the evidence is strengthened, and the
evidence itself is analyzed to provide support for the
claim.

Using Quotations: A Special Type of
Evidence

One effective way to support your claim is to use
quotations. However, because quotations involve
someone else’s words, you need to take special care to
integrate this kind of evidence into your essay. Here are
two examples using quotations, one less effective and
one more so.

Ineffective Use of Quotation

Today, we are too self-centered. “We
are consumers-on-the-run . . . the very
notion of the family meal as a sit-down
occasion is vanishing. Adults and
children alike eat . . . on the way to
their next activity” (Gleick 148).
Everything is about what we want.

This example is ineffective because the quotation is not
integrated with the writer’s ideas. Notice how the writer
has dropped the quotation into the paragraph without
making any connection between it and the claim.
Furthermore, she has not discussed the quotation’s
significance, which makes it difficult for the reader to see
the relationship between the evidence and the writer’s
point.

A More Effective Use of Quotation

Today, Americans are too self-centered.
Even our families don’t matter as much
anymore as they once did. Other people
and activities take precedence, as
James Gleick says in his book, Faster.
“We are consumers-on-the-run . . . the
very notion of the family meal as a
sit-down occasion is vanishing. Adults
and children alike eat . . . on the way
to their next activity” (148). Sit-down
meals are a time to share and connect
with others; however, that connection

has become less valued, as families begin
to prize individual activities over
shared time, promoting self-centeredness
over group identity.

The second example is more effective because it follows
the guidelines for incorporating evidence into an essay.
Notice, too, that it uses a lead-in phrase (“. . . as James
Gleick says in his book, Faster”) to introduce the direct
quotation. This lead-in phrase helps to integrate the
quotation with the writer’s ideas. Also notice that the
writer discusses and comments upon the quotation
immediately afterwards, which allows the reader to see the
quotation’s connection to the writer’s point.

REMEMBER: Discussing the significance of your
evidence develops and expands your paper!

Citing Your Sources

Evidence appears in essays in the form of quotations and
paraphrasing. Both forms of evidence must be cited in your
text. Citing evidence means distinguishing other writers’
information from your own ideas and giving credit to your
sources. There are plenty of general ways to do citations.
Note both the lead-in phrases and the punctuation (except
the brackets) in the following examples:

• Quoting: According to Source X, “[direct

quotation]” ([date or page #]).

• Paraphrasing: Although Source Z argues that

[his/her point in your own words], a
better way to view the issue is [your own
point] ([citation]).

• Summarizing: In her book, Source P’s main

points are Q, R, and S [citation].

Your job during the course of your essay is to persuade
your readers that your claims are feasible and are the most
effective way of interpreting the evidence.

Questions to Ask Yourself When Revising
Your Paper

• Have I offered my reader evidence to substantiate

each assertion I make in my paper?
• Do I thoroughly explain why/how my evidence

backs up my ideas?
• Do I avoid generalizing in my paper by specifically

explaining how my evidence is representative?
• Do I provide evidence that not only confirms but

also qualifies my paper’s main claims?
• Do I use evidence to test and evolve my ideas,

rather than to just confirm them?
• Do I cite my sources thoroughly and correctly?

For free help at any stage of the writing process:

Writing Tutorial Services

Wells Library Information Commons
Indiana University

855-6738
www.indiana.edu/~wts/

See our website for hours, times, and locations

Revised 08/11/11

Using
Evidence

Like a lawyer in a jury trial, a writer must convince her
audience of the validity of her argument by using
evidence effectively. As a writer, you must also use
evidence to persuade your readers to accept your claims.
But how do you use evidence to your advantage? By
leading your reader through your reasoning.

The types of evidence you use change from discipline to
discipline—you might use quotations from a poem or a
literary critic, for example, in a literature paper; you
might use data from an experiment in a lab report.

The process of putting together your argument is called
analysis—it interprets evidence in order to support, test,
and/or refine a claim. The chief claim in an analytical
essay is called the thesis. A thesis provides the
controlling idea for a paper and should be original (that
is, not completely obvious), assertive, and arguable. A
strong thesis also requires solid evidence to support and
develop it because without evidence, a claim is merely
an unsubstantiated idea or opinion.

This pamphlet will cover these basic issues:

• Incorporating evidence effectively.
• Integrating quotations smoothly.
• Citing your sources.

MEAL PLAN: DEVELOPING PARAGRAPHS

M
ain point: Each paragraph should have a main idea (a main point) that is connected to your larger claim for the essay.

E
xplain, Examples, Evidence: You need to explain and reason this main idea. You need to provide examples that
explain the main idea and Evidence that
supports the argument.

A
nalysis: The analysis is your
interpretation of what is being said about an idea, evidence, or examples. You can explain how one idea compares to another idea. You can show if an author is being persuasive, or you can show the strengths and/or weaknesses of an argument. In the analysis
you build your argument and demonstrate how the evidence (quotes, examples) is important to your argument and
supports your argument.

L
ink: It links the paragraph back to the main idea. It closes the paragraph and helps the reader understand the logic of the argument and the main idea.

Example of a student paragraph using MEAL:

The impact of fast food is far reaching beyond the obvious risk to our health. In fact, if we act as unconscious consumers, we might only think of health or convenience and not realize our food choices impact every aspect of our life.

In his book
Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser warns consumers about the far-reaching influence of fast food beyond the restaurant doors. He points out, “The fast food industry has helped to transform not only the American diet, but also our landscape, economy, workforce, and popular culture. Fast food and its consequences have become inescapable, regardless of whether you eat it twice a day, try to avoid it, or have never taken a single bite” (4). Because these fast food companies have such vast purchasing power, they have an effect on how food is produced, what kind of food is produced, and how much it costs. This impacts everybody and all aspects of society, whether we participate in the system or not. People seek the convenience and affordability of certain foods, and forget that their choices tell producers what will sell, and then these companies will cut corners to make profits. Since these multinational companies are so big, so powerful, and so ubiquitous, it affects the diversity of the food supply, the quality of our food, and the price we pay. As responsible consumers, we need to not only be concerned with our individual health or convenience, but also how our food choices may have an impact on the world around us.

Here is a list of verbs and verbal phrases you can use to cite an author and reflect an author’s purpose or point of view:

The author…

admits brings to light conveys

advises cautions declares

affirms claims discusses

argues concludes emphasizes

asks confesses establishes

asserts contends examines

believes maintain s says

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FYS127G Essay #1

DUE DATE: The

first draft is due on Wednesday Feb 22nd.

The final draft of your essay is due on Monday March 6th.

We read Lahiri, Wong, Ahn, Harris, McCorkle and Alvarez. In their stories, the authors talk about their relationship to food and about the purpose and meaning of food. Your purpose for the essay is:

PURPOSE:

· To put 3 texts in conversation with each other by finding a common theme/issue/message in relation to food and its purpose/meaning and compare and contrast how this common theme/issue/message is presented or addressed in the 3 texts.

· To respond to this conversation by reflecting on your own understanding of the theme/issue/message presented in the texts and to come up with your own conclusions.

FORMATTING CRITERIA—IMPORTANT:

· Write 4-5 pages,
double-spaced and in Times New Roman font size 12. The margins must be 1” on all sides. DO NOT insert spaces between paragraphs; just tab once for the first sentence of each paragraph.
INCLUDE the following on the left side upper corner (each entry one line): Your Name, Course Number and Section, Prof. Martinez Earley, Essay # and draft #, date. On the upper right side, INCLUDE a HEADER with your last name and page number.

· Include
all your drafts with your final draft.
Post all your drafts and final draft on Schoology.
Participate in drafting and revising and peer review in a timely manner. Hand in drafts and final revision
on time. Meet with professor once for feedback (in person or via zoom).

·
Follow MLA academic standards for documenting and citing your sources. For example, when you begin talking about a source, introduce the full name and the title of the reading. Thereafter, just include page number in parenthesis, or last name and page number if you do not include the author’s name in the signal phrase: (Harris 49) or (49). You’ll find information on in-text citations and works cited citations in Schoology under each reading assignment.

· Include
a Works Cited page at the end of your essay listing your sources in
alphabetical order by author’s last name. You can copy and paste the citations from Schoology under each reading assignment. Here is an example:

Berry, Wendell. “The Pleasures of Eating.”
Food Matters. Ed. Holly Bauer. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2014. 64-70. Print.

· Proofread read your essay
BEFORE you hand it in. Your essay will not be perfect, but I expect you to correct what you can in terms of grammar, punctuation, formatting errors, and avoidable typos. Sloppy essays are unacceptable.

CONTENT CRITERIA—MOST IMPORTANT:

· Set the context for your essay. Clearly introduce the theme/issue you are discussing in your essay.
Have a main point that addresses the purpose of the essay.

· Support your main point
throughout the essay. Organize
your essay and argument following a logical order. Paragraphs need to have the purpose of supporting the main point for the essay. Develop each paragraph with a controlling idea, logical reasoning, explanations, examples, supporting evidence, and analysis of the evidence.

· Clearly introduce the 3 texts (title and author) and set the context.
Briefly
summarize what the texts are about and what key ideas they present.
But do not limit your discussion to a summary of the sources.
You need to also
analyze how the sources relate to each other, and how they connect to your main idea. Compare and contrast how the common theme/issue is addressed in the texts, look for patterns, analyze the significance of your comparison, and come up with your own conclusions.

· Include at least 4 direct quotes in your essay. You’ll need to set the context for the quote, introduce the quote using a signal phase, quote, and then comment on the significance of the quote by comparing it to another source or your own argument, agreeing with the author, disagreeing, or adding to the author’s point. Do not limit yourself to merely repeating what the source says.
NO OTHER OUTSIDE SOURCES ARE ALLOWED AND WILL NOT COUNT AS ANY OF THE REQUIRED SOURCES.

· Reflect on whether any of the texts have made you come to a new realization about your own understanding of food, or whether you have achieved new insight into your own relationship to food, and explain why that is, and why it is significant.

· Make
substantial conceptual changes (rather than just lexical changes) during the revision process.
Lexical changes are surface level changes such as word choice, or simple sentence structure changes.
Conceptual changes have the WHOLE essay in mind and focus on
concepts or ideas. Some examples of conceptual changes are: adding details, adding evidence, using different evidence, adding examples, using different examples, expanding on an idea, introducing a new idea, deleting parts, changing focus, rethinking a point, rearranging paragraphs, or restructuring paragraphs.

· Include a COVER LETTER for the FINAL DRAFT of your essay:
Write
one full page
explaining your revision process. What kinds of changes did you make, and why did you make those changes? What exactly is different or similar? How did you approach the revision process? What revision techniques did you use? What did you learn from this exercise about your writing process? How did you choose/not choose to use the feedback you received? You can add additional information about your writing process if you want. Complete your letter by giving yourself a grade and explaining how you earned it.

GRADE:

(Green) Meets Expectations. (Yellow) Approaching Expectations. Developing. (Red) Does not meet expectations.

·
A paper (90-100): fulfills
all criteria and shows consistent great effort, attention to details, high quality of work, and complexity.

·
B paper (80-89): fulfills
almost all
criteria, shows good effort, and is effective in meeting the expectations of the assignment. Some areas of performance may need more development.

·
C paper (70-79) fulfills
most criteria and reflects satisfactory effort and an acceptable performance of the assignment, but a number of areas of performance are still developing.

·
D paper (60-69) fulfills
few criteria and reflects significant weaknesses in the many target skills, and does not meet expectations in some areas. Reflects minimal effort and little understanding of the requirements.

·
F paper
(below 60)
does not fulfill most of the criteria and does not meet expectations in most areas. Reflects little or no effort and a lack of understanding of the requirements.

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