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Chapter 1 Sharing Tradition
Class 11 English
Exercise
Frank LaPena
Understanding the text
Answer the following questions.
a. According to LaPena, what is the importance of the oral
tradition? To what extent do you agree with his opinions and why?
Answer: Frank Lapena, the writer of this essay give more
importance in the oral tradition. According to him, the tradition
followed by our elders must be passed from generation to
generation orally. It helps to maintain our cultural resource.
Yes, I agree with his opinion because oral tradition helps the young
generation to know about the lifestyle. Social, cultural environment
of our elders in the past moreover, they can know about their
family history. Our culture is our identity simply oral tradition helps
people to preserve their identity.
b. Who preserve and pass on the oral tradition?
Answer: Oral tradition is a form of human communication in which
knowledge, culture, traditions, ideas etc. are transmitted orally
from one generation to another generation. Its duty of every to
preserve and promote to pass on their tradition because they are
experienced one.
c. What is the danger of not passing on information from
generation to generation?
Answer: If the information from one generation to generation is not
passed then there will not be perseverance of cultural environment
i.e. following festivals, religion etc. our identity and values will be
no more left.
d. What is the difference between oral tradition and literary
tradition?
Answer: The difference between oral tradition and literary tradition
is that in an oral tradition information related to culture and values
are transmitted from generation to generation through oral means
whereas in literary tradition information is transmitted through
written means.
e. How does LaPena establish a relationship between art and the
oral tradition?
Answer: Both art and the oral tradition are the form of
communication in which the author or story teller tries to convey a
message to the listener/reader. LaPena presents the oral tradition
as the source of our inspiration for art. He says that the oral
tradition has an impact on how one visualizes the stories, the
characters, the designs and color for art.
Reference to the context
a. LaPena states that the oral tradition helps maintain the values of
a culture. If you believe that the oral tradition is important, how
would you maintain it?
Answer: It is true that oral tradition helps maintain the values of a
culture. I would maintain oral tradition in the following ways:-
i) I would save the original tape as well as the transcript of the
interview that were given by old peoples.
ii) I would pay much more attention to the things that the elders
are willing to share with us.
iii) I may start a project on preserverance of our oral tradition.
iv) I would perform different street dramas about our oral tradition.
v) In my old age I would try to share my views and ideas that I
know about oral tradition. I would like to share it with the next
generation.
b. “Not everyone is capable of fulfilling the roles of the elders.”
Explain this statement with reference to the essay.
Answer: Yes, obviously not everyone is capable of fulfilling the rules
of elders. Elders are the old aged persons. On the one hand
everyone who lives long enough automatically becomes an elder.
According, to my view of point to be an elder one should live for
long years. And to fulfill the roles of elders, the elders should have
better views, knowledge about the past traditions. We know that all
the elders are not of same type. Some may have followed their
traditions from their young age and some may not have followed
their traditions from their young age which means the one who has
not followed traditions from their young age, they do not know
much more about the tradition.
So, to fulfill the responsibilities of the elders, the elders should be
specialized, they should have to know much more things about past
tradition. So, they could pass to us. If they don’t know anything
about the tradition than they pass us the knowledge, views and
ideas. Hence, “not everyone is capable of fulfilling the rules of
elders.”
c. What is the controlling idea or thesis of this essay?
Answer: The controlling ideas or thesis of this essay is to preserve
and protect our tradition. Whatever our tradition are that we follow
always should be preserve. The persons of next to next generation
should also follow their tradition, they should be well known about
the tradition that we are following and the same type of tradition
they should also follow. Coming to present generation, many
people does not know some traditions, they already forget and
some traditions have already been disappear and stopped. So, to
preserve and protect our tradition this essay is written.
d. How do topic sentences guide the reader through the essay?
What would be lost without them?
Answer: The topic sentence relates to the thesis, or main point of
the essay guides the reader by signposting what the paragraph is
about. All the sentences in the rest of the paragraph should relate
to the topic sentence. An effective topic sentence combines a main
idea with the writer’s personal attitude or opinion. It serves to
orient the reader and provides an indication of what will follow in
the rest of paragraph. If there is no topic sentences then the main
point of a paragraph can’t be expressed and hence the reader can
understand the main thesis or controlling idea of paragraph.
e. What are the four major problems developed by LaPena with
regard to maintaining the oral tradition. How are they used to
structure the essay?
Answer: The four major problems developed by LaPena with regard
to maintaining the oral tradition are as follows:
• Some of the elders have played ideal and special roles in
preserving the values. And it is hard to fill their places.
• The youngsters do not show enough interest in listening to
and asking the elders.
• It is hard to maintain traditions in changing times when new
technologies destroy old values.
• There is no authentic sharing between the generations.
Modern research may not collect true data about the oral
contents of tradition. Once wrong information is published,
correction is difficult.
Reference beyond the text
a. Write a paragraph or two explaining your attitude toward the oral
tradition of passing along information.
Answer: Oral tradition is one of the effective practices for all the
people of this world to maintain and preserve the culture and values
of tradition. It is also an art form as it takes its subject matters from
our tradition. There is an important role of both the elders and
young people perform their vital roles in maintaining and
preserving the culture and values of tradition through passing
authentic information from generation to generation.
I believe that it helps to share and transmit ancestors’ culture, skill
and knowledge to next generation. Next generation gets a chance
to know past culture and tradition. They will understand that our
culture is our true identity. So my attitude towards the oral
tradition is positive. I believe that if we lose our culture, we will lose
our identity and existence. We will suffer from the problem of
identity crisis. Our culture and tradition are a living experience.
Without it, we will lose our true identity. So, we must preserve,
follow and transmit it from one generation to next to save its
existence.
b. Our culture is our identity. Write a few paragraphs explaining
how you intend to preserve your culture, values and norms.
Answer: Yes, it is true that our culture is our identity. Cultural
traditions and perspectives have shaped who we are. The way we
are determined to our cultural values, reveals who we are. If we
lose our culture, we will lose our identity and existence. So its our
duty to preserve our culture, values and norms.
I intend to preserve my culture, values and norms doing the
following activities:
1. Celebrating every ceremony related to my culture.
2. Making people aware of the importance of our culture, values
and norms.
3. Promoting cultural and traditional events in my community.
4. Forming an organization related to cultural heritage.
5. Sharing information related to the culture and values of my
tradition.
In conclusion, cultural preservation is vital. It preserves a sense of
unity and belonging among people of a specific community. So, the
forefathers passed much cultural heritage to the new generation.
Cultural preservation’s future is at risk. Because of today’s busy
lifestyles and intense social responsibilities. Preservation of cultural
heritage requires the protection of our cultural heritage. Above all,
sharing your cultural heritage is the best way to preserve it. Future
generations can live according to their ancestor’s values by
preserving cultural heritage. Cultural heritage is a constitutional
right that the constitution should protect.
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