West Forsyth High School AP Language & Composition
Summer Reading Assignment
Summer 2015
Assignment:
1. Cohen, Samuel S. 50 Essays: A Portable Anthology. 3rd Edition ; High School ed. Print.
You may want to consider both purchasing the latest edition of this anthology and reading the
Introduction and the following 15 essays OR accessing these essays online in preparation for the first six
weeks of class. This assignment is optional. Students will receive access to this text on the first day
of school. However, if you choose, you may jumpstart the reading for the first nine weeks.
Consider the 3-4 questions at the end of each essay for discussion and formative writing later. You
should interact with this text by noting and annotating main and supporting ideas, styles, tones, appeals,
etc. First essay, “I Just Wanna Be Average”, due Friday, August 14th.
Essays to be read:
Maya Angelou, Graduation
Langston Hughes, Salvation
George Orwell, Shooting An Elephant
David Sedaris, A Plague of Tics
Alice Walker, In Search of Our Mother’s Gardens
Annie Dillard, Seeing
Zora Neale Hurston, How It Feels to Be Colored Me
Virginia Woolf, Death of the Moth
Sherman Alexie, The Joy of Reading and Writing:
Superman and Me
Malcolm X, Learning to Read
Eric Schlosser, Kid Kustomers
Sojourner Truth, Ain’t I A Woman
Stephen Jay Gould, Sex, Drugs, Disasters, and the
Extinction of Dinosaurs
Scott Russell Sanders, The Men We Carry in Our Minds
Mike Rose, “I Just Wannna Be Average”
2. Miller, Arthur. The Crucible: A Play in Four Acts. New York: Viking, 1953. Print.
Read & annotate The Crucible. There should be a free copy of the text you can download from public domain if you
wish. We will discuss this work beginning Monday, August 31st. Discussion & review questions will be available
the second week of school on itsLearning to help guide your understanding.
Some questions to think about which will provide springboards for your eventual writings:
1. What is the setting (time and place) of the play? How do they put the subject matter into a particular
context? How are the people and the landscape “flat” or “sharp”?
2. What are two major themes of this work? Can you find any quotes to support your ideas?
3. From what perspective is the story told? Why? Does the POV ever shift? Where and why?
3. On the back of this sheet is a list of rhetorical strategies you should be familiar with. You should keep a
copy of these in your notebook for reference.
Assignment: Define ALL terms. Choose 25 and provide: 1) example 2) sentence using the strategy.
You will have quizzes throughout the year on these rhetorical strategies.
Assignment due Friday, August 28th.
A.P. Language and Composition
Rhetorical Terms & Glossary
Abstract
Exposition
Parable
Alliteration
Extended Metaphor
Paradox
Allusion
Figurative Language
Parallelism
Analogy
Figures of Speech
Anaphora
Foreshadowing
Anecdote
Generalization
Antithesis
Genre
Aphorism
Humor
Apostrophe
Hyperbole
Argumentation
Image
Assonance
Imagery
Asyndeton
Induction
Cacophony
Interior Monologue
Rhetoric
Caricature
Inversion
Rhetorical modes
Chiasmus
Irony
Rhetorical Question
Cliché
Jargon
Sarcasm
Juxtaposition
Satire
Lending Credence
Setting
Litotes
Simile
Logic
Speaker
Logical Fallacy
Spin
Loose Sentence
Stereotype
Metaphor
Style
Metonymy
Subjectivity
Mood
Syllogism
Moral
Symbolism
Dissonance
Motif
Synecdoche
Ellipsis
Narration
Syntax
Objectivity
Tone
Onomatopoeia
Transition
Oversimplification
Understatement
Oxymoron
Voice
Pacing
Zeugma
Parody
Pedantic
Periodic Sentence
Personification
Persuasion
Polysyndeton
Colloquialism
Concrete Language
Connotation
Consonance
Protagonist
Repetition
Conundrum
Deduction
Denotation
Description
Diction
Didactic
Discourse
Epistrophe
Ethical Appeal
Euphemism
Euphony
Explication