About the use of the comma.

    We often use a comma to separate elements in a series (three or more things). We tend to think that the comma before the coordinating conjunction “and” is not needed. However, there are cases in which we need to place a comma before “and”. Otherwise, the last two items of a list will glom together and change the meaning of a sentence as it happens in the following one:

Curiosity for sex, rejection in love and loneliness, some of the dilemmas that come along with the girls’ relationship.

    If a comma is not placed before the coordinator “and”, the phrase will be read as if the rejection happens both in love and in loneliness. This will leave the list with just two items. Therefore, a comma is necessary to clarify the intended meaning of the sentence:

Curiosity for sex, rejection in love, and loneliness, are some of the dilemmas that come along with the girls’ relationship.

The uses of 'what'

Hi! Well, since I've had problems using 'what', I'm posting a short explanation for you to take it into account when writing.

 WRONG SENTENCE:

 These topics, among others, in addition to the protagonist’s traits, would make this story appealing for young adults, what leads us to the concept of Young Adult Literature (YAL).

Here I’m not able to use ‘what’ since I needed a relative pronoun such as ‘which’ or ‘that’ to introduce the following relative clause. The word ‘what’ may introduce:

ª  Exclamations: What a fool she is!

ª  Interrogatives: What do you want?

ª  Pseudo-cleft sentences: What you need most is a good rest.

Any of those was the case of my sentence. So I've corrected it in this way.


RIGHT SENTENCE: 

 These topics, among others, in addition to the protagonist’s traits,would make this story appealing for young adults, which  leads us to the concept of Young Adult Literature (YAL). 

Chicken (review)

Controversial and appealing, Chicken, taken from Canadian author Kathy Stinson’s book “101 ways to dance”, tells the story of a teenage girl who plays a daring body-contact game with a boy from church. With Stinson’s story, young adults will find an engaging story about sexual curiosity.

When the teenage girl finishes painting the church basement, she remains alone with Bram, the new guy from British Columbia. The boy had received a letter stating that he will be a father. She knows that involving with him means troubles. However, she accepts playing Chicken with him. What are the rules? They place one finger on each other’s foreheads and go down their bodies until one says stop. Bram stopped, but she wants the game to keep on going. Just like her mother said, she is asking for it.

In Chicken, Kathy Stinson introduces an interesting topic for adolescents, curiosity for sex. Thoughts are racing in the teenage girl’s mind. But who can blame her? The awakening of sexual curiosity is a common matter in adolescence.

In most of it, Chicken is written in a thought-provoking dialogue style. The length of the story is quite short, but it can’t help but being attractive for adolescents.

With a short-sized but captivating narrative and a topic more than interesting for teenagers, Chicken becomes a must-read short story for young adults.

Colons with lists

Hi everyone! Since I had a problem using colons with lists in my essay, Blas asked me to include an explanation and to publish it on the blog. So here it is: 

• We use colons in a list when the list is preceded by a complete independent clause. We should never use a colon to separate a preposition from its object or a verb from its complements.  

This is the wrong sentence: 

In I Kiss a Door we will find such topics as: sexuality, insecurity, etc.

(Notice that the sentence that precedes the colons is not grammatically complete.)

This is the corrected sentence: 

In I Kiss a Door we will find such topics as sexuality, insecurity, etc.

If I would have decided to leave the colons, the sentence should have been like this: 

In I Kiss a Door we will find several controversial topics: sexuality...

(Notice that now the sentence that precedes the colons IS grammatically complete.)

Meat and prejudice

     That teens are sarcastic and sometimes evil or ironic is not new, but what happens 

with discrimination and disregard of those who are different.  The Winning award Bison Terry perfectly brings the latter concepts into awareness in the short story ` They are made out of meat´ in which two ageless aliens analyse human beings found in planet earth and  as teenagers do, the aliens are tormented by `the other´.  Later, as the story develops, meat becomes an issue.

     After making a deep search throughout the Cosmos, one of the aliens is going to tell to his comrade the analysis results of this new specie.  The most noticeable feature is that they are made out of meat.  This piece of information comes as a shock to the other alien and every detail of the new specie´s achievements and abilities only increases the unconscious disregard of all possible distinguishing feature of the new `other´.

      Adolescence is a time when prejudices come up to the light as easy as words come out of the mouth and although the age of the aliens remains unknown, many of the attitudes they have during the story, resembles what teenagers actually do in front of new ´others´.  If taking these ideas into account the story becomes enjoyable and it makes ponder the reader about human behaviour

Don't be 'Chicken' 

“Chicken” is a short story written by Kathy Stinson, an award-winning author for young people, which magnificently deals with adolescents' first sexual experiences and pregnancy in such a realistic way that teenagers will easily be able to identify with. 

The plot revolves around two teenagers, a girl and the new guy from B.C. Bram, that are painting a church basement alone and he proposes her to play 'Chicken'. The game consists of a challenge, in which one of them puts a finger on the other person’s forehead and moves it down and the first one to say ‘stop’ is the chicken. Although the girl knew that he has just been a daddy and that her mother had warned her that being alone with a boy like Bram was asking for it, she accepted. The open ending is what makes this story even more attractive.

I am convinced that this story is a powerful tool to work with our students, because the topics are of their interest and at the same time, we will give them (and perhaps ourself) the possibility to do away with taboos. Moreover, Stinson's writing style catches the attention of any reluctant young reader. You can not miss it!

Do you know about this?