In the book excerpt by Firoozeh Dumas, “The F-Word”, Dumas uses several techniques to hook her readers and keep their interest in her piece. It was her style, however, that did most of the work. Dumas’ article has a very strong single argument that she works toward throughout her entire piece. She claims that the English language could do with a bit more “spice”, as she calls it (Dumas).
Though this argument is only listed only twice in the excerpt, it is the underlying foundation of every humorous story as well as every painful moment.
Throughout the excerpt, Dumas has paired together the use of her style with how she builds ethos in the reader’s eyes. This creates a very good way to convey the argument, however it still lacks certain strengths. Had she written in a slightly more formal tone and included more evidence, she could have kept her humor and continued to build on her ethos by appealing to a more professional group.
The use of an easy going conversational style in Dumas’ excerpt helps to portray her claim in a way that most readers will be able to identify with, however, the style does not work well in appealing to a professional setting due to the lack of empirical evidence. Dumas spends the entire excerpt, and probably a great deal of her book, simply building her ethos to her readers. She builds up her ethos by talking about all of her childhood stories about how her name was mispronounced or how she had to change her name to get anywhere in life.
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Within every single one of these stories, she uses subtle humor to get the reader to identify with her story just a little bit more. Humor creates a more personable view of the author for the readers and gives them more to identify with, thus pushing the author’s ethos and respect higher. For good measure, she uses a situation that nearly everyone has had to face; having to respond to your name that has been horribly mispronounced in a public setting. An author that can use humor has a very powerful tool at their disposal. All of her stories come across in a light and conversational tone.
The entire excerpt could easily be the transcript of a coffee house conversation. This conversational tone goes along with the style that she uses to once again make her look like a very personable author that an audience can identify with. Since she does not speak English as a native, she tends to use the occasional Farsi word or name, but she quickly explains its meaning or how the word translates. She spends some time going into the beauty of her language compared to the English language, once again, only to build ethos.
She discusses the difference between Farsi names and how they mean things such as “beautiful” or “turquoise” and English names such as Richard, Dick, Bill and Susan and how they completely lack any sort of meaning. The use of humor, common situations and a conversational tone all lend to her overall use of style to make her argument. The use of her writing style does a great job of getting her argument across to the readers. The informal way that Dumas speaks to the readers and conveys her stories allows the readers to connect with her in a very powerful way.
As noted above, she spends a great deal of time in the excerpt building her own image for the reader. This image will become a reputable character in the minds of her audience members. However, there is a problem with her easy going style. Her book is aimed at middle Americans or other immigrants living in the country. Her book is not aimed at professionals in a field, or people of power. By going with such an easy tone, she severely limits herself to appealing only to the average person.
A more professional tone would have made her work more appealing to the professional world; a professional world that takes notice of current problems and addresses them. Dumas’ style also limits how much professional backing she has with her argument. Since she chose to work with such a style, she is unable to give any facts, figures or statistics to support her argument, at least in the given excerpt. Once again, had she used a more professional tone, she could have used more evidence than her own stories.
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Since her excerpt lacks facts and figures, she is unable to support her overall claim. By adding official figures of how much of the English language is derived from modern day immigrants, the number of foreign words added to the English dictionary, or even the ratio of immigrants to naturally born U. S. Citizens, would have helped her make the point that the English language is not accepting of new and unfamiliar words and sounds. Her overall claim is based on her own opinion, however, that doesn’t mean she can’t use some figures to support her idea.
Through all of this, the style of her argument does limit her audience and some of her power, but she is still able to speak to a great deal of people in an easy tone. The style that Dumas chose to use with her book excerpt called “The F-Word,” is a very easy going and simple style that hooks the reader. Dumas claims that the English language could branch out and become more colorful to include more interesting sounds that other cultures use. This claim is headed by many stories that she tells from her life, ranging from the humorous to more serious events.
All of these stories are told as if there were a very basic conversation taking place. She chooses to use a very relaxed style to move her audience. This style builds her ethos by allowing people to identify with her and make her a more believable and respectable author. This style, though, has its drawbacks in that she is unable to use any concrete evidence to back her claim and that she is unable to largely appeal to people in a professional manner, thus limiting her power to change the language.
However, it would seem slightly strange to have a simple conversation and to be suddenly overwhelmed by different figures, statistics and facts that were suddenly strewn about. For the most part, Dumas’ choice of style was a smart choice because it allowed the audience to have a simple and somewhat entertaining reading experience. The style that Dumas chose helped portray her claim in a way that a great deal of people were able to identify with and understand, however, because of that choice in style, Dumas was unable to supply concrete evidence and power to further back her claim.
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