First-Year Writing Project 1: Cultural Narrative Peer Review Final Submission Due with final draft A Narrative offers a compelling story about an author’s self-awareness. Authors make deliberate rhetorical choices about what to include (and exclude), in what order, with what language, and to which audience. Process 1. read papers carefully. (15- min.) 2. Trade papers and discuss feedback 3. Complete the peer review using the criteria on the next page. This review is a tool of communication directed to your partner, not me. Do Not simply answer the questions, instead use them as a guide to help you understand what to look for in the paper. 4. Revise your draft. Use the peer feedback to revise your paper for homework. 5. Final submission: Along with your final paper, include an author’s note and copy of your peer review (i.e., the ones that you wrote for other authors). 6. In your 300-500-word author’s note, discuss how you used the peer review feedback from your partner (or not), additional information that I may find useful in responding to your work, and/or anything in particular you would like me to address in my feedback to you. Review criteria Your partner is the audience; use this guide to help with content and structure of your feedback. DO NOT simply answer the questions. Indicate with brief bullet-points, ways that the writer can improve each section. : Content Introduction: 1. Is the topic of the paper clear in the introduction? What made it compelling? 2. Has the author given sufficient information in the introduction to foreshadow or hint a story rather than an essay? 3. Is there a hint of a theme: a point of personal discovery). 4. What should obviously come next? 5. Suggestions for improving the introduction? Body: 6. Has the paper been arranged in a logical way (subsections or not)? Does this make it easier to engage, or no? 7. What kind of rhetorical choices have been made by the author? This has to do with stylistic choices such as voice, tone, rhetorical appeal. 8. Has the author used appropriate sources to illustrate, explain and support the narrative? Is it descriptive? 9. Do you get an image of who the writer is based on the narrative? Conclusion/Implications: 10. Has the author achieved some resolution? What has the narrative accomplished? 11. Is there a clear message for the reader? References: MLA style 12. Has the author referenced sources (must have at least one)? (family, other text) 13. Are those source(s) cited in the works cited page? Overall Quality of Manuscript 14. Is the writing sufficiently clear, fluent, and engaging? If not, identify areas that are unclear. 15. Does the paper’s a focus seems appropriate to the project’s objectives? Why or why not? 16. Has the paper identified an interesting perspective for sharing their cultural identity and experiences? How so or not? 17. What did you learn in reading this paper? Advice to Author What more advice can be o ...

1. First-Year Writing
Project 1: Cultural Narrative
Peer Review
Final Submission Due with final draft
A Narrative offers a compelling story about an author’s self-
awareness. Authors make deliberate rhetorical choices about
what to include (and exclude), in what order, with what
language, and to which audience.
Process
1. read papers carefully. (15- min.)
2. Trade papers and discuss feedback
3. Complete the peer review using the criteria on the next page.
This review is a tool of communication directed to your partner,
not me. Do Not simply answer the questions, instead use them
as a guide to help you understand what to look for in the paper.
4. Revise your draft. Use the peer feedback to revise your paper
for homework.
5. Final submission: Along with your final paper, include an
author’s note and copy of your peer review (i.e., the ones that
you wrote for other authors).
6. In your 300-500-word author’s note, discuss how you used
the peer review feedback from your partner (or not), additional
information that I may find useful in responding to your work,
and/or anything in particular you would like me to address in
my feedback to you.
Review criteria

2. Your partner is the audience; use this guide to help with content
and structure of your feedback. DO NOT simply answer the
questions.
Indicate with brief bullet-points, ways that the writer can
improve each section.
: Content
Introduction:
1. Is the topic of the paper clear in the introduction? What made
it compelling?
2. Has the author given sufficient information in the
introduction to foreshadow or hint a story rather than an essay?
3. Is there a hint of a theme: a point of personal discovery).
4. What should obviously come next?
5. Suggestions for improving the introduction?
Body:
6. Has the paper been arranged in a logical way (subsections or
not)? Does this make it easier to engage, or no?
7. What kind of rhetorical choices have been made by the
author? This has to do with stylistic choices such as voice,
tone, rhetorical appeal.
8. Has the author used appropriate sources to illustrate, explain
and support the narrative? Is it descriptive?
9. Do you get an image of who the writer is based on the
narrative?

3. Conclusion/Implications:
10. Has the author achieved some resolution? What has the
narrative accomplished?
11. Is there a clear message for the reader?
References: MLA style
12. Has the author referenced sources (must have at least one)?
(family, other text)
13. Are those source(s) cited in the works cited page?
Overall Quality of Manuscript
14. Is the writing sufficiently clear, fluent, and engaging? If
not, identify areas that are unclear.
15. Does the paper’s a focus seems appropriate to the project’s
objectives? Why or why not?
16. Has the paper identified an interesting perspective for
sharing their cultural identity and experiences? How so or not?
17. What did you learn in reading this paper?
Advice to Author
What more advice can be offered for improvement?
Précis

4. 18. Provide a summary of the paper (your partner’s paper) in no
more than three sentences. [author, date, title, central idea].
Marybeth Johnson
Dr. Pearsons
ENGW 1111
22 January 2020
You’re Not Vietnamese
“Cám ơn bá nhiê,” I say to the giggling ladies. I’m not
quite sure why they think I am so funny. They have been
laughing at me since I first opened my mouth when I walked in
through the doors and my Mom told me to say hi. But my Mom
has been smiling from ear to ear so I do not think that there is
anything wrong with their laughter. If she says that it is ok, then
it is ok. To be fair, it is only the first time that my Mom has
ever taken me to the nail salon next to where she worked to get
my nails done. The nail ladies addressed my Vietnamese Mom
by her full name, Phương Lan, normally people only called her
by her American name, Lan.
It is my seventh birthday and my Mom gifted me with a
pamperous manicure and pedicure. What do I know? Maybe the
nail ladies always laugh. As the nice lady scrubs my feet and I
try to hold in my giggles, a crowd of nail technicians surrounds
my Mom and I, and I am questioned. In Vietnamese, they ask
me, what is your favorite food? What grade are you in? How old
are you? These questions are pretty easy. I answer them, in
fluent Vietnamese, not thinking too much into it because I am
too focused on how cool my nails look. After all, my Mom
taught me Vietnamese while I was growing up and I have been
speaking with her and her family members since I was very
little. This was the first time I genuinely felt confused that
people did not understand how I could understand Vietnamese. I
did not understand that my White complexion I got from my
Swedish-English Dad did not match the language I spoke. When
we are leaving, I was so excited because my toes were a

5. sparkling blue with beautiful intricately patterned flowers
painted on each of them. I hope my Mom takes me there again
soon, I thought to myself after being pampered for over an
hour.
A few weeks later, my Dad took me to visit my Mom at work.
As we leave, my Mom takes me by the nail salon to say hi to her
friends. They all smile as we walk in and stop what they are
working on to greet us. My Mom and the ladies talk for a little
bit in Vietnamese. Coincidentally, my best friend Ally was there
getting her nails done at the salon with her Mom. I walk over to
say hi to her because she is just finishing up. She shows me her
toes: pink, but plain. I think to myself, “That's a pretty color but
she didn't get any designs. That's kind of weird.” Oh well.
Later in the year, several of my Mom’s high school friends
travel to our house from all around the country for a dinner. She
had not seen these friends since she fled from Vietnam, almost
30 years ago. Until I grew older, I was never really able to
conceptualize just how long my Mom hadn’t seen her friends. In
my 4th grade mind, not seeing your friends for summer break
was the longest time!
In preparation for the big reunion, my Mom harangues me and
my younger brother on how we are to act when the guest come
over: We must be on our best behavior, look everyone in the
eyes when they are talking to us, and roll our arms and bow
when greeting others. As my brother and I are being introduced,
everyone is so impressed with me. Of course my brother doesn’t
listen to my Mom’s directions, but I will not let her down. Cháo
ông. Cháo bà, I greet all of her friends, rolling my arms, and
bowing, just as she carefully instructed. My brother remains
silent and bows after me. After the formalities are finished and
he sneaks a couple of egg rolls, he runs upstairs to play Wii.
After getting all of my favorite snacks from the gifts that people
have brought, I try to run upstairs and join him, but I can’t get
through all of the people. Everyone is asking me questions and
laughing: “The American girl,” they call me. I just want to play
Wii, but I stay downstairs because I can see that it will make

6. my Mom happy.
Almost a year after my first trip to the nail salon, in the
summer of 2008, my Mom took me back to Vietnam while my
brother went with my Dad to visit Boston. Clearly, I got the
better end of the deal. This trip was very important. It was the
first time my Mom had been back to her home in over 33 years.
She escaped as a refugee to Australia when she was 19 years
old. In Australia, she worked hard and rose to a high position in
a carpet manufacturing company. She later met my Dad when
the same company sent him to Australia from Georgia. They fell
in love and moved back to America with my older brother.
This trip to Vietnam was eye opening for me; not only in the
sense that I learned more about my Mom and her culture, but
also because I learned more about the world and myself. At this
point, I was used to all of my Mom’s friends being genuinely
impressed and shocked with me, when I spoke Vietnamese to
them. I was a White girl speaking a foreign language. However,
in the rural setting of my Mom’s hometown, Sóc Trȃng, I was
not used to being the complete minority: a foreign White girl
speaking the native language. Most people had never
encountered someone with my complexion or with my nose. My
nose had a bridge, something not characterized in Vietnamese,
flat noses. Furthermore, I had several brown freckles, speckled
across my face and nose. In comparison to the porcelain
Vietnamese facial complex characterized by flawless and
smooth skin, my facial features stood out. As I walked through
the market, people consistently came up to me and touched my
nose or my arm or my face. As a young child, I was hesitant.
Why is everyone touching me? But my mom would reassure
me. She would give me a nod, letting me know that it was ok. I
felt like somewhat of a celebrity. Everyone would look at me
everywhere we went. But why? It was in this moment that I first
fully came to realize that despite being related to my Mom,
feeling just like her, and even going so far as to wanting to be
just like her, we did not look similar. People never put two and
two together because I looked White and my Mom looked

7. Asian. I always knew that I looked more like my Dad, mostly
because people would always tell me. However, I never thought
of myself as something other than a little version of my Mom.
As I got older, I became more understanding of my
appearance, but there was still a disconnect between how I
looked and how I wanted to be perceived. After moving districts
to join middle school, I had to remake all of my friends. In an
effort to join a social scene, I joined orchestra, and I ended up
growing very close to all of the players. I was the only white
person in my friend group. This was dissimilar to elementary
school. None of my new friends would believe me when I told
them that I was Asian. When I ate my rice and chicken for lunch
with chopsticks, they would joke around with me, still not fully
convinced. At our first orchestra concert, during intermission,
all of my friends rushed into the crowd to see my Mom, not
telling me that they were going to do this. When they finally
asked the right lady if she was “Marybeth’s Mom,” they were
shocked to see that my Mom was indeed Asian; I hadn’t lied.
My Mom told me after the show, and we both sort of laughed it
off. Even though I was a little sad that they would do that, my
Mom told me to not look too much into it. “They just don’t
understand,” she said in an effort to comfort me.
Looking back at my first trip to the nail salon, I cannot
help but laugh. I was so unaware and oblivious as to why the
nail technicians were so excited to talk to me, or why I got
special treatment. I thought that I was just cool. I did not
understand why Ally did not get an intricate design on her toes
like me. Now that I am older, I realize that the nail ladies were
excited because I, someone who does not look Vietnamese,
could speak Vietnamese. This is also why, whenever I go back
to the same nail salon, I get extra designs on my nails and nicer
treatment. There was always a constant conversation taking
place while I got my nails done, compared to when they would
work with other customers without a single word spoken
between them. In a similar manner, I understand why my Mom’s
friends wouldn’t let me go upstairs. They enjoyed seeing that

8. their language and culture was being carried down
generationally to “the American girl.” Similarly, my middle
school friends weren’t trying to be mean; they just didn’t
understand that I could look more like my Dad, but still be
Asian.
In highschool, I was again the only “white” friend in a
largely Asian friend group. The majority of my classes
consisted of Asian students with white students being the
minority. Even with the divide, I thought that race was no
longer something that people used to predominantly define
themselves. I was wrong. There was still the disconnect and I
found that I had a very divisional friend groups. I was able to
identify with both groups of people. However, I only identified
with one group at a time: I had my Asian friend group and I had
my white friend group. In my white friend group, we would go
to the beach together to surf, watch football games, and go out
to eat. In my Asian friend group we would play soccer in the
park, eat Korean BBQ, and study in the LA museums together.
Though I didn’t act differently depending on which group I was
in, I didn’t feel like the same person in both friend groups. My
white friends saw me as white. My Asian friends saw me as
Asian. There was no overlap between the two groups. I was
either one or the other.
Growing up in Southern California, I lived 40 minutes
away from the largest Vietnamese population outside of
Vietnam: Westminster, or as we like to call it, Little Saigon.
Every weekend, my Mom and I would make the trip up to go
grocery shopping and eat lunch. Everytime we went to the
grocery store, and would wait in the poultry line to order meat,
people always assumed that we were two separate transactions.
“And for you, miss?,” they would ask me as I stood next to my
Mom who was already ordering. This was something that she
and I always giggled at. When we came back from our grocery
trip, she would always realize that we had forgotten something
and we would have to stop by the local grocery store. In line I
would once again stand next to my Mom and begin to place

9. things on the conveyor. “Miss, this line is also open,” another
cashier would say to me. “Haha, no this is my Mom, and we are
together,” I’d answer as we laugh. It happened wherever we
went. Though it was difficult for me to understand when I was
younger, I am now more aware and understanding of the
mistake.
As I grew up, I became more solidified in my beliefs and
understanding of the world. I know now that I am Vietnamese
AND Swedish-English. All I ever wanted to be was just like my
Mom: hardworking, careless about the superficial, and
determined in the face of challenges. I can learn all of these
things from my Mom, and I can do this without even looking
like her. I can also get my Dad’s humor, strong work ethic,
altruism, and stubborn inclination to do what is right no matter
the consequences. I don’t have to identify as one or the other; I
can have the best of both of my parents. I moved across the
country this year to go to college in Boston. It is during this
time that many people are insecure and still learning who they
are. Granted, I am too. However, I believe that I should be the
most insecure about who I am right now: I am away from my
family, who are my primary influences; at least for the first 17
years of my life. Despite this, in the face of the shortfall of
leadership, I have found that I know who I am more than ever; I
am a Southern California native. I am laid back and more easy
going than most. Things don’t get under my skin very easily. I
have a strong passion for everything that I do. If I am going to
do something, then I am going to do it right. I am Vietnamese. I
am, also, Swedish and English. I am my Father. I am also my
Mother. In October during our parents swim meet, my parents
came across the country to watch me swim. Afterwards, at our
team lunch with all other parents and team members, a senior
comes up to me. “Marybeth what the heck?! I didn’t know you
were Asian! Did anyone else know she was Asian?” she
questions. My parents and I laugh. “I’m half,” I respond.
I recently went to the nail salon near campus with my
swim team. We got our toes done. I talked to my friends the

10. whole time. After realizing my nail technician was Vietnamese
because she was speaking to another nail technician, I got
excited. As I went to pay, I thanked her. Cám ơn bá nhiê. A
huge smile rushes across her face and she laughed. She
ecstatically said to the white customer next in line, “She speaks
my language! She is speaking Vietnamese! How do you know
Vietnamese?”
Works Cited
Khmers Kampuchea-Krom Federation. KKF | Khmers
Kampuchea-Krom Federation, 12
June 2007, khmerkrom.org/78how-soc-trang-kh-leang-province
-founded-and-its-major-historical-events-1658-1953/.
“Soc Trang Travel.” Lonely Planet, 8 Sept. 2019,
www.lonelyplanet.com/vietnam.mek
ong-delta/soc-trang.