Sharing Tradition Complete Exercise
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:
- Celebrating every ceremony related to my culture.
- Making people aware of the importance of our culture, values and norms.
- Promoting cultural and traditional events in my community.
- Forming an organization related to cultural heritage.
- 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.