Graduate / 'the importance of education in a society' - Teaching Statement for graduate program [3]

Teaching Statement
In a separate statement of no more than 600 words, explain your interest in teaching at Syracuse University as part of your graduate program, and describe the skills and experiences that could make you an effective and committed teacher. How is teaching related to your intellectual interests and career goals? Have you ever been a tutor, classroom teacher, or coach? If not, what experiences have prepared you for teaching, including work, community service, or developing your own strategies of learning? Draw on these experiences to explain the skills and philosophy of learning that you would bring to teaching. Although you are not expected to have formal teaching experience before coming to the University, all graduate students in English with teaching assistantships or fellowships will teach at some time while at Syracuse University. Teaching may include: being a teaching assistant for an English Department lecture course, teaching composition courses in the university's independent Writing Program, and designing and teaching one's own courses as a Teaching Associate in the English Department. The teaching statement will be assessed not only for its content but also for its writing.

I want to be a teacher because I believe in the importance of education in a society, and because knowledge we accumulate is valuable only if it is shared. I want to assist with teaching undergraduate students because my dream is to be a scholar and professor in literature. I want to teach during my graduate study because teaching expands my communication skills and tests the depth of my knowledge.

I don't have formal teaching experience, but I know what kind of teacher students like and need. Students like interacting with teachers, because they wish to know teachers as a full man not only as a teacher. Students also need a professional teacher, because "a full man" isn't somebody who boasts of his language skills or academic achievements. Students like encouragement from teachers, because they value teachers' words though they don't say it out. Students also need criticism, because they thoroughly understand "No Pain, No Gain". Students like teachers who use various materials in the class, such as lovely videos and attractive extra books, because only textbook makes Jack a dull boy. Students also need explanations and analysis beyond those physical materials, because these materials have strength only if combined with lecturing. Students like patient teachers because bad scores just mean that they don't find the right way for the moment. Students also need pressure, because too much ease makes them addicted to it. Students are in contradictions because they love truth but always dissatisfied with the way teachers guide them. I know these because I'm a student. I realize a calling to be such a teacher because I used to lack one in my life and I don't want to be regret if I find a chance to become one myself.

I hope to teach, because I want students to know English, no matter writing or literature, is interesting, relevant and fun and because it's the responsibility of the teacher to present the subject in an attracting and engaging manner that show the beauty of English as well as its applicability to solving practical and real-world problems and to nurture each student's interest to learn. I want to teach writing, because writing has always come naturally to me, because writing gives me a great advantage-being able to communicate what I think and feel and need and see in suitable words and logical sentences to someone else. I can teach writing, because writing is more about the ideas which have no huge difference between the Chinese and American than about the vocabularies and grammar. I can teach writing, because I've experienced the terrible struggle of writing-racking our brains and trying to write down the hidden and mysterious inside of us, because students will had the advantage of advice from someone who has struggled with it, and because writing, in fact, it not that difficult.

I can teach, because I have enthusiasm and experience and knowledge and understanding of whom and what I'm going to teach. I want to teach, because I am always contend but never satisfied.

Graduate / "an eminent scholar in English study" - Non-English speaker's SOP on Literature [NEW]

Hi guys, I'm preparing the SOP on Literature.
Could anyone be so kind to help me to revise it in grammar and give me some advise to improve it?

Because I'm not an Native English speaker, everything that's natural and OK to you is not OK to me. I sometimes got confused about the words I used and the organization or the logic structure of my SOP.

If you can help me, I'll put my SOP in this topic or you can just message me.
Thank you very very very much~~~~~
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I am not afraid of storms for I am learning how to sail my ship. For the twenty-year life, I have always been proud of my unswerving pursuit for English Literature. Though the path has not always been smooth, I believe I can go further.

Driven by my original dream to literature, I chose English as my major at Nanchang University. However, the major offered me a wide academic curriculum with only a few literature courses, which upset me so much that I couldn't concentrate on other classes for a few semesters and did spend all the spare time on literature books. Though later I realized that it was not good for the comprehensive English major study, it has already resulted in an overall low GPA over the last three years. To the positive side, the experience fostered my self-study ability, and I appreciated it because I read a few classical and original books about feminist literature, like A Room of One's Own by Virginia Woolf, The Second Sex by Simone de Beauvoir, and Woman and Nature: The Roaring inside Her by Susan Griffin.

In the senior year, I took the first literature course "Brief History of English Literature". The teacher, Mrs. Tu, was surprised by my diligence and rich literature knowledge. The midterm paper in which I analyzed generally the social and historical significance of Beowulf, and the final paper which was about the representation of sarcasm in Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels, got me a top score. In the next semester, I attended classes of "Selected Readings in British Literature" and "Selected Readings in American Literature" initiatively, though they were not included in my curriculum. These courses gave me a strong background on the all-round picture of different historical periods, genres and representatives. Most importantly, they introduced me to the critical theory to which I devoted.

It is the course "Appreciation of American Movies" that changed my view towards literature dramatically. One chapter called" critical perspective" which explains seven critical theories to analyze Hollywood film surprised me because of the overlapping between a popular model and the literary canon in terms of critical theory. I started to think about the historical and social factors that consist of and influence both literature and popular culture, that is, what common fundamental elements do popular culture and traditional canonical literature share, and I believe that this is an issue I need to continue studying in future education. Anyway, having spent days and nights in the library and under the instruction of my tutor, I completed the final paper Feminism in Revolutionary Road for this course discussing the feminism displayed in a typical Hollywood film in respect of structure, character and narrative, after which I began to explore other fields, including sociology, language, philosophy, film study and performance study. The completion of the essay has also confirmed my determination to keep on studying literature to a master degree.

Through a master's degree program, I plan to explore in the fields of feminism, popular culture, film study and holocaust. Particularly, there are several questions that I'd like to explore primarily: 1, as I believe that all tests and their meaning are socially and historically connected, whether the content and narration in form of literature can be studied or manifested in other art forms, such as cinema and photography? 2, does film represent a popular culture that is constantly top-down drive in which people are passive or that is made of individual and community culture in which people are participatory? 3, how traditional prevailing ideology of heterosexual gender system and male dominance is questioned and challenged by film in terms of gender study.

As for holocaust study, it relates to my future plan leading to a Doctoral degree after I achieve a Master degree. As my dream goes, the comprehensive and specialized study in Syracuse University will enable me to explore a more professional subject that's the relationship between feminism and holocaust. Specifically, it may be about how feminist literature as a cultural force play a role in conveying and bearing witness to the experience of survivors of the World War Two and other traumatic experience, such as earthquake.

In a word, even though I didn't have a high overall GPA in the last three years' study (the GPA of English courses was B level), it cannot frustrate me to apply for the English MA program in Syracuse University. To be an eminent scholar in English study far away there in the sunshine is my highest aspiration. I may not reach them, but I can look up and see their beauty, believe in them, and try to follow where they lead.