Tom Wolfe Mau-Mauing the Flak Catchers 1) Whats Mau-Mauing 2) Who are the Flak Catchers?

? Why are they described that way? 3) How would you describe Wolfes tone? Why? Point to specific passages to support your answer. 4) How would you describe Wolfes ethos? What impression do you have of him based off of this article? 5) Do you find Wolfe credible? Why or why not? Give specific examples of his writing that you think bolsters or undermines (as the case may be) his credibility.

Tom Wolfe Mau-Mauing the Flak Catchers The Bureaucrats at City Hall and in the Office of Economic Opportunity talked ghetto all the time, but they didnt know any more about what was going on in the Western Addition, Hunters Point, Potrero Hill, the Mission, Chinatown, or south of Market Street than they did about Zanzibar. They didnt know where to look. They didnt even know who to ask. 1) What does Wolfe mean here when he said that the bureaucrats talked ghetto all the time? 2) Why does he put ghetto in quotation marks? 3) Look at the analogy he constructs: why does Wolfe compare the bureaucrats knowledge of Western Addition, Hunters Point, etc. to their knowledge of Zanzibar? a. Whats the purpose of this comparison? What does it say about the competence of City Hall bureaucrats? b. What does this comparison suggest about Potrero Hill, the Mission, Chinatown, etc. What does it mean for these neighborhoods to be like Zanzibar?