FACULTY

ACADEMY OF LANGUAGE STUDIES

PROGRAMME

LG243 - BACHELOR OF APPLIED LANGUAGE STUDIES (HONS.) ENGLISH FOR

INTERCULTURAL COMMUNICATION

COURSE

ALS461 - CRITICAL THINKING

ASSIGNMENT 2: TAKE HOME WRITTEN ASSIGNMENT ( INDIVIDUAL )

PREPARED BY:

NO NAME STUDENT ID

1 ANIS SYAFIQAH BINTI KAMAL 2021843738

PREPARED FOR:

MADAM FAUZIAH SAADAH HAJI ABDUL HALIM

SUBMISSION:

25 DECEMBER 2022
 The first article entitled “What my bicultural background taught me about being a leader” a
piece by Revati “Rani” Paranik that was published on 6 September 2022 provides readers with
some explanation on how being bicultural helped the author become a great leader. The next
article entitled “Bicultural Latinos embrace dual identities, Shun pressure to assimilate” by
Gabriela Fresquez was released on 24 September 2021 explains how difficult it is for Latino
immigrants to keep their cultural identity while adapting into American culture in the United
States. For the sake of this assignment, I'll compare and contrast the papers' arguments in
terms of appropriate critical thinking concepts such as clarity, language vagueness, accuracy,
and hasty generalization.

The first and second articles share the same elements, which is clarity. According to
Bassham et al. (2011), he asserts that the author's capacity to make their views very clear is
what is meant by clarity. Richard Paul and Linda Elder (2016) said that clarity is a gateway
standard. They further explained that we cannot judge if a statement is factual or pertinent if it is
ambiguous. For example, Revati “Rani” Paranik (2022) writes in great detail about how
American and Indian cultures differ from one another but that each culture has value regardless
of how they differ from one another. She also mentioned that “each culture has a spiritual fabric
that allows us to understand the world around us.” Nevertheless, she gained six crucial abilities
from experiencing two different cultures that assisted her in forming a successful global
leadership mindset: consider cultural context, strive to support equity, lead with empathy,
value nonverbal cues, maximize your resources, and earn to return. Similarly, Gabriela
Fresquez (2021), also made her messages apparent in what she was attempting to say. She
quotes an interviewee who shared his experience with discrimination. She goes into detail on
how crazy it is to be a Latino in the US since they are expected to be excellent representatives
for their culture in a country where doing so would subject them to terrible discrimination. In
short, this demonstrates that both authors efficiently and clearly communicate their arguments,
enabling readers to easily understand and comprehend their thoughts.

The next element of critical thinking that can be found in the first article is accuracy.
Accuracy is about correct information. According to Richard Paul and Linda Elder (2016)
accuracy is when a statement is free from errors, mistakes, or even distortions. Unquestionably,
accuracy is necessary for critical thinking. Revati “Rani” Paranik (2022) gave an illustration by
briefly elaborating on India’s culture. She continued by precisely describing the respect and
hierarchy that are the cornerstones of Indian culture and not unfiltered speech. She then gave
instances to back up her arguments. Examples include the fact that when an elderly person
enters a room full of people, everyone stops talking, and elderlies are surrounded with a
respectful look to ensure that their voice is heard. Additionally, she also gave out some advice
on ways to develop empathy. She explains that empathy creates equality, which therefore
permits engaging on the same level. In short, the author successfully presents her arguments
with accuracy.

In contrast to the previous article, the second one illustrates the use of vagueness.
According to Basham et. al (2011), he clarifies that a word or a group of words is vague when its
meaning is fuzzy or inexact. In research from Cambridge Dictionary (2022), vague language is
highly prevalent. In order to make our statements less factual and straightforward, we frequently
use words and phrases like some, about, kind of, sort of, and that kind of thing. For instance,
the author said that ‘some’ Latinos are starting to reject the notion of complete cultural
assimilation. To express the vagueness and unexact number of Latinos who had this opinion,
the author used the word ‘some’ in the statement. As a result, it can induce readers to believe
the article is misleading.

Furthermore, hasty generalization is another instance of the use of illogical fallacies, which
is used in the second article as well. A hasty generalization is a fallacy that uses too few
examples to come to a general conclusion (Lumsden, Lumsden, and Wiethoff 149). A hasty
generalization has a fault since it is based on insufficient evidence. Broad claims necessitate
broad evidence, etc. To put it another way, the author is jumping to conclusions. For example,
the author drew a conclusion that Latinos in the US are facing criticism for not assimilating
enough into American culture because it was based on multiple viral videos where they receive
criticism from random people for speaking Spanish. This argument is fallacious because the
author drew a general conclusion about the whole Latino community from multiple biased
samples of unrepresentative viral videos. At the same time, the author is trying to gain the
reader’s sympathy.

In conclusion, the authors of these two papers were successful in critically presenting their
arguments. The first and second articles show clarity, while the first and second articles show
accuracy, vagueness, and hasty generalization, respectively. In the end, both authors do a good
job of expressing the difficulties faced by bicultural people.

(857 words)