Victoriano Cárdenas

LETTER: Revision cuts most of UNM Mission Statement

 When I taught expository writing at the University of New Mexico in 2018, my students read “Animal Farm” by George Orwell. A staple of most high school English classes in the U.S., a lot of students dismiss the book as being just “a fairy story.” A few students asked me why they had to read it again in college, and I asked them to be patient and see if they could glean anything new. Once you understand a story’s plot, you can focus on dialogue, setting, characterization, theme, historical context — all elements of a good story that point a reader toward its deeper ideas.