Sponsors in a literacy contribute to the ones who are getting sponsored by in a various way. They usually play an important role in a literacy narrative. Sponsors can determine a trait of the writer’s story. The may lead the people to write a success narrative or a rebel narrative. Learners can often move from an identity to different identity in a narrative.
Sponsors can have negative effect to the ones who are getting sponsored by. This lead students write rebel narrative. According to Brandt, “sponsors are any agent who enable, support, teach. The concept of sponsorship is suggestive for explaining the outcome of one’s literacy success.” (Brandt). “Sponsors” is a fitting term for the figures who affect a lot in people’s memories of literacy learning such as teachers or supervisors. In Brandt’s passage he gives an actual example of how the quality of a sponsor can affect people. A person named Raymond was supervised by some of the most powerful agents of the university, while Dora Lopez was being sponsored by her parents who worked part time jobs at a local university. The outcome of Raymond and Dora was completely different. According to Alexander, “rebel narratives are written by the students who resist traditional literacy beliefs, conventions, and ideologies by rebelling against them. The students portray themselves as resisting the system rather than to dislike reading and writing.” (Alexander). In Shaylee’s narrative, her teacher acted as a negative sponsor to her. Her teacher would always take her book away whenever she was reading the books. Shaylee quoted, “My story isn’t the only one like it, so many people are shot down for being different by their own choice. It shouldn’t matter what you like as long as you are not hurting anyone.” As shown in this example, negative sponsor can lead one to write rebel narrative.
Little and master narrative are related to each other. Some little narrative such as victim narrative may move to success or rebel narrative. It is dependent on the writer’s characteristic whether the narrative will be success or rebel. In Shamus’s narrative, he was affected by two different sponsors. His mindset toward English was negative when he met his first teacher. The first teacher was ignorant sponsor who influenced his students in a poor way. Shamus felt victimized in this situation. The situation however changes as Shamus enters new school and meets new teacher. The new teacher knew exactly what is needed for success and eventually lead him to change his mindset. The new teacher had a quality of positive sponsor in contrast to the first teacher. This is certain part from his narrative which explains the situation. “There are teachers who will ruin things for you, change you and make you want to quit. But all it takes is that one teacher, friend, and/or mentor to change your mindset.” He turned from victim narrative to success narrative by meeting new mentor. In Shaylee’s narrative, her teacher acted as a negative sponsor to her. Her teacher would always take her book away whenever she was reading the books. She felt victimized and rebelled against it. She quoted, “My story isn’t the only one like it, so many people are shot down for being different by their own choice. It shouldn’t matter what you like as long as you are not hurting anyone.” In contrast to Shamus she turned from victim narrative to rebel narrative. These examples show how one move from victim narrative to others.
