L.A. Stories describes the experiences of a university instructor teaching English to culturally diverse students. It uses excerpts from student essays to demonstrate the emotional connections communicated by writers drawing on the wealth of their own experiences. For many of these students, English is a second language, and many others have had little opportunity to develop their writing skills. Therefore, the excerpts illustrate the varying degrees of success the writers achieved. Carol Clark Ottesen reflects on the journey of a teacher attempting to guide these students in improving these skills. The voices she presents speak of the lives of African Americans, Asian Americans, Hispanics, Native Americans, and others. Otteson seeks to expose the importance of the recognition of diversity and the effective communication of it in an increasingly integrated society. She accomplishes this not only by presenting writing samples, but through descriptions of the unification between cultures as they shared experiences in the classroom. This book serves not only to represent the outcomes of openly expressing diversity, but to guide those teaching many different cultures through a learning experience of their own, while maximizing the achievement of their students.
