Extra Credit- Last Blog!

As ENGL 489 comes to the end with the final week class, my thoughts on taking this course has changed immensely. Being that the course was named Our Others, Our Selves, I had no idea what to expect from this class. The first day of class opened with going to hear Kelly Wisecup speak about the topic of Obeah, which I had never heard until she spoke of it. Learning that the theme of the class was Identity, I knew this was going to be an interesting class. Reading the first novel for the class entitled Slave Moth, was a good introduction of the course and it tied nicely into Kelly Wisecup’s discussion. I like reading novels that expand culturally and gain a perspective from a view that I had never seen before. The next novel Another Country by James Baldwin was by far my favorite book! It was tremendously written and the characters in the story were equally interesting to analyze and how their identities really defined them and the struggles they had to conquer to find themselves. I really did not care for the novel Drown, but liked how it was a collection of stories. Some of the parts of the story were confusing and I really did not get into it. Blu’s Hanging was another novel I enjoyed reading. This book was filled with emotion and my heart really went out to Ivah because she was the caretaker of her other sister and brother after her mother passed away. Their father drank a lot and worked several jobs to support the family. He was not a very nice man and blamed Ivah for her younger brothers rape incident with their uncle. Ivah had to grow up and take responsibility at such a young age that she did not have time to be a kid. I really felt bad for her character. The book The Heartsong of Charging Elk was a more slow paced novel and it took time for me to get into it. This book has a lot of nostalgia with Charging Elk remembering his past and holding on to the “plains” culture while adapting to another lifestyle and culture shock in France. He was never fully assimilated. He was homesick and was forced to learn another language if he wanted to survive. While in France he fell in love with a woman who was a prostitute. Charging Elk plans to marry her but, Bretueil “blackmails Marie into betraying him.” Charging Elk ends up killing him. This book was really long and filled with a lot of information. The Book of Salt, The Powerbook, and The Autobiography of Red to me represents the whole persona of what it means to find the true essence of your identity and experience it in a way that transpires through you. The title Book of Salt in itself explains how Binh dealt with the issues he did. The salt represents many things inclucing in the kitchen where he was taken in by two ladies who were also lovers. The salt also represents the sea where he travels after he is banished from his home. The painful memories he has from his father beating him and calling him names. The salt is rubbed in his wounds of the past. I really got into this story and liked it a lot. Overall this course has been inspiring not only reading these intriguing novels but also getting a chance to write on a topic that interested us. I also enjoyed blogging and getting a chance to view what other’s had to say. I am glad I took this class because I have learned a great deal!

Blog # 7

The book Autobiography of Red by Anne Carlson was certainly an interesting novel. It is much different than the novels we have read so far. Although still sticking with the theme of identity, the story of a young boy who is also a “red winged creature” captures the reader’s attention right away. I liked this book because it is “magical” and filled with “fantasy” in a way. Geryon, the little boy, also struggles with his sexuality and by the end comes out and is open about his sexuality being recognized as a homosexual. The story is about the two boys who go visit a volcano with Herakles. The mother wants her sons to return right away. The two must leave only to find out later in the story that Gerygon and him meet in Argentina to pick up where they left off. This book was broken up differently in that the chapters were much shorter and it was more of an easier read. The layout of the pages was also different in that it read more like a poem than a regular page in a book. This book also had some strong symbols in it referencing to the front cover of the book which has a volcano on it. The volcano represents the passion and destruction of the relationship between Geryon and Herakles. They had to part for awhile not knowing the future but soon to realize that they would be reunited. The use of color in this book is also interesting to note. The hot red fiery lava that slowly turns black represents death. He also refers to his mother as the color red and his father is the color gold. Over the novel, he contrasts the image of a volcano to certain things. One scene in the story depicting this is when Geryon returns to the volcano and reunites with his ex lover, who is with someone else. I also liked this story because it had some mythology to it. It played on the mortal and immortal feel to Hercules, the son of Zeus. This story was also full of emotion from all characters. Through taking pictures he also finds a way to connect more with in himself. He discovers that “the only way to remain immortal is to capture life on camera.” I really enjoyed reading this book a lot. I actually read it over twice because the first time I read it, I had some questions. After the second time, all the answers seemed to be clearer. I thought the characters in the story fit and the dialogue was good. I really liked the symbol of the volcano and thought it worked really well with the story. I also thought the quote by Emily Dickenson at the beginning was intriguing. It really made me think as to what this novel was going to in tale and made me really want to read it. Overall this was a fantastic book that fit our theme of identity and mixed with it was some mythology and fantasy. It was a really well written book!

Blog # 6

The Book of Salt written by Monique Truong is a piece that is well written in that in the story, there are two stories going on at once. One part is of Binh telling of his present life at 27 rue de fleurs. The other part is Binh explaining why he left for Paris to begin with. I liked this book for many reasons and one was because of the character development throughout the novel. Binh transforms throughout the novel and ends up confessing that he is gay. Being in a family of four boys, his father bans him from the household and is forced out. His father is also very abusive and it troubles Binh. He leaves and heads to the sea and ends up in Paris. The lines, “I wanted the deepest water because I wanted to slip into it and allow the moon’s reflection to swallow me whole”- are my favorite lines describing how he felt. Frustrated and confused, he tries to get a hold of reality and reminisces about the past. Another reason I enjoyed this book because it was very personal coming from the view of Binh and describing his life, while he finds out things about himself reminiscing about the past. I also like the emotion portrayed. Some of the events such as his father beating him were intense. The lines, “A stick of wood thicker than my arm splintered into my skin” is an example of the pain he endured from his father. The title of the story, “The Book of Salt” to me represents everything in this novel. The salt referring to the sea that he traveled, working in the kitchen, the pain he endured from his father, the emotion of sadness in his life. This story to me also seems like a confession in a way. It is very personal in that Binh’s real journey starts when he was little and forced out of the house. He has to fend for himself and start a new life. His sexuality is questioned and is taken in by two lesbian women. They all embody the same thing. This book intrigues me because I could never imagine having being banned from my own house and forced to live on my own. The sadness and anger in Binh lives while growing up. He questions his faith in the story and thinks that there is no hope. Overall I really enjoyed reading this and thought it was very well written. There was not one part I thought that was confusing. I thought the other characters in the story were important but didn’t overshadow the main character Binh. The voice in the story is important and think that if it would have been told in another point of view, it might have been confusing. I like stories that are more personal and draw the reader in making it feel like they are apart of it. This has by far been my favorite book and thought all of the issues dealing with abandonment, faith, hope, and sexuality tied into a wonderful and intense story to read.

blog #5

The book The Heartsong of Charging Elk, to me represents the innerness and changing view of how people of different cultures interact. This book presents itself in a way that not only captures the true meaning of identity, but allows the reader to actually feel what the characters are going through in the novel. The character of Charging Elk struggles when he is left behind in France by his traveling show and is confined to a hospital due to influenza. He is then taken prisoner in the country and is forced to live a life outside of his culture. He is thrown into a situation that is not familiar to him and ends up meeting a prostitute and has an affair with her. He also gets wrapped up in a murder scandal and is thrown in jail. His life is everything but normal and he himself gets lost in himself and cannot seem to find who he is. This story has some unusual turn of events, but it kept me wanting to read further. I have never read a book by James Welch but found his writing to be interesting. His characterization in each character has a unique style to them. I have not read a lot about the different tribes that settled in South Dakota so it was a learning experience to read about them. The setting of the novel sets the tone for the story and South Dakota is the ideal place for the western- mid American culture. I don’t think this book could’ve been written in another setting. In the book it is interesting to see references to Crazy Horse which is now a main culture identifier of South Dakota. I have visited Crazy Horse and found it to be fascinating. I think it is important, especially for the people that live in South Dakota to know where their roots came from and how this land was brought to be. Tapping into periods of time that not many cross the minds of people now, it is fascinating to look at. Having lived in South Dakota my whole life, growing up I didn’t appreciate the history and culture, but now as Im learning and reading more about it inside and out of school, the appreciation has grown. The beginning of the book gave a lot of background to the story and it was easier to read. There were a lot of characters to keep track of and remember, but each had their trait that were memorable.

Spring Break Extra Credit Blog

The novels we have read in class all deal with identity and in some form all tie into each other. It seems like there is always conflict with a character that has trouble finding them and by the end of the story, they have found meaning in who they truly are. It is interesting to me to see the breakdown of each character and what obstacles they have to overcome in order to achieve success. All of the characters in Another Country, seem to all “feel” a certain way. Eric “feels” that he is homosexual and Rufus “feels” he is black living in a white person’s world. They are all tied together in that they don’t realize they all feel strongly about what really exists. They all believe they live in different worlds when in reality, they are all struggling to find who they really are. Rufus has the most trouble finding who he is because he deals with issues on a deeper and eventually it gets to him so much that he ends up killing himself. The setting in New York City is interesting because when you think of a big city, you think of all the different kinds of people and culture. The issue of race back then was heavily affected. In the story, Rufus encounters a police officer coming out of the restaurant and the police officer stares him down. Rufus gets discriminated because of his color. Another scene in the story is when he is walking with Leona and Vivaldo and a young couple walks by and stares at Leona wondering which man was with her. One of the more serious scenes is when Vivaldo comes over to Rufus’s place and Leona has been beaten by Rufus. Leona says that Rufus thought she was looking at other black men. Rufus’s insecurities lead him down a path of sadness and hate. His friendship also is tested when Vivaldo suggests that Leona stay with him until Rufus figures himself out. Rufus accuses him of stealing his girl. All of the struggles in this story deals with individuality but at the same time, everyone is going through the same thing. . Reading this story also gave me a new perspective on the issue of class. Cass and Richard seem to be on a path of success with Richard’s new book, but Cass doesn’t like the things it comes with like all the dinner parties and all the fancy people that come over. Also the issue of moving is brought up and Richard wants to move, but Cass wants them to stay in the city. Although Cass and Richard have the most in common, they are the ones that have a lot of conflict. This was one of the best stories I have read and enjoyed analyzing and comparing the characters and tying into our class and the issue of identity. There comes a point in everyone’s life where their identity is tested whether it be a relationship, family, or friends. It seems as you get older your values stay the same but what changes is your identity.

Blog #4

I found the author Lois-Ann Yamanaka to be quit interesting in her writing and enjoyed reading about her life. She realized when she was teaching and observing her students write poetry that she too wanted to write creatively. Going back to school, she became “one of the state’s best novelists, as well as a vocal proponent of Hawaiian Creole English.” Her writing I found was controversial and very personal wrapped in emotion. Her first novel entitled Wild Meat and the Bully Burgers was “nominated for the AAAS literature award.” Other pieces of writitng that was nominated for the award, but was considered contriversial was the story called Pahala Theatre and also her second novel Blu’s Hanging. The passages of the stories gave reference to racism and the “award committee decided to issue no prize that year.” In Blu’s Hanging there is a scene where Blu, the young boy of the three children, gets raped by the next door neighbor guy who is Filipino. This controversial and intense emotional scene was too much for some people to read. I thought some of the passages in the book were real and gruesome and violent. The three Ogata children are devastated by the death of their mother and the oldest child, Ivah, tries to keep the family together. Their father withdrawls and secludes himself from the children and goes into a state of unstability. Because of the death of the mother, “Blu is propelled into increasingly insidious relationships by his flamboyant imagination and uncontainable need for love.” Some of the issues that the book dealt with like racism and cruel punishment to animals and children was hard to read. I didn’t like that the dogs were only allowed to go out once a week and kept locked up. The kids had to go over and clean the dirty infested room. Parts of the book was hard to understand because it was written in Pidgin, “which is spoken by many of the islands’ working- class residents.” I had mixed feelings about this novel because I don’t know what it is like to lose a parent and raise your siblings pretty much by yourself, but I can’t imagine it is easy. Ivah is still a child herself at 13 and having to take over and assume responsibility for her younger siblings is difficult. She doesn’t get to live a normal childhood and has to grow up fast. Another part of her life is hurt when her father blames Ivah for Blu getting raped. “The tension between Ivah and her father stemming from the rape is indicative of a thematic preoccupation in Yamanaka’s works with Japanese-American father-daughter relations.” She “explores the emotional distancing, elisions, and reticence.” It must have been hard for Ivah to know that her own father was not there for her and to blame her for soemthing she had no control over. This story is filled with emotion and that’s what kept me reading because the issues were so real. This story was one of the best novel’s I have read and found it to be extroadinary. Dealing with the Hawaiian culture, it was interesting to read something new and different!

blog #3

I really enjoyed reading the identity essay, “If You Are What You Eat, Then What Am I” by Geeta Kothari. I liked the topic of the essay because it was fun to read and not a serious topic. I enjoy reading pieces that are more intimate and feel like the writer is directly speaking to the reader. The one-on-one dialogue is interesting to read. I also liked that this dealt with another culture and you as the reader get a sense of nationality and cultural identity to it. When the writer talks about going back to India and eating in the restaurants that is it not true ethnic food, it reminds me just like here if you eat at Taco Bell that they modernize and Americanize the food and it is not truly Mexican food. The food there would taste different because it comes from real ingredients, not processed food. The characters in the story are not use to the “real food” of India and cause them to get sick. I like tuna and think that the food choice of this essay is interesting. Also the writer mentions other foods that you would find in other countries such as “yellow dal, rice, chapatti, bhaji, lentils. I have never heard of some of those foods. Overall I liked the story and found it to be interesting. The paper we had to write of our own identity was interesting to write. Thinking back at a time in my life and talking about an event that dealt with identity was emotional. Everyone goes through times in their lives where their identity is questioned and you are forced to find out who you are. Going through school is in itself an identity adventure and as you grow older you find out more about yourself. I really liked this assignment because it allowed me to rethink all the way back in middle school and forward all the way up to now. There were a lot of ups and downs and emotional times, but that is what makes you who you are. You have to experience the bad to find out the good. It is neat to think of all the teachers and coaches that have helped you through growing up. I can still remember an old song our grammar teacher taught us in 7th grade to remember linking verbs and can still sing the song! This class so far has been really intriguing on levels that I had never imagined. The knowledge I will take from this class will be with me as I continue on in life. I am thinking about pursing my masters and English is a subject I really enjoy. Not only do I get to express myself creatively by writing, but also by reading and researching well known writers that have been known as some of the greatest of all time. In every upper level English class I take, I findd more about myself than any other class that I have taken here.