I wanted to write out a long blog post about Entropy, but the more I think about it the more depressed I get. I had so many good things to say, but it seems kind of wasted now. Plus I have to go to work tonight so I must get off the computer and sleep.... Just let me say this:
I really wish I could have discussed this story with the class. I feel like out of all the stories we discussed during our last classes we spent the least amount of time on this one. I understand it happens, but I was SO prepared to teach everyone a thing or two about what I learned about this story and what I liked about it, but every time I tried to speak out about its deeper meaning it seemed I was pushed under the rug for lack of time and a somewhat disinterest from everyone in the room.
So yeah. Entropy.
Friday, May 3, 2013
American Literature: Expectations and rewards of the semester
My expectations have changed. American literature is about
struggle and overcoming our fears and oppression of society. We see that in ALL
of the things we've read! In the Land of the Free (544) is about the oppression
of immigrants and how the government rules on money. These people cannot even
get their child back without waving some money in someone's face. The Other Two
by Edith Wharton (522) is about a woman climbing out of oppression through the
men she marries. An Agony. As is Now (1520) is about the oppression of a man
who cannot be himself in his own skin. Even Entropy (1547) is a story of
intellectuals being oppressed by the advances in technology making free
thinking seem obsolete. All of these stories are from different time periods,
yet deal with the same ideology. Being oppressed and unable to express their
feelings based on societal clauses, which either make them feel helpless and
suffocated, or liberate them in to going against the current and being the
person they long to be.
Cathedral
Great story. Wonderfully written. The ending was obviously the best part. The
man/narrator "sees" nothing but what is in his mind. He is drawing a
cathedral, but once he's in the rhythm of the picture the blind man tells him
to "close [his] eyes" (1567) and to keep drawing. Once he finished he
refused to open his eyes. I think he pictured life from the blind man's
perspective. Through this blind man he was able to be outside of himself and
see something in his mind as vividly as he ever has. "It was like nothing
else in my life up to now" (1567).
I think that through this exercise the narrator has a spiritual
experience. He's unable to answer his wife when she asked him what was
happening (1566). This man had a sort of "out of body experience"
where he left his physical world and went into a state of complete zen, kind of
reminds me of meditation actually. We can see this clearly in the second to
last paragraph of the story: My eyes were still closed. I was in my house. I
knew it. But I didn't feel like I was inside anything (1567).
Monday, April 8, 2013
Am I Racist?
When I was a small child (roughly 4) I grew up in a predominantly poor, white neighborhood. Looking back, it's easy to see that most of my poor, white neighbors were poor, white racists. I know this because I only had one friend. She lived at the end of the street and she came from a contextually rich family. She happened to be black. I considered this girl my best friend. Every day I would ride my bike to her house and we would sit in her back yard and do whatever it is that little girls do. She was really important to me. Now, I honestly can't remember her name, but she helped shape the kind of person I am from a very young age.
I remember she invited me to her birthday party. I was excited. My parents were social people at the time, and would occasionally have our neighbors babysit me. I mentioned this great news about her birthday party to my neighbor and my neighbor said, "It's nice that you're friends with that little black girl." Her statement confused me. Why was that nice? She's a nice girl, of course I'm going to be her friend. It really never occurred to me, being a four year old, that she was different from me. I knew I was white and that she didn't look like me, but it's like someone had withheld a certain amount of information from me that white people and black people were different. We're all just the same. She's a girl who's four, I am a girl who's four. She likes four year old girl things, I like four year old girl things. What's more to it than that? She is a human, I am a human and we are friends.
So I started paying more attention to these things and came to realize that my parents and other neighbors that I considered my role models would ALSO make snide little comments about "my little black friend". It pissed me off. I was confused for a lot of my childhood on the difference between having a white friend and having a black friend. I never asked. It seemed like something I should have already known and I would have felt stupid for asking, so I never did. Thankfully I grew up, matured and went to school, where my mind developed and I was able to form opinions and realize my own moral standings. I don't know when it exactly happened, but I vowed to myself to never be like my neighbors, my parents and whoever else and to NEVER classify people of color as a "little black girl" and focus more on these people as just "little girls".
So maybe that's why I feel kind of racist when we talk about Black Aesthetic. Throughout high school, when we'd talk about Civil Rights and "African American Writers" I always rolled my eyes, groaned and thought to myself: Why can't we just talk about WRITERS? Why do we have to segregate these writers as BLACK writers. Why don't we mention when a writer happens to be white? WHY IS THIS A THING THAT HAPPENS?
As you can see, I would get pretty angry about it. It sometimes came to the point that I would be so fed up about hearing about "black writers" and "black poets" and "black artists" that I considered to myself that I might be racist. Why did I react in such a negative way when speaking about African Americans? It's not that I didn't care, and I honestly find racism repulsive, but why did I have such hate for a subject that is important to understand?
Thankfully, in college I have found, that I DON'T have to feel racist about ignoring the race of a writer. Ralph Ellison made this apparent to me in Invisible Man (chapter 1) because even though this story is about a black child in a room of disgusting white men who treat him like an animal, that's not what the story is about. The story is about being oppressed in a general way. An oppressed African American child is the same as an oppressed gay man, the same as an oppressed woman, and the same as me, an oppressed white female who just wants to learn and go to college to make money doing something she loves. We are all the SAME regardless of everything else. We all have hearts and brains and feelings and we can all form thoughts and opinions, therefore nothing separates us.
I remember she invited me to her birthday party. I was excited. My parents were social people at the time, and would occasionally have our neighbors babysit me. I mentioned this great news about her birthday party to my neighbor and my neighbor said, "It's nice that you're friends with that little black girl." Her statement confused me. Why was that nice? She's a nice girl, of course I'm going to be her friend. It really never occurred to me, being a four year old, that she was different from me. I knew I was white and that she didn't look like me, but it's like someone had withheld a certain amount of information from me that white people and black people were different. We're all just the same. She's a girl who's four, I am a girl who's four. She likes four year old girl things, I like four year old girl things. What's more to it than that? She is a human, I am a human and we are friends.
So I started paying more attention to these things and came to realize that my parents and other neighbors that I considered my role models would ALSO make snide little comments about "my little black friend". It pissed me off. I was confused for a lot of my childhood on the difference between having a white friend and having a black friend. I never asked. It seemed like something I should have already known and I would have felt stupid for asking, so I never did. Thankfully I grew up, matured and went to school, where my mind developed and I was able to form opinions and realize my own moral standings. I don't know when it exactly happened, but I vowed to myself to never be like my neighbors, my parents and whoever else and to NEVER classify people of color as a "little black girl" and focus more on these people as just "little girls".
So maybe that's why I feel kind of racist when we talk about Black Aesthetic. Throughout high school, when we'd talk about Civil Rights and "African American Writers" I always rolled my eyes, groaned and thought to myself: Why can't we just talk about WRITERS? Why do we have to segregate these writers as BLACK writers. Why don't we mention when a writer happens to be white? WHY IS THIS A THING THAT HAPPENS?
As you can see, I would get pretty angry about it. It sometimes came to the point that I would be so fed up about hearing about "black writers" and "black poets" and "black artists" that I considered to myself that I might be racist. Why did I react in such a negative way when speaking about African Americans? It's not that I didn't care, and I honestly find racism repulsive, but why did I have such hate for a subject that is important to understand?
Thankfully, in college I have found, that I DON'T have to feel racist about ignoring the race of a writer. Ralph Ellison made this apparent to me in Invisible Man (chapter 1) because even though this story is about a black child in a room of disgusting white men who treat him like an animal, that's not what the story is about. The story is about being oppressed in a general way. An oppressed African American child is the same as an oppressed gay man, the same as an oppressed woman, and the same as me, an oppressed white female who just wants to learn and go to college to make money doing something she loves. We are all the SAME regardless of everything else. We all have hearts and brains and feelings and we can all form thoughts and opinions, therefore nothing separates us.
An Agony. As Now.
This poem is amazing. I think it's probably the best poem assigned in class and it all happens for me in the last stanza:
It burns the thing
inside it. And that thing
screams.
This small little stanza sums up the entire poem, but it does it in a way that is haunting. The whole poem talks about this man/soul being trapped in a metal jail/another human and we see the suffering steady throughout, but this last stanza makes you FEEL the agony with the speaker. I'm really impressed with Baraka's ability to do this because it sneaks up on you. It certainly did to me.
This oppression is hot like metal, it is suffocating and unrelenting. I think what hits it home for me the most is the fact that even though "this thing" is screaming, the oppression, the hot metal, is stopping it from being heard. He is screaming out, being burnt by this oppression, and he has no way of letting it out and letting himself be heard.
Baraka has this ability to bring forth your own sense of touch when talking about this metal. This metal burns, burns, burns. Imagine a summer day getting in to your car. You reach to put on your seat belt and you grab this hot metal. You immediately pull away, cursing the sun for the pain. You fidget and manage somehow to put on your seat belt without touching the metal. You avoid this metal because it BURNS and it HURTS. Imagine not being able to remove your hand from that metal? Imagine being stuck in your car in the middle of no where, windows up, 100 degrees, with your hand permanently attached to this belt buckle. You're screaming in pain, wanting desperately for someone to come save you. Wanting some sort of relief from this scolding metal....and no one even knows you're there. That's agony.
It's like watching a horror movie. This person is being tortured. We are aware that this person is being tortured, but there is no hope for them. No one can hear the screams, the cries. He is forever trapped to feel this agony forever. Forever.
It burns the thing
inside it. And that thing
screams.
This small little stanza sums up the entire poem, but it does it in a way that is haunting. The whole poem talks about this man/soul being trapped in a metal jail/another human and we see the suffering steady throughout, but this last stanza makes you FEEL the agony with the speaker. I'm really impressed with Baraka's ability to do this because it sneaks up on you. It certainly did to me.
This oppression is hot like metal, it is suffocating and unrelenting. I think what hits it home for me the most is the fact that even though "this thing" is screaming, the oppression, the hot metal, is stopping it from being heard. He is screaming out, being burnt by this oppression, and he has no way of letting it out and letting himself be heard.
Baraka has this ability to bring forth your own sense of touch when talking about this metal. This metal burns, burns, burns. Imagine a summer day getting in to your car. You reach to put on your seat belt and you grab this hot metal. You immediately pull away, cursing the sun for the pain. You fidget and manage somehow to put on your seat belt without touching the metal. You avoid this metal because it BURNS and it HURTS. Imagine not being able to remove your hand from that metal? Imagine being stuck in your car in the middle of no where, windows up, 100 degrees, with your hand permanently attached to this belt buckle. You're screaming in pain, wanting desperately for someone to come save you. Wanting some sort of relief from this scolding metal....and no one even knows you're there. That's agony.
It's like watching a horror movie. This person is being tortured. We are aware that this person is being tortured, but there is no hope for them. No one can hear the screams, the cries. He is forever trapped to feel this agony forever. Forever.
A Streetcar Named Desire
Let me start off by saying that it has been a while. I know, I know, I know. I'm sorry.
A Streetcar Named Desire is a play that I am rather fond of. My boyfriend is a movie enthusiast and tends to make me watch all of the great things that has ever been produced in the film industry. I first saw this play about three years ago. I watched the Marlon Brando rendition.
In class we did a lot of talking about the characters that we chose. I chose Stella. I chose her because I felt everyone seemed to find her to be an idiot. I wanted to stick up for her character and try to rationalize the situation she was in and try to help others realize there was more to her than just a punching bag for Stanley.
So I guess I sympathized with her right off the bat. I "got" her, you know? She wasn't a weak woman, hell I think she was pretty empowered actually. She lived in a place that she loathed. A southern town of the same people, the same routines and the same scenery. She wanted a CHANGE . I can't imagine how scary it must have been for her to go out at this time in the world to a city she didn't know, just because she needed a change. It takes a lot of guts to put yourself out there like that, especially as a woman in this time. So no, Stella isn't weak. She's just bored and needs excitement.
I am not condoning woman abuse. I do think there is an element of shock and dysfunction her relationship with Stanley, but who's to say she doesn't want it that way? She seemed pretty aware of Stanley's anger issues throughout the whole play, so when she went off at his poker buddies in Scene Three, I think she knew what she was doing...at least subconsciously. She subconsciously knew how Stanley would react and she didn't care. She's thrilled by Stanley and the way he makes her feel.
Some people in class brought up that she just wanted attention and I couldn't disagree with a statement more. It wasn't about having all the attention on her, it was about experiencing the desire and ignoring the actual problems in her life. We see her ignoring "real life" when she flees town, we see her ignoring her actual problems when she causes a fuss with Stanley and we even see her ignoring the reality that Stanley rapes Blanche when Stella sides with Stanley and "ships" her sister off to a mental hospital. She rejects the harshness of the world and only wants to have fun.
Now this isn't to say she does this without regret. She probably does regret some of the things. She seems guilty for leaving her sister to deal with all the problems back home and she seems extremely guilty for sending her sister away, but at the end of the day, the need for Stanley and the need for adventure will overpower her feelings of guilt. For ever ounce of guilt she feels, she'll more than likely make up for it fun. Desire overrides guilt.
A Streetcar Named Desire is a play that I am rather fond of. My boyfriend is a movie enthusiast and tends to make me watch all of the great things that has ever been produced in the film industry. I first saw this play about three years ago. I watched the Marlon Brando rendition.
In class we did a lot of talking about the characters that we chose. I chose Stella. I chose her because I felt everyone seemed to find her to be an idiot. I wanted to stick up for her character and try to rationalize the situation she was in and try to help others realize there was more to her than just a punching bag for Stanley.
So I guess I sympathized with her right off the bat. I "got" her, you know? She wasn't a weak woman, hell I think she was pretty empowered actually. She lived in a place that she loathed. A southern town of the same people, the same routines and the same scenery. She wanted a CHANGE . I can't imagine how scary it must have been for her to go out at this time in the world to a city she didn't know, just because she needed a change. It takes a lot of guts to put yourself out there like that, especially as a woman in this time. So no, Stella isn't weak. She's just bored and needs excitement.
I am not condoning woman abuse. I do think there is an element of shock and dysfunction her relationship with Stanley, but who's to say she doesn't want it that way? She seemed pretty aware of Stanley's anger issues throughout the whole play, so when she went off at his poker buddies in Scene Three, I think she knew what she was doing...at least subconsciously. She subconsciously knew how Stanley would react and she didn't care. She's thrilled by Stanley and the way he makes her feel.
Some people in class brought up that she just wanted attention and I couldn't disagree with a statement more. It wasn't about having all the attention on her, it was about experiencing the desire and ignoring the actual problems in her life. We see her ignoring "real life" when she flees town, we see her ignoring her actual problems when she causes a fuss with Stanley and we even see her ignoring the reality that Stanley rapes Blanche when Stella sides with Stanley and "ships" her sister off to a mental hospital. She rejects the harshness of the world and only wants to have fun.
Now this isn't to say she does this without regret. She probably does regret some of the things. She seems guilty for leaving her sister to deal with all the problems back home and she seems extremely guilty for sending her sister away, but at the end of the day, the need for Stanley and the need for adventure will overpower her feelings of guilt. For ever ounce of guilt she feels, she'll more than likely make up for it fun. Desire overrides guilt.
Tuesday, February 19, 2013
Fate vs Total Control
In class I was really struggling with which I believed in, but I think sitting here at home I can make my words more clear.
I don't believe that we have total control over everything, but I also don't believe that no matter what we do there's always one outcome. I like to look at it like this: We have control of what actions we take and, depending on those actions, we get an end result. There can be numerous end results. I could be an astronaut, or a bum on the sidewalk. A stay at home mom or the single mom bread winner of four. I think that life is limitless in the terms of what one can accomplish, but other factors play in to it. We could be born in to a family of limited means, or in to a family with money to piss away and that its self can change the end result.
I want to be a teacher, so that is what I aspire to be. The choices I make are choices that revolve around this idea. So I get up every day and go to work and go to school and read things and shove as much information in my head as I can. But that's because I WANT to. If I keep it up with these actions I will more than likely reach the goal I am after. But let's say I started binge drinking. I stop going to work and school and the only thing I shove in my brain is alcohol. What are the chances of me being a teacher then? Very, very slim.
My fate is what I chose it to be. Actions have great consequences. Through control we help define our fate. Fate is heavily weighted by choices.
I don't believe that we have total control over everything, but I also don't believe that no matter what we do there's always one outcome. I like to look at it like this: We have control of what actions we take and, depending on those actions, we get an end result. There can be numerous end results. I could be an astronaut, or a bum on the sidewalk. A stay at home mom or the single mom bread winner of four. I think that life is limitless in the terms of what one can accomplish, but other factors play in to it. We could be born in to a family of limited means, or in to a family with money to piss away and that its self can change the end result.
I want to be a teacher, so that is what I aspire to be. The choices I make are choices that revolve around this idea. So I get up every day and go to work and go to school and read things and shove as much information in my head as I can. But that's because I WANT to. If I keep it up with these actions I will more than likely reach the goal I am after. But let's say I started binge drinking. I stop going to work and school and the only thing I shove in my brain is alcohol. What are the chances of me being a teacher then? Very, very slim.
My fate is what I chose it to be. Actions have great consequences. Through control we help define our fate. Fate is heavily weighted by choices.
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