THEY ARE GAY

In All the Light that We Cannot See, there are such heavy undertones that suggest that Werner and Volkheimer are gay. And for each other no less! There are several scenes in the book where Volkheimer's actions suggest a fondness for Werner and this fondness seems to run deeper than favoritism. He shows tenderness for Werner and Werner reciprocates in his shy way. While some would argue that Werner had a thing for Marie, I would like to argue that it is simply platonic. It's like what would happen if you met an angel: you marvel at how pure they are but you don't feel romantically for them. Werner and Volkheimer have been through so much together and they're both impure and they've both helped to kill and they're just meant to be.

All the Light that We cannot See 1

What have we learned in the exposition of this novel? Discuss setting, main characters, goals of main characters, and major conflict(s).

In the exposition of All the Light, we learn about the two separate settings for Werner and Marie (Zollverein and Paris) as well as their shared setting of Saint-Malo. We also learn about the characters and many of their quirks and mannerisms through paragraphs of mini exposition at the beginning of each chapter. Werner's goal is easy (keeping himself out of Zollverein's coal mines at any cost) and Marie's is to become more proficient and at ease at being blind. As the novel progresses, both characters might gain new goals. Some goals I have suspected are in the future include Marie protecting the Sea of Flames and Werner protecting Marie. A major conflict for Marie is her struggle with being blind, and one of Werner's major conflicts is his struggle to get out of Zollverein and get better with the technology he is so good with from the get-go. The most major conflict would actually be how the main characters' stories intertwine with World War II.

Oral History Interview Fun

For this week's blog post, reflect upon your experience interviewing your oral history subject. How did you feel about the experience? Do you think it went well - why or why not? What do you think you might do differently in future oral history interviews? What was interesting about your subject's story?

I felt kind of awed by the experience of hearing how someone's life story came to be. It's really amazing how much I learned from Mike (the guy we interviewed) and how well the interview went. Some of the reasons it went well include how much information we got from him and how easy he was to talk to. In the future I would move the recording device closer to the person being interviewed and make sure all of my partners were seated behind me (in the case of me interviewing). I learned a lot of interesting things from Mike, such as what it's like to move around to a lot of different states when you're younger. He also went to art school and learned how to paint before he realized he hated it. Finally, the way he looked at his art was the most interesting. He didn't really think about it so much as doing it and I thought that was really cool.

Magazine Analysis

The article I read was about the history of the LGBT community (as well as its high and low points) in Houston, but specifically the Houston Pride Parade. The parade has been there as a symbol of community and something that says that LGBT individual stands alone. It has been a huge part of the city's LGBT community since the 50s and it was there when everything looked dark for all individuals gay, bisexual, transgender, or otherwise. While in the 1950s people were really starting to accept others who were different, there were those who didn't support it. The parade stood as a show to say that the LGBT community wasn't going anywhere anytime soon. I really enjoyed some of the word usage in this article as well as its overall positive stance on LGBT rights. The article on the internet was only part of it and I would enjoy reading the whole thing.

A cool dad

Summarize the story to which you listened and provide a link to that story. Then write three follow-up questions that you would like to be able to ask the person(s) telling the story.

https://storycorps.org/animation/the-saint-of-dry-creek/

This story was about a rural farm boy, Patrick Haggerty, slowly realizing he was gay (and thought he was doing a good job at it) when he wasn't actually doing the best job. His father who must have probably come across as a stereotypical Southern farmer wasn't the first to notice that his son may have been coming to terms with being gay but he was the first person to do something about it and not in the way you might expect. He confronted his son about it and instead of reassuring his son that he liked girls and that he was just "going through a phase" he told him something along the lines of this: he needed to not hide who he was because the impression hiding, or "sneaking", creates is an impression that what someone believes they are is wrong. Patrick tried to deny what his father was saying about him possibly being gay but Charles, his dad, saw right through him. Some follow-up questions I'd like to ask Patrick include if his father did anything else to help him towards realizing his identity, if he had to deal with coming out before or after his dad died, and how his life would have been different if his dad hadn't been accepting.

Final post

The way Marjane illustrated her book was especially interesting to me. Some of the qualities that really drew me in were the simplicity in the panels and the way that the story was illustrated beyond the way it needed to be. The way the characters were drawn with not too much detail made me feel a sort of kindred spirit because my drawing skills are only good enough to draw the way Marjane did (if I can even say that much). Other things that interested me about Marjane's work include the way she moved from panel to panel in a way that was disjointed and at the same time fluid. I would love to learn how to do that. Finally, I loved the black and white art style. While making it feel older may not have been Marjane's intention, it was a stylistic choice that really appealed to me.

Setting

Describe how setting plays a part in the book. How does it move the plot forward? What does it reveal about the plot? How does it set the mood? Give specific examples from the book.

In Persepolis, the setting moves the plot forward by changing from Iran to Austria (p. 155). This change signifies several things. First, it marks what many would consider the beginning of puberty for Marjane. Second, it also shows the drastic change in both social and physical environment from strict, religiously-run Iran to a more free society in Austria. Not that the free society was accessible to Marjane at first, seeing as she was living in a boarding school run by nuns. Not related to the change, the mood is also set by the setting. All through the book the confined nature of Marjane’s surroundings really sort of lends light to what it was like to live her life when she did.

Discrimination

On many occasions in Austria, Marjane experienced discrimination (from the nuns, other students, etc.). Why do you think the Austrians felt this way about Marjane, and how do you think this changed Marjane's opinion of Europeans? Use specific examples from the book to support your claims.

Marjane gets a lot of discrimination thrown against her during her four years in Austria as shown by the students in the cafe on page 196 and by many others. I think the Austrians felt this way about Marjane because she was different from them. One of the major differences was probably how she looked different. While the book never actually says it, I'm sure that she had some sort of accent that people also didn't like. The discrimination changed Marjane's views of the Austrians in many ways, one of them being that she obviously thought they were much worse than they were. They also must have seemed alien-like to her because of their cultural and physical differences. All in all, the way that Marjane and the Austrians don't like each other seems very petty and it could easily be solved.

Why did Marjane's parents decide to send her to Europe. Do you think this was the right decision? Why or why not?

Mainly, Marjane's parents sent her to Europe to get her out of Iran as the revolution escalated. They didn't want her to be caught up in the arrests and executions with her current rebellious state. They also wanted to make sure she could get a proper education and be able to express herself without the restrictions set on Iranian women. There was the war with Iraq as well. Marjane wouldn't have even needed to be caught to be killed by a bomb. I don't think there could be any way this wasn't the right decision, unless keeping a family together is more important than getting your daughter to a place where she can be herself. Marjane may not have realized it, but this was the right choice.

The end of days

So here we are. Armageddon approaches. And as we stare down the impending doom we realize...it's just ELA ending for the year. I enjoyed the class a lot, but I know that I enjoyed some parts more than others. I feel like we should have had seminars a lot more often. I also think we should've introduced some sort of basic structure to the seminars. I have no idea what kind of structure that would be, but anything works as long as it gets people talking. I also would really enjoy it if we could read another play. I thought that was a hell of a lot of fun. Just one more thing (this is for CW Club). If we could set up an active system on Google Docs to comment on each other's work on days that don't start with an F.

Racist Coins?

I enjoyed how Hansberry portrayed the two racist characters in the book, Lindner and (ironically) Murchison. Lindner was very soft-spoken, polite, nervous man, an opposite to a stereotypical racist in every way. It may seem counterintuitive to reference a stereotype in a post of this nature, but bear with me. The way Lindner worded his speeches to the Youngers sort of made me feel like he was only conveying the wishes and opinions of the people of Clybourne Park when that wasn't the case at all. The other racist character, George Murchison, seemed like a paradox. He was African-American, and yet he held himself above other African-Americans on the level of white people. He attempted to give himself the qualities of a stereotypical white person in that time: college boy, nice clothes, "gay" shoes (as observed by Walter Lee). But, to the Younger family, he only displayed a demeanor of trying too hard to be cool. These two men seemed like two vastly different sides of a same coin.

Asagai vs. Murchison

In Act II, Scene 1, we meet George Murchison. How is he different from Joseph Asagai? Why do you think that these two men are so different?

Asagai is a man who is proud of his Nigerian ancestry and accepting of himself. He courts Beneatha by giving her robes from his home country and giving her a nickname in his language. He is shameless in observing her semi-Americanized ways, picking at them and trying to replace them with what he believes is natural. Murchison is completely integrated into white culture, disregarding his roots because he believes that the closer he is to being white the closer he is to being better than other African-Americans. He encourages Beneatha to continue with the ways she tries to assimilate with white culture, such as straightening her hair and wearing what a white woman would be expected to wear. Murchison does not accept who he is racially and it manifests as contempt for others of his race.

The Shoes of the Younger Family

Put yourself into the shoes of the Younger family. What do you think it would be like to live in a tiny, three-room apartment with three generations of your family, without the choice or resources to move elsewhere?

It would be extremely frustrating, firstly. Waking up every morning to see three generations of your family living would be a constant reminder that you didn’t make enough money to house them and give them the space they properly needed. To me, it would feel like failure slapping me across the face. After reading about the Younger family’s relations, it would be understandable that tensions would be high. The family members would be resentful of each other because of past fights or conflicting opinions or almost anything, really. Family may be considered to be strong, but it will fall fast under heavy pressure. Money would be a constant issue, whether it was for rent, food money, clothes, etc. It’s hard to think about the many people who actually live like this because I know it would be near impossible for me to do.

Favorite Book?!?!

This week, you will be working on your response project to The Great Gatsby. For you blog post, you may write about anything that you want, as long as it is appropriate for your audience and is substantive enough to begin a discussion.

Recently I've been thinking about what my favorite book we've read this year is. I really enjoyed The Alchemist for its imagery and "mythology," as well as the explanations of the world it was set in. Coelho did an amazing job integrating supernatural phenomenons into everyday life in a way that made these phenomenons seem normal. But The Alchemist wasn't my favorite. Maus was one of those books that you don't want to read but you feel like you need to read it. Generally books concerning the Nazis are unpleasant, to say the least. But it was striking, how accurate the animal portrayals of different races are in the book, as well as how vivid the images were. You see one thing and it stays like a flash of light in the front of your mind for the next thirty pages. Maus wasn't my favorite either. I probably enjoyed the Odyssey most, since it was a more in depth discussion of the mythology I spent most of my childhood obsessed with. The writing and the translation were superb, and it amazes me how great of a job the translator did. The most amazing thing about this book was that I could relate with these characters created by some old dude thousands of years ago. The Great Gatsby was good, but there was too much information packed into too few pages. The story went too fast, but it certainly did a good job of explaining itself.

Gatsby against IHSS/Science

Comment on any connections that you were able to make between The Great Gatsby and the topics that you are exploring in IHSS and Science. How did our outings and/or the seminar contribute to your ability to make these connections.

One of the most prominent connections I can make between Gatsby and our current topic in IHSS is the way the lower classes live. In Gatsby, the lower class live in the valley of ashes. Fitzgerald makes this out to be that these people are living, eating, and breathing these ashes (figuratively, of course). They live in poverty, doing the higher echelons of society's dirty work day after day. The migrant workers that we've learned about in IHSS do much the same thing, living dirt-poor and doing the things on the farm that are too tedious or too dangerous for the higher-ups to complete. Our outings to the food marts in less-fortunate parts of town contributed to my ability to make these connections by showing me how things planted and harvested by the poor didn't even make it to the poor food marts. That was striking to me, how all-encompassing our food intake is that the poor don't even get any. It really makes me want to do anything I can to fix this.

Questioning the American Dream

On Thursday, we watched two documentaries about migrant workers and then had a seminar to discuss these issues through the lenses of science, literature, and economics. Examine how this experience informed your understanding of major themes, such as questioning the American Dream and whether we live in a meritocracy, inThe Great Gatsby.

I think the second film we saw affected me a lot more than the first one (seeing as the second one was newer and somehow more relatable). It showed me that the American Dream isn't what it's made out to be. Some of those workers' dreams were simply to provide for their family, not to get a lot of money or even have a nice job. Plus, the resources needed to make the American Dream possible were not available to these migrant workers in the first place. They couldn't even get a proper education due to their constant migration, which really struck me. I can't even imagine not being able to finish a single school year because of work. I think our country needs to do something about this.

Miss Baker the Skeptic

Women's ideals changed a lot during the 1920s. They were gaining new rights, taking up new outlooks on life, even changing the way they dressed. Often, outlooks on life from women were somewhat skeptical, as if their new rights were going to come back and bite them. I think Jordan is a good example of a woman in the 1920s because she is described as "this clean, hard, limited person who dealt in universal skepticism." (p. 79) As Nick Carraway says, "There are only the pursued, the pursuing, the busy, and the tired." (p. 79)

Nick's principles

So far, Nick Carraway has made two statements about his principles. At the beginning of the book, on page 1, he states, "I'm inclined to reserve all judgements..." Then, a the end of chapter 3, on page 59, he claims, "I am one of the few honest people that I have ever known." Comment on whether you believe these statements to be true about Nick. Include evidence from the text.

I don't think Nick is as honest and as nonjudgmental as he thinks he is. He specifically says on page 1 that "...frequently I have feigned sleep, preoccupation, or a hostile levity when I realized by some unmistakable sign that an intimate revelation was quivering on the horizon..." If feigning isn't lying then I don't know what is. It seems like every time Nick describes someone he makes at least one judgment about their person or personality (p. 25 and 7).

Is the concept of the American Dream specific to the United States?

I don't think the concept of the American Dream is specific to the United States at all. The concept behind it seems a lot like the concept of national pride. Everyone's got to have some reason to be proud of their country, and the American Dream is just sort of a thing that shows that we have goals. Ideas of the American Dream differ from person to person, adding and taking away goals with each idea. I think national pride is a lot like that, the way people find things about their country to be proud of.