No Name Woman by Maxine Kingston

For today, we were suppose to read "No Name Woman" by Maxine Kingston. Kingston was born in Stockton, California and her first language was Say Yup, which is a dialect of Cantonese. She learned a lot about story telling from her community which consisted of mainly Chinese from the same village that her family grew up in. This essay is about a girl trying to discover her Chinese heritage and background. It starts off with her mother telling her the story of the girl's aunt that she never knew of. Her mother tells her that her aunt had an arranged marriage and then her husband soon after left for America. When her husband was gone she ended up pregnant and the town knew that there was no way that it was her husband's baby. So the night she was suppose to deliver, the townspeople killed all of their family's livestock, tore up their yard, their house, and all of her aunt's belongings. She went on to have her baby that night. The next morning, the girl's mother went outside to get water from the well, where she seen the aunt and her newborn. She had committed suicide. No one in their family claims her or talks about her because she was considered a disgrace on them. So the family acts like she never existed and this is why the girl never knew she had an aunt. Her mother is deciding to tell her this story now because the little girl has started menstruating so she knows now that there is a possibility that she could end up pregnant. The mother wants the girl to know the consequences and what could happen to her if something like that ever happened. This leads the girl to try to figure out her and her family's past and her chinese heritage. She also tries to imagine what could have happened to her aunt. She believes that her aunt was raped and forced to have sex with some man and he got her pregnant. She does not believe that she was just sleeping around and cheating on her husband. The girl discovers alot about Chinese history, but she will never know for certain what happened with her aunt's life.

In Search of Our Mothers Gardens

Alice Walker wrote about the struggle of black women in her essay, "In Search of Our Mothers Gardens". She talks about all of the injustice and uncivil barbarity. The women she wrote about were, to her, pillars of what it meant to survive the struggles and obstacles they were presented with. Walker was ultimately trying to show the world the creativity of black women, but in turn made them seem crazy or insane. She talks about how these women were able to be creative during their time and women who could have been main characters during their time if it were not for all of the oppressions. She says that oppressions made it difficult and confusing for women to express themselves. I liked reading this essay, but I'm not sure if it was one of my favorites. If we have to write a paper on one of the essays that we read, I might write it on this essay.

Sherman Alexie

When I first decided to go see Sherman Alexie speak in Kenan Auditorium on Monday night, it was only because I was going to get extra credit somehow. I just knew this was going to be some type of boring lecture that was only interesting to people who were majoring in English or Creative writing. You know, this was going to be a lecture about how to become a famous author and such. But when I saw so many people there I thought a little bit different. Was this really going to be interesting or were all of these students here because their professor offered them extra credit as well? As soon as Mr. Alexie began to speak, I realized I had a made a good decision on coming to this. Let me just say, he really entertained me for an evening. I mean, he could definitely be considered a comedian over being a writer. He was so funny and spoke so well. I didn't realize though that he was just telling the story from the book he had written, about himself, while adding some other little things in there to relate to us as an audience. I had an amazing time and I wish he could've stood up there for hours and told his whole story. After hearing Sherman Alexie, I really want to go out and buy his books and writings. He was so interesting and never boring. The question and answer session was good too, but he did come off a little "full of himself" there in the end. He pretty much talked down and was a little rude to his biggest fan. But other than that it was a great time, I thought of it like a show. I would definitely be interested in hearing him speak again. Now it's time to write my paper so I can get my extra credit. :) I took really good notes too, so I hope this paper turns out how I want it to.

Our Next Short Essay

I am really glad that our next short essay can be done in a blog or written informally. I think that sometimes those types of writing are the best. It makes it so the writer can express themselves in any way they choose, especially being able to write how they would speak. The things we are suppose to write about are "Trifles" by Susan Glaspell, Lorraine Hansberry's "A Raisin in the Sun", and Frank Cordelle's photographic exhibit titled "The Century Project". We are suppose to discuss the images of women and how these "texts" define women and men. I am very excited to see Frank Cordelle's photo exhibit on Wednesday. I think that this will be a great experience for everyone. I am disappointed that UNC Wilmington decided to remove the photos of the females under the age of 18. I think that those photos would be most informing and appreciated by the students because we have been through things that some of those females might have. I am glad that we get to have a question and answer session with Frank Cordelle because I'm sure I will have many questions for him after viewing his photos. I already have some questions in mind to ask him, but I want to think of more. I think I will like doing this next short paper because it concerns women and how they are viewed. That subject is very important to me.

Plays: Cultural Context

This week we were assigned to read "A Raisin in the Sun". I have really enjoyed reading ACT 1, Scene 1 of this play. The title for this play comes from the poem, written by Langston Hughes, titled "Harlem". This play was written by an African American woman named Lorraine Hansberry. Her play was the first by an African American woman to be produced on Broadway. This play is about a family who lives in a poor black Chicago neighborhood in the 1950's. The family in the story, the Youngers, survive by working for white people. They are in near poverty, but get lucky with a large inheritance of money. Now they must argue about what to spend the money on. Everyone in the family has their own opinion of where this money should go. The way this play is written helps show the culture of these people. It is easy to see their race and the time period by their dialect and the topics they talk about. Also, by throwing terms of money around you can see the time period because it shows how valuable a little amount of money is to them. The way they are living shows that they are almost in poverty. Many family members share this small house and some of them do not even have their own room. I really like this play so far because the arguments between the different people are just funny. Even though they are being serious, it is amusing the way they go about the things they say and do. I cannot wait to finish reading this play to see how it ends. I think the writer wrote this play well and I love how she used true African American dialect from that time period.

Short Stories of this Week

We were assigned a few short stories this week to read. Some of the stories were in the "love" section and some were in the "war" section. I thought that all of these stories were well written and kept me interested. All of the authors used good imagery words and had great story lines. I liked the fact that some of the authors used true examples and facts to tell their stories. I am still unsure which story I will choose to write about for my second essay. I am thinking about writing on "A Rose for Emily" because I found it a very interesting and a weird story. I wouldn't prefer writing about any of the war stories because it makes me sad. My uncle is in the army and is over in Iraq right now. He will not be back at home until fifteen months from now. I do not really like reading about wars, people fighting, and soldiers dying. I try to stay positive when he's overseas in a dangerous place. I also don't prefer stories with a lot of violence, no matter the situation. "A Rose for Emily" was in the "love" section of the book and the story line didn't bother me any. Also, I feel like I could write a lot on this story because it deals with depression and things like that. My grandmother was manic depressive so I know a lot about that and I can relate to this story in certain ways. I will probably start writing my essay on this story tomorrow.

Revising My Paper

I didn't have that many problems with writing our first short essay. I enjoyed the poem that I chose to write about. I think maybe there may have been some miscommunication with how we were suppose to write this paper. Also, I think that I was confused about how we were suppose to discuss literary techniques and strategies within our paper. I thought that we were to write about what strategies we used when we read our poem and how we interpreted it. After having our meeting to discuss my paper, I realized that we were actually suppose to explain how the author had used these strategies and techniques. I found that the meeting we had was very helpful and useful to me. I was aware of mistakes I had made as well as what could be changed into something else to make it sound better. I was given a lot of suggestions that I am going to take advantage of. I am ready to revise my essay for my final draft. I feel that now I can write a really awesome paper after clarifying exactly what I am suppose to write about as well as having received some helpful hints. Also, I will be prepared to present a well written paper for our next short essay that is due. I plan to meet you with in the future when writing my papers. This was a great help and I feel that all professors should do this for their students. Especially since now I know exactly what you are looking for and what you consider a well written paper.

The Lady in the Pink Mustang

I really enjoyed reading "The Lady in the Pink Mustang" by Louise Erdrich. I liked the fact that Erdrich was not afraid to be promiscuous or use risque words with this poem. One of the lines that stood out to me was "Painting her nipples silver for a show, she is thinking, you out there. What do you know." This line suggests to me that this "lady" is maybe a show girl or a stripper. It says she is thinking "you out there, what do you know?" and I think she is referring to the reader or maybe her customers/audience when she says "you". I like the fact that the author chose a pink mustang to be this lady's car. A pink car, to me, suggests that she is girly, proud, and different. The fact that the car is a mustang has some connotation to it as well. A mustang is fast, loud, envied, and seems promiscuous as a car. Also, you could extract the word "must" from mustang and that might have connotation. She does "shows" every night so maybe she is sweaty or musty. "The sun goes down for hours, taking more of her along than the night leaves with her" is a line that stands out to me. I inferred this to mean that she does more or works at night and after her work, "parts" of her are missing. The last line I want to discuss is "It is what she must face every time she is touched, the body disposable as cups." That line makes me feel really sad for her. I don't know if she is a showgirl or a prostitute, but I wonder if she likes this job or if she HAS to do it. I feel bad for her because men are taking advantage of her and body and disposing of her like a cup. All in all though I enjoyed reading this poem and I think the author gave good imagery.

My First Short Paper

I decided that I would write about "Blackberries" for my first short paper. This was the poem that I was assigned to be an expert on. I feel that this poem was very well written and I enjoyed reading it. The writer used a lot of imagery words which made the poem seem real. As I read this poem, I could actually see what was happening. I can relate to this poem because it refers to the differences between social classes. This should be fun to write about because it gaves so many details that I can discuss. It leaves a lot up to the reader to decide, like "what does he mean by this?" Everyone in class gave a lot of ideas about what certain sentences or certain words were referring to and I like that because of any of those ideas could be correct. I can't wait to get started on this paper.

Blackberries by Yusef Komunyakaa

I was assigned to be an expert on the poem 'Blackberries' by Yusef Komunyakaa. I really enjoyed this poem, but there are a lot of details that are left to be assumed by the reader. For one, I have been trying to decide, is this person a male or female? I have came to the conclusion that I think it is a young boy, mainly because it says in the poem "my bird dog spot" and I would just assume that a boy would have a bird dog before a young girl would. Also, it says "When I leaned closer I saw the boy & girl my age", the boy is listed first which makes me think the speaker is a boy. I really liked this poem because it showed the difference between social classes and how kids and young adults have to deal with it as well. I believe that this poem is about a young boy who has to pick blackberries and then try to sell them just to make a living. I feel like this is an every day thing for him and has been for awhile. It seems to me that he hasn't really been able to actually have a childhood and have fun. The words that were used in this poem gave great imagery and it actually gave me the chills. The whole last stanza was my favorite. It showed how hard his life was and how unfortunate he was compared to other children his age. He was forced in life to stand on side of the road holding buckets of blackberries and try to sell them for $1.00 to people who had money and easy lives. This poem really made me feel sorry for the speaker when he said the young boy & girl were smirking at him in the backseat of the car. Also, he makes it seem as if they were rich because he says "in the wide back seat" which lets us a know he considered it a big car. To me, this poem was written mainly to show the feelings of a young boy who is in a low social class and already has to work to survive.