2011

PETER ELBOW: An Analysis 

*Many teachers in certain disciplines EXPECT their pupils to hone the writing skills.

*Privileged students can pick up dynamics of the writing, but we must span the lessons to all.

ACADEMIC DISCOURSE                                                     NONACADEMIC DISCOURSE

-Not filtered through S.E. status                                          *It Lurks rather than announce itself   (106)

-Disinterested impersonality, and detachment

-Objective

-Rhetorical

-“Think through genuine problems and issues,

and of writing to an imagined community of

peers with a personal rhetorical purpose,” (Flower 104)

-Say what you are saying, not much else

-Business, not pleasure

-Signposting ~ Most general convention

-Shy, indirect, or even evasive of texture of feeling

~~Need for Nonacademic Writing in Freshman Writing ~ 

1) Students will not need academic discourse as much after graduating college. Employers are irked by their employees who cannot untangle the messiness of academia discourse and distance that out from unlearning it. FDA as a prime example as to producing documents vastly differing from Air Force.

2) Elbow’s best test to students is whether they want to implement writing INTO THEIR LIVES (96). The outlets of writing can extend out to diaries, journals, poems, stories, etc. Only academic discourse is a failure in not helping students have choice in their hectic lives. Colleagues angered by a boy’s topless Greek maiden essay because it was Not revised or carefully examined—it was fluffed to be easy. Elbow calls to the nonacademic discourse that RENDERS experience rather than explain it. By this, he means convey what I see when I look out the window, what it feels like to walk down the street or fall down—to tell What it’s like to be me or live my life. Most novels/works used in Eng. courses actually render experience  (think The Outsiders) Rendering can enable new cognitive insights such as seeing

3) Nonacademic discourse can be the ingredients to good academic discourse. Reflecting a sound understanding of chemistry / ecology. Beyond the textbook…Only academic discourse can MASK a lack of comprehension by churning out the vanilla textbook phrases that don’t get you any higher of the taxonomy of knowledge.

*Don’t write in the textbook language. *Best discipline is when students word into their own words

*Elbow affirms that professionals / teachers must disdain the fact when students are limited in only writing in the lingo of the discipline.

*He is bothered how theorists peg the assumption one DOESN’T know their field if they don’t write in its mode…such as working engines. One can fix it, but might not articulate on paper. Teaching something else in addition is good to stirring the pot of academic discourse.

*There is NO Platonic entity of ‘academic discourse’ (98).

*Elbow goes over the empirical overlooking studies of English.

-High Germanic Scholarship has you relying on others and backing it up, citing constantly.

-British tradition has you map out what you want to say, to just do it. Even make anecdotal digressions, if possible like C.S. Lewis.

-Writing out ‘feelings’ can apply to psychoanalysis, feminism, or Reader Response. Discourse is always talking to someone…trying to IMPACT them. Violations spotted by Elbow on Page 103 determine one’s use of ‘I’ with too much interest, direction to subjectivity with ‘You’, and referring Hemingway as Ernest as if he is the writer.

*The clear stream to harness writing comes when one avoids mere subjectivity and objectivity –rather aiming with clear reasons and evidence while dabbling and becoming aware of your passion geared for the audience. You must know the stakes for the audience.

*FLOWER:  ‘All writing is problem solving’

*MACDONALD:     ‘Problem solving activities generate Academic Writing’

*Berlin’s theory paper: (Page 105)    “…in teaching writing we are tacitly teaching a version of reality and the student’s place and mode of operation in it.”

*Elbow cleans up the sentence with: “…in Using Discourse…”

*Berlin’s essay is proving to Elbow that All Discourse is interested or biased. Author-evacuated prose /  Author-Saturated

*Elbow trims up the prose       “Who has a strong sense of”   / “Is always accompanied by”

*Elbow feels in his point #2 of Acad. Discourse that it is Exclusive, the jargon stock piled and shared within that community. No ordinary mom from Kansas would be aware.

 

 

 

Hillocks Chapter 1: Matters of Significance. Differences Among Teachers

*The Aristotle allusion hints that rigorous study and grasping of theory trumps a manual worker’s experience(s).

~What do teachers know?                    ~What knowledge is essential for teaching?

*Basically as the Connelly studies indicate, I and my classmates in observation—our goal is to reconstruct the past and gear for the future in our own present situation/dilemma. (Personal Practical Knowledge)

*Bruce teacher example, he is asked why he requests his students to take notes and copy verbatim even from a handout they possess in front of them. He responds –to prepare them for the copious notes upcoming for 9^th grade—Bruce’s assumptions seem to fit his own time/energy to have dictation over the 7^th graders’ manner of note taking as it will have a same (or better?) effect on learning.

*Big question posed on Page 5: Do stories/images/metaphors really constitute all of teacher knowledge & determine matters of significance linked to planned conduct of classrooms?

* “Planting seeds” metaphor  –It’s not about the what kind, but HOW…

*Second big question on Page 5 (bottom): What knowledge is essential for teaching?

1. Knowledge of subject taught
2.  Pedagogic knowledge
3.  Curriculum knowledge of ‘materials/programs
4.  Pedagogic content knowledge
5. Knowledge of students
6. Knowledge of EDU contexts
7. Knowledge of EDU values

^^^Many will easily agree to this basis, but even teachers of the same core subject will tend to teach in different approaches.

Professor Wade believes in a ‘chicken foot’ outline of forming papers.He suggests nudging them with sophisticated insights at the crucial times, find confidence in their own ideas. Anyone with a stronghold of their lexicon can reciprocate the lessons we as teachers provide from writing.

*What are the decisions teachers make to bring about learning in students & why do they make them?  –Hillocks writes about the passion and deliverance of writing because it is key in operating your analytical motioning of thought and is applicable to communication among real world ideas and categories.

Hillocks Chapter 2: Knowledge in Classrooms

*Chapter’s purpose is to stream the nature of relevance & knowledge a teacher can use when handling students’ difficulties. How does knowledge manifest in the classroom? Performance is greater than anything.

*Criteria with working on performance help govern self-correction (24).

*Teachers cannot verbalize All of that they do.

*It’s about what they do/say about it all.

*Knowledge to some English teachers, you can say, is what 9^th graders’ topics work in those classrooms. Finding their niche of evidence and building a stepping stone toward greater knowledge.

*^^It is all about the students’ experiences prior to dispersing the materials.

*Hillocks loosely defines class discussion(s) as the pliers to picking out and comparing what texts offer in INTERPRETING what others thought of such as hashing out other’s thoughts succinctly.

*”What do you make of that” is authentic instructing…

*Knowledge manifests from students transforming simple observations into complex interpretations of what they see.

Hillocks Chapter 3: Profiles of Teaching

*Proportion of time to instruction?   *Kinds of activities in delivery? *Nature / variation of knowledge taught?  *Factors among different teachers?

***More instruction means more classroom management according to the studies

*Frontal teaching attributes 89% of speaking in front of class.

*Their observations recorded a myriad of teaching methods. Hillocks stressed variety in methods, as one teacher was 100% frontal, another was 27.9% of small group work…one teacher had 46.7% of frontal teaching. One teacher had 52% of individual work.

*Frontal should require Declarative Knowledge. The teacher should announce clearly what presumably is to be learned.

*Dispersing forms of rhetorical knowledge, mechanics of syntax, substantial knowledge, or combinations indicate how content is worked within time. It varies from teacher to teacher.

*In fact, teachers devote less than 5% of instructional time to procedures for developing ideas of writing.

*2 years of observation, teachers devoted more than 70% of observed class instructional time to the delivery of DECLARATIVE KNOWLEDGE. Teachers has 89% transcript filled of lines, as students were merely listening to what the teacher was saying…seems to me this is susceptible to distractions—interruptions—losing track of their attention and other problems. Some teachers referred these as ‘discussions’.

*Sometimes teachers strike bargains with their students for good behavior amid testing in favor of making the course easier. This manner is defined as DEFENSIVE TEACHING, in which the maximum control (just listen, remember, pass) is orchestrated.

*Opposite of this makes the teacher ‘adventuresome’ in which they rely on student centered & responsive to their own needs. These teachers value their students’ ideas and ENCOURAGE inference making, problem solving, and creative synthesis. Teacher-led small groups focusing on open-ended questions to which the answers are not highly predictable (42).

*These discrepancies of defensive/adventuresome are accountable based on the teacher’s attitude, a big factor in how the class functions.

*Portions of frontal teaching were prevalent in the declarative knowledge and non optimistic view of students.

*Negative reactions via teachers included the unwieldy load of the student in working effectively on their own and their deficiencies.

*Non optimistic views stem from one teacher’s view of ‘tunnel-vision oral language’ fostered in only the home… lack of rules from students. “They just don’t know”…

*^^^^^ Failure to follow content form, no ‘outside the box’ thinking…

**GOOD Students = Ones that take it serious, compatible, ones that are able to follow concrete procedures rather than ignore. Motivation and creative thinking also extend this. One teacher used how to rate a sex partner’s qualities parallel to arranging favorite clothes, based on preferences.

*Racial biases on optimism or no optimistic status for the teacher

*More optimistic teachers spend 14% more time on Instruction rather than non…

*Higher degree of Frontal teaching means more simplification.

*Students must apply & create, which is the ultimate goal.

*What entails Assessment and Diversion?

*If we believe that our students are very weak, we spend less time assisting with Direct help at all times.

*Optimistic teachers spend 50% more time on the substance of WRITING than do others. They devote more time far more time to matters of formal characteristics and to combination of formal/syntax mechanics than do non-optimistic teachers.

*Exclusivity on formal mechanics help bridge ideas to other students, stimulating the ideas if all sides have a say. It catalyzes the intellectual pot for embracing the complexities of the lesson, perhaps.

*Building Block Theory:   Before students can proceed to writing paragraphs, they must know how to write sentences, before they can write whole compositions, they must be able to write paragraphs, and so on (50).

 

 

Digesting Love is the Worst Part 

February 2011

The close-knit backdrop of Hong Kong has two love-struck Hong Kong cops in the middle of director Wong Kar-Wai’s two stories in the movie Chungking Express, eliciting hidden beauty in the world. A sense of wholeness is achieved by the full narrative’s conclusion. Linked in an unexpected way, the hopes and pitfalls of romance between the cops convey prominence of the narrative’s emerging theme to acceptance of change as both literally and figuratively digest and uncover healthier means of gratification. I feel this sheds some light on how the director wished to arrive at an unconventional end to each narrative by tapping new means of closure.

 

The first story was written between He Quiwu’s chance encounter with a mysterious smuggler woman as both were expecting approaching deadlines of May 1^st. The opening lines of the movie, “Everyday we brush past so many other people…People we may never meet”. While one is introspective of refusing an expiration of a dashed love, the other must find a group of Indians before facing the consequences. Quiwu’s losing control when the little events that made up his time (calling May after an arrest, his phone password set to Undying Love) deteriorate in conjunction with his looming birthday. His only outlet is to consume it all in—imbibe pineapples all dated with a May 1^st expiration date. He even emphasizes to the clerk, “People like you are hung up on freshness,” also describing how the pineapple comes to be only for time inevitably to “just throw it away!” His compulsive habits, much like an addiction, stem from his prior experiences of May and repeat in the film, although backfiring on him.

 

By losing sight with old girlfriends and classmates, he decides to become intoxicated. The romantic comedy such as Chungking Express stays consistent to other conventions of romantic comedies, as defined by Film Art, “because the artist lives in history and society” (60). This leads to his urge to rely on the bar for support. The more he tries, the more he feeds into these stomach-wrenching servings of ‘love’. He ultimately challenges his will to fall in love with a random woman at the bar. He picks his lead to the femme fatale, but both merely need each other’s company to rest one night. Their exchanges at the bar lead to her with a key quote, “A person may like pineapple today…and something else tomorrow”. I feel this encounter, while in the arena of bar convention, misleads the viewer unexpectedly as a cop unknowingly is hitting on a wanted killer. By staying together over the early hours of his birthday, he eats four chef salads while she drifts away.

 

The smallest gesture to lodge merging with her birthday sentiment on his pager brings resolution to his troubles. He completely sweats out May from his body, but finds solace in how someone like the femme fatale and her ever-changing life provided him the hope that things do change, by prompting his thought, “If memories could be canned…would they have expiry dates?” Even if it comes to liking pineapple one day and not liking it the next, he’s preserving the best out of and therefore replenishing what was disposed from the dreadful bowels of his digestion.

 

A novice film viewer may have taken the transition of He’s encounter with Faye as a fragmentation of the narrative, but the ending result (to the best of its ability) fulfilled a changing dynamic in portraying the director’s vision. It also goes beyond our expectations as Bordwell and Thompson mention as Chungking Express does not introduce characters from the first half of the film to the second half (Film Art 60). The focalization doesn’t stick with He as the other cop enriches narrative presentation (based within the movie) while not becoming a drastic change of character empathy in the film’s form. I feel, alluding to the quote, “[form] in artworks appeals to ready-made reactions to certain images. But form can create new responses instead of harping old ones,” (61). His world has the mundane consuming him as well, with such chunks of detail like his fetish with planes; which provides adjustment for the viewer in a motif of departing and landing. This cultivates a transitory take on the pitfalls of love rather than the urges of eternal hopes elicited by He in the first story. The form changes, as well as audience expectations as we are invited into a new world but with a common ground of conflicts plaguing a love-struck male. The emotions we perceive can be adapted into the context of the film while Wong Kar-Wai’s changes our conventional expectations with a new slate of characters.

 

The second cop becomes a deeper pool of cinematic tactics used by Kar-Wai. The mental subjectivity given from a lens of the slow backdrop of life passing quick while he deposits a coin in a record player becomes one example. His inanimate objects and those gloomy conversations become attributed to his character, along with watching a towel drip out water. The water slowly dripping out in essence is very much like the first narrative of releasing all that was left in emotions, but the opposite of He’s fast jogging comes the towel. His indecisions and lack of change is prevalent in the film up until his shift actually changes. Ordering the same food, checking up on her hidden spots at his apartment, and keeping the same dank apartment never occurs to him that a change is necessary.

 

Faye’s the new dynamic that the femme fatale could not become for He in the first narrative. She takes an extreme fondness for the second cop and taps in on how his dull life is going. Working with food in the store and carrying baskets of oranges help their candid encounters with each other. By obtaining his address, she sneaks in and out of his apartment for cleaning. The apartment as a structure is the cop’s life, as shown by the flashback with his ex-girlfriend. The temporal order is changed but only to reinforce the memories of the second cop. The temporal duration the narrative spends in his apartment becomes a major portion as the viewer soon learns that Faye’s world (including her music) enters it upon cleaning.

 

What I like to reflect on, picking up again on the uniqueness of the film, is that the women in both narratives are more chooser-friendly. The femme fatale’s previous quote on pineapples demonstrates her unstable approach to choices, while the latter narrative’s ex-girlfriend of cop number two gives the viewer her choice of ‘fish and chips’ pertaining to the man on the motorcycle. Life becomes as candid and unpredictable as it does in actual life. The loose ends do get tied up at the heart of each character even though time , which seems appropriate for most romantic comedies. Most importantly, Kar-Wei’s film served no definitive climax as far as I could find based on conventional Hollywood standards. The fallout of breakups are already determined and his narrative depicts the long stages of digesting the heartache and following unique steps in taking a leap forward, whether it be running into a smuggler or a young server.

 

 

Chillingworth and Ahab: Men of Monomania 

May 2011

In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s 1850 novel The Scarlet Letter, a jilted yet spiteful man named Roger ‘Chillingworth’ Prynne attempts to uncover the traces of adultery from his wife Hester Prynne and her unidentified lover. Chillingworth occupies most of his time to overpower a fragile priest named Arthur Dimmesdale, who in actuality had sex with Hester. The story describes Chillingworth’s persistent invasion of Dimmesdale’s guilty conscious as Chillingworth wishes to dissect and possess every aspect of the priest’s beating heart in a sadistic act of revenge.

Herman Melville’s 1851 novel Moby-Dick; or The Whale is a global account across the seas. Melville’s narrator Ishmael and diverse supporting characters sail The Pequod in Captain Ahab’s hunt for the white whale known as Moby Dick. Moby Dick, in a previous voyage, scarred Ahab for life physically and psychologically by devouring his leg. Moby-Dick exposes savage intent stirring inside Captain Ahab, solely bent on killing the whale on this do-or-die voyage. This malicious determination wielding all of Ahab’s strength overlaps a quality in Chillingworth. Both men’s torrential actions invoke a closer look at how monomania shapes their turn to immorality and satanic allegiance. These aspects are introduced in several themes. A palpable comparison is told by James E. Miller Jr. in the article titled, “Hawthorne and Melville: The Unpardonable Sin”. Primarily, both characters become agents of defiance when presented with the wills of God and nature.

When no violent intentions are overtly expressed in Roger Chillingworth’s entry into the text, there are subtle malevolent indications. He first appears secretly and unbeknown in the crowd watching the public scaffold. His gliding presence into the crowd shocks Hester with an eerie non-verbal cue for her to remain silent in the chapter, “The Recognition”. In this chapter, he accesses information from a townsman and vows, “It irks me…that the partner of her iniquity should not, at least, stand on the scaffold by her side. But he will be known!—he will be known!—he will be known!” (The Scarlet Letter 56). This is the pledge to his pursuit of uncovering information belonging only to nature.

This detachment from other humans especially affects Hester’s views on Chillingworth as she seethes in anger, “Hatred…has transformed a wise and just man to a fiend! Wilt thou yet purge it out of thee, and be once more human?” (TSL 156). This detachment from other humans, only to urgently strike a wicked oath against an entity in nature initiates the events that orient one to Chillingworth’s sin and Ahab’s blasphemy. Ahab too becomes a silent figure upon The Pequod at first. As noted by Miller, withdrawal carries over in the characters’ performances as there “is the loss of respect for the sanctity of the human heart and soul” (98). He is a stranger at the voyage’s start while bottling in a grave conflict prior to revealing his malevolence until he speaks out on the quarter deck.

Similarly, the two men hail their fight in a verbal motion to empower their cause, which resonates with T. Walter Herbert Jr.’s point in the article “Calvinism and Cosmic Evil in ‘Moby-Dick’, that there is cosmic significance with the conflicts. Herbert elaborates, “The efforts or virtues of individual men have no influence on God’s decision in this matter” (1614). Ahab assembles his crew for this public outcry, which leads Starbuck to suspect, “To be enraged with a dumb thing…seems blasphemous” (Moby Dick 139). Ahab’s emergence in the quarterdeck scene spreads his monomaniac tendencies against collective will of his men in defiance of higher powers (Miller 110). The link of pride between the two keeps this merciless sin alive throughout both works. Ahab instills the confidence in his men to take part in the suicidal hunt of Moby Dick while Chillingworth’s field of expertise justifies his commitment. On the route of his sin Chillingworth denies his actions on Dimmesdale are neither fiendlike, but to what must be done “[to] have snatched a fiend’s office from his hands. It is our fate. Let the black flower blossom as it may” (TSL 156). Both characters refuse pardon and would rather strike at what is deemed necessary at all costs.

Sciences and their empowerment distinguish the two men with their need to master their practices. Chillingworth’s sinister livelihood is introduced by Hawthorne as a deep rooted practice of nature—in terms of science and alchemy. Chillingworth acknowledges his skill in rooting out the heart of a man much to his practices. He exercises a strong will for a high goal, as Chillingworth undertakes “To the inquest with other senses than they [people] possess” (TSL 66). He is basically on a higher level of knowledge and instinct to extract the energies of another human being. As a man of logic and methods, Chillingworth is described as “[To have] devoted his entire career to study, to the pursuit of that particular knowledge which is most concerned with the alleviation of human suffering—medical science” (Miller 93). Chillingworth recognizes with his advanced expertise ailments of one’s character, such as Dimmesdale’s very own. Dimmesdale grows weary in the span of time, enabling Chillingworth to manipulate a way for a cure. The revealing characteristics exerted on Dimmesdale reveal the resemblance of what the narrator alludes to “[as] Satan himself or Satan’s emissary” (TSL 114). This practice helps Chillingworth’s systematic burrowing and desecration of the vulnerable priest.

Miller also depicts how Ahab is the “intellectual brother to Chillingworth” (107). The source that drives Ahab’s monomania to reality is his expertise of sailing the seas.  Conquering the knowledge intellectually and conquering the physical entities in nature brings Ahab ever closer, only intensifying his monomaniac desires. In the chapter, “The Chart”, a vivid account shows “shadows of lines upon his wrinkled brow, till it almost seemed that… some invisible pencil was also tracing lines and courses upon the deeply marked chart of his forehead” (MD 167). These markers of his scientific magnificence stand out as he is transcended to become a force that only God could attempt to challenge.

Textually, the whale Moby Dick possesses a symbolic power unlike any other animal in literature. Whiteness, its renowned feature, aesthetically becomes a sheer element of recognition for the crew—especially Ahab. This whiteness contains myriad impressions on the human being, according to Ishmael’s historically accurate narration. Ishmael embarks on comprehending how this white beast also becomes a means of dreadful attention for Ahab. The familiarity with the color as a connotation of supremacy and spotlessness grotesquely contrasts its’ cosmetic relationship with death. Ishmael says whiteness is “divorced from more kindly associations, coupled with any object terrible in itself, to heighten the terror” (MD 160).  Much like the fierce polar bear or great white shark, this whiteness consciously threatens Ahab while still pushing his drive for destruction of a powerful force.

This ties to Ishmael stating, “No man can deny that in its profoundest idealized significance it calls up a peculiar apparition of the soul” (MD162). In terms of Moby Dick’s existence, Ahab staunchly believes he is destined to discover a greater purpose in his hunt among his crew:

All visible objects…are but pasteboard masks. But in each event—in the living act, the undoubted deed—there, some unknown but still reasoning thing puts forth the mouldings of its features from behind the unreasoning mask. If man will strike, strike through the mask! (MD140).

This entails more insight on how not only this is a personal strife with a creature, but a higher power in evil altogether.  Thornton Y. Booth, in his article, “Moby-Dick: Standing Up to God” implies, “Ahab’s monomaniac defiance to the death is not the only nor the best answer given inMoby-Dick to the question of how men can or should respond to the evil of the universe” (39). Ahab’s solution is to defy God and the designed universe by pushing the norms of charting and arranging a crew of experienced whale hunters.

Chillingworth undergoes a predetermined decision in unearthing and eradicating a ‘force’ of his own. Throughout The Scarlet Letter, this is known as the stigmatizing effects of Dimmesdale betraying his faith with adultery. Chillingworth becomes keenly instinctive in fetching traces of the sin. Chillingworth champions this fascination with exploiting Dimmesdale (while sleeping) the feeling beyond his garments. The narrator notes it as a “moment of his ecstasy” for Chillingworth, reveling in this satisfaction (TSL 124).  Chillingworth is endowed by the prospects of obtaining figuratively, the means of evil much so like Ahab. When Dimmesdale questions about the dealings of his case, Chillingworth endorses a way to look at Dimmesdale’s suffering as a spiritual tick. He says, “A bodily disease, which we look upon as whole and entire within himself may, after all, be but a symptom of some ailment in the spiritual part” (TSL 121).   *** Chillingworth has intuitive perceptions and becomes an intrusive ally. He makes note of black weeds, which parallel to the concept unconfessed sin sprouting out of a grave with no tombstone upon gazing at a grave (TSL 117). Dimmesdale defends “a zeal for God’s glory and man’s welfare” but Chillingworth shoots it down as the evil inmates barrage the heart as men deceive themselves and are not heavenly lifted upward. (TSL 118) Chillingworth acts not only as an inspector, an apothecary, but an exterminator of the manifestation growing inside Dimmesdale.

Ahab’s profound characterization during this epic pursuit resonates with Father Mapple in Chapter 9, “The Sermon”: “And if we obey God, we must disobey ourselves; and it is in this disobeying ourselves, wherein the hardness of obeying God consists” (Moby-Dick 49). Religious allusions appear in the text such as Mapple’s on Jonah, where he abandoned God’s order to judge the town of Nineveh. The consequence has God sending a whale to swallow up Jonah for his sin. Ahab is purposefully used to contrast the stark differences in ‘defying God’ into a journey of peril. By the sequence of events leads to the chapter, “The Candles”, Ahab has just made his own compass. He then embraces the lightning storm that wreaks havoc on the Pacific. His harpoon is lit burns in all the while he summons his mind, body, and spirit to “leap[est] out of darkness” (MD 383). Starbuck violently warns Ahab that God is against him and that all that he is striving for is ill-fated as the storm becomes one of the climactic omens (MD 383).

The monomania on both Ahab and Chillingworth also depicts satanic imagery. Chillingworth, according to the narrator, exemplifies best “man’s faculty of transforming himself into a devil” (TSL 152). The narrator goes on even touch upon how Hester’s scarlet ‘A’ burned with his presence and touch. Hester also sees from few direct gazes that Chillingworth’s eyes become an intense red along with a mystifying heat rising from their rapport between one another (TSL 152). Ahab’s voyage includes The Parsee harpooner known as Fedallah. A conversation between Stubb and Flask at one point questions their view of him. They surmise he may kidnap Ahab or that they can possibly toss him overboard. They even acknowledge that their fear of the devil fits suited to involve Fedallah (MD 260). Fedallah and a few other men were stashed away in Ahab’s cabin before the hunt of Moby Dick began. In obtaining the power to control how he will harpoon with other boats, Ahab assured these sly men could do the job. Herbert verifies the satanic presence looming over Ahab from Fedallah “becomes the agent of ‘an unseen tyrant’ rather than the agent of a holy God who does not share the evil of the errand on which he sends Satan” (1617).  Every movement of Fedallah shadowed Ahab, enforcing this ominous allegiance until the end.

Herman Melville employs Captain Ahab as a spokesperson for broken humans devastated by God’s natural occurrences. The outcome of Ahab’s past is a vindictive edge. Ahab lost his first battle with Moby Dick. Ever since his physical injury, Ahab’s monomania showed signs of consuming his psyche. When The Pequod runs into The Goney, Ahab abruptly greets the crew by asking news on the White Whale. He then acts out, as to Ishmael’s point of view, “[Ahab] noticed a similar sight…the veriest trifles capriciously carry meanings” (MD 195).

Ahab’s mannerisms in tone experience a shift in emotion as to hinting a sinking depression if his quest goes unfulfilled. Ahab asks out loud in frustration that Moby Dick is swimming away from him. Meanwhile, Ishmael regards this moment as capturing the “deep helpless sadness” (MD 195). Ahab’s hope shaped by this bold global journey exposes the potential devastating grief that comes into play with such an untamed desire. The grief goes unmentioned throughout the rest of the novel, but only to this mentioning does it hint his deepest concerns. Chillingworth himself experiences the discomforting loss of his monomania. This reaction comes shortly after Arthur Dimmesdale’s sudden death. For Chillingworth, his once dominant and imposing force tapers off. Devoid of any means to absorb personal and cognitive information, “all his strength and energy…seemed to desert him; insomuch that he positively shriveled up” (TSL 237). Chillingworth’s ultimate duty abruptly ended but in result, he dies in a draining of his desire.

Hawthorne enhances Chillingworth as a force in his manner and language; one with extraordinary powers and keen vision. Chillingworth prizes the potential of playing a sort of God in disciplining and controlling the open sin of Dimmesdale. While his extreme campaign leads him down a path of overbearing pride, mastering of sciences, and a satanic image, he withers quickly in the end with the loss of his dark passions. Herman Melville’s Captain Ahab set sail in a passion to vindicate his life on the hunt of Moby Dick. However, he falls into what Henry Alonzo Myers deems as “a tragic interpretation of an action” (“Captain Ahab’s Discovery: The Tragic Meaning of Moby Dick” 19). His blasphemous ways shape a radical look at defaming God and fate while paving your own into the inevitable fall of man, in death. Nature cannot be destroyed nor control, as these two characters display. Good and evil ultimately derive many meanings in Chillingworth and Ahab’s eyes from the fierce, immoral emotions that outweigh their suppressed rationality.

 

 

WORKS CITED

 

Booth, Booth Y. “Moby Dick: Standing Up to God.” Nineteenth-Century Fiction         17.1 (1962): 33-43. JSTOR. University of California Press. Web. 10 Apr. 2011.

 

Hawthorne, Nathaniel. The Scarlet Letter. New York: New American Library,  1999. Print.

 

 

Herbert Jr., T. Walter. “Calvinism and Cosmic Evil in “Moby-Dick”” Modern Language Association 84.6 (1969): 1613-619. JSTOR.. Web. 10 Apr.2011.

 

Melville, Herman, Hershel Parker, and Harrison Hayford. Moby-Dick. New York:  Norton, 2002. Print

 

Miller Jr., James E. “Hawthorne and Melville: The Unpardonable Sin.” Modern Language Association 70.1 (1955): 91-114. JSTOR. Web. 21 Apr. 2011.

 

Myers, Henry Alonzo. “Captain Ahab’s Discovery: The Tragic Meaning of Moby Dick.” The New England Quarterly 15.1 (1942): 15-34. JSTOR. Web. 10 Apr. 2011.

 

 

Encouraging Graphic Novels in Middle Level Classes

May 2011

Young readers of tomorrow must adapt, practice, and eventually master literacy. A middle level teacher faces challenges accomplishing those prescribed platforms of success for parents, school districts, and the government with unpredictable students. Not every student is going to become the bookworm with all the answers. That’s a given. It’s also worth noting that an online survey conducted by SmartGirl.com and the Young Adult Library Services Association found that 72 percent of teens liked to read for pleasure. 43 percent of the survey respondents between the ages of 11 and 18 said, “[They] enjoyed reading, but did not have time to do so” (Bookspot.com).

Middle level English teachers do not need strive to be content specialists. However, preparing an intriguing, yet, simple curriculum must be developmentally appropriate for 21^st century middle level learners. Bombarded by internet and television, exposure is likely at its peak for this age group. At the same time, they are on the fringe of becoming formal thinkers. By immersing into a few alternative texts such as the graphic novel, an English teacher is more likely to maintain students’ interests. By changing the pace of learning, graphic novels like Maus and Persepolis become just as worthwhile as the standard Ethan Frome and Lord of the Flies.

The big question may be, “Just what is a graphic novel”? According to Katherine T. Bucher and M. Lee Manning in their article “Bringing Graphic Novels into a School’s Curriculum”, students engaged in a graphic novel “must not only decode the words and the illustrations but must also identify events between the visual sequences” (qtd. Tabitha Simmons 67). Graphic novels come in all sorts of genres and styles of storytelling, much like other works of literature. From novels like Dear Mr. Henshaw by Beverly Cleary written in letter form and Monster by Walter Dean Myers, written in a screenplay and a diary—children are going to be exposed to experimental forms.

The key is to treat graphic novels no differently. Bucher and Manning advocate for graphic novels based by “literary terms and techniques such as dialogue, to serve as a bridge to other classics, and as the basis for writing assignments” (68). Elizabeth M. Downey acknowledges the broad aspects and magnifies the usage of a graphic novel, which overlap “standardized tests [which] include visual elements as part of assessment” (Graphic Novels in Curriculum and Instruction Collections 183).

A graphic novel is also an arena of new vocabulary words. The convenience in pointing out words in panels rather than hunting in the text bolsters the chances of student comprehension. According to William Bintz’s article “Teaching Vocabulary Across the Curriculum”, “Students’ vocabularies may increase by 3,000 to 5,000 words per year by reading, resulting in a reading vocabulary of nearly 25,000 words by the eighth grade” (qtd. in Graves, 2000). In Maus and Persepolis, a teacher can pull from context the value of such words such as ‘recuperating’ (Spiegelman 63) and ‘dowry’ (Satrapi 143) in order to develop and solidify meanings.

The English teacher must pull down the reins (before any students breeze by images and panels) to effectively treat the graphic novel like any other literary artifact; providing plentiful amounts of theory and content. A teacher can take the pedagogical approach to setting objectives of theory and content with deductive reasoning. This helps bridge the gap for those unable to conceptualize literary terms. Students must be able to uncover subtext and give meaning of what’s in front of them. With the advantage of deductive reasoning, students are endowed with a quicker take on narrative time and space, setting, dialect, metaphor, and in some cases like in Maus—anthropomorphism. Anthropomorphism clearly becomes a vehicle of identifying the themes driving the background of the Holocaust: A predatory versus prey dynamic. Nazis as cats, Jews as mice, and the Polish as pigs for example. Another rhetorical element used in Persepolis for effect is the imagery/repetition panel to convey the meaning of conformity (Satrapi 95).

With a melting pot of genres and context, it shouldn’t be too hard implementing instructional strategies. From the standard lecture or popcorn reading, there are no limits give personal touches to a graphic novel. The role of the teacher is to maintain focus on how middle level students can read and incorporate the graphic novel in their lives. Think-Pair-Share, Brochures, Performance, Literary circles, ABC Brainstorm, Panel questions, Jigsawing, and inevitable evaluations such as tests are prime examples middle level learners can engage with material from the classroom. According Downey, graphic novels can cut across certain cognitive stages of development for adolescents—Linguistic, Interpersonal, and Spatial. Researched by Gardner, Linguistic intelligence promotes “the capacity to use language to accomplish certain goals” (Smith 4). Interpersonal helps “understand the intentions, motivations and desires of others” (Smith 4). Visually, students grasp with even the slightest facial reactions of a character trait. With spatial, Gardner says a student “recognizes and uses the patterns of wide space and more confined areas” (Smith 4). This allows a student to engage with the setting of the text conveniently.  Introducing graphic novels has plenty of upside. Maus is engulfed in religion, family relationships, and the Holocaust. Persepolis involves social class, gender, and religion amid the Iran-Iraq conflicts of the late 1970’s. In interdisciplinary or integrated curriculums, a teacher can alleviate the pressures of what expectations are given. It also gives students an unfamiliar look at well-cultivated topics.

 

WORKS CITED

 

Bintz, William P. “Teaching Vocabulary Across the Curriculum.” Middle School Journal 42.4 (2011): 44-53. Print.

 

Bookspot.com. StartSpot Network. http://www.bookspot.com/features/teenreadinglists.htm.

Bucher, Katherine T., and M. Lee Manning. “Bringing Graphic Novels into a School’s  Curriculum.” The Clearing House (2004): 67-72. Heldref Publications. Web.

Downey, Elizabeth M. “Graphic Novels in Curriculum and Instruction Collections.” Reference & User Services Quarterly 49.2 (2009): 181-88. Web.

Satrapi, Marjane. The Complete Persepolis. New York: Pantheon, 2007. Print.

Smith, Mark K. “Howard Gardner, Multiple Intelligences, and Eduction.” InFed. The Encyclopedia of Informal Education, 2008. 1-12. Web. 2 May 2011.      <http://www.infed.org/thinkers/gardner.htm&gt;.

Spiegelman, Art. Maus I: A Survivor’s Tale : My Father Bleeds History. New York:                                   Pantheon, 1986. Print.

 

 

 

 

Color My Paper the Trouble of Chaos

May 2011

My writing paints how I see the world. This art of expression was once cherished by the scribblers of Romantic eras, but is magnified heavily by the academic elite today. All the effort a struggling high school or college writer builds upon becomes an engaging personal activity. As a result, a skilled writer must equip his or her lexicon, syntax, voice, grammar, and focus accurately. The purpose is to grab one’s attention of an original and honest idea for writing topics. For my reading in the course of the first week of February, I read Peter Elbow’s “Reflections on Academic Discourse: How It Relates to Freshmen and Colleagues” and David Bartholomae’s “Inventing the University”. I am endorsing ways enthusiastic writers can dabble with their creations. My outlook on Elbow largely supports his argument using ‘Nonacademic discourse’ as a more meaningful vehicle to improve every student’s writing, as it allows the student to personalize their material.

I agree with Allie Doyle’s points from her post based on target audiences and how we as writers tend to demonstrate an understanding when teachers try to conceptualize our audience, and have us practice by doing. To add to her blog’s post:

What if there were vague objectives? Whether or not one must sail the ship of unchained creative thought or to instruct and pre-write ideas is a decision a teacher must make before handing off the potential hot potato to students.

I think a prime example of how nonacademic discourse can mold better writing in the classroom may emerge if, hypothetically, you start to teach the play, Death of A Salesman. From there, a writing teacher must decide (alluding to Allie) methods of pre-writing to keep tabs on the students’ progress. I champion the goal of driving their interests through an exercise of frontloading: thinking about the material metacognitively, clearing their throats– without throwing them into the fire of assessment. This past semester, I learned an effective example based on the play Death of a Salesman. As one of my persistent and pushy professors may ask:

How would any urban student find Death of a Salesman interesting at all? What prompt would they pay any mind to?

Teaching urban adolescence writing is not always a walk in the park. They may pay attention if you motivate their interests, which for example may be the impact of sports for Willy or Biff. By having students share how they participate in sports-related lifestyles in a frontloaded exercise, they can yoke prior knowledge and interact better by writing genuinely relating to literature, for instance. As a teacher, it is an opportune time to capture their interest and lead the blitzkrieg of ideas for other writing prompts. My aim would be to reach that personalization of their writing and have them feel comfortable enough to continue on with that. The bulk of their discourse must carry asignificant conversation, which may require one to stray from the readymade curriculum of the school districts.

I admire how the term ‘academic discourse’ is not only tossed around in articles by David Bartholomae and Peter Elbow, but unveiled as this filtered form of writing. Academic discourse merely sucks potential writers dry of life force with its cardboard jargon. What Bartholomae mentions as to “finding compromise between idiosyncrasy, a personal history” (Teaching Composition 3) is what can stretch a writer’s muscles while entering a conversation. The end result Bartholomae keeps in mind is that writers must avoid regurgitating material like someone tied down by history and telling the facts rather than showing an understanding.

I recall a course I took on Shakespeare froze my fingers every time I touched the keyboard. The material was stale and uninteresting to me. However, my professor passed out sheets of paper detailing and mapping out ways to include citation examples and styles. It wasn’t as detached as other academic templates. My professor effectively reached us and had us initiate, then later scaffold off our prior knowledge to express writing. I even remember her pulling out a pen and paper to require our own written thesis—about anything. Now I regret the moment I assumed she patronized us with these prompts. I now know it improved my writing. Her strategy worked, drilling us for something that later on did help for the final papers.

Bartholomae suggests that as writers, we need to see ourselves as ‘insiders’ to gain something in the discourse (Teaching Composition 11). His claim ties to how Peter Elbow seeks for an alternative way writers can strengthen their practice. This sense of finding oneself, I feel, dovetails many ideas introduced by Elbow’s article “Reflections on Academic Discourse”. Primarily, Elbow’s most valuable idea is that you must establish a mode of nonacademic discourse. You as a writer need to render the experience for you, audience, and others rather than explain it (97). There are ways to go beyond the textbook phrases and tedious terms. Elbow asserts for one to pave new ground for your own comprehension and go with the flow. That’s how I feel about the overall writing experience. The task to speaking up to audiences using academic discourse stifles the reader, and only produces mechanical writers. A writer unwilling to set personal markers or explore stylistic moves will only become a ‘Human Spark note’ and jade their writing teachers.

A pedagogical observation I spotted from professor and writer Lad Tobin is his claim, “We cannot read any student essay without unconsciously and simultaneously reading a number of other texts” (Reading Student Writing 12). Teaching writing covers universal topics. A teacher must assess and determine (from their prompted assignments) a better way of interpreting students outside of the limited academic discourse box. One must not get shelled in by the exclusivity and highly commendable modes of academic discourse because it has its own faults. As Elbow nails home the point, “I’m all for students being able to write academic discourse, but it bothers me when theorists argue that someone doesn’t know a field unless she can talk about it in the discourse professionals use among themselves” (Reflections on Academic Discourse: How It Relates to Freshmen and Colleagues 96). You as a teacher must toy with the jargon but give access to the writers for ways of personalization. In simplest terms, I recommend making expression real–cohesively, yet honestly.

 

WORKS CITED

Bartholomae, David. “Inventing the University.” Teaching Composition: Background Readings. By T. R. Johnson. 3rd ed. New York, NY: Bedford/St. Martins,  2008. 2-31. Print.

Elbow, Peter. “Reflections on Academic Discourse.” Teaching Writing: Landmarks Horizons. Ed. By McDonald, et.al. Carbondale: Southern University Press, 2002.

Tobin, Lad. Reading Student Writing: Confessions, Meditations, and Rants. Portsmouth,NH: Boynton/Cook/Heineman, 2004. Print.