Nonwestern Lit Blog Reflection Paper- 10/9/08

Within classes, reading is a crucial part of everyday learning. Students use reading to help better their understanding of certain topics, help support literary statements that may need secondary information, and / or simply as a tool for a well thought out intertextual connection. Because reading is so dominant in education, it is important for us as students to look at our reading development through class discussion and personal writing, and create a meta-analysis of how well we rate ourselves as readers and students. Reading development is categorized into three subcategories, Text-Self, Text-Other Texts, and Text-World, which help us as students learn where we stand in reading development and how to improve our developmental levels. Although I can be categorized as any three of these levels, I am most appropriately labeled as a stage two: Text-Other Texts.
Text-Self is a neutral, safe level that most students begin at, myself included. Before classes began as well as throughout my first few weeks of class, I was very nervous about speaking my mind or stating any opinions conflicting with others initial statements. As one can blatantly see, my first two blogs of the semester reflected this. They were very “I-centered” and subjective. I believe that early on in a semester, students can be apprehensive about speaking their minds and using outside sources for support, fearing that they may offend someone. In my case, I thought that I should write “safe”, short, broad blogs, fearing writing that may be offensive, confusing, or worse, stupid / incorrect information that could embarrass me during class. One example was expressed in my first week’s blog. It was one paragraph, stating information solely on the film, Bride and Prejudice, a cinematic feature viewed a few nights prior to class. I used language such as “I have come to the conclusion that although entertaining, Bollywood seems to create "over the top" cinema classics” or “As discussed in class, this film is hybrid. It combines western and non-western tactics to create a simple, yet fun movie” (Blog entry #1, 8/28/08). Both statements profess boring, obvious comments that any student, whether in or outside of class could have written. After comparing my first two blogs of the semester to later analyzes, I can definitely see a huge jump in language choice, intertextual connections, and personal comparisons to other peoples comments in and outside of class that help to make my blogs better.
Throughout the next few weeks, I was able to post more detailed, edgy blogs that could actually help within class discussion rather than hinder it. In my third blog of the semester, I took a tactic that actually used all three levels of reading development, presenting questions that I have. One example was “I am still confused / pondering whether the sheep is an actual object or simply a metaphor for the unknown” (Blog Entry #3, 9/12/08). Surprisingly, later that week, I found that other classmates did indeed have some of the same pondering questions. In addition to asking questions, my blog also touched upon the topic of symbolism within the book, Wild Sheep Chase. My group briefly discussed the three symbols the whale’s penis, a woman’s slip, and a woman’s ear, in class; however, I felt that there was more information about these symbols that were not discussed and should be given publication. Discussing specific concepts and emotions such as “…the ear is a fetish. It has no emotion to it, not necessary attachments like a human attraction and / or a relationship…” or “…the slip is a symbol of the feminine connection he seems to long for.” (Blog Entry #3).
To deepen the analysis, I completed the symbol investigation with a final comment that I feel is the ultimate example of my transition from stage one (Text-Self) to stage two (Text-Other Texts), stating,
“The whale penis is the most interesting of all three symbols. Severed from a whale and placed on display at the Aquarium, Boku admired that whale genitalia daily. Comparing him to the object, I feel that he has realized the uselessness of a severed penis as well as his feeling of uselessness in society. He discusses his ‘disheartening’ sex life and realizes that although he and the whale are quite different, their similarities do shine through” (Blog Entry #3).
At this point in my blog entries, I do not feel that I have fully transitioned into stage two; however, I do think that I am improving. I need to add more intertextual connections from other literary pieces. With that said, my ability to use in class information and relate it to outside information, is showing growth.
The specific definition of stage two: Text-Other Texts is to leave the personal opinions and reactions (“I-centered”), and be able to critically analyze the literary piece using outside sources and compare commonalities between the two or in this case, the comparison of a film and literary piece. Jumping ahead to last week’s blog: blog five, I discuss the film, Indian Jones and the Temple of Doom in connection to Said’s definition to Orientalism. I feel that this connection is a drastic improvement from the third week into the fifth week. I use specific intertextual connections from the film including the discussion of racism and genderism which could lead to offending viewers and the specific party discussed, different generalizations and fantasy within the creation of the village, temple, and night club that were influenced by western cinema, and multiple stereotypes among the characters, all of which were developed by writer George Lucas and director Steven Spielberg, helping to deepen my comparison of Said’s article and this box office hit (Blog Entry #5).
In addition, I also took advantage of the article itself, using specific comments from within the article to support my opinions and statements about the movie as well as discussing the validity of the article in relation to other sources. To support this transition, my fifth blog concludes with a discussion of how unique and rare the concept of orientalism is. With that said, when really pondered, Orientalism is not as foreign as previously determined. This concept is used in many books and movies throughout the world. Specifically discussing film, I point out “The other Indiana Jones movies are perfect examples of that as well as comedic movies such as Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker's Rush Hour movies. They include multiple stereotypes and cliques that create modernized orientalistic cinema” (Blog Entry #5, 9/25/08). I know that there is still a lot more that I can do with stage two before improving to stage three; however, I do think that this is a start.
Stage three: Text-World is a very detailed, intuitive stage that must be taken seriously and will not be easy as easy of a transition as it was from stage one to stage two. This is because stage three requires a deeper thinking that needs to be taught and conditioned into ones brain.
There are many different strategies that I wish to enforce in order for me to transition from stage two to stage three. First of all, I will need to ease into stage three. Because stage three will require a mind set different than what I currently have, I will need to condition myself to think more psychologically, philosophically, or even scientifically. My first step in conditioning will be to look back at each of my previous blogs and contemplate how I can improve them from their current stages to the ultimate, third stage of reading development. Once I have improved my specific blogs, I will also research other classmates’ blogs and see where their reading development levels are. There are a few members within our class that seem to “get it” and I will most likely concentrate on their blog entries and compare. The final strategy that I will enforce in order to improve my reading development is to broaden my reading material. I feel that I have a specific category of literature that I tend to read. The broader my reading material, the more outside sources available as literary support, the better my blogs and class input will be.
Blogging has helped to broaden my horizons. I have never written a blog before, however, this weekly activity has proved to be successful. I am able to visually see my original developmental level at stage one as well as my continuous growth to stage two. I know that I have a lot of work to do in order to grow / develop into stage three, however, I do believe that the more blogs I write and the more research I do, the better I student I will be. This has been an interesting activity thus far and it looks as though within the future blogs, can only get better and more interesting.