Kate Hammond's Blog

Hello Readers!

Writing this last blog post for ASTU 100 is bittersweet; it means that summer is quickly approaching but it also means that my first year at university is coming to an end. It is difficult to choose one “aha” moment that I have had in this class because I’ve learnt a significant amount of useful things that I know will stick with me throughout the rest of university.

Although it is hard to choose one, one of the biggest “aha” moments I’ve had this year is with scholarly writing. It is extremely difficult to transition from high school writing to a completely different style in university. I remember reading our first scholarly article “The Role of Interpretative Communities in Remembering and Learning”, by Farhat Shahzad, and feeling like I was reading a book written in a different language. As we began to work through the different features of scholarly writing, something clicked and I was able to read scholarly articles with much more ease. Knowing the different features enabled me to know what to look for from the scholarly pieces of writing, so instead of reading an article three times and still being very confused, I can now take out the key aspects from the piece of writing. Even though there were still many scholarly essays that were difficult to understand, I now feel as though I have gained a strong set of skills to be able to both read and write like a scholar.

For me (and for a lot of other first year students), it was hard to see what benefits many of the courses I took throughout the year were going to provide. Although my ASTU class was at the two o’clock slump of the day and sometimes difficult to make myself go to, I can definitely say that I will take away so many important skills that will help me throughout the rest of my university experience.

It’s been awesome blogging and I hope everyone has an awesome summer!!

-Kate

Hey readers! Over the past couple of weeks in my ASTU class we have been reading and analyzing various poems, some of which are directly written about 9/11. There are 2 that I am going to focus on: “Photograph from September 11” written by Wislawa Szymborska and “The Names” written by Billy Collins. Although both of these poems were written after 9/11, the two writers take different approaches. While Collins’ poem represents what we could call 9/12 or the mourning process rather than the chaos of 9/11, Szymborska’s piece is a clear representation of the day itself.

Another difference between the two poems is that for me, one clearly represents the memory of 9/11 while the other is not necessarily as obvious of a representation of that day. In Szymborska’s poem, starting with the title, the piece is obviously about 9/11 and her in depth description of individuals jumping out of the burning buildings gives me a clear picture in my head of that day. This poem also reminded me of the post 9/11 novel that we recently read, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer. At the end of the novel, there are several pictures of a man jumping out of a building, which for me is a clear indicator of the trauma of 9/11. In Collins’ poem, although there were lines that made me think of the 9/11 memorial, I also think that this poem could easily be about other traumas as well. Lines such as “Names printed on the ceiling of the night. Names slipping around a watery bend” made me think immediately of the 9/11 memorial, with the two large fountains and the dark stone that each name is engraved in. Yet there are no other clear indicators that would suggest that this poem is written for the victims of 9/11.

Although Szymborska’s poem is about an extremely traumatic event, she manages to bring a more positive light to her piece. With lines like “There’s enough time” and “They’re still within the air’s reach”, Szymborska is able to make this poem not as sombre. Collins was able to produce a beautiful memorial poem, yet all of the names made this piece slightly more negative for me. Szymborska’s ability to make such a traumatic day be seen from a more positive perspective made this poem my favourite out of the two I discussed. As I sign off for this week I encourage you to reflect and decide which poem you think better represented 9/11. Lastly, do you agree with me and think that Szymborska’s poem indeed does succeed in putting a more positive light on such a traumatic day?

Hey everyone! For the past week in my ASTU class, we have been analyzing Ilka Saal’s article “Regarding the Pain of Self and Other: Trauma Transfer and Narrative Framing in Jonathan Safran Foer’s Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close”. I must say, at first glance this article was a bit difficult to follow but after some class discussion, a few key points stuck with me.

First, in the section titled Frustrated Analogies: “Shakespeare doesn’t make sense”, Saal makes a shift in her analysis of trauma transfer. She describes the ineffectiveness of trauma transfer displayed in Foer’s novel, specifically through the character of Oskar. In my ASTU class, we discussed how Saal is at times fairly critical of Oskar, for example when she claims “Given his thirst for knowledge, it is quite surprising that with regard to world history, Oskar is rather ignorant and disinterested” (461). Here, I disagree with Saal. For a nine-year-old boy, I actually think that Oskar is quite interested when he states “So I tried to remember them so that I could Google them, when I got home” (Saal, 461). I almost feel as though Saal is contradicting herself when she says this because to me, this quote shows that Oskar is in fact quite interested in history. What do you think? Is Saal being too hard on Oskar or is he in fact “ignorant and disinterested” when it comes to history?

Another point that this section of the article raises is Oskar’s inability to talk about “the worst day” of his life, which is a prominent effect of trauma on individuals. Oskar’s grandparents also suffer from this incommunicability of trauma. After the Dresden bombings, Thomas Schell Sr. looses his ability to speak. When Oskar’s grandma tries to type out the story of “My Life”, she does so without a typewriter ribbon, which again signifies how she is unable to communicate her experience going through the trauma in Dresden. This incommunicability of trauma makes me think back to my post, titled “The Act of Forgetting”. I discussed two perspectives on the act of forgetting, one being that forgetting is necessary in one’s life who has experienced trauma and the other being that the act of forgetting can go too far and erase the memories of people who matter. It seems as though Oskar and his grandparents need to forget in order to move on from the trauma that they experienced. In Foer’s novel, Thomas Schell Sr. writes to his son in a letter, “If I could tell you what happened to me that night, I could leave that night behind me, maybe I could come home to you, but that night has no beginning or end” (208). Here we see that the incommunicability of trauma leads to Oskar’s grandpa being unable to move on and forget the traumatic experience of the Dresden bombings. As I sign off for this week, I’ll leave you with a question: If Thomas Sr. was able to forget and move on from this trauma do you think he would be able to speak again?

Hey everyone! Now that we’re back from Christmas break and back into the madness of classes, assignments and due dates, it’s time to get back into the blogs! In my ASTU class, we have been reading Jonathan Safran Foer’s novel Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, which follows nine-year-old Oskar Schell on his quest to find the lock that belongs to the key that his father, who died in the 9/11 terrorist attacks, left for him. I started reading this novel over the break, not thinking that it would be one that I would actually enjoy, but hearing the story of the affects of the brutal attacks on the World Trade Center from the perspective of a young boy was very moving and made the book a page turner.

In our most recent class, we started discussing major themes that are portrayed in Foer’s novel, the first one being absence. There are many examples of absence throughout the novel but an obvious one that I didn’t think of until another group mentioned it is the absence of Thomas Junior’s body. Thomas Junior’s (Oskar’s father) body was never found after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, which can represent a lack of closure for his family. Oskar, a boy with a very active imagination, starts to imagine where his father could be and, at one point, even thinks that his father could have been one of the bodies jumping out of the building. I can not imagine the affects losing a loved one in a tragic event, such as the 9/11 terrorist attacks, has on a family and then on top of that not having any closure to attempt to move on.

While reading Foer’s novel, I thought back to when I went to New York last year and visited the 9/11 memorial. Seeing the beautiful architecture of the waterfalls and the names of every person that died in the 9/11 attacks was an extremely moving experience and allowed me to truly understand how tragic this day was (because I was only 4 when it happened). I also thought back to the ideas of absence and lack of closure portrayed in the novel and how difficult it would be for a family to see the name of their loved one inscribed around the waterfall, but to not know where their body is. Because I’ve been fortunate enough to not experience losing a loved one, a big question comes to mind. With such a tragic event, would knowing where the body of your loved one is make the coping process easier or simply be unbearable?

Hello everyone! It has been a few weeks since I have posted, so I thought I would catch you up on what we have been focusing on in my ASTU class. We recently had a group presentation as well as a literature review to follow. Each group was assigned a key word and our job was to research what scholars had to say on our specific word. We then each wrote a literature review on the scholarly sources, which we analyzed. My group’s key word was forgetting and the scholars seemed to share some similar, but also contrasting views on this word.

Some scholars deem forgetting as a necessary act in order to move on from traumatic and painful experiences. For example, in his article Between Remembering and Forgetting, Mordechai Gordon, an educational scholar, states that “forgetting can make it possible for people to move on with their lives and ‘turn the page’ so that they do not get stuck in negativity and ruin” (496). Gordon uses the traumatic event that occurred at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown Connecticut, where 20 children and 6 adults were shot, to highlight the importance of forgetting. The decision was made to tear down the school, leaving no trace of it left, because the individuals living in Newtown felt as though it would be too painful to have to see the school where many were killed.

On the other hand, there are scholars who believe that the act of forgetting can go too far and completely erase the memories of certain groups of people who in fact should be remembered. Katherine Hayes, a scholar of culture and memory, suggests that commanded forgetting has the tendency of completely erasing certain ethnic groups from history. Hayes uses the example of Aboriginal communities to highlight that “commanded forgetting cannot be deemed successful as a strategy” (214). I find Hayes’ argument on forgetting very convincing. It makes me think of The Canadian Residential School System, which we have talked about a lot in my Sociology class. The Indigenous children were forced to “forget” their culture, traditions and values in order to fit in with the dominant Canadian culture. This is one of many examples where forgetting has gone too far, erasing the memories of Aboriginal culture.

As I sign off for this week, I want you to take a position on the act of forgetting. Do you think that forgetting is necessary in order to move on from painful experiences? Or do you believe that the act of forgetting has the tendency of going too far?

Works Cited

Gordon, M. “Between Remembering and Forgetting.” Studies in Philosophy and Education. 34.5 (2015;2014;): 489-503. Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht. Web. 22 October 2015

Hayes, Katherine. “Occulting the Past. Conceptualizing Forgetting in the History and Archaeology of Sylvester Manor.” Archaeological Dialogues 18.2 (2011): 197-221. Cambridge Journals Online. Web. 22 October 2015

Hey everyone! As you read, last week I focused on a specific article that we have been reading in my ASTU class. This week though, I want to go back to the question that all three of my professors in the CAP program have asked: What is a global citizen? We were asked to post a 50-word response to this question and following that, we had a group lecture with all of the CAP students in the Global Citizen stream along with our professors to discuss this question. For me, this was a challenging task. Some of you are probably wondering why I’m complaining about a 50-word response when I’m going to be eventually writing 20 page papers. There are many aspects of a global citizen, so it was difficult to pick and choose what I wanted to include in my response. Like I always do when I’m stumped, I went to my best friend Google and typed in “what is a global citizen?” As I was typing, Craig Kielburger’s name popped up. I clicked on his name and as I was reading some of the pages, I realized that he is a great example of a global citizen.

For those of you who don’t know, Craig Kielburger is the co-founder of the international charity Free the Children as well as Me to We, a social enterprise. When Kielburger was just 12 years old, he was reading the newspaper when he came across a story about a 12-year-old boy from Pakistan, who had been a child slave and was murdered because he spoke up for human rights. At that moment, Kielburger realized that he needed to do something to make a change, and Free the Children was born.

When I think about what a global citizen is, I think of someone who travels the world and who is aware of issues within their own community as well as global issues. I think of words such as impact and change. These words are what inspired Kielburger to create Free the Children. When I was in middle school, I joined the Free the Children club, which was one of the highlights of my 3 years there! We put on events to raise money for building schools in places such as Kenya and we also went to the event We Day, also co-founded by Keilburger. If you’ve never heard of this event, “We Day is a celebration of youth making a difference in their local and global communities” (http://www.weday.com). We Day was an over the top inspiring event and when I look back at it now, I realize that I was surrounded by a whole stadium of global citizens seeking to make the world we live in a better place. Keilburger’s speech helped me to define what a global citizen is. I now realize that you don’t have to travel all over the globe to be considered a global citizen. It is possible to make changes to communities that are struggling by spreading the word and getting others around you to have the same goal of spotting problems and seeking change to fix them. Being a global citizen also means being determined. This is a clear trait of Keilburger, who was only 12 when he decided he needed to make a change. We Day was an awesome experience and I suggest that you check it out here! Anyways, that is all for this week, thanks for reading!

Hey everyone and welcome to my first blog post! I am a first year at UBC and enrolled in the Coordinated Arts Program (CAP), specifically in the Global Citizens stream. As a relatively shy individual, I am a bit nervous to share my thoughts and ideas with the whole world, but I am ready to take on the challenge by starting this blog!

In my ASTU class, we have recently started analyzing the article “The Role of Interpretative Communities in Remembering and Learning” written by Farhat Shahzad. This article, which is found in the Canadian Journal of Education, focuses on how Canadian students remember the War on Terror. The article begins by talking about Wertsch’s idea of collective remembering, a process between humans and technologies of memory. However, Shahzad adds to this theory that remembering and learning also depends on the role of interpretative communities. Although this article is extremely repetitive, the influence that interpretative communities have on how we remember and learn is not something I typically think about everyday. Even though Shahzad’s concept may be fairly simple, it has made me think about how the communities I am a part of shape my memory.

The most influential interpretative community in my life that I want to touch on is family. In our class discussion on Tuesday, one of my classmates made a comment that has stuck with me. He said that he wouldn’t usually think of his family as an interpretative community, which I thought was a good way to put it. Family is such an important part of my life and I too have never thought to describe it as an “interpretative community”. According to Shahzad, family plays an important role in the process of remembering and learning by influencing our interpretations and shaping our thoughts. In my family, there is a strong set of values that have been presented to me ever since I’ve been able to walk. The presence of these values definitely influences the process of learning and remembering. A very simple example of this is how my mom has always taught my sister, brother and I to send thank you messages after receiving birthday or Christmas gifts. This may seem like a very simple idea, but surprisingly not everyone does this. I find that because I’ve been doing this for a while now, writing a thank you note is something that I will always remember to do and I have my mom to thank for that. When I think of this example some questions pop into my head. Without the influence of my mom, would I have learned this concept on my own? What other interpretative communities can teach us fundamental values? Do most individuals find family to be one of the most influential interpretative communities?

With these questions in mind, I hope that you can reflect on what an interpretative community means to you and if like me, family is an important community who plays a role in the process of learning and remembering. Below I have attached the link to the full article if you are interested in exploring these concepts more!

http://www.cje-rce.ca/index.php/cje-rce/article/view/343/1074

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