Good day, and welcome to my blog of English 372, Canadian Literature. This is my first time running a blog, so I am both nervous and excited to engage in this particular area of learning. I hope that I can meet all of you throughout this course, and I can’t wait to get started!
Who art thou?
Unexpectedly, I am an English Major focusing on language and literature. Currently, in my 3rd year, I hope to pursue education as my post-graduate degree to work in the field of high school education. During my time off-campus, I frequent the nearby park to reflect and relax. I’m also working towards my volunteer hours for my bED application at a nearby high school. Subjects that I enjoy outside of English include philosophy (of morality, meaning, and religion), psychology (neurological processes for communication/consciousness), and geography (mineral deposits and lattice formation).
What do I anticipate learning in this course?
Over the next 13 weeks, I hope to delve into the discourse of First Nations people and develop a critical eye for the historical progress of Canadian canon. As the course has laid out, I anticipate opportunities to gain an understanding of connections between colonialism and literature, recognizing text for their significance beyond the scope of Western thinking, and I hope to explore new ways to improve the future of literature in Canada. For instance, such misconceptions or lack of understanding of literature, limited to the scope of western culture, have led to the alienation of the Turtle Island people. In this read, I found the myths of the First Nations people questionable at first, but further reading and rereading have opened my mind to just a little bit of what their culture is and how the predominant western culture masked it.
Why am I interested in this course subject matter?
The focus of my future involves the education of the younger generation. As such, I find it pertinent to my endeavor to familiarize myself with Canadian literature. However, the scope of the course offers so much more, which I find more valuable than merely the history or significance of Canadian literature. More recently, I have noticed that students have become desensitized towards First Nations, in both culture and the strife that they went through (and continue to go through). Instances such as the case with the missing First Nations women and girls, which was a semi-recent issue, were unknown to them, and I felt deeply bothered that such media isn’t prevalent in both popular literature and social media stories. Being able to connect, identify, and decolonize Canadian literature is an asset that I wish to pass down to my students in the future.
Thank you for reading my first blog post! I hope that I will get the opportunity to connect with many of you.
Works Cited
Brant, Jennifer. “Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls in Canada | The Canadian Encyclopedia.” Thecanadianencyclopedia.Ca, 22 Mar. 2017, thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/missing-and-murdered-indigenous-women-and-girls-in-canada. Accessed 8 Jan. 2020.
Didlick, Nick. Indigenous Leaders and Environmentalists March in Protest against Morgan’s Trans Mountain Pipeline in Southern British Columbia, 10 Mar. 2018, www.macleans.ca/news/canada/trans-mountain-politics-and-first-nations/. Accessed 8 Jan. 2020.
Mclaren, David. Encountering the Other: Racism Against Aboriginal People Chippewas of Nawash Unceded First Nation Report to the Ipperwash Inquiry. 26 Feb. 2007.
Hello Aran! I love the way that you think, your writing style, and what you choose to write about! You voice your ideas in an incredibly clear manner, which is something I’m still working on… I read a little bit of your hyperlink about the Turtle Island People, the beginning of the universe, and some other explanations of things. For example, “Gitchie Manito created Gee-sis (Sun), so that he could have light to see. Then he tried creating other objects…the Wa-bun-ah-nung (Morning Star) that tells us each day of the approach of the Sun. Then, he tried to create a place on which to put life. One of his attempts turned out to be covered with a cloud. One was a rock full of heat…” With each idea I read, I really tried to imagine myself thinking about the world through the way that the Turtle Island people saw the world, but I found it very hard to see from their eyes without my existing framework/belief system resisting with each idea and saying that isn’t how the world works… And this stopped me from being able to understand the worldview expressed in the article. This made me think about how the western way of rationalizing and thinking about the world seems to discount ways of seeing that are mythological or not based on observable phenomena and the premises built up from these layers of supposed truths. I have a few questions… feel free to answer one, some, or all of them.
1) What relation do you think the western thinking style has with one’s ability to see the world truthfully? What about a mythology and story-based thinking style?
2) How do you think the Western style of thinking impacts how people view/experience reality? What about a mythology and story-based style?
3) Do you think a thinking style needs to prioritize closeness to reality?
I’m beginning to think that maybe that is only one possible framework, furthermore, the framework we were socially taught to prioritize.
5) Can mythology and story-based styles also lead us to interpret the world in a way that is just as close, or even closer to reality?
Hi Gabrielle!
Thank you so much for the compliments I really appreciate them! English has been a struggle for me since I was very young so I had made it my goal to improve on it and the reason I decided to major in it. I also really appreciate your questions, and here are my responses to them:
I think that western and eastern philosophy greater dictate their mode and style of thinking, this also applies to cultures within each sector themselves. In our case, within “western thinking” (really, it might as well be named European thinking) are the First Nations people. Although they may be categorized under western philosophy, their culture is vastly different from the modes that we move ourselves under. Western philosophy constitutes itself with the empirical sciences, heavily relying on what we can see, prove, hear, spell and sense over what may or may not make sense. First Nations people move themselves on a different mode of thinking that isn’t too far off from our own. They make sense of the world, using their own stories, experiences, and beliefs on a broader and more holistic scale (similar to many religion). Let’s take for example, Christianity who believes that God created the entire universe and resides over us as our maker. It helps explain many occurrences in the world such as the reason for the creation of mountains, natures disasters, diseases and many other grandiose worldly things. The same can be said about ancient religions such as the ancient Aztecs and their belief about Huitzilopochtli and Coyolxauhqui. In the myth, the describe the process of the sun and the moon and why they must make blood offerings to keep the sun alive. Although it doesn’t exactly mesh well with today’s society, it is, none-the-less, a way to see the relationship between the sun and the moon. As we read in Chamberlin’s book, what truth really is, shouldn’t be between myths, religions or beliefs. For the “reality” that we seek are always often influenced already by our own beliefs. If I am an empiricist, I may not believe anything other than what I am seeking, despite the fact that it may actually be true. Take for example, Christians. They believe that God made the world, but scientists say the big bang made the worst. In this case, Christians furthered their beliefs and said that God made the big bang. Although scientists can’t necessarily prove or disprove the presence or influence of God in this regard, they may (for the majority) choose to deny this because it doesn’t align with their empirical beliefs.