Hello dear readers, and welcome back! I hope you were able to get some R&R and spend time with the ones you love during the winter break. For the past few weeks, our class has been focused on Jonathan Foer’s Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, a novel that portrays the events of 9/11 through the narrative of a nine-year-old child named Oskar. The novel touches on many themes, with one of them being the theme of “trauma” and the different ways individuals deal with it.

As one may expect, the majority of our class decided to write their blog posts on Foer’s novel. Therefore, ‘trauma’ is going to be the dough (foundation) of our pizza, and the responses of my classmates will be our ‘toppings.’

-Add sliced pepperonis-

Kaveel’s blog post talks about how he experienced 9/11 during his childhood because his parents wanted him to become “as aware and informed” as he could be. It was through the media that he learned about the horrors of that event, and it was through the horrors of that event did an irrational fear manifested within him as a child. He speculates that the irrational fear of Arab’s he had was emphasized by the media, and how he ended up “obliviously” associating traditional Arab outfits with terrorism.

-Add a pinch of herbs-

Peijia’s blog post  speaks about the language Foer uses in his novel, and she suggests that using a child narrator allows for acceptable usage of blunt language. And she has a point – Oskar is very blunt (“There was a lot of stuff that made me panicky, like […] Arab people on the subway (even though I’m not racist) …” (36)). She further noticed that the racial language Oskar uses towards Arab people was a reflection of “some of the thoughts thousands of Americans were thinking after the attack – but they couldn’t directly say it.”

-Add mozzarella layering-

Raphael’s blog post touches on “xenophobia, fear, anger” in the “post 9/11 world” in his conclusion. He explains that because of traumatic events involving international players, the language of fear and discrimination will continue to exist. He further suggests that “fear, xenophobia and anxiety are very much intertwined with our human reaction to traumatic events.”

-Cook for 5 minutes…-

Taking into consideration these three toppings for our recipe, they suggest that a mix of fear and anxiety can cause people to act irrationally – mainly by manifesting an irrational fear linked to a traumatic event. A combination like this is what can lead to headaches, stomach aches, xenophobia, and racial speech. This is quite unhealthy for a daily diet, because understanding, compassion, and sympathy become replaced with ignorance, malice, and revenge.

-…then rotate the pizza and bake for another 3-5 minutes-

However, just like how there are many different kinds of pizza, there are also many different ways of dealing with trauma. For example, some further toppings that I’d like to suggest are pineapple and fried bananas.

Thank you for reading, and bon appétit!