Hello readers,
It’s been a long time since we did not write blogs for our ASTU class. This week’s blogs mentioned the different works we touched during class, for example: class presentations, literary reviews, Safe Area Goražde by Joe Sacco and Obasan by Joy Kogawa. As it is my time to be the class blogger, before I start to mention the different themes discussed this week, I want to let you bloggers know that it was a pleasure to read all of your blogs and it is amazing to realize that ASTU is helping us developing more of our critical thinking skills.
First I would like to start with Safe Area Goražde by Joe Sacco. This graphic journal takes place in the war in eastern Bosnia from 1992-1995. Many bloggers emphasized the difference between Persepolis and Safe Area Goražde. Therese mentioned how Sacco’s information in his graphic journal “was gathered and came from individuals who experienced the historic event firsthand.” This differs from Persepolis since Satrapi was one of the main characters on the graphic novel and we are able to know how the Islamic Revolution had an impact on her life since she is the one who is telling us her own experience. Sandra on the other hand mentioned how the drawing style in Safe Area Goražde was realistic and how the style actually suits Sacco’s narrative because he draws the victims of the war “as real people, and not just statistics or interviewees. They are the people within Gorazde, all with their own emotions and stories.” The realistic technique of Sacco in his way of sharing people’s stories was also supported by Mia’s blog when she mentioned that “it’s been said many times that a picture is worth a thousand words; in the case of Gorazde that could not be more true.”
Another novel we touched during class is Obasan by Joy Kogawa. This novel focuses on Japanese-Canadian families who were victims of internment during World War II. It was interesting to read how Obasan is an object that created cultural memory as seen in Paolina’s blog when she mentioned how a piece of this book was even read during a ceremony of the Redress Settlement Agreement in 1988. From a cultural memory point of view, “remembering is the active engagement with the past.” The action of remembering from this point of view makes me think about Inneke’s position about the keyword: forgetting. It contradicts the point of remembering since she asserts that “we can equate the term “forgetting” with “delete” which means selecting what to delete and what to keep.” This position is supported by Kate, when she reported that “some scholars deem forgetting as a necessary act in order to move on from traumatic and painful experiences”. The idea of forgetting presented in Kate’s blog argues the idea of cultural memory because Paolina reveals that “ Trauma is seen as an essential part of cultural memory.” During Obasan we can identify how cultural memory is produced through traumatic events.
As seen above the keywords we touched in class during our presentations had a big impact in how we are analyzing the pieces we are reading. Gabo mentioned it was interesting to analyze how “the emergence of new technologies changed the dialog that was formed by scholars talking about technologies of memory.” The idea of scholarly articles bringing in new sides on different fields makes me think about Ryan’s blog since he highlights that under arts “there are many theories on certain subjects, which are all similar but usually with different names.” This leads to the question of “How do you know who is right?” This is a tought question to answer on the field of arts since there are multiple theories and scholars backed their points of view by other scholars.
Thank you for your time!
Maria Jose Zegarra
In reference to Joseph’s blog, “the numbers”:
I found your blog incredibly thought provoking, and the questions your writing asks equal parts intriguing and disturbing. Disturbing in the sense that you point out many aspects of society and culture that we are relatively blind to, but is incredibly evident. We don’t realize the amount of emphasis that society puts on empirical data through numbers. The level of apathy towards events that don’t generate shocking statistics is scary and inhumane. I was impressed that you used an example from in-class when you walked us through your reaction to a question about your feelings. I found it intriguing how you were able to draw from an in-class experience and relate it to your blog post so neatly. Overall, excellent post, and I appreciate the critique that you have on empirical data and societal perceptions of it.
Isaiah
I find what you point out about “forgetting” to be fairly interesting. Within technologies of memory, it has also been pointed out that it has some ties to “forgetting” as well. Technologies of memory influence what is to be remembered and what is to be forgotten simply by embodying the memory to be remembered. If a memory was to be forgotten, then technologies of memory for it would not exist. As Inneke says, we can select what we want to remember and, consequently, what we will forget.
I would like to comment on Ryan’s blog, in particular the question of how do we know what is the real truth? 10/10 blog my friend. I don’t think that you could have asked a more difficult or pertinent question to this course and to the entire stream of Global Citizens (and life, but let’s not go there). I definitely understand your frustration with the lack of hard evidence or fact that we are presented with in course material. We are without question being bombarded with relativity from all directions. It makes one considerably uncomfortable, as questions no longer have answers and learning begins to lose the purpose and quality that it previously held when we were all confined to the naivety of our childhood bubbles. I think it is somewhat worthwhile to think of these impossible questions in the context of being very characteristic of modern thinking, when today we live in a society that is equally influenced by the unreasonable post-modern. What I am aiming to say is that there isn’t a whole lot we can do with this question without on some level ascribing to a metanarrative, which we keep being told to reject because they are all simply “constructed” and in our heads. This is not to say that I don’t think your question has no significance, I actually believe quite the opposite. In the closing chapter of The Deathly Hallows when Harry is in a state of limbo between life and death, Harry asks Dumbledore if what he is experiencing is all inside his head. To this, the wise old wizard replies “Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?” (Dumbledore, timeless). Just some food for thought as we wage the scholastic wars of existentialism.
-Joseph Moric
Hi! I would like to respond to Grace’s blog this past week “Fiction and Memory”. Grace recapped our class visit to the archives in UBC’s library to look over the hundreds of documents surrounding Joy Kogawa’s novel Obasan. In her post she mentioned how she was taken back by Kogawa’s ability to write such a personal piece of fiction, without having experienced the events herself. The archives offered insight into how Kogawa was able to piece together such a realistic book with the aid of real letters and journal entries from the Japanese internment. I completely agree with Grace, in fact I had the same initial reaction when I began reading Obasan. I couldn’t believe how real and personal the events in the book seemed, especially since the novel was written in an almost non fiction style with letters and dated entries. I truly admire the effort that Kogawa put into Obasan to make it as authentic as possible, and as true to the events of the Japanese Internment as she could.
I enjoyed reading Grace’s post and being able to relate so well to it!
Mia Spare
Hi I want to leave a comment on Baris’ blog on origins of genres (blog http://blogs.ubc.ca/astu100barisuzel/2015/11/26/origins-of-genres/).
Thinking about the genre of high school essays as a way to introduce students to the academic language and a specific way of writing reminded me of Clara’s blog “Force versus Control“ where she says that a culture has to be learned exactly as we have to study a language to be able to communicate and understand it.
Although Clara speaks about spoken language and culture and Baris about the language of Academia certain parallels between these two topics become visible.
If we see genres as certain academic cultures they have to be learned in a certain way in order to be able to understand and use them. The genre of high school essays guides us towards the understanding of how the “academic culture/genres“ work.
And hopefully at the end of university we will be able to speak and understand the language of academia fluently.
Nice blog post Baris!
Paolina