Category: Unit 2

In The Truth About Stories, Thomas King juxtaposes two creation stories, one involving Charm, and one involving Adam and Eve, concluding this comparison by insisting that only one creation tale can be true, and that it is therefore up to the reader to decide which of the stories to believe.

As Dr. Paterson suggests in her unit question, King is enacting a kind of hypocrisy when he encourages his readers to participate in such a decision, because the division he established between Charm and Genesis, and the dichotomy between true and false which he proffers to the reader, all takes place within the broader context of a discussion that subtly but firmly warns against the type of black and white paradigm that, for example, is promoted in the Judeo-Christian creation narrative.

So, why does King insist that his readers participate in dichotomous thinking?

In fact, King’s is utilizing a clever rhetorical tactic: first, he illustrates the pitfalls inherent in dichotomous thinking. When King asks his readers to choose Charm or Genesis, he seems to undermine his own position, but in actuality he has simply primed his audience to fully recognize the absurdity inherent in this dichotomy, this decision. In this sense, king has “shown” rather than “told”; he has not relied simply upon informing his readers that dichotomies are irrational, and problematic as a result. Rather, King positions his readers in such a way that they are required to actively engage with the subject at hand, to experience and interact with dichotomous thinking and experience this irrationality for themselves. This method of engaging the audience is, in the end result, a much more impactful and efficacious method of communication and education.

 

Works Cited:

King, Thomas. The Truth About Stories. House of Anansi Press Inc, 2003. Print.

Paterson, Erika. “Lesson 2:2 Blog Questions.” ENGL 470A Canadian Studies, https://blogs.ubc.ca/courseblogsis_ubc_engl_470a_99c_2014wc_44216-sis_ubc_engl_470a_99c_2014wc_44216_2517104_1/unit-2/lesson-2-2/. Web. 2016.

In his article, “A Map that Roared and an Original Atlas: Canada, Cartography, and the Narration of Nation” Matthew Sparke recalls memorable words uttered by Chief Justice Allan McEachern while presiding over a court case regarding land claims made by the Gitxsan and Wet’suwet’en peoples.

The Gitxsan and Wet’suwet’en presented a map in court, which was intended as evidence of sovereignty and illustrated their traditional land holdings. In response McEachern exclaimed, inexplicably, “We’ll call it the map that roared” (468).

Sparke goes on to offer a variety of possible interpretations for McEachern’s cryptic statement. While he notes that these words could reference the idiomatic phrase “paper tiger” (Tse-tung, 1956), Sparke ultimately asserts the belief that McEachern’s turn of phrase pays homage, perhaps unintentionally, to First Nations people’s powerful claim upon the lands, inhabited for generations by their ancestors, which were forcibly stripped from them with the arrival of European settlers.

It is possible McEachern’s use of the word “roar” suggests to Sparke the unconscious (and rather colonial) evocation of something powerful, aggressive, vocal. In any case Sparke ascribes to McEachern’s words an awareness and appreciation of ferocious, unwavering intent on the part of the Gitxsan and Wet’suwet’en people, who, determined to reclaim their homeland, chose to fight a long legal battle with the Canadian government.

Works Cited:

Sparke, Matthew. “A Map that Roared and an Original Atlas: Canada, Cartography, and the Narration of Nation.” Annals of the Association of American Geographers. Sept. 1998. DOI: 10.1111. Web.

Tse-tung, Mao. “U.S. Imperialism is a Paper Tiger, Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung.” Marxists.org. 2004. Web

 

 

After reading from a variety of student blogs, I have composed a cursory list of the major themes, images, emotions and so forth considered by my peers to constitute home:

• Home suggests familiar physical surroundings and sensory perceptions. Sights, scents, sounds.
• Though home is often predicated on the physically tangible, many people make note of the fact that home is also an emotional state. An inward feeling.
• The physical and psychological reality of home is not anchored solely in the presence of ones private property, but within a broader community. Home is constituted by other people, in the presence of family members or friends, providing a form of “social capital“.
• Though home may be embodied in static structures, objects, landscapes and so forth, this is an orthodox conception of home which is oftentimes unfamiliar. Rather, home is, for many,  an unfixed site, a state of fluidity and simultenaety,  the locus of perpetual movement, growth, change.
• One of the most commonly cited perceptions of home espouses a location, whether physical or psychological or both, that one creates for oneself for oneself.

Ultimately, I identify strongly with the majority of these common associations. There are numerous qualities cited less frequently that I find equally central to my definition of home, such as a shared, familiar language. In foreign countries I often feel lost, not so much in unfamiliar geography as in an unfamiliar culture or dialect. At these times, discovering a fellow English speaker or material written in English functions like a welcome injection of “home” into a world otherwise composed of “elsewhere”.

Works Cited:

Lee, Chloe. “2.2 Home”. Chloe’s Blog For English 470. 28 Sept. 2016, https://blogs.ubc.ca/470chloe/2016/09/28/2-2-home/. Web.

Woo, Patrick. “Canada Is My Home And Not–Assignment 2:2”. We Are In The Same Boat. 28 Sept. 2016, https://blogs.ubc.ca/patrickwoo/2016/09/28/canada-is-my-home-and-not-assignment-22/. Web.

 

Preface

Chamberlain didn’t tell the right story. He told a story, or part of one, but he didn’t tell it properly. He says:

My godmother who with nice irony came from a settlement in Saskatchewan called Qu’Appelle. Whatsitsname.

The place I come from, the place I call home, is not so far from Qu’Appelle Valley, and there schoolchildren are taught that the settlement takes its name from a legend that tells of a man, paddling home in his canoe. The man hears his name called, ghost-like, upon the wind. He responds: Qu’Appelle? “Who calls?” but receives no answer, only an echo: Who calls? When the man reaches home, he learns that in his absence his true love has died, crying his name aloud with her final breath.

And so the valley is branded by this tragedy:

“Who calls?”

Qu’Appelle?

Home

Home is a river valley, in winter, with a heavy cloak of snow; a shroud of silence. The naked poplars and birch form stark, skeletal smudges against an endless white.

Home is a river valley, in spring, come late. Ice, still on the waters, is breaking; there is loud cracking and eager, flowing movement.

Home is a river valley, in summer, warm wind redolent with the scent of wolf-wood, prairie sage, sun-baked clay.

Here are ancient stones, older than the grasslands, older than the sea that once lay atop the grasslands. Their faces, split by glaciers, are wordless.

Home is a river valley, in autumn, painted every shade of harvest. See vermilion, viridian, see umber, ochre, dun. See a gold that touches everything, subtly, gilds everything.

These leaves, every leaf, is the colour of a memory, is a memory; my whole life, articulated in the language of these fading hues. As the season turns each leaf, each colour, turns dark, turns silent, drifting downward. Memory becomes a rich blanket, layered upon the earth, all the colours of time, passing, of roots, growing.

 

 

 

Works Cited:

Chamberlin, J. Edward. If This is Your Land, Where are Your Stories?: Finding Common Ground. Vintage Canada Ed., Vintage Canada, 2004. Print.