In the last lesson I ask some of you, “what is your first response to Robinson’s story about the white and black twins in context with our course theme of investigating intersections where story and literature meet.” I asked, what do you make of this “stolen piece of paper”? Now that we have contextualized that story with some historical narratives and explored ideas about questions of authenticity and the necessity to “get the story right” – how have your insights into that story changed?
Although I didn’t write about the written document, I made various comments on different blogs that did write about their interpretation. My initial thoughts were more Christianized due to the fact that I live in Canada and have come across Biblical pieces. However, that was not my only thought.
There is, indeed, a necessity of “getting the story right”, but at the same time, there is value in hearing different interpretations of each person’s perception of the story. Not that people should choose to ignore historical details, but instead be aware of all sides of history at the same time in order to decrease conflict and bias, and increase understanding. There’s no reason to point fingers and that’s clearly not what we’re doing. But, if we’re going to set goals to be more understanding, set them higher. Inaccurate history does indeed have “serious consequences”, but how do we know what is truth without listening to every side of the story? We never lived in that era. We may experience repercussions of the past, but we never experienced it for ourselves. Blend the stories and let one’s own understanding take the narratives and decide on a new truth. What happened in the past was written by humans. Humans can try to be as objective as they can, but they can only see and experience so much. In order to truly decide on a truth, one should be required to cross examine and understand their own bias and moral preferences. Even then, they should continue to read and find those patterns that bring forth a sense of authenticity.
So, even though the ideas have become more contextualized and we have explored the ideas of authenticity and necessity to “get the story right”, my thoughts on the concept has not changed. I still believe that we should seek to understand all sides of the story. The authentic truth is one that comes from ourselves because we did not live in the past. We can only understand our own experiences and blend them with those that we read.
Work Cited:
Paterson, Erika. “Lesson 2.3.” ENGL 470A Canadian Studies: Canadian Literary Genres Sept 2016. N.p., n.d. Web.
Robinson, Harry. Living by Stories: a Journey of Landscape and Memory. Ed. Wendy Wickwire. Vancouver: Talonbooks, 2005. Print.