“Write a blog that hyper-links your research on the characters in GGRW using at least 10 pages of the text of your choice. Be sure to make use of  Jane Flicks’ GGRW reading notes on your reading list.”

From Mirror News online

Pages 414 – 424, 1993 edition.

King is the master of hidden references (hidden, that is, if you don’t attempt to decipher them). As Fee and Flick point out, Green Grass Running Water arouses the readers desire to understand the allusions, jokes, and unanswered questions throughout the novel. King combines several networks of cultural knowledge within his story, expecting that every reader is familiar with at least one of the networks, allowing them to cross the borders between what they know and don’t know through analogy – training the reader in Coyote pedagogy (Fee & Flick, 131).

Within the last section of the novel, there are many “jokes” and allusions to cultural references that even my familiar network of knowledge could not help me decipher without the help of Flick. Several references in particular impressed me once I began to understand their meaning.

A Nissan, Pinto, and Karmann-Ghia

The first name mentioned within my chosen pages is Clifford Sifton, the character in the book responsible for the dam. It is thought by Flick that this is a reference to the real Sir Clifford Sifton, who ultimately was a promoter of aggressive settlement of Alberta and a supporter of the displacement of indigenous populations so their land could be obtained for Western settlement.

The three missing cars are then seen by Sifton and a colleague to be floating on Parliament Lake, heading towards Sifton’s dam. According to Flick, the three cars are potentially a reference to the three ships – the Niña, Pinta, and the Santa Maria – which were sponsored by Isabella of Spain to sail with Columbus on his voyage to the West Indies. Instead, however, he landed upon North and South America and is now often credited with their “discovery”. The cars are then thrown into the dam by Coyote’s earthquake, and the dam fractures. At this point, King states that “the water and the cars tumbled over the edge of the world” (King, 414), referencing the flat earth theory that has been (falsely) attributed to early explorers, such as those in Columbus’s day.

Columbus initially led the way for European colonization of the Americas, and Sifton only further promoted it within Canada. The dam built by Clifford Sifton (the character) could be a representation of the promotion of European colonization of Alberta and the lack of regard of the Blackfoot’s traditional territory. Through its destruction by the cars, Sifton and Columbus’s colonial narratives are also brought down by Coyote, an Indigenous narrative, and Indigenous treaty rights are reasserted.

Bill Bursum is also present in this section of the text. Like Sifton, King based Bursum from two real historical figures: Holm O. Bursum and his Bursum Bill of 1921, as well as William F. Cody. The Bursum Bill of 1921 was proposed to give land and water rights to non-indigenous settlers of Pueblo lands, stripping the Pueblo people of large portions of their traditional territory in New Mexico. The “Bill” portion of Bill Bursum also could refer to William F. “Buffalo Bill” Cody, who exploited Native American peoples in the name of entertainment. In the story, Bill Bursum purchased lakeside property, essentially claiming land that was not his, and also using the exploitation of the Indigenous land for economic benefit.

Coyote the Trickster

Coyote also has a large role in this section of the story. According to Flick, Coyote is a familiar trickster figure within the traditional oral literature of Indigenous peoples in North America. Tricksters have tremendous powers, creating the world, human life, and human culture, but were also associated with being rule-breakers who crossed borders and ignored social harmony and order (The Canadian Encyclopedia). In this section of the story, Coyote starts an earthquake which eventually causes the destruction of the dam. The 4 old Indians begin to chastise him for fooling around, Robinson Crusoe specifically mentioning “the last time [Coyote] fooled around like this…the world got very wet” (King 416). This statement is potentially implying that, rather than God causing Noah’s flood, it had been Coyote. Coyote also tries to argue that he had been helpful in the past, as shown in the following passage:

“But I was helpful too,” says Coyote. “That woman who wanted a baby. Now, that was helpful.”

“Helpful!” said Robinson Crusoe. “You rememberthat last time you did that?”

“I’m quite sure I was in Kamloops,” says Coyote.

“We haven’t straigtened out that mess yet,” said Hawkeye.

(King, 416)

In the first line, Coyote is taking claim for Alberta’s pregnancy. Robinson Crusoe’s statement is referencing the immaculate conception of Jesus in Mary, yet again implying that rather than God’s actions creating the birth of Jesus, it had actually been Coyote. Likewise, the last statement made by Hawkeye is suggested by Flick to be referencing the creation of Christianity (through the birth of Jesus). The tone of the statement inferences that Christianity was the problem that resulted from Coyote’s mistake in impregnating Mary, again breaking down a generally Western, colonial narrative.

References:

Fee, Margery, and Jane Flick. “Coyote Pedagogy”. Canadian Literature 131 -139. (1999). Web. http://canlit.ca/canlitmedia/canlit.ca/pdfs/articles/canlit161-162-Coyote(FeeFlick).pdf. Accessed 17 Mar. 2019.

Flick, Jane. “Reading Notes for Thomas King’s Green Grass Running Water.” Canadian Literature 161-162. (1999). Web. 17 Mar. 2019.

Hall, David. “Sir Clifford Sifton”. The Canadian Encyclopedia. 5 April 2018. Web. https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/sir-clifford-sifton. Accessed 17 Mar. 2019.

King, Thomas. Green Grass Running Water. Toronto: Harper Collins, 1993.

Martinez, Matthew. “All Indian Pueblo Council and the Bursum Bill”. NewMexicoHistory.org. Web. http://newmexicohistory.org/people/all-indian-pueblo-council-and-the-bursum-bill. Accessed 17 Mar. 2019.

Pritchard, Heledd. “How did this car end up submerged in a lake in a country park?” Mirror. 17 Aug. 2015. Web. https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/weird-news/how-car-end-up-submerged-6270762. Accessed 18 Mar. 2019.

Robinson, Amanda. “Trickster”. The Canadian Encyclopedia. 5 April 2019. Web. https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/trickster. Accessed 8 Mar. 2019.

“William F. Cody”. PBS. Web. https://www.pbs.org/weta/thewest/people/a_c/buffalobill.htm. Accessed 17 Mar. 2019.

“Coyote Pedagogy is a term sometimes used to describe King’s writing strategies (Margery Fee and Jane Flick). Discuss your understanding of the role of Coyote in the novel.”

The first place to start in understanding Coyote’s role in Thomas King’s novel Green Grass, Running Water, is understanding the connection between pedagogy and the Indigenous “trickster” figure.

The term “pedagogy” is generally defined as the act of teaching, whether that be in an academic or a philosophical manner (Oxford).

The term “trickster” is an all encompassing word describing various figures within various Indigenous mythologies, that embody a specific set of characteristics. In particular, tricksters are

“credited with protecting (and in some cases, creating) human life. As their name suggests however, tricksters are also associated with rule-breaking. They are curious pranksters who frequently cross and challenge boundaries, as well as ignore social harmony and order.”

– The Canadian Encyclopedia

Through the Coyote’s trickster traits, his role in King’s story is that of a sort of philosophical teacher attempting to guide the reader in examining stories from different, sometimes foreign perspectives.

In particular, Coyote stands as an Indigenous representative and voice. Throughout the novel, King utilizes both Indigenous oral storytelling practices as well as more Western literary traditions, blending them together to tell one, or perhaps many, stories. Symbols and metaphorical references also accompany each storytelling tradition into the greater creation story King establishes in his novel. Due to this, there are many instances where Judeo-Christian and Indigenous beliefs interact within the same space – within the same creation story.

A particular instance of this is Coyote’s frequent referencing of commonly understood Western religious symbols. For example, Alberta’s sudden pregnancy follows a storm established by Coyote’s singing and dancing, referencing a Cherokee story of Star Woman becoming pregnant from the wind. However, as the “four Indians” begin to chastise him for what he did, he says “But I was helpful too…That woman who wanted a baby. Now, that was helpful” (King, loc 4795). Similarly, when Thought Woman says no, Coyote asks if she really means yes. In trickster nature, he assumes that the rules do not apply to him, that he may ignore social harmony and order and do whatever he pleases. Within these passages, Coyote claims responsibility for the impregnation of Alberta, but King also hints at Coyote’s involvement with the Virgin Mary. By ignoring these social borders, Coyote turns a central story in the Christian religion into a story from an Aboriginal framework, also allowing the reader to cross the same boundaries from the framework they understand into a Coyote framework (Fee & Flick).

Additionally, within the novel, GOD and Coyote often appear together within one creation story. GOD is representative of the Western perspective while Coyote is representative of the Indigenous perspective, and thus the two creation stories are intermixed. This serves to allow the reader the opportunity to challenge their own cultural boundaries and cross into a world where perhaps there isn’t just GOD, but GOD and Coyote.

All in all, King includes Coyote as a central figure within the creation story to aid the reader in crossing the border between the known and unknown or the understood and misunderstood; between being an insider and being an outsider.

– More than just a trickster: The many faces of the coyote

References

Fee, Margery, and Jane Flick. “Coyote Pedagogy”. Canadian Literature 131 -139. (1999). Web. http://canlit.ca/canlitmedia/canlit.ca/pdfs/articles/canlit161-162-Coyote(FeeFlick).pdf. Accessed 8 Mar. 2019.

King, Thomas. Green Grass Running Water. Toronto: Harper Collins, 1993. Amazon. Web. 8 Mar. 2019.

“Pedagogy”. Oxford English Dictionary. Web. https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/pedagogy. Accessed 8 Mar. 2019.

Ravenheart, Jules. “More the just a trickster: the many faces of the coyote”. Fractal Enlightenment. Web. https://fractalenlightenment.com/40732/culture/just-trickster-many-faces-coyote. Accessed 8 Mar. 2019.

Robinson, Amanda. “Trickster”. The Canadian Encyclopedia. 5 April 2019. Web. https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/trickster. Accessed 8 Mar. 2019.

“In this lesson I say that it should be clear that the discourse on nationalism is also about ethnicity and ideologies of “race.” If you trace the historical overview of nationalism in Canada in the CanLit guide, you will find many examples of state legislation and policies that excluded and discriminated against certain peoples based on ideas about racial inferiority and capacities to assimilate. – and in turn, state legislation and policies that worked to try to rectify early policies of exclusion and racial discrimination. As the guide points out, the nation is an imagined community, whereas the state is a “governed group of people.” For this blog assignment, I would like you to research and summarize one of the state or governing activities, such as The Royal Proclamation 1763, the Indian Act 1876, Immigration Act 1910, or the Multiculturalism Act 1989 – you choose the legislation or policy or commission you find most interesting. Write a blog about your findings and in your conclusion comment on whether or not your findings support Coleman’s argument about the project of white civility.”

The Immigration Act of 1869 began as a national policy by Prime Minister Macdonald to encourage open immigration to Canada in order to settle the Western portion of the country. The primary focus of this initial act was to ensure the safety of immigrants and protect them from exploitation once landing in Canada, guaranteeing a customer service standard that can be said to always be expected today. For example, captains of ships transporting immigrants were required to provide services such as: docking at reasonable hours, unloading luggage for no charge, and allowing passengers to remain on board their ship for up to 48 hours after arrival to allow them time to find lodging.

However, as immigration began to exceed emigration, Canada’s immigration policy began to become more and more restrictive. The open immigration policy was molded into a selective policy in order to limit the number of “undesirable immigrants” (Pier 21b) entering the country. This policy specifically was discriminatory on the basis of an immigrant’s cultural and ethnic origin, established on the fear that these new people would threaten the “preservation of Anglo-Saxon norms and [would be] incapable of assimilating” (Pier 21b).

This policy eventually evolved into the Immigration Act of 1910. The 1910 act further narrowed the spectrum of who could enter the country, preventing impoverished British immigrants from trying to find a better life and forcing immigrants of Asian descent to have very large sums of money in their possession before permitting them entry. These large sums of money turned into the Chinese Head Tax, ultimately transforming into the Chinese Exclusion Act in 1923. This new iteration of the act also gave the federal cabinet the power to arbitrarily prohibit an immigrant from landing if they were “deemed unsuited to the climate or requirements of Canada” (Pier 21c).

Fundamentally, the evolution of the Immigration Act in Canada went from a policy protecting new immigrants to one that turned away anyone not “fit” for the middle class, Anglo-Saxon life, therefore supporting Daniel Coleman’s “White Civility”.

The concept of “White Civility” is built on the initial belief in white superiority, which initially spurred the creation of the discriminatory immigration acts of the early 20^th century. A popular imperialistic view existed within the English speaking population of Canada at the time, with many people believing that British people and principles were at the height of physiological and societal advancement. Therefore, Canada’s prominence as a nation was dependent on preserving the Anglo-Saxon heritage, and allowing non-Anglo-Saxon people (or people who in English Canada’s point of view would not be able to assimilate to the Anglo-Saxon values) would destroy the country. Therefore, the selectiveness and discriminatory principles of past immigration policies are guilty for establishing a white “fictive ethnicity” within Canada.

“Fictive ethnicity” describes how a nation is representative of “the narrative of its diverse peoples’ past and future as if they formed a natural community” (pg 7), and because selective immigration policies discouraged and prevented immigrants of specific ethnic backgrounds from entering the country, Anglo-Saxon values were normalized as English Canada’s cultural identity (pg 5). This is reflected in the literature of the time, which only further reinforced the white cultural normativity, eventually leading to “white civility” presently shaping English Canadians’
“perceptions of themselves, their families, and their relation to social legitimacy” (pg 3), and establishing white privilege as the norm.

The Immigration Act 1910 from Pier 21

References:

Chan, Arlene. “Chinese Head Tax in Canada.” The Canadian Encyclopedia. 8 Sept. 2018. https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/chinese-head-tax-in-canada. Accessed 28 Feb. 2019.

Coleman, Daniel. White Civility: The Literary Project of English Canada. University of Toronto Press, Toronto, 2006.

Palmer, H & Driedger, L. “Prejudice and Discrimination in Canada.” The Canadian Encyclopedia. 10 Feb. 2011. https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/prejudice-and-discrimination. Accessed 28 Feb. 2019.

Pier 21a. “Immigration Act, 1869.” Pier 21. https://pier21.ca/research/immigration-history/immigration-act-1869. Accessed 28 Feb. 2019.

Pier 21b. “Immigration Act, 1906.” Pier 21. https://pier21.ca/research/immigration-history/immigration-act-1906. Accessed 28 Feb. 2019.

Pier 21c. “Immigration Act, 1910.” Pier 21. https://pier21.ca/research/immigration-history/immigration-act-1910. Accessed 28 Feb. 2019.

“In order to address this question you will need to refer to Sparke’s article, “A Map that Roared and an Original Atlas: Canada, Cartography, and the Narration of Nation.” You can easily find this article online. Read the section titled: “Contrapuntal Cartographies” (468 – 470). Write a blog that explains Sparke’s analysis of what Judge McEachern might have meant by this statement: “We’ll call this the map that roared.””

Cartography is succinctly defined as the science and art of map-making. This vague description, however, does not fully communicate the power that exists behind a map.

A common theme in Geography is everything exists somewhere. Everything in the world has a location and a value, which we rely on to understand the environment around us. Except, this reliance can lead to a power imbalance for the makers and holders of the maps, being that maps are an abstraction of reality.

Not only can maps be inherently deceitful, but they are also inherently a colonial tool. On first arrival in Canada, European explorers and settlers brought with them centuries old knowledge of cartography that began with the Ancient Greeks. To the Indigenous populations the colonists then encountered, this would have been a new and very different perspective on the Indigenous pre-colonized worldview. Even today, maps convey the fundamental colonial notion of a “singular national origin” and “heterogeneous past” (Sparke 468), omitting the other origin stories present within Canada.

That is why, when two First Nations (the Wet’suwet’en and Gitxsan) came forward with their own cartographic evidence of their sovereignty in 1987, the judge presiding over the trial, Chief Justice Allan McEachern, described one of their maps as “the map that roared” (Sparke 468). Matthew Sparke (1998) suggests in his article, “A Map that Roared and an Original Atlas: Canada, Cartography, and the Narration of Nation”, that a possible interpretation of McEachern’s statement is a reference to the colloquialism, “paper tiger” (468).

A “paper tiger” is something which externally appears to be powerful or dangerous, but in actuality is internally weak or ineffectual (Merriam-Webster). Initially, the judge found these maps to be threatening. In an attempt to frame their sovereignty in a way that the court may understand, the First Nations utilized cartographic tools, which naturally carry a colonial understanding of the world. However, to the Chief Justice, their integration of traditional knowledge into a tool that historically only ever carried the knowledge of the colonial origin story, implied to him that the First Nations were attempting to undermine the world view that he understood. Additionally, he could not fathom the power and knowledge that the map was trying to convey, as he lacked an understanding of the duality of Canada’s origin stories. Therefore, he dismissed the map, finding its traditional knowledge of the Wet’suwet’en and Gitxsan to be ineffectual in placing their “ownership and jurisdiction within” the Canadian context (Sparke 463).

Sparke also connects McEachern’s statement to a political satire called “The Mouse that Roared”, in which a small European country, whose pre-industrial economy relies on wine exportation, wages war against the United States after a California winery causes the small country’s economy to collapse (Wikipedia). This reference, on one hand, characterizes the Wet’suwet’en and Gitxsan as archaic through the comparison to the pre-industrial, and therefore backwards, European nation. On the other hand, however, this reference also implies the Wet’suwet’en and Gitxsan’s resistance and “roaring refusal of the…accoutrements of Canadian colonialism on native land” by equating the First Nations’ fight for sovereignty to the European country waging war against the U.S. (Sparke 468). This implies almost a sense of foolishness on the part of the Indigenous peoples for even trying to fight against the colonial worldview and further added to the Chief Justice’s disregard of the Wet’suwet’en and Gitxsan’s battle for “agency and territorial survival” (Sparke 470). Therefore, Chief Justice Allan McEachern dismissed the Wet’suwet’en and Gitxsan’s case on the basis of questioning the colonial worldview.

“A Map that Roared.” Reprinted from Monet and Skanu’u (1992), by kind permission of Don Monet. From Matthew Sparke’s “A Map that Roared and an Original Atlas: Canada, Cartography, and the Narration of Nation”.

References:

Gartner, Georg. “The Relevance of Cartography.” ArcNews. Esri, 2013, https://www.esri.com/esri-news/arcnews/winter1314articles/the-relevance-of-cartography. Accessed 17 Feb. 2019.

“Paper Tiger.” Merriam-Webster.com. Merriam-Webster. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/paper%20tiger. Accessed 17 Feb. 2019.

Sen Nag, Oishimaya. “What is Cartography?” Worldatlas. n.p., 17 Aug. 2017, https://www.worldatlas.com/what-is-cartography.html. Accessed 17 Feb. 2019.

Sparke, Matthew. “A Map that Roared and an Original Atlas: Canada,
Cartography, and the Narration of Nation.” Annals of the Association of American Geographers 88:3 (1998): 463-495. Taylor and Francis Online, https://www-tandfonline-com.ezproxy.library.ubc.ca/doi/abs/10.1111/0004-5608.00109. Accessed 17 Feb. 2019.

“The Mouse that Roared.” Wikipedia.com. Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mouse_That_Roared#Film_adaptation. Accessed 17 Feb. 2019.

“We began this unit by discussing assumptions and differences that we carry into our class. In “First Contact as Spiritual Performance,” Lutz makes an assumption about his readers (Lutz, “First Contact” 32). He asks us to begin with the assumption that comprehending the performances of the Indigenous participants is “one of the most obvious difficulties.” He explains that this is so because “one must of necessity enter a world that is distant in time and alien in culture, attempting to perceive indigenous performance through their eyes as well as those of the Europeans.” Here, Lutz is assuming either that his readers belong to the European tradition, or he is assuming that it is more difficult for a European to understand Indigenous performances – than the other way around. What do you make of this reading? Am I being fair when I point to this assumption? If so, is Lutz being fair when he makes this assumption?”

One of the first things that stood out to me in John Lutz’s “First Contact as a Spiritual Performance: Encounters on the North American West Coast” was Lutz’s observation that “one must…enter a world that is distant in time and alien in culture, attempting to perceive indigenous performance through their eyes as well as those of the Europeans” (Lutz, 32) when understanding Indigenous performances. However, I do not think that the way in which Lutz frames his statement necessarily presumes that the reader is European in heritage. Lutz is implying that when trying to interpret any performance from any unfamiliar culture, one has to step outside their own cultural narrative to see the unfamiliar culture from a different context. This does not just apply to people of European heritage attempting to understand Indigenous performance, or Indigenous peoples attempting to understand European performance, but also applies to a more general population. This is evident by one particular part of Lutz’s statement: “attempting to perceive Indigenous performance through their eyes as well as those of the Europeans” (Lutz 32). He is not necessarily assuming that the reader themselves are European, but is suggesting a strategy of beginning to understand the performances of another culture (any other culture) by stepping outside one’s own world in order to see through the eyes of the people conducting the performance. He is also suggesting that any reader, no matter their background, would be required to step away from their cultural narratives while interpreting origin stories in order to more accurately understand the perspectives of both the Indigenous and European parties.

Hence, I do not think it is fair to make the outright assumption that Lutz is only speaking to those of European heritage in this context. However, I do believe that it is fair to point to Lutz’s assumption that it is more difficult for Europeans to understand Indigenous performances than the other way around. Assuming that Lutz is referring to present day readers attempting to understand the first contact dialogues of the past by the statement “distant in time” (Lutz 32), it would be easier for present day Indigenous peoples to understand the dialogues of the past Europeans due to the forced cultural assimilation that has occurred within the last century.

Indigenous children were forced for many years to attend schools which were mainly Eurocentric and generally disallowed indigenous cultures, preventing Indigenous children from becoming acquainted with the dialogues and histories of their people. Even though these schools did come to an end, the Eurocentrism did not. Indigenous children were and are still exposed to all sorts of different Eurocentric media and education that increases their exposure to “Western” culture, further contributing to an already existing distance between Indigenous peoples and the world view of their ancestors. However, Canada as a whole is only in the beginning stages of starting to understand and acknowledge the Indigenous cultures that have been silenced and ignored for so many years. There is still very little education in grade school about Indigenous issues (although it is improving) and very little exposure and understanding for today’s children. Therefore, today’s Indigenous children would have a much greater understanding of the European dialogue than children of European heritage in Canada might have of the different Indigenous dialogues. Furthermore, since throughout history, Indigenous peoples have been forced farther and farther from their cultures while European Canadians have remained close to their “ancestors’ world views”, Lutz suggests that European Canadians need to step outside their culture in order to move forward and actually begin to understand the Indigenous performances.

From the Daily Scandinavian

References:

“Indigenous Peoples Worldviews vs Western Worldviews”. Indigenous Corporate Training Inc. Blog. Indigenous Corporate Training Inc., 26 Jan 2016, https://www.ictinc.ca/blog/indigenous-peoples-worldviews-vs-western-worldviews. Accessed 7 Feb 2019.

Kjolberg, Tor. “First Black Woman Monument in Copenhagen.” Daily Scandinavian. 12 April 2018, https://www.dailyscandinavian.com/first-black-woman-monument-in-copenhagen/. Accessed 7 Feb 2019.

Lutz, John. “First Contact as a Spiritual Performance: Aboriginal — Non-Aboriginal Encounters on the North American West Coast.” Myth and Memory: Rethinking Stories of Indigenous-European Contact. Ed. Lutz. Vancouver: U of British Columbia P, 2007. 30-45. Print.

Neeganagwedgin, Erica. “A critical review of Aboriginal eduction in Canada:Eurocentric dominance impact and everyday denial.” International Journal of Inclusive Education 17.1 (2013): 15 – 31, https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1004&context=aprci. Accessed 7 Feb 2019.

“Read at least 6 students blog short stories about ‘home’ and make a list of the common shared assumptions, values and stories that you find. Post this list on your blog with some commentary about what you discovered.”

Just from the 6 posts I read, there seemed to be three major common themes across each student’s story and interpretation of what home truly is to them and the values that made home what it is to them:

• Home is fluid
• Home is what you make it to be
• Home is where you find comfort

Home is Fluid

As I somewhat alluded to in my story for assignment 2:2, I did not grow up in Canada. I am however Canadian by nationality, but I lived from the ages of 3 to 12 in Qatar and Vietnam before moving back to Vancouver. My perception of home growing up revolved around Qatar. My immediate family was there and so were my school, friends, and sports. Canada was the place I knew I came from, but only a temporary home from June to August when my family came back for summer vacation. That changed when I moved back. Suddenly I was in an unfamiliar culture that I felt I should have been familiar with, and while it was hard to feel as if I was home in Canada at first, my perception gradually adjusted. Now when I think of “home”, I think of my house in Langley that my family has lived in for the past six years, but I also think of my house in Qatar that was my childhood home for eight years. Other people who had similar stories to mine contained a similar notion. Tamara’s story highlights this idea of fluidity well. Both her and I grew up as third culture kids, and like me, her definition of home is not rooted to one place. Over the years, home has changed for Tamara and as she says, “the world is my home”. Home does not have to be in one, static place, it has the ability to change and adapt.

Home is What You Make it to Be

Another common theme across many of the stories, is how home is often a figment of the mind and the heart (metaphorically speaking). Many people spoke about how their “home” lived in their memories. Home to Charlotte, for example, lives in her continually expanding memories and experiences as she became older and traveled through life. Tamara’s sense of home in Vancouver, while also linked to her experiences, is more based in her emotional connections to nature rather than specific memories of growing up. Many other people associate home with a specific place, like a house or a specific city. Therefore, home is what you yourself choose it to be.

Home is Where You Find Comfort

Similar to the idea of “home is what you make it to be” many people in the class also associated home with places where they feel comfortable. It makes sense that many people would correlate the two things, as most people make home a place where they can be who they want to be and not have to have a constant guard up. Some people make home a place of comfort through decoration. Some people consider it a place of comfort because of the presence of family, a significant other, or a pet. I think this sentiment is reflected well in Phillip Phillips’ song “Home”.

References:

Aitken, Charlotte. “Home in Vignettes.” WordPress., 28 Jan. 2019. Web. 2 Feb. 2019.

Ensor, Tamara. “2.2 Home….” WordPress., 29 Jan. 2019. Web. 2 Feb. 2019.

Mayberry, Kate. “Third Culture Kids: Citizens of Everywhere and Nowhere.” BBC. BBC., 18 Nov. 2016. Web. 2 Feb. 2019. Retrieved from http://www.bbc.com/capital/story/20161117-third-culture-kids-citizens-of-everywhere-and-nowhere

“Phillip Phillips – Home.” 2 Aug. 2012. Youtube. Web. 2 Feb. 2019. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HoRkntoHkIE

“Write a short story (600 – 1000 words) that describes your sense of home; write about the values and the stories that you use to connect yourself to, and to identify your sense of home.”

Canada was not truly home. At least, it wasn’t at first.

Canada was the place where my grandparents and aunts and uncles and cousins lived. It was the name stamped on the front of my passport and pictured on each of its pages. It was the anthem I sang loudly and with all my might during the International day fair at school, when the red and white flag was carried down the centre of the gymnasium by fellow Canadian students. It was the pride I felt in telling others where I had come from whenever someone asked.

But it was not home, and hadn’t been for the 9 years I lived overseas.

My family had been back in Canada for six months. It was a permanent move. We stood in the basement of my grandparents house, my mom holding my brother and I in her arms as we stared in disbelief at our shipment of moving boxes that my dad had sent from overseas. Every cardboard box was stained and sagged and struggling to stay together. The items inside were in worse condition. Our clothes that had been shipped were musty and moldy and went straight into a garbage bag. The skins of my brother’s hand drums were yellowed and flaking and could not be fixed. Books were unreadable, toys in pieces, art my mom cherished were ruined. My mom broke down in tears as we took the garbage bags full of what had been parts of our “home” for our nine years in Qatar, to the curb by the road. She cried again as we piled most of what had made the journey safely in to storage because it was my grandparents house – their home.

It was not something we could make ours.

Two years later, my mom had saved enough money to buy a house. We stood in the entry way of a stranger’s home. It had on display the absolute minimum: no decorations, no personalization; the perfect house for showing. My mom and the real estate agent talked back and forth.

“This is a three bedroom, 3 and a half bath with a finished basement.”

“The floors are really nice.”

“Yes, they are real slate. Look how nicely they match with the walls.”

We walked through each room of the house and my mom continued to ask questions about the condition of the carpeting, how many cars the garage could fit, and on and on. After looking at the master bedroom, my mom asked me which of the remaining two I would want. Of course I chose the larger one (since I was the oldest child and therefore always deserved the bigger room) but it was just a room with ugly blue walls and a closet with a semi-broken door.

It was a home, but it wasn’t mine.

The September after my graduation from high school, we stood by the window in my dorm room barely large enough for the three of us, and I gave both of my parents a large hug each while my mom balled her eyes out after finally realizing I would not be returning “home” with them. We had unpacked all of my worldly belongings from the car and dragged them up two flights of stairs to the room that would be mine for the next eight months – my “home”. My mom had stayed to help me decorate a little, make the room a little more inviting, while my dad had gone to get us lunch. And at the end, when the boxes were mostly empty, my mom had started to cry and cry and cry. I joked that it was because she had to deal with my dad and brother by herself now and would be the only sane one left in the house. She laughed, but continued weeping until they were well into their drive back to our family house. I returned to my room, my room that would be my “home” (as the university resident advisors had cheerily reminded me as I moved into the building).

But it wouldn’t be my home.

I moved from house to house, from city to city, from country to country for ten years of my life. Each house, each place was never “home” like it is for people who grew up in the same place for a large portion of their life. A house was never my root. It never had the opportunity to be. My family though, were always there, in each new house and each new place.

My brother and I, growing up, we referred to hotel rooms as “home”. It seems like a weird concept, calling a hotel room you are living in for a week your home, but it was always the same as moving to a new house for us. Its not the location, but the familiar, and our familiar lived in our family.

Home will always be where my mom and dad and brother are.

References:

Curiano.com. “Home is not a place…its a feeling.” Curiano.com. n.p. Web. 28 Jan. 2019. Retrieved from https://www.pinterest.co.uk/pin/103160647693385111/

Faye, Ndela. “Am I rootless or am I free? ‘Third Culture Kids’ like me make it up as we go along.” The Guardian. Guardian News and Media Limited. 9 March. 2016. Web. 27 Jan. 2019. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/mar/09/third-culture-kid-identity-different-cultures

Langley, Brianna. “Third Culture Kids Part 2: What it Means to Come Home.” Team. n.p. 22 May. 2018. Web. 27 Jan. 2019. Retrieved from https://team.org/blog/third-culture-kids-what-it-means-to-come-home

“Your task is to take the story about how evil comes into the world, the story King tells about the Witches’ convention in Chapter One of The Truth about Stories, and change it any way you want, except the ending. You can change to place, the people, the time – anything you want. But, your story must have the same moral – it must tell us how evil came into the world and how once a story is told, it cannot be taken back.

First, learn your story by heart, and then tell the story to your friends and family.

After you have told the story a few times,  post a blog with your version of the story and some commentary on what you discovered about story telling.”

Long ago, there was a world unlike ours today. There was a world with unobstructed blue skies and a world with clear ocean waters. There was a world with rolling fields and bright snow-capped mountains; a world with millions of tall, unwavering trees and sand that would roll and toss and play in a passing breeze.

There was a world which was always light and good and joyful with inhabitants that were much the same. And every once in a while, the inhabitants of the world gathered to check-in, to make sure that everyone still felt light and good and joyful.

It was at one of these check-ins that our story begins.

The rabbits went first. Their chosen representative stood in the centre of a perfect circle formed by the surrounding check-in attendees. He told his group’s stories of their time since the previous gathering. He told of all the great many berries they discovered and the cozy new burrows they had built, and at the end of his tale, the rabbits were thanked by the many inhabitants for bringing more light and good and joy to their world.

The elk went next. Their representative stood in the centre of the circle and told the stories of her group’s travels through the snowy mountains and how they found a way to locate the buried grass. At the end of her tale, the elk were thanked for bringing more light and good and joy into the world.

Group by group, each representative took their spot in the centre of the the circle, told their stories of light and good and joy, and were thanked for their contribution to the world. After the very last group had taken their turn in the circle, the animals began to disband, returning to the world to continue bringing in more light and good and joy.

“Wait!” a voice declared from the gathered inhabitants, “I did not get my turn.”

A man, standing on two legs, stepped into the centre of the gathering, into the centre of the circle which had become just a little less perfect in the scuffle to leave. The other inhabitants stopped and urged him to tell his tales of bringing light and good and joy into the world. Everyone should get a chance to tell their story.

So he did. He spoke of his many travels, like the other inhabitants had, except his tales contained less light and good and joy. He spoke of cutting up trees, so he could burn them. He spoke of attaching sharp rocks to long poles and spearing (and killing) their fellow inhabitant fish. He spoke of much death and destruction and while he did, the blue skies became obstructed with thick, grey blankets and the clear oceans became dark and foreboding. The mountains were less bright, the trees less strong, and the sand less playful.

“Stop! Please stop!” a bluebird demanded as the light that had once filled the world began to dim, “Your stories are taking away our light and good and joy. You must take them back! You must return our world!”

But he could not, for once a story has been told, it cannot be taken back.

Transparent Earth Model on a Dark Green Background by Teerayut Khuenwan

This week’s assignment contained elements of both written and oral story-telling, and after telling my version of how evil entered the world, I was much more aware of how the story changed based on its medium. I think that Pixar director Pete Docter puts it well:

“What you’re trying to do, when you tell a story, is to write about an event in your life that made you feel some particular way. And what you’re trying to do, when you tell a story, is to get the audience to have that same feeling.”

It is one thing to only write the story down on paper, but it is another to be able to add pauses and emphasis to make not only the story more interesting, but also to stress the underlying significance and help my audience understand the story the same way I did while writing and telling it. That’s where oral story-telling is different from written: you can have control over the emotions of your audience.

I also noticed that when telling my story orally, the meanings and emotions of my words changed each time I told it. I never told my story the same way twice, with pauses in exactly the same places or with emphasis on the same parts of words. So even when only focusing on one medium, my story was still able to alter its meaning and essence with each new time I told it.

References:

Khuenwan, Teerayut. “Transparent Earth Model on a Dark Green Background – Illustration.” iStock. 30 July 2017, https://www.istockphoto.com/ca/illustrations/transparent-earth?mediatype=illustration&phrase=transparent%20earth&sort=mostpopular. Accessed 23 Jan. 2019.

Peters, Brian. “6 Rules of Great Storytelling (as Told by Pixar).” Medium. n.p., 21 Mar. 2018, https://medium.com/@Brian_G_Peters/6-rules-of-great-storytelling-as-told-by-pixar-fcc6ae225f50. Accessed 23 Jan. 2019.

Vanessa. “How to Tell a Great Story: Using the Science of Storytelling to Share your Message.” Science of People. n.p., https://www.scienceofpeople.com/how-to-tell-a-story/. Accessed 23 Jan. 2019.

“Words. Chamberlin talks a lot about language, in particular the strangeness and wonder of how language works. Stories, he says, “bring us close to the world we live in by taking us into the world of words” (italics mine,1).  He describes learning to read and write as learning “to be comfortable with a cat that is both there and not there”  (132). Based on Chamberlin’s understanding of how riddles and charms work, explain this “world of words.” Reflect on why “words make us feel closer to the world we live in” (1).”

According to Chamberlin, the so called “world of words” (44) is a world defined by both language and what we perceive to be reality. However, both are deeply intertwined and are trapped in a constant contradiction with each other. Riddles and metaphor, on a basic level, demand that we change our understanding of the language we know so well in order to “make sense of what seems like nonsense” (Chamberlin, 2121). Charms, on the other hand, do not ask for us to change our perception of the language itself, but ask for us to alter our understanding of our own reality (Chamberlin, 2389). Despite the differences in these concepts, they connect to the ultimate underlying theme of the stories we tell and the way they shape the world: the contrast between reality and imagination. The language we use ultimately allows us to simultaneously believe and not believe in a certain imagined reality (Chamberlin, 2112), and therefore each person’s “world of words” differs depending on their connection to language and reality.

Furthermore, words and language on a fundamental basis can bring us closer to our own world because language is largely responsible for creating and shaping our thoughts and emotions. Charlemagne is quoted as proclaiming something along the lines of “to speak another language is to possess another soul” (Shwayder, 2010). Studies have shown that thought patterns and emotional tendencies shift in people who are able to speak more than one language. This does not only apply to those who can speak multiple languages, but also applies between people who speak different languages.

In her TED Talk, Boroditsky points out these very differences in her observations regarding an Aboriginal group in Australia. The specific words and grammar structures which this Aboriginal group use in everyday language are centred around cardinal directions (unlike the English which we speak in Canada). This one  particular difference changes the way this group considers other fundamental concepts, such as location and time. They possess a significantly different thought pattern than the majority of Canadian English speakers, and therefore, they also posses a very different world view. Boroditsky also comments on how some languages have many different words for colour while others only have a couple. For example, Chamberlin states that “the Blackfoot have nearly a hundred words for the different colours of horses” (Chamberlin, 2369) and would therefore also have a deeper and more expansive connection to the world around them in a way.

This is not to say that English speakers are not connected to their world through language. They are connected in a different way, but through the same means as any speaker of language.

No matter the language that is spoken, the words and sentances and grammer allow us as people to communicate with each other and interact with world around us, thereby bring us all closer to our own individual world’s.

References

Boroditsky, Lera. “How does our language shape the way we think?”. Edge. Edge Foundation. 6 November 2009. Web. 14 January 2019.

Chamberlin, Edward. If This is Your Land, Where are Your Stories? Finding Common Ground. AA. Knopf. Toronto. 2003. Amazon. Web. 14 January 2019.

“How Language Shapes the Way we Think – Lera Boroditsky”. 2 May 2018. Youtube. 14 January 2019.

Shwayder, Maya. “Change languages, shift responses”. The Harvard Gazette. Harvard University. 2 November 2010. Web. 14 January 2019.