Hyperlinking GGRW: From the General to the Star

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Each student will be assigned a section of the novel Green Grass Running Water (pages will be divided by the number of students). The task at hand is to first discover as many allusions as you can to historical references (people and events), literary references (characters and authors), mythical references (symbols and metaphors).

My assigned pages are from 315-324, which correspond to pages 379-389 in the version that I am using. All citations here from GGRW are from the version that I am using.

“Just had a story published in New Age” (King 379).

The magazine that George claims he is published in has an identical name to the New Age Journal. This journal, however, states that it is “not affiliated with any magazine on paper.” Furthermore:

We occasionally get email from people asking about the former printed magazine named “New Age Journal.” It is our understanding that its name was changed to something like “Body Mind and Spirit,” which was later purchased by Oprah, and is no longer being published. (“About Us”)

So the magazine in GGRW, assuming that it is a real reference, no longer exists.

Photographing the Sun Dance

George attempts to photograph the Sun Dance, creating a similar incident to the one that starts on the bottom of page 138. Whereas this earlier incident ends with the Natives losing the real film, the incident with George–who uses the same tactic of giving dummy film–is exposed by Eli, who has thus learned from his uncle’s mistake.

On a related note, the Sun Dance was filmed in 2013 by the Aboringal People’s Television Network, creating controversy.

“What are you going to do, scalp me?” (King 385).

Scalping is described by Encyclopedia.com as “[t]he practice of removing the scalp, the ‘hair skinne of the head,’ from a slain enemy as a trophy, originated in ancient headhunting.” According to Native-Languages.org, colonists learned the practice of scalping from Natives and began using it against them. Nova Scotia still has a Native Scalping Law.

George here displays his view that modern Natives are barbaric and stuck in the “ice age” (King 386).

Coyote responds by saying, “Where did you ever get an idea like that?”, referencing the colonial narratives (e.g. from “film”) that fed George his views (385).

George Morningstar and George Armstrong Custer

Refer to Jane Flick’s Reading Notes under “MORNINGSTAR, George” (146) and “CUSTER, George” (149). For more context, read Custer’s biography.

“George was surrounded. For a moment he looked as if he wanted to run. Instead, he smiled and shrugged and released the snaps on the case.” (King 385)

Possible allusion to Custer’s Last Stand.

“Lionel slipped out of the jacket and handed it to George.” (King 385)

The jacket, according to Flick’s Reading Notes under “JOHN WAYNE” (147), is an allusion to both John Wayne and George Custer’s outfits (which possibly looks like this). Lionel, who wants to be like John Wayne, thus strips that allusion from himself in returning the jacket to George, who then completes his own allusion to George Custer.

“Nobody cares about your little powwow.” (King 386)

The Canadian Encyclopedia describes Powwows as “celebrations that showcase Aboriginal music, dances, dance apparel, food and crafts,” “showcase” being the key word here. That George and the tourist who also tries to take photos of the Sun Dance compare it to a Powwow shows their ignorance of and disrespect towards Native culture. Also note that George says “little powwow” with a lower case first letter, which is reminiscent of “little god” (386, 2).

“As he [George] got to the car, he turned and shouted, his mouth snapping open and shut like a trap. But the words vanished in the distance and the wind.” (King 387)

Reminiscent of this passage:

As he [Sifton] climbed out on the opposite bank, Sifton turned and raised his stick over his head. Eli could see the man’s mouth open and close in a shout, but all the sound was snatched up by the wind and drowned in the rushing water. (143)

It is thus non-Natives rather than Natives who here lose their voices among nature.

“And in the morning, when the sun came out of the east, it would begin again.” (King 388)

Another allusion to the Medicine Wheel and GGRW‘s cyclic nature.

“And, of course, there was the star.” (King 389)

Allusion to the Star of Bethlehem. Also connects to Babo’s words on page 276, who Flick states “may be one of the three Wise Men of the East, following the mysterious star/light” (145). Dr. Hovaugh and Babo’s journey to find the four Indians thus alludes to the Wise Men’s journey to find Jesus.

“All the while, he [Dr. Hovaugh] plotted occurrences and probabilities and directions and deviations on a pad of graph paper, turning the chart as he went, literal, allegorical, tropological, anagogic.” (King 389)

Blanca Chester connects Dr. Hovaugh’s actions to the “modes of literary expression that Frye develops in The Anatomy of Criticism” (50); Flick mentions the same connection on page 162 of her Reading Notes. This behaviour shows Dr. Hovaugh’s obsession with imposing order over perceived chaos and controlling Native movement with non-Native Western methodology. The “pad of graph paper” emphasizes the disconnect between his–and Frye’s–representations and that of the real world’s (King 389).

Suspected Allusion: “The [camera] case had tipped over on its side, was lying in the grass like a dead animal.” (King 386)

This sounds like an allusion to me but I have been unable to track it down, assuming that it actually is one. Please comment if you have an idea or just think I’m reading too much into it.

Works Cited

“About Us.” New Age Journal. NAJ, 2015. Web. 8 July 2015. 

Boon, Jacob. “It’s 2015 and a Scalping Law is Still on the Books.” The Coast. Coast Publishing, 7 Jan. 2015. Web. 8 July 2015. 

Chester, Blanca. “Green Grass Running Water: Theorizing the World of the Novel.” Canadian Literature 44-61 (1999). PDF file. 

“George Armstrong Custer.” History. A+E Networks, 2015. Web. 9 July 2015.

Gonzaga, Kevin. “Filming Sundance: Tradition, Technology, and Journalism Colllide.” Speakfaithfully. WordPress, 15 Aug. 2013. Web. 8 July 2015. 

Flick, Jane. “Reading Notes for Thomas King’s Green Grass, Running Water.” Canadian Literature 161/162 (1999). PDF file.

“John Wayne Biography.” Bio. A+E Networks, 2015. Web. 9 July 2015. 

King, Thomas. Green Grass Running Water. 1993. P. S. Toronto: HarperPerennial-HaperCollins, 2007. Print.

Paterson, Erika. “Lesson 3:3.” ENGL 470A Canadian Literary Genres May 2015. U of British Columbia. Web. 9 July 2015.

Paul Fraser Collectables. “General Custer’s ‘Last Jacket’ to Auction for $300,000?” PFC, 15 Aug. 2013. Web. 9 July 2015.  

“Powwow.” The Canadian Encyclopedia. Historica Canada, n. d. Web. 8 July 2015.  

“Scalping.” Encyclopedia.com. Highbeam Research Inc., 2015. Web. 8 July 2015. 

“Setting the Record Straight About Native Peoples: Scalping.” Native-Languages.org. Native Languages of the Americas, 2007. Web. 8 July 2015. 

Taylor, Paul. “The Wise Men and the Star.” Creation Today. CT, 28 Nov. 2011. Web. 9 July 2015.

“The Battle of the Little Bighorn, 1876.” EyeWitness to History. Ibis Comm., n. d. Web. 9 July 2015.

From the Beginning

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In order to tell us the story of a stereo salesman, Lionel Red Deer (whose past mistakes continue to live on in his present), a [college] teacher, Alberta Frank (who wants to have a child free of the hassle of wedlock—or even, apparently, the hassle of heterosex!), and a retired professor, Eli Stands Alone (who wants to stop a dam from flooding his homeland), King must go back to the beginning of creation.

Why do you think this is so?

When Eli is driving with Lionel in Green Grass Running Water, Lionel asks Eli why he came home to the reserve when doing so didn’t change his life. Eli’s answer is as follows:

Can’t just tell you that straight out. Wouldn’t make any sense. Wouldn’t be much of a story. (361)

Why can’t Eli just tell it straight out? Why wouldn’t it make any sense? Why does he have to tell a story?

When Lionel asks Eli why he came home, he is not trying to understand Eli–he is trying to understand himself. He wants to use Eli’s answer to examine an answer that he will have to eventually give, be that the answer to whether he will pursue Alberta, the answer to whether he will return to university, or the answer to some other question. Eli understands that, and that is why he can’t just say his answer by itself, but has to also communicate his own questions and circumstances. He needs to tell Lionel his entire story so that Lionel can compare that to his entire story.

Many if not all listeners and readers and viewers of stories share Lionel’s motivation. They want to experience stories that are not their stories and that can therefore be compared on an equal scale to their stories. They want to try other answers on their own questions.

What question does King answer in Green Grass Running Water? Who is asking it? I don’t know, but my hopefully educated guess is that it’s non-Native Christian Canadians who are asking the question. Their question: Who are Indians?

Their real question: Who are we?

A question this broad requires an answer that is just as broad. King addresses the question of who Indians are by giving the stories of several Natives–of Lionel, of Alberta, of Eli, of Latisha, of Charlie. Considering the novel’s length and its other stories, however, it may seem that none of these stories are complete as there are just not enough pages. I have two thoughts about this. My first thought is that they don’t have to be complete because the communication is between cultures rather than individuals, and the shape of a culture’s entire story is very different and a lot more complicated than that of an individual. My second thought is that they are complete. After all, they all have a beginning.

What is it about the beginning that makes it so important? Well, it is (or should be) common knowledge to story creators that the beginning is everything. For writers, the beginning starts and often ends at the first sentence. The story’s beginning is what introduces readers to the story and what urges them to stay. It is equivalent to the advertisement, the storefront window, the free trial. A story gains or loses its audience at the beginning, and it is only in dire circumstances that someone drops out afterwards.
Simply put, beginnings have to do a lot of things at once.

The beginning sets a contract stating that this is how it is and that this is how it’s pretty much going to be. It is thematically comparative to the entire story and is in that sense an entire story itself. That which follows the beginning always connects back to the beginning; the beginning is the schematic of everything that follows it.

The schematic of Green Grass Running Water is a creation story. The creation story, the most influential kind of story, is the story that all believers examine in search of answers to their own questions. Rather than a separate story, however, believers think of the creation story as a part of their own stories. This beginning is certainly important to them. It illuminates everything that follows.

This illumination goes both ways.

The prompt asks why, in telling the stories of several Natives, King must go back to the Native creation story. What if that question is reversed? What if King, in telling the Native creation story, must go forward to the stories of several Natives? Why would he have to do that?

King answers the question of who Indians are by giving a Native creation story; his answer is that Natives, like everyone else, are their creation story. King answers the question of what the Native creation story is by giving the stories of several Natives; his answer is that the Native creation story, like all other creation stories, is its believers.

Works Cited

Appel, Jacob M. “10 Ways to Start your Story Better.” Writer’s Digest. F+W, 2015. Web. 3 July 2015.

King, Thomas. Green Grass Running Water. 1993. P. S. Toronto: HarperPerennial-HarperCollins, 2007. Print.

Nichol, Mark. “20 Great Opening Lines to Inspire the Start of Your Story.” Daily Writing Tips. DRT, 2014. Web. 3 July 2015.

Paterson, Erika. “Lesson 3:2.” ENGL 470A Canadian Literary Genres May 2015. U of British Columbia. Web. 3 July 2015.

Politely Taxing the Chinese?

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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. (Paterson)

I will write about the government activities that lead to the Chinese Head Tax and Chinese Exclusion Act. Since Charmaine beat me to posting on this topic, I will try not to repeat what she wrote.

A good place to start in talking about this subject would be the 1858 Fraser River Gold Rushes, in which immigrants flooded to Canada in search of wealth. These immigrants came from different places, which caused trouble: “Competition for prospecting rights and other business associated with the gold rushes led to conflict between European, American and the visibly different Chinese, who often found themselves at the harsh end of justice on the frontier” (Gold Rush). Of course, the gold rush had to end eventually, and when it did in 1865, worsened economic conditions resulted in further hostility towards the Chinese. They were racially segregated into Chinatown (which they didn’t really mind) and then deprived of voting rights along with the Natives in 1871. Chinese and Natives were not even allowed to be buried in the same place as Europeans.

So not only did Europeans consider their arrival chapter 1 in the Native narrative, they considered Chinese arrivals chapter 15 in their narrative.

Then work on the Canada Pacific Railway began. Fearing for European workers, the Anti-Chinese Association attempted to block Chinese workers from getting CPR jobs. This petition was rejected, not because it was blatantly racist, but because Chinese workers were absolutely necessary for the building of the CPR. In addition to the Chinese who were already in Canada due to the gold rush, the government encouraged further immigrants from China to work on the CPR. Chinese workers had far lower wages, dealt with far worse working conditions, and were put to far more dangerous tasks such as blasting rocks. Many died.

Then the railway was done. But the Chinese were still there. The government thought that was a problem.

In 1885, Prime Minister Macdonald, who had supported Chinese workers during the CPR’s construction, changed his tune:

When the Chinaman comes here he intends to return to his own country; he does not bring his family with him; he is a stranger, a sojourner in a strange land, for his own purposes for a while; he has no common interest with us . . . A Chinamen gives us his labour and gets his money, but that money does not fructify in Canada; he does not invest it here, but takes it with him and returns to China . . . he has no British instincts or British feelings or aspirations, and therefore ought not to have a vote. (Perpetual Foreigners)

Consul-General Huang in San Francisco had a different view:

It is only about thirty years since our [Chinese] people commenced emigrating to other lands . . . You must recollect that the Chinese immigrant coming to this country is denied all the rights and privileges extended to others in the way of citizenship; the laws compel them to remain aliens. I know a great many Chinese will be glad to remain here permanently with their families, if they are allowed to be naturalized and can enjoy privileges and rights. (Chinese Perspective)

There are two contradicting stories here, and the latter I think would be more legitimate considering it comes straight from a Chinese mouth. But rather than believe or even acknowledge that story, the government chose to create its own story, perhaps in a similar way to how it created its stories about the Natives. It does this to continue its vision of white civility and justify its actions that support it.

The Chinese Head Tax, enacted right after the CPR was built, started off by charging every Chinese immigrant, with exceptions, $50 upon arrival. The government’s message was clear: Don’t come here; we don’t want you. But Chinese immigrants still came, and the head tax was increased to $100 in 1900, then $500 in 1903, apparently “enough to purchase two houses in Montreal at the time” ($50, $100 . . . $500!). But they still kept coming. Finally, in 1923, the government decided that enough was enough and passed the Chinese Exclusion Act, banning Chinese immigration altogether.

Prime Minister Macdonald assumed that Chinese immigrants did not go to Canada to raise families. The Chinese Head Tax and Chinese Exclusion Act turned this assumption into a reality.

Imagine if Natives had forced settler Europeans to pay head taxes on arrival. Imagine if they had told them to go away.

With the blatant racism that the Canadian government employed during these years, one might wonder why they didn’t just skip the head taxing and go straight for exclusion. One possible answer is that they didn’t think it morally just to enforce such policies, but then again, they were quite fine with racial segregation, disenfranchisement, and job inequality. Another possible answer is that they wanted the money, liked the money (especially when it nearly paid for the Western section of the CPR), and (despite their own contrary whining) liked cheap Chinese labour, so long as those Chinese workers weren’t starting up their own businesses (which got its own problems). One more possible answer is that they didn’t want to tarnish their image–their narrative of superiority, of white civility. They were polite Canadians, after all, and they were just politely asking the Chinese to not come to them with their $50 tax; they were gritting their teeth in politeness when they upped that to $100; they bared their distressed politeness in making it $500. Then they gave up, but at least they tried? Had European Canadians shown that they were tolerant of and therefore superior to the Chinese? To the Natives? They probably thought so.

There are of course many way to tell this story, and this site shows one of them. I chose not to use this site in my above writing, not because its facts are wrong, but because I found the way it presented them troubling (it’s interesting to note, however, that this site is funded by the same organization as one of the sites that I did use). Here’s a question then: Do you share my troubled feeling in the way that this site presents this story, and why, or why not? It is worth noting that the site states that it specifically targets children, but this statement could very well make it even more troubling.

You do not have to answer the question should you choose to comment. If you want to write on something else, then please do.

Works Cited

Anne Li, Charmaine. “Race, Nationalism, and a Forgotten Story.” Canadian Yarns and Storytelling Threads. UBC Blogs, 26 June 2015. Web. 26 June 2015. 

Chinese Neighbourhood Society. The Long Voyage: From Pigtails and Coolies to the New Canadian Mosaic. CNS, 2015. Web. 26 June 2015. 

Metro Toronto Chinese & Southeast Asian Legal Clinic. Road to Justice. MTCSALC, 2011. Web. 26 June 2015.

Paterson, Erika. “Lesson 3:1.” ENGL 470A Canadian Literary Genres May 2015. U of British Columbia. Web. 26 June 2015.

University of British Columbia. Chinese Canadian Stories. UBC, 2012. Web. 26 June 2015. 

Assumptions and Truth

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“To raise the question of ‘authenticity’ is to challenge not only the narrative but also the ‘truth’ behind Salish ways of knowing “(Carlson 59). Explain why this is so according to Carlson, and explain why it is important to recognize this point.

seek-truth

Truth is a difficult concept to work with. There’s its conventional definition of factual adherence, which sounds irrefutable but is really far from it, and then there are all those other meanings that people ascribe to it, resulting in a mass of confusion whenever discussion is attempted. It’s no surprise then that this confusion is exemplified in the cross-cultural context. When people who speak the same language have so much trouble agreeing on what truth is, how do you think people who speak different languages will handle the same issue?

For the sake of a coherent discussion, I will give a (rather bad) working definition of the word truth as Carlson uses it in the quotation above. It is as follows: Truth is the moral and/or spiritual significance of a story, which justifies the story’s authority in prescription. So when Carlson states that “non-Natives have generally not been overly concerned with the historical legitimacy of Aboriginal legends and myths” because “they assume them to be fiction,” he is stating that non-Natives think of those Aboriginal legends and myths as untrue, not necessarily because they are not factual (which they are in no position to verify), but because they are not morally/spiritually significant and therefore not authoritative sources of prescription (56). In other words, non-Natives do not believe that Aboriginal legends and myths should influence their behavior–that’s what their bible is for.

So what does authenticity mean? Well, to the Natives, it doesn’t mean anything: “[N]either reality . . . nor authenticity is part of the indigenous criteria for assessing” their stories (56-57). What it means to the non-Natives is the real question, and the underlying assumption of the term is that there are two kinds of Native stories: authentic and unauthentic. Pre-contact and “post-contact” (56). Now, the optimist might say that in seeking out so-called authentic Native stories, non-Natives are attempting to study a unique culture in an effort to gain more understanding and respect towards that culture; the skeptic, on the other hand, might say that in seeking out so-called authentic Native stories, non-Natives are seeking more so-called evidence for their so-called superiority.

Let’s try the skeptic route. In claiming that stories such as Robinson’s story of the twins are unauthentic, or influenced by “post-contact European events and issues,” non-Natives are insinuating that those stories cannot dispute non-Native assumptions about pre-contact Native cultures (56). The most important non-Native assumption being protected thus is that of pre-contact Native illiteracy. By claiming that a Native story describing pre-contact literacy is an unauthentic, post-contact-tainted story, non-Natives can maintain the stance that pre-contact Native cultures did not have literacy. In other words, they can still claim that they brought literacy to the Natives.

 

To return to the prompt questions, the idea of authenticity challenges the truth (as badly defined by me) behind Salish ways of knowing by ignoring the significance–the truth–that the Salish culture attributes to their stories. Carlson states that the “sacred historical narratives” of Salish historians are “sacrosanct” (59); they are too powerful to be interfered with. That which might be a matter of good or bad scholarship for non-Natives is a matter life or death for the Salish culture: “And shortening myths would shorten the lives of all listeners” (59). In throwing around labels of authentic and unauthentic, non-Natives are asserting an assumption that they are superior authorities on matters of truth. The consequence of this assumption is that non-Natives “not only close a door on another way of knowing, [they] potentially insult the people who share the stories and thereby reduce the likelihood of their generosity continuing” (56). Recognizing this point then is important for two reasons. The first reason is so that non-Natives can recognize that they are very likely insulting Natives and so can stop doing that before it is too late. The second reason is so that they can expand their understanding of truth rather than remain ignorant of its many facets.

Works Cited

Carlson, Keith Thor. “Orality and Literacy: The ‘Black and White’ of Salish History.” Orality & Literacy: Reflectins Across Disciplines. 43-72. Print.

Haydey, Brent. “The Undeniable Truth Limiting Personal Trainers and Other Wellness Entrepreneurs.” Entrepreneurial Freedom. Brent Haydey, 2015. Web. 19 Jun. 2015. 

Pardi, Paul. “What is Truth?” Philosophy News. Philosophy News, 29 Jan. 2015. Web. 19 Jun. 2015. 

Paterson, Erika. “Lesson 2:3.” ENGL 470A Canadian Literary Genres May 2015. U of British Columbia. Web. 11 Jun. 2015.

True Stories That Contradict Each Other

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First stories tell us how the world was created. In The Truth about Stories, King tells us two creation stories; one about how Charm falls from the sky pregnant with twins and creates the world out of a bit of mud with the help of all the water animals, and another about God creating heaven and earth with his words, and then Adam and Eve and the Garden. King provides us with a neat analysis of how each story reflects a distinct worldview. “The Earth Diver” story reflects a world created through collaboration, the “Genesis” story reflects a world created through a single will and an imposed hierarchical order of things: God, man, animals, plants. The differences all seem to come down to co-operation or competition — a nice clean-cut satisfying dichotomy. However, a choice must be made: you can only believe ONE of the stories is the true story of creation – right? That’s the thing about creation stories; only one can be sacred and the others are just stories. Strangely, this analysis reflects the kind of binary thinking that Chamberlin, and so many others, including King himself, would caution us to stop and examine. So, why does King create dichotomies for us to examine these two creation stories? Why does he emphasize the believability of one story over the other — as he says, he purposefully tells us the “Genesis” story with an authoritative voice, and “The Earth Diver” story with a storyteller’s voice. Why does King give us this analysis that depends on pairing up oppositions into a tidy row of dichotomies? What is he trying to show us?

While King does read the “Genesis” story with an authoritative voice, he does so in an ironic way. This is made clear when he says, in the same ironic way, that “none of [us] would make the mistake of confusing storytelling strategies with the value or sophistication of a story” (23). He is thus not emphasizing the believability of one story over the other; rather, he is emphasizing the narrative technique that (mis)leads readers to thinking that one story is more believable than the other: “These strategies colour the stories and suggest values that may be neither inherent nor warranted” (22). He heavily implies that narrative techniques which makes stories seem more believable (e.g. the authoritative voice) do not justify judgments that one story is more valuable or sacred than another, especially in the cross-cultural context where different techniques are valued.

King’s irony extends to his discussion of dichotomies. The long list of them that he gives emphasizes Western society’s obsession with what are ultimately superficial oppositions that possess unjustified and discriminatory connotations (25). This irony is then briefly discarded for a more genuine appeal:

So am I such an ass as to . . . suggest that the stories contained within the matrix of Christianity and the complex of nationalism are responsible for the social, political, and economic problems we face? Am I really arguing that the martial and hierarchical nature of Western religion and Western privilege has fostered stories that encourage egotism and self-interest? Am I suggesting that, if we hope to create a truly civil society, we must first burn all the flags and kill all the gods, because in such a world we could no longer tolerate such weapons of mass destruction?

No, I woudn’t do that. (27)

The irony may return with that last line, but he’s already said what he means. His viewpoint is evidently inclined towards the Native narrative, and so I think that King gives us this dichotomy-laden analysis to criticize those very dichotomies and make us examine not only their validity but the consequences that they have already wrought on our world. I think he is trying to show us that there is a way out, even if he knows no one is going to take it.

Now, to backtrack to the prompt’s first question (which I am backtracking to because it requires a personal answer), I do not believe in any creation story. To be more precise, I do not believe in the possibility of rendering the world’s origin (assuming that such an origin happened) in a communicable format. That’s it. So, the quality of sacredness that the prompt refers to is frankly lost on me. However, I do perceive and am affected by the world structures that the “Genesis” and “The Earth Diver” stories posit; were I to be exposed to one story and not the other, I would likely lean towards the structure that the story I’m exposed to portrays. That structure would be cooperation or competition in the case of these two stories, but it could be a lot more.

As someone who does not really understand the concept of sacredness, I view sacredness as an attribution that has the effect of prioritizing a story’s portrayed structure over that of every other story. This prioritization over other stories is what causes all of the resulting problems as people with different world views try to convert each other, through any means. I think then that in cautioning us against binary thinking, King and others are trying to get us to accept a world of true stories that contradict each other–one in which we acknowledge that sacredness is in the eye of the beholder.

Works Cited

Fuchs, Jackie. “10 Creation Myths as Strange as the Bible.” Listverse. Listverse Ltd., 11 Jan. 2014. Web. 11 Jun. 2015.

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

Paterson, Erika. “Lesson 2:2.” ENGL 470A Canadian Literary Genres May 2015. U of British Columbia. Web. 11 Jun. 2015.

Wright, N. T. “How Can the Bible Be Authoritative?” Vox Evangelica 21 (1991): 7-32. Web. 11 Jun. 2015.

Our Homes

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Read at least 3 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.

I’ve decided to interpret this prompt literally, so here’s the list.

Shared Assumptions (i.e. the obvious yet not-so-obvious):

Home exists. Regardless of what Home means or how it is invoked, no blog denied the concept of Home. Granted, we didn’t have much choice as the prompt itself assumed this.

Home is personal. It is not homeland. Although nationality can be and often is a part of our concepts of Home, we attribute much more to it than just that, and many of those attributions are unique to us as individuals.

Home is linked to the physical world. When we think of Home, we think of tangible things. We may refute that Home is wholly represented by things such as houses, but we inevitably turn to talking about physical things in describing our concepts of Home.

Home doesn’t exist everywhere. There are places where you don’t feel at Home. Home is a limited space. It is a precious resource.

Home is worth it. Even with its faults.  

Shared Values:

Home is a conglomerate. It is a lot of different things put together to form one experience.

Home changes. Like us.

Home represents the past as well as the present. It is a special space for memories.

Home represents the connection between people. It represents the bonds we have with those special to us.

Home is a narrative. It is made of stories.

Shared Stories:

People stories. Stories about friends, stories about family, stories about community.

–

The biggest take-away I have from reading this week’s blogs is that Home is complex. It means a lot of things to different people and is represented by a lot of things as well. It is because Home is so complex that we try to convey it through stories. We always go back to those stories in the end.

Works Cited

Abeed, Alishae. “Assignment 2:2.” ENGL 470A: Canadian Studies. UBC Blogs, 5 Jun. 2015. Web. 8 Jun. 2015.

Avery, Laura. “2.1.” ENGL 470A: Querying Narratives of ‘Home’ and of National Identity. UBC Blogs, 5 Jun. 2015. Web. 8 Jun. 2015.

Cardoso, Kathryn. “Where is Home?” ENGL 470. UBC Blogs, 5 Jun. 2015. Web. 8 Jun. 2015.

Cook, Erica. “Home.” Oh Canada!. UBC Blogs, 6 Jun. 2015. Web. 8 Jun. 2015.

Cook, Hayden. “2:2.” Hayden’s English 470 Blog. UBC Blogs, 5 Jun. 2015. Web. 8 Jun. 2015.

Datten, Gretta. “Assignment 2:2.” Liberal Leaning Literary Landscapes Labryritnhinely Lined with Liminal Loops of Logic and Legend. UBC Blogs, 3 Jun. 2015. Web. 8 Jun. 2015.

Downs, Cecily. “Story as Home.” Canadian Lit. UBC Blogs, 6 Jun. 2015. Web. 8 Jun. 2015.

Franey, Evan. “Home in Transition.” Liminal Space between Story and Literature. UBC Blogs, 5 Jun. 2015. Web. 8 Jun. 2015.

Froehler, Hailey. “The Ambiguity of ‘Home’.” English 470A. UBC Blogs, 5 Jun. 2015. Web. 8 Jun. 2015.

Ghazi, Saarah. “2.1.” Saarah Ghazi. UBC Blogs, Jun. 5 2015. Web. 8 Jun. 2015.

Goei, Debra. “So This Is Where I Know Is Home.” Oh Canada! An Interpretation. UBC Blogs, 5 Jun. 2015. Web. 8 Jun. 2015.

Li, Freda. “Blog 4: A Home is Not (Always) a House.” ENGL 470: Whose Canada Is It? UBC Blogs, 5 Jun. 2015. Web. 8 Jun. 2015. 

Millar, Whitney. “Let Me Come Home.” Whitney ENGL 470 Experience. UBC Blogs, 5 Jun. 2015. Web. 8 Jun. 2015.

Paterson, Erika. “Lesson 2:1.” ENGL 470A Canadian Literary Genres May 2015. U of British Columbia. Web. 8 Jun. 2015.

Ready, Alyssa. “Painting the Sky-The Outdoors is my Home.” Alyssa Ready. UBC Blogs, 1 Jun. 2015. Web. 8 Jun. 2015.

Where I Live

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The first home I remember living in is an apartment in Tianjin, China. I remember a big bed, a gigantic model ship, and little else.

The second home I lived in is an apartment in New Westminster, Canada. I got there at the age of six and started school with extra English classes, the result being that I more or less forgot everything about Chinese. Anyway, the apartment was a small one, like the one in Tianjin. The outside was wood (or brick?), giving a more homely feel compared to Tianjin concrete, and the neighbourhood on Ash street had a lot of trees. The school was within walking distance.

There was a small television in the bedroom, and on a certain night, I had the misfortune to flick to a horror channel. Being little older than six, this was not a pleasant experience for me, and it was perhaps after that that I gained a strong aversion to a clump of fabric on the bedroom curtain. It looked like a face—a grinning face, no less.

bedroom-curtains-pictures

*Not the same curtain.

My feud with the grinning face continued for years, but despite that, the small apartment in New Westminster was a good place to live.

My parents started looking for a new home when I was in grade four. We went to a few places and eventually settled on one of two, over which I had the executive decision. The first place was a small apartment, just like the one we were already living in, but had an active and welcoming community full of weekly events and stuff like that. The second place had three floors.

I chose the three floors.

We took a vacation back at Tianjin; it was fun. Nice relatives, good food, places to tour. Air was horrible and it was like a furnace in what should’ve been winter, but whatever. We went back to my first home, which was still our home, and we went up the creaky steps that carried the distinct flavour of dust and mystery. The place hadn’t changed much. The bed was still there. The ship was still there. The toilet didn’t work, but whatever. It was a place I didn’t remember much, but it had definitely been my home.

Here is a conversation that never happened:

“Hi Kevin.”

“Hi. How do you know my name?”

“Not important. I have a question: What does Home mean to you?”

“You mean where I live?”

“Maybe. But I don’t mean home—I mean Home.”

“Huh?”

Anyway, the vacation ended and I was eager to see my school friends again; in fact, on the same day that we came back form the airport, I had us drive by the school and asked if I could go in to say hi. My parents said no, as that was no longer my school.

The third home I lived in is a co-op unit in Burnaby. It was sizable compared to the apartment but not really that big, and the basement got flooded a few months later. Still, it had a backyard, which was nice, and I had my own room, which was nicer. I settled in comfortably enough and forgot about the grinning curtain clump. Years later, I could no longer imagine living in a cramped apartment where I had to share a room and didn’t have stairs. Still, it had definitely been my home.

Almost a decade later, my parents started looking for another home. We were going to get someplace really big this time, but I found myself resisting the idea, wanting to just stay where we were. Why? I wasn’t sure. A large part of it was convenience, a desire to not go through all that trouble associated with moving yet again, but another part was perhaps that I just didn’t want to leave. This home was comfortable, just like the last home had been and, I believe, the home before that, and I just didn’t want to go. But I did. We went through that trouble and believed it was worth it.

The fourth home that I am living in is one side of a duplex in Coquitlam. It’s big, too big really, and we’ll own it all once the mortgage is paid. The inconveniences are many, the biggest for me being the 3-zone commute to UBC, but I can now no longer imagine living where I had lived before. Still, that place had definitely been my home, just as this place is and just as the next place I go to will probably be.

“Hi Kevin.”

“Hello.”

“What does Home mean to you?”

“You mean where I live?”

“Maybe. But I don’t mean home—I mean Home.”

“Easy. It’s where I live.”

Works Cited

“About Us.” Garden Square Housing Co-Op. GSHC, 2015. Web. 5 June 2015. 

“Bedroom Curtains Pictures.” Soulfjord.com. Soulfjord.com, 2015. Web. 5 June 2015.

The Story of the Earth People

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Cat

Hello. I have a great story to tell you, and it’s about the Earth people.

The Earth people were quite free. They liked to swim in the asthenosphere and skydive from the moon; the gravity still worked because they never believed it wouldn’t. But gravity didn’t stop them from flying through clouds. They hosted parties in neighbouring galaxies and played tag amongst the stars, and although they never got tired, they always returned home. They were Earth people, after all.

They had a good time. They didn’t eat because they never believed they’d get hungry and didn’t sleep because their dreams were all around them. They carved palaces out of diamonds, danced with tornadoes, played with cats and told stories to each other. They had everything because they never believed they had nothing.

They had a good time, but eventually, they got a bit bored. They got a bit bored of swimming in the asthenosphere and skydiving from the moon, of hosting parties in neighbouring galaxies and playing tag amongst the stars. They got a bit bored of shiny diamonds and breezy typhoons and purring cats. So, being a bit bored, they stopped playing with all that and just shared stories, since they never got bored of sharing stories. But they got a bit bored of their settings, their characters, their plots. Their stories that had everything because they believed in everything got a bit boring to them, but they couldn’t stop sharing them cause what would they do then? So they needed a new story.

The Earth people put their heads together and tried sticking those heads into the planets and the stars, searching for story material in the void of everything they already believed in. It didn’t work. They got a bit discouraged and went back home to share stories on the matter, but the stories were the same old stories and a bit boring.

And so the Earth people continued, a bit bored but still having a good time, until one of them had an idea. This Earth person was no different than any other Earth person and believed in everything that every other Earth person believed in, so who knows how this idea popped into this Earth person’s head. Perhaps it was just a coincidence, or perhaps it would have popped into some other Earth person’s head at some other time even if it hadn’t popped into this one’s, and that person would have shared with the other Earth people what this one was now sharing. Whatever the case, the idea happened.

The Earth person crafted this idea into a story and shared the story with the other Earth people. It is the story of how the Earth people cannot swim in the asthenosphere because it’s too hot and how they cannot skydive from the moon because the gravity is weak and there’s no air. It’s the story of how the Earth people cannot fly through clouds because the gravity is strong and how they cannot visit other galaxies and play tag amongst the stars because it’s too far away and the gravity is weak and there’s no air.

It’s the story of how they have to eat to survive, of how they have to sleep to stay wakeful and dream dreams that aren’t around them anymore. It’s the story of how it takes them countless years of hardship to make palaces of stone and the story of how tornadoes destroy those palaces in minutes. It’s the story of how cats have nine lives because one just isn’t enough.

It’s the story of pain. The story of death. The story of war.

The Earth person shared this story and the Earth people weren’t bored anyone. They had a good time with it, actually, until they realized that the good times were over. They tried to soar up and could only hop. They tried to swim in the ocean and drowned. They tried to dance with the wind but were embarrassed by their clumsiness. They tried not to eat and starved, tried not to sleep and went to sleep forever. They slaughtered their cats because they wanted nine more lives.

The Earth people were never bored again. Not even a bit. Even so, they wished they could go back. They wanted to take back the story, but the story happened. They believed in that story and then stopped believing.

*

This story was easier to write than I expected, probably because a template was given. I had the most trouble with the ending in that I wanted to evoke the assigned meaningfulness in a way that suited this specific story. The result is that I’ve kind of tacked another meaning on, which I can now no longer take back.

My friend liked the story’s repetition but couldn’t relate to it. Honestly, I can’t either, and perhaps that’s the point.

Works Cited

Horton, Helena. “Cats Have 9 Lives: The Facts Behind The Myth.” Mirror. MGN Ltd., 6 Oct 2014. Web. 29 May 2015. 

McNeill, Abbey. “Which Cat Breed Are You?” Playbuzz. Playbuzz, 7 Mar. 2015. Web. 29 May 2015.  

The Catalyst of Home

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Home is an abstract concept that requires a physical manifestation. While you can examine the concept without the manifestation, you cannot receive the effects that Home provides without a physical location to attach it to, the effects being specific associations and emotions such as safety and belonging. Joining the concept with the manifestation requires a catalyst, and for many, that catalyst is stories. The stories give Home its form: their narratives shape the Home’s effects and their details link those effects with the chosen location. Those who use stories as the catalyst thus only need to refer to those stories to know where their Home is and what it means to them.

“Figuring out this place we call home is a problem” therefore for those who either cannot choose a physical manifestation or do not possess a suitable catalyst (Chamberlin 87). Even if a catalyst is available, those who do not believe in it cannot believe in Home.

Home as a concept tends to require exclusivity: many, probably most people cannot enjoy Home’s effects while acknowledging that other people are enjoying the same Home, without permission. The concept of Home cannot be shared, but the physical location can be, and this intolerance creates conflicts such as the one between European and Indigenous people in Canada. How is this conflict fought? The physical location cannot be attacked, as it is the prize. The concept of Home cannot be attacked, as it exists only as an abstract. The only possible target is the catalyst.

Put differently, the history of many of the world’s conflicts is a history of dismissing a different belief or different behaviour as unbelief or misbehaviour, and of discrediting those who believe or behave differently as infidels or savages. (78)

Whereas the “fact” that Chamberlin gives before this statement emphasizes the result of the problem, this statement emphasizes the method (78). To discount a culture’s catalyst is to discount their claim to their chosen land as their Home. However, this is not done by rejecting the culture’s stories, but by rejecting their belief that their stories have the power to turn a land into their Home. This, to use Chamberlin’s terminology, defines the distinction between “Them and Us” (239). Our stories matter; theirs don’t.

The consequence of understanding the method behind the problem is that the solution becomes clearer:

Like home, it [common ground] is at the centre of contradiction. It is a place where what we have in common is neither true nor untrue, a place where we come together in agreement not about what to believe but about what it is to believe. (240)

Chamberlin thus suggests that cultures reconcile by bonding through their shared use of catalysts. This entails the removal of exclusivity and the rejection of its power as a truth-marker, bringing to foreground the contradiction that something means something and something else. It requires the acknowledgement that many Homes can and do exist on the same Earth.

Works Cited

Beck, Julie. “The Psychology of Home: Why Where You Live Means So Much.” The Atlantic. The Atlantic, 30 Dec. 2011. Web. 22 May 2015.

Chamberlin, J. Edward. If This Is Your Land, Where Are Your Stories? Toronto: Vintage Canada, 2004. Print.

“What Does Home Mean to You?” Real Simple. Time Inc. Network, n.d. Web. 22 May 2015.  

Introduction

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globe

Hello and welcome to this student blog for ENGL 470A Canadian Studies. My name is Kevin and I am a 3rd year UBC student pursuing a double major in Creative Writing and English Literature. I am a Canadian citizen but am not as interested in Canada as I perhaps should be, demonstrated by the fact that I frequent World News rather than CBC. I will start visiting both.

My current understanding of this course is that it focuses on the relationship between European and Indigenous narratives that are situated in the country of Canada. On a broader scale, it will focus on the effects of stories on cultures and how they are used to craft a concept of community and a concept of home.

Our word “land” is too spare and meagre. We can scarcely use it except with economic overtones unless we happen to be poets. The aboriginal would speak of “earth” and use the word in a richly symbolic way to mean his “shoulder” or his “side.” I have seen an aboriginal embrace the earth he walked on. (W. Stanner qtd. in J. Chamberlin 79)

I originally intended to title this blog “Many Homes, One Land,” but after reading that quote, I made a most likely futile change. As someone who is not as interested in Canada as he perhaps should be, my chief interest in this course is how its specific focus applies to the universal context. I think of the relationship between European and Indigenous narratives in Canada as another instance of the timeless problem: that of having many groups live on Earth that can only comfortably accommodate one. Every instance is different, of course, and it is in the specifics of this one that I hope to find new insights. I am also as a creative writer interested in the techniques that make these stories as compelling as they are, especially those that remain compelling outside of historical and cultural context.

I am not an active social media poster but do have experience blogging with the Arts One course that I took in my first year. I have also taken quite a few distance courses and have done research on online communication, so I look forward to experiencing this course’s unique structure.

Works Cited

CBC/Radio-Canada. CBC News. CBC/RC, 15 May 2015. Web. 15 May 2015.

Chamberlin, J. Edward. If This Is Your Land, Where Are Your Stories? Toronto: Vintage Canada, 2004. Print.

Paterson, Erika. ENGL 470A Canadian Studies. U of British Columbia, 11 May 2015. Web. 15 May 2015.

Sun, Kevin. kcsaob. WordPress, 25 Mar. 2013. Web. 15 May 2015.

The Real Deal. Globe. TRD, 26 Dec. 2012. Web. 15 May 2015.

WN Network. World News. WNN, 15 May 2015. Web. 15 May 2015.

 

 

 

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