Tag Archives: rmst

Conclusion Post

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To conclude the term, I want to say that this course is different from what I had initially expected. I did not expect to be exploring the themes that I have in this class, including but not limited to; memory, war, betrayal, and loss. To start off, I enjoyed most of the texts in the course and felt as though they were different than what I had expected and had read in classes so far. Additionally, something I found interesting was that I was able to make connections between the texts that I had decided to read. That’s something that I enjoyed about the way that the course is structured, that the texts in the course are inadvertently related to each other in one way or another. Whether that be through similar themes or similar historical contexts and events occurring within the novels. Such as, when we read the text W, or the Memory of Childhood, with the theme of memory, I related the text to The Old Gringo. The expectations that I have for myself when it comes to reading or tackling texts have evolved while being a part of this course. For example, now I know how to analyze texts and read long texts without being intimidated by the prospect of reading them.

Additionally, I also believe that now with the texts that I have read sometimes they are confusing and difficult to understand, and after this course, I do not penalize myself for that. Sometimes, more than I would like to admit, with the texts in the course, I have found that some specific themes and ideas jump out at me and that I understand as opposed to others. Such as, when we read Soldiers of Salamis, for some reason, the theme of loss became clear to me when reading the novel. That was surprising to me with this course, to say the least. One of the expectations that I had set for myself in this course was to understand Latin American literature better, even though I have lived in different countries in Latin America. I can state now that I have a decent understanding of Latin American literature. On top of that, I do have a better experience of European literature as well. Also another expectation that I had made for myself in this course was to better my writing skills. Though I cannot state that my writing skills have improved with my time in this course, I can say that doing blog posts and comments weekly has aided me in bettering that skill. Thank you for a great and exciting semester. 

I would ask my peers: have you guys set expectations for yourself at the start of the semester, and do you believe you have better or achieved those expectations?

 

Introductory Post

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My name is Muskan Shukla (she/her), and I am a second-year student planning to do a major in English and a minor in History. I am from India, but I have lived in Latin America for 13 years of my life, in which I spent my last two years of schooling in India. I have lived in Chile, Colombia, Venezuela, and Ecuador. I did my first year’s first term of UBC in India, and my second term in Bogota, Colombia. I have always been interested in English and History and figuring that has been one of the main challenges at UBC. From these two interests, I realized that I have a passion for reading. Reading is one of my hobbies. I had decided to take electives or courses that include various readings from my interest in reading. Thus, I had decided to take this course since it seemed interesting when I read about the course, and therefore this class is now an elective for me.

The expectation that I have for this course is to be a means to grow my current understanding of literature. I have limited knowledge of Latin American literature even though I have lived in Latin American countries. I also expect that the readings give me historical perspectives in their given times which would help grow my knowledge regarding my possible minor. Through the information provided to expand my knowledge, I would want the information to also develop my writing skills. My writing skills are not the best since, at times, I am not able to articulate what exactly I want to present clearly. Through the process of writing blog posts, my writing skills would grow and be challenged to present ideas in the form of a blog post.

After the first RMST 202 lecture, what I found interesting about the course was the way that the course was structured. I saw how we can choose which texts to read and somewhat predetermine our grade to be different from the other courses that I have taken at UBC. The difference between this course and other UBC courses regarding the structure makes the course much more appealing and exciting, in my opinion. Additionally, the openness in the course could also be a reflection of Romance Studies itself since Romance Studies is not bound to one specific discipline. Instead, the lack of imagining a particular field for Romance Studies allows for the explorations of texts and sources to be much more enjoyable. One question that I have after the first lecture is; are there any other disciplines similar to Romance Studies that are not bound to a specific field?
I am incredibly excited about this course and the learnings I will gain from it!