With most of my first cousins, parents, dad’s siblings (and their husbands/wives) and my grandma! Woo! Big family!

She had been dreaming of this day. At long last, she would be leaving home and the rigid constraints she had so deeply detested. “Do this. Do that. Where are you? Come home, it’s late!”  The words rang in her head as she unpacked her belongings. The room was empty, except for a tiny loft bed in one corner and a barren desk in another. “It looks dreary but I’ll dress it up. This is my new home and it’s going to be perfect”, she thought to herself. She sat there for a bit, realizing she had moved in much earlier than anyone else on the sixth floor of Dene. An hour later, the dresser was organized. Her closet was full of hanging clothes. A few knick-knacks sat atop the once barren desk. Posters of “inspirational people” stared back at her from every wall. Voices drifted down the hallway and finally, she was ready to meet the floor mates with whom she would be making this place her “home”.

Minutes turned to hours, and the sun was setting while girls waved goodbye to their parents and other family members. She had asked her parents to let her move in on her own. She could do it. She was mature now. She would be living alone, after all. She looked over at the girls waving goodbye and quickly averted her eyes.  A deep breath followed and then she was off with her new friends. There remained a pit in her stomach even while she excitedly got to know the other girls. She ignored it, telling herself it was the anxiety of all these amazing new experiences. She had barely slept the day prior. She was too eager, too ready get out of North Delta. “All I need is a good rest and this weird feeling in my stomach will be a mere memory” she muttered to herself.

The day had come and gone. It was nearing 2 a.m. She noticed a missed call on her cell phone from her mom but by now, her mom was probably fast asleep. The building was silent and dark. She opened the door to her room and looked down the long hallway. No lights were on. Everyone was probably fast asleep, except for her. The pit in her stomach had not gone away and she was especially aware of it now that she sat atop her bed with nothing but silence ringing in her ears. It felt like the silence was growing around her. The pit in her stomach was growing. She decided to lie down and pulled the covers over herself, reaching underneath to grab at something she realized she had forgotten. Princess G… where was Princess G? The pink stuffed kitten she had gotten nearly fifteen years ago was nowhere to be found. She balled up a pillow and pulled it close, hugging it tightly. Eventually, she closed her eyes and tried to drift off to sleep like the rest of the world.

As she lay there, the silence was overcome by the voices in her head. No, relax, she was not losing her mind. She thought of her mom, gentle and kind but stern when the need be, standing in the doorway of her bedroom in North Delta. “You look like you’re going to doze off”, she would say every night after they told one another about their days. She would then say a quick “I love you, good night” and head down the hallway toward her own bedroom. She opened her eyes and glanced toward the door, almost confident the voice was not just in her head. The door was closed and the room was empty, of course. The pit in her stomach continued to grow. She felt like a knot was forming in her chest. She closed her eyes again and pictured herself sitting on the couch in her home. Not this “home”, not her new “home”. In her mind, she was at home in North Delta; the town she had so desperately wanted to escape. She reveled in the comfort of the couch. Her grandmother was in the next room, making tea. Moments later, they were both seated firmly on the couch, drinking tea and laughing about something funny her dad had said the day before. He was always saying funny things and spewing out the most random bits of information. Did you know, for example, that chess originated in India? “Why are you telling me this at 7 in the morning?” She would say to whatever tidbit he was sharing before he rushed off to work. “The more you know, the more you grow” He would respond. She smiled to herself, feeling the memories rush through; engulfing her in their warmth. That night, she finally did manage to drift off to sleep, dreaming about her parents’ cooking, the feel of her bed in North Delta and the chats with her mom before bed. School was not to start for a couple more days, but she had been eager to move in as early as possible to settle into her new home. The next morning, she got on the 99 B-Line and, much to her own surprise, headed back toward North Delta. At first, her parents looked incredulous and asked if everything was alright or if she had forgotten something important. She looked up at them and apologized profusely for being so eager to leave them all behind. As she was leaving, the pit began to form in her stomach again. Her parents hugged her tightly. She was about to leave when her mom called her name. “You forgot something” her mom said, holding Princess G in her hands.

She was back on the Skytrain, a little piece of home in her hand. “Dene will become a home away from home, in time…” she thought to herself. As she sat there, she began to think of the words from one of her favourite songs. “Home is wherever I’m with you…” she hummed quietly. The song was a romantic song, but the “you” took on a different meaning for her. The “you” was family. No matter how much she would grow to love Dene, she knew that at the root of it all home was with her family and the memories and spaces they filled in together.

This short story tells the tale of my first foray into the world of (partial) independence and moving away from home to live on campus at UBC. Although North Delta is not that far away from UBC and the trek home was actually quite simple, I will never forget the feelings of nostalgia that haunted me when I moved into Dene. After living there for the duration of the year and making close friends and special memories, however, I found that I was haunted with a similar (but lesser) nostalgia and pit in my stomach when it came time to leave. These feelings of sadness were likely muted by the knowledge that I was going back to a place full of love, memories and family. Despite the happy times I had in Dene, I always thought of it as my “home away from home”, never as the “home” that I felt most attached to. It is these feelings and the paramount value of family that, I believe, defines home for me.

Works Cited:

“Origins of Chess.” Princeton University. Web. 30 Jan. 2015. <http://www.princeton.edu/~achaney/tmve/wiki100k/docs/Origins_of_chess.html>.

I have a great story to tell you. It is a story about evil, and you will find that this evil is closer than you think.

There was a time when the truths of our world were not readily known and, for that matter, could not be known. These truths were secret burdens; hidden from the world’s people to protect them from the despair that would follow if these truths were unleashed. The Creator of this planet, this universe, all that we know and, of course, what lies beyond, concentrated the knowledge of these truths into one living individual. This individual suffered from the despair of these truths alone and was not to share them with any other person. She was known simply as “the Knower of All”.

For centuries, the world was a place full of happiness and carelessness; not a worry in the world among the majority of its inhabitants. There were no fights or quarrels. There was no inequality. Oppression of any kind did not exist. In fact, these words: oppression, inequality, words with any sort of negative connotation were unknown.  It was not merely the words that had not yet come into existence but rather, no harms had ever come to anyone. As I have mentioned, there was not a worry in the world for almost every one of the world’s people. The Knower of All (or simply, the Knower as we will affectionately call her for short) was the only one, of course, who did not and could not share in this worriless lifestyle because the Knower knew things and these were things nobody would ever want to know, you see. I am sure, at this point, you would like to know more about the Knower and what, exactly, it was that she knew.

At the time of her creation, the Knower was blessed (or more aptly, cursed) with the power of knowledge. This power stemmed from the ability to see into the future. These visions of the future came to the Knower in her mind, and she was not to share them with anyone. One night, a long, long time ago, while reveling in some of the past truths she had uncovered through her visions, the Knower began to see a scenario in her mind. As the scene disappeared, the Knower fell to the floor. She had just had a vision, and in it was knowledge of a time soon to come. This knowledge had brought her more despair than she had ever felt before.  After this incident, the Knower was visibly shaken. She wept loudly in public and those around her, who had never before seen or experienced sadness, merely assumed she must be elated; crying tears of happiness, of course!

The Creator saw the utter despair that had befallen the Knower. It was far more pain than the Creator had ever intended to bestow upon her. The Creator knew the only way to make the Knower’s pain more bearable was to spread the despair; to have her share it with others and remove the world’s burden from the Knower alone. That night, as the world slept, a story full of images crept into the minds of each and every individual. The images were the same ones the Knower had seen earlier that day. They were images of mass destruction, hatred and revenge. They were images of inequality, oppression and marginalization. They were images of disease and death. They were images of impoverished families living in the streets and comparatively wealthy passersby shooting them looks of contempt while discussing the latest episode of “Keeping up with the Kardashians”. There was ignorance and there was apathy. In all of these things, the Creator was showing the world that evil was coming.

 In the morning, when the world had awakened, there were tears shed every which way the Knower looked. She knew, of course, that nobody was crying tears of happiness. The world did not know what to do with this terrible knowledge. For them, it was too much too soon, but the story could not be taken back.

The above story deviates quite heavily from Leslie Silko’s original. The point I wanted to hit on, however, was that stories cannot be taken back. Once they are out there, they are out there. In the story I mentioned, there is an obvious positive side to the knowledge of “evil” coming into the world. It is lifting a veil of ignorance and, of course, the ignorance of our world to all of its evils is an evil in and of itself. It is not only the story itself that matters, though. What I learned from sharing this story is that in large part, how you share a story matters as well. The Creator shared the story with the inhabitants of the world in a manner that perhaps proved to be too much for the emotional capacity of any human (especially when you’re living in a time when these evils simply do not exist and you cannot fathom their existence) and sent its inhabitants into disarray. So, I have a question for you guys: how do we tell our stories and who do we share them with? Is there such a thing as telling “too much” or telling “too much, too soon”? Anyway, I hope you enjoyed reading my story and I would love to hear your thoughts on it. I may have missed the mark completely, but hey, I had a fun time writing this!

Works Cited

“Canada Income Inequality.” Canada Income Inequality. Web. 28 Jan. 2015. <http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/news/canada-income-inequality/>.

Edward Chamberlin states that “stories give meaning and value to the places we call home… they hold us together and at the same time keep us apart” (1). These stories differ between cultures and nations; across physical and social boundaries. The act of telling stories differs as well, and cultures are often differentiated on the basis of how their stories are told. As Chamberlin discusses, for example, societies in which people communicate through spoken word and spread stories via word of mouth are deemed “oral cultures”. Conversely, however, cultures whose stories are shared and preserved through the processes of reading and writing are classified as “written cultures”. Entangled in this binary distinction is a type of social hierarchy in which those who are part of “oral cultures” are considered inferior while those who are part of “written cultures” are believed to be part of a culture that exercises a greater level of mental complexity and superiority. Chamberlin states that it is these notions that “[encourage] people to treat other societies with a blend of condescension and contempt while celebrating the sophistication of their own” (19). Much like Chamberlin, MacNeil argues with the oft held academic perspective that literate cultures are evidence of evolutionary progress. MacNeil suggests that this viewpoint (in which oral cultures are seen as being primitive) largely reflects a deep-rooted bias against non-Westernized civilizations.

Chamberlin, too, argues against the perspective that there exists a clear-cut binary between “oral cultures” and “written cultures”. “Oral cultures”, he states, are “rich in forms of writing [that are] non-syllabic and non-alphabetic” (Chamberlin 20). These forms of writing, he argues, are evident in “woven and beaded blankets… carved and painted trays, poles, doors” (Chamberlin 20). Chamberlin continues to argue against the distinctions between the two cultural categories by pointing out that the central institutions of supposedly “written cultures” are rich with oral traditions, like the ritualistic way that “certain things must be said and done in the right order by the right people”(20). By sharing these examples, the author forces the reader to consider the ways in which we are all part of both oral and written cultural traditions and may, in some cases, fail to recognize these elements in our stories and in our societies. Both MacNeil and Chamberlin point out that members of Western societies often overlook the oral forms of communication that they practice, and a sense of “Western egocentrism” becomes clear in this dismissal of oral traditions and the subsequent hierarchy created between “written cultures” and “oral cultures”.

MacNeil continues to argue against the decisive division between “oral and written cultures” by discussing technological advances that have blurred the line between the two. Sound files (like mp3 files), for example, are oral means of communication but are readily available, easily accessible and “permanent” on the World Wide Web. Spoken word stories, typically, are not associated with this type of permanence. Similarly, the definition of “written cultures” is challenged by technological advances like the use of twitter (and other online mediums of sharing stories) where text can be deleted and can exist as a temporary means of communication.

I find the points brought up by both Chamberlin and MacNeil to be very thought provoking, and I certainly believe that upon closer investigation, elements of both oral and written traditions can be found in any culture and the definitions associated with the two categories are being continuously challenged by technological advancements. I agree that the privileging of one mode of storytelling over another reflects a heavy Western egocentrism, but is it problematic to recognize a difference between oral and written/literary stories (without the hierarchical associations and privileging)? Cultural artifacts (like those discussed by Chamberlin) should absolutely be considered valuable, relevant and valid means of cultural communication for the symbolic meaning and stories attached to them. However, should the definition of literature widen its scope to include the means of story-telling and communication that Chamberlin brings up (e.g. woven and beaded blankets) or does this definition of literature then become too ambiguous? These are questions I will mull over tonight, and I welcome further insights!

Works Cited

Chamberlin, Edward. If This is Your Land, Where are Your Stories? Finding Common Ground. AA. Knopf. Toronto. 2003. Print

King, Rita J. “How Twitter Is Reshaping The Future Of Storytelling.” Co.Exist. 22 May 2013. Web. 17 Jan. 2015.

“Literature.” Merriam-Webster. Merriam-Webster. Web. 16 Jan. 2015.

MacNeil, Courtney. “Orality.” The Chicago School of Media Theory. Uchicagoedublogs. 2007. Web. 19 Feb. 2013.

Hi there!

Let me begin by briefly introducing myself to those who have intentionally or perhaps accidentally stumbled upon my blog for ENGL 470! My name is Shamina and I hope to be pursuing a career in Social Work in the near future and am especially passionate about matters concerning mental health, immigration and child welfare. Although I have been residing in Canada for the majority of my life as a permanent resident, I did not become a Canadian citizen until I was in the tenth grade. Interestingly, however, I have always identified as “Canadian” and, for me, identity formation has been a complex and confusing process.

I am thrilled to be posting to my blog for the first time. For the duration of this course, this will serve as a vehicle for me to express my thoughts and share my analyses on the various pieces of Canadian literature we will all be looking at this semester, as well as specific themes of Aboriginal identity, nation-building, and so forth. I also hope that my posts will provide its readers with some thought-provoking insights that allow for further discussion in the comments section! The subject matter of ENGL 470 appealed to me instantly and the structure of the course is completely new to me. Despite having taken online courses before, I have never been introduced to a course that relied on participation and commentary as its crux, and I am so very excited to be a part of this new and exciting venture!

(Image source: Vancouver Observer)

The image I have chosen to share with you is of two passengers who were aboard the Komagata Maru ship which arrived in Vancouver from India in 1914 (read more about this here). Most immigrants aboard the ship were turned away from Canada. This image is iconic, especially amongst the South Asian communities residing within Canada. The “incident” has sparked much debate, and serves as a reminder of the exclusive legislations and regulations that sought to build Canada within a specific framework that favoured European settlers and immigration. I have chosen to share this image on my blog because I believe it illustrates the intentional creation of a specific hegemony within Canada’s nation and the often discriminatory practices that were used in the creation of dominant narratives. These immigration laws, however, are only one part of this exclusionary approach. The colonization and dispossession of Aboriginal land and their traditional way of life has been another such mechanism in the creation of these dominant ideologies.

In the past, I have taken courses (primarily in Sociology) that focus on the dominant narratives in nation-building through an analysis of historical timelines, immigration laws, etc. I am interested in taking ENGL 470 for the different angle it will take in addressing and uncovering these narratives. The focus on Canadian literature and its analysis allows for, I believe, a means of deciphering covert and symbolic messages that discuss and provide commentary on these narratives and alternative narratives. I cannot wait to put my analytic skills to the test!

Works Cited:

“History of Vancouver – Komagata Maru.” History of Vancouver – Komagata Maru. Web. 9 Jan. 2015. <http://www.vancouverhistory.ca/archives_komagatamaru.htm>.

“Lessons from the Komagata Maru.” Opinion. Web. 9 Jan. 2015. <http://www.vancouverobserver.com/opinion/lessons-komagata-maru>.

“Understand Permanent Resident Status.” Government of Canada, Citizenship and Immigration Canada, Communications Branch. Web. 9 Jan. 2015. <http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/newcomers/about-pr.asp>