seems bleak

hi,

if anyone was paying attention about the two pretty bleak books i mentioned today you can find more information on them here, plus a semi-comical video of zizek snorting on charlie rose (he says some very smart things about OWS during the interview; worth a watch).

important to note that these are not 'apocalyptic' works at all, if anything they diagnose why much of the western world (and countries that operate on the free market system and/or have economies inextricably linked to 1st-world economies, so everyone) finds itself drowning. so don't feel bad. the world is generally ok.

slavoj zizek - living in the end times

http://www.powells.com/biblio/1-9781844675982-4

chris hedges - the world as it is: dispatches on the myth of human progress

http://www.powells.com/biblio/1-9781568586403-1

slavoj zizek on charlie rose:

http://www.charlierose.com/view/interview/11966

peas

Discussion questions for Lone Star.

1. John Sayles writes Lone Star in a way that White southerners and Latino's in Frontera, Texas live separately but a lot of their history is intertwined. Why does he connect Sam Deeds and Pilar Cruz through incest to bring the story together? Why couldn't the tension in Frontera have been strictly historical?

2. Throughout the movie there are historically references made about Native Americans, Black slaves, and Mexicans. How are these groups used in the story line to make the situation in Frontera contemporary?

3. What are the themes used in this film? Does the film succeed in getting the point across to audiences?

Response to Baca's Poem

I would like to respond to something we touched on only briefly in class, and that's the aggressive tone used throughout Baca's poem. Although many of us harbor sympathy for Baca's perceptive, I think it's important to look at the work's rhetoric objectively. And to me, doing so reveals the shortcoming of the poem's conceit.

Anger in poetry can be expressed more effectively with subtlety and metaphor. Baca, perhaps through his rage, rejects the traditional poetic tools available to the poet and plunges into a rant, one that does not defend itself against its own emotions. The question of audience comes into play; however, strong poetry should be felt by myriad peoples, regardless of racial and ethnic backgrounds. This is where Baca fails--by his dehumanizing the antagonist while refusing to relent his heated tone, he loses his credibility as historian/poet.

We can look at someone like Matrin Espada as an example of a poet using the finest poetic rhetoric and techniques to compound a critical tone in a way that can touch all readers, mostly because it attempts, through the Hispanic immigrants plight, to reach deeper into the human emotions the lie there. This gives the poem a touch of the universal and therefore makes it more lasting, even more accessible. Here is a link to Espada's poem, an ode to Hispanic workers killed in the 9/11 attacks: http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/177383

Espada uses a very American and universal tragedy as a means of exploring the more specific cultural narrative of latino workers in the food and restaurant industry. Rather than pushing the subject on the reader, he invites the reader into his world and, not unlike Virgil to Dante, leads us through the poem as a trustworthy and grounded voice.

Sure, we can understand Baca's frustration, even share it with him. However, it's important to ask the question: Would someone alien to these politics, say someone form China or Lithuania, trust a voice like Baca's?

-Ocean

Willie Perdomo, Jimmy SantiagoBaca, Sandra Maria Esteves

Perdomo's "Nigger -Reecan Blues"

1. Why do you think there is an anxiety about being fully "Boricua"? Why can't being half Cuban and half Chinese enough?

2. This piece raises the topic of racial identity inside a minority. Why do you think an already-oppressed minority would possess a tendency towards discrimination within it's own community?

3. What is the importance of the vernacular in this piece? Why strategic use does switching between the conventional and the vernacular offer for the poem's reading?

Baca, "So Mexicans Are Taking Jobs from Americans"


1. This poem employs a simple language, often using rhetorical questions in its presentation of stereotypes impose don Mexican immigrants. Why do you think the poet chose this kind of language, this tone?

2. I am most intrigued by the depiction of the "leader" (who I think we can assume is white). He is described as "asthmatic", "turtle heavy", with a "nest of wrinkles" and a "paddling" tongue. In other words, he is dehumanized. Do you think this aggressive approach is in retaliation t the dehumanization of Mexican immigrants? If so, do you think it is successful in this poem? Can we trust a poet whose conceit is overtly one-sided?


Esteves, "South Bronx Testimonial"

1. In this poem, the American dream is crushed by its own landscape; the city is a place of "despair" where young ladies are crushed into shapes of old women. But as the poem progresses, the poet forces her native land in the work, the stark New York landscapes literally breaks off with each word and a lush and bountiful world emerges from beneath. What does this say about the meaning of "home" for the Hispanic American immigrant? Is the memory of home a place of refuge in the mind or can it be a tantalizing impossibilities, especially for immigrants who, for myriad reasons, cannot return to their native countries?

-Ocean Vuong

Latino/Nuyorican (New York-Puerto Rican) poets:Miguel Algarin,Aurora Levins Morales, Pedro Pietri

Raphael Tufiño, Cortadores de Caña (Cane cutters) Linocut 21x29cm

Miguel Algarin, "Latero Story" Questions:

Language/Style:

Miguel Algarin intentionally uses explicit technical language throughout the poem. He uses this explicit use of explicit language with a complete abandon of standard syntax. (he refuses both punctuation and capitalization) I have two questions about this stylistic choice.

1.What is the purpose of his coupling of complex multisyllabic words with lack of formal grammar. (ex. dry blood infectious diseases/ hypothermic needles tissued/heroin water drops pilfered in/ slimy greases hazardous waste materials)

2. How does this form, relate to his interpretation of american success and entrepreneurialism.

Aurora Levins Morales, "Child of the Americas" Questions:

Diction:

Aurora Levins Morales uses many racial/ethnic identifiers. Many of these identifiers are the compilation of one or more ethnic groups which are commonly considered distinct from one another.

1.What is Aurora Levins Morales trying to say about the nature of ethnicity,nationality and race through the use of these compilations? (ex. mestiza,U.S. puerto rican jew, Latinoamerica.)

2. Also what are these labels saying about the nature of diaspora, and the movement of peoples in an increasingly globalized world.

Pedro Pietri, "Puerto Rican Obituary" Questions

Style:

1.This poem is dominated by short declarative sentences. What effect is achieved by this stylistic choice?

2.Pedro Pietri constantly repeats phrases and lines throughout his poem. What is the effect of this repetition?

3. How do these two stylistic choices mirror Pietri's understanding of the lives and deaths of Puerto Rican workers?

Content:

1. Pietri is suggesting a relationship between numbers (financial and other wise) and the names of puerto rican immigrants. What relationship do you think Pietri is suggesting?

Brooklyn Part Three

Early in part three Miss McAdam talks to Eilis about why Miss Keegan left the house, stating that she went to Long Island?  Later It Miss McAdams states that "It might be long island for all of us".  Is Long Island used as a postivie or a negative symbol throughout the story and if so why?

How has Eilis home life in America reflected her experience as an imigrant? Why hasn't she gotten closer to any of her house mates?

Why Do you think Miss Bartocci picked Eilis to work the counter when more "colored" customers were coming into the store?

Do you think that if tony did not ask her to marry him that she would return to america? 

Why is it up to Eilis to return home and stay with her mom while her brothers go back to England? Has their absences made them less like family and more like visitors?

When Tony mentioned kids Eilis got very scared, but when talking about moving to Long Island she seems very pleased with the idea, Why?

Brooklyn by Colm Tóibín, Part Three

There are a few allusions to World War II in this section. For example, Mrs. Kehoe says “after the war some of the Italians were very forward” (109) and the old man in the bookshop mentions “the holocaust … the churben” and says “The Germans killed everyone belonging to him, murdered every one of them, but we got him out, at least we did that, we got Joshua Rosenblum out” (125). What impact do you think WWII had on interactions between ethnic groups in Brooklyn based on the behavior of these characters?

As previously mentioned in class, Bartocci’s department store appears to be maintaining its reputation for progressive racial relations in order to expand its marketability. Eilis and another worker, Miss Delano, are reassigned to the counter with darker stockings for black customers (115). How do their reactions differ? What does this say about Eilis? Why do you think Eilis finds this switch so exhausting and stressful?

Eilis meets Tony at an Irish dance, even though he is the Brooklyn-born son of Italian immigrants. Why might he have attended the event?
Is there a deeper significance to the fact that Eilis begins to doubt her relationship with Tony when he says that he wants their children “to be Dodgers fans”? What might this be?
How does Tony’s Italian family differ from or resemble Eilis’ Irish family?

Eilis is attending Brooklyn College in the hopes of advancing from working on a shop floor to being a bookkeeper in an office. Dolores’ fellow lodgers shun her because she is a “scrubber” (126). Eilis tries to explain in letters to Rose that “in this world Tony shone despite the fact that he worked with his hands” as a plumber (175). What do the reactions characters have to various occupations say about the associations between jobs and social classes? Do the characters seem to believe in the “American Dream”?

When Eilis hears about Rose’s death, she begins to cry and repeats, “Why did I ever come over here?” (179). Now that we know Rose’s fate, do you think Eilis made the right decision in allowing her family to send her to America?
Jack’s letter informing Eilis of their mother’s condition causes Eilis and Tony considerable distress, yet this leads to them having sex for the first time. What do you think Tóibín may be asserting about the relationship between grief and sexual intimacy?
Shortly after, the couple goes to confession and then marries in a quick civil ceremony, even though Eilis is not pregnant, because Eilis is returning to Ireland for a month and Tony says, “If you go, you won’t come back” (205). Do you think Tony’s concerns are valid?