ENLIT 12 (Literature: Global Voices and Encounters) Notes PDF

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201109INTRODUCTION TO LITERATUREWhy study literature? - While literary training does not automatically make us humane people, literature can broaden our horizons and invites us to take part in an ethical act. - A text is more than just a composition of nicely strung words. When we approach a text, w...

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201109

INTRODUCTION TO LITERATURE Why study literature? - While literary training does not automatically make us humane people, literature can broaden our horizons and invites us to take part in an ethical act. - A text is more than just a composition of nicely strung words. When we approach a text, we are navigating factors that influence the creation of identity, ways of representation, and the production of meaning in society. - Reading is not just about sharing how a text made us feel or talking about the moral lesson. It should be done with care. Widening our perspective through literature - It becomes problematic when we impose our norms and preferences on someone from a totally different culture. - It may also be harmful to have set ideas that box the identity of a person or culture that we are encountering for the first time or don't have an in-depth knowledge of. - Resisting changes based on context and circumstance may cause more harm than good. - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichi: Danger of a single story - Vulnerable to the face of a story—limited to some things that affect our perspective (especially as children) - “People like me could exist in literature” - Kung ano lang yung nakikita/nababasa, ‘yun na ‘yung alam o nakikitang “tama” - Something becomes “one thing” in your mind over and over again - “Single stories” create stereotypes, not because they’re not true, but because they’re incomplete - The consequence of single stories: robs people of dignity - Stories have been used to break dignity and malign, but they can empower and humanize, and repair that broken dignity - “When we reject a single story, we regain a kind of paradise.” Analyzing literature through close reading - A literary analysis is not a summary of what happened, not a sharing of your feelings about the text, and not a subjective interpretation of or reflection about the piece. - The bedrock of doing a literary analysis is the method called close reading. - How to analyze? - Identify the THEME

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Recurring idea or insight the text Consider a broad topic, then describe what the story is saying about that topic 1. So you try to look at as many details as possible. 2. You draw a preliminary theme. 3. You go back to the details, see how they reinforce the theme, then see how they seem to give rise to tensions and ambiguities. 4. Finally, you will try to reconcile those tensions and ambiguities in order to arrive at a more organic, insightful theme. - Begin ANALYSIS - Examining critically by looking at its separate parts, not a summary - Separate parts: LITERARY ELEMENTS (Imagery, Character, Symbolism, Setting, Plot, Tone/Mood) - New Criticism - look at the elements of the literary piece and closely examine how these elements work together to communicate a theme -

THE ELEMENTS OF FICTION Understanding elements of fiction ● Conflict - the problem that the story revolves around ● Plot - the sequence of events in the story ● Character - an actor or agent in the story ● Setting - place and time of the story ● Point of View - a vantage point from which the story is told ● Tone - linguistic features that set the story’s mood ● Symbols - objects that carry a figurative meaning ● Theme - story’s underlying motivation or idea - IN FOCUS: CONFLICT - The reason why a story is taking place; keeps a story going and holds it together - Examine why the conflict is important for the particular story that you are analyzing - Any struggle between opposing forces - Internal Conflict: Person VS Self - External Conflict: Person VS Person, Nature, Fate, Society; *Person VS The unknown, Machine

THE ELEMENTS OF POETRY Understanding the Elements of Poetry ● Imagery - concrete representation of sensory impressions ● Dramatic Situation - circumstances presented in the poem

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Persona - speaker in the poem Tone - poet’s implied attitude towards the subject Direction - words used as well as their connotation and denotation Sound - auditory effect of linguistic features Form - how the poem is organized and its genre Theme - poem’s underlying motivation or idea IN FOCUS: IMAGERY - lends poetry power and allows a poem to communicate much with a few words - It helps set poetry apart from prose - Examine how imagery is important for the particular poem that you are analyzing - Appeals to our senses - Puts you somewhere and takes you to that certain place - Imagery can be a visceral, symbolic, allusion, sound effect

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What Does the World Say About Pinoys? “We should seek to cultivate an attitude of tolerance and understanding, as well as an interest in different cultures if we ever want these barriers in knowledge, attitudes, and culture to be overcome.”

They Don’t Think Much About Us by Alfredo Salanga ● ● ●

“Not thinking about us” ← meaning? How does the American attitude of not thinking much about us temper or curtail the freedom of the persona in what is supposedly the Land of the Free? Own thoughts: Americans don’t think about us that “deep”; they just know about us bc they associate us to china/vietnam (according to the text)/geographical context (just a dot on the map like guam); they don’t care about us not unless we start to bother them, which gives them a bad impression of us (they dont worry about exports until they stink up their apartments); persona thinks they are free but if there are “barriers” when expressing their thoughts bc the americans dont fully understand them (due to cultural differences (?) )

What Is It Like Being A Filipino Abroad? “It's not all hell, but it's not all heaven either. You feel like there are good things happening, that there's progress in your life. You want to share those nice things with your family and friends who are sadly not there with you. Some of your loved ones back home can't even relate to what you are experiencing. Most overseas

Filipinos earn well but don't spend or enjoy much in order to save up and send money.” ● The experience is somehow “in-between” ○ You keep how you used to be but you are also changing to adjust to the culture you are living in. ○ This feeling of in-betweenness or liminality is a concept in cultural studies. ● A new identity comes out because of such experiences.

The Story of a Letter by Carlos Bulosan ●

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What does it mean for Berto's letter not to reach the father in time? What does it mean for Berto to say that America is great but still feel sad about being there? How does Berto's demonstrated level of English proficiency clue is in as to how his interactions with the Americans are like? Letter as a form of communication ○ Letter did not reach father in time, so is there still communication if there is no feedback?

Writing a Literary Analysis Paper ● ●

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The key here is arguing a claim. After close reading, you need to formulate a thesis statement that concisely expresses your insight about the text. In the actual essay, the thesis statement is placed ideally somewhere in the beginning and echoed in the conclusion. This thesis needs to be supported by textual evidence taken from the text. Everything you put in your literary analysis paper should highlight your insight and strengthen your claim. Hence, you should not be writing about how the text made you feel, about whether you like it or not, or if you think it is well-written or worth recommending. You are also not supposed to use the text as a springboard to reflect on life. Finally, you are not supposed to rehash or describe everything that happened in the text. Look at the author’s claims and how those claims are presented Thesis statement = concise sentence which articulates your own claim about the source Identify evidence (quotes, summaries, paraphrases) from the text you’re analyzing. Defend your claims. Write your logical argument. Avoid fallacies. Be aware of what you promised. Don’t make an argument you cannot justify.

Understanding Academic Citation ●

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Production of knowledge is the purpose of academic research. New research aims to address relevant issues and determine trends in your respective field. Citation helps other researchers to replicate the process or locate the materials. Because each discipline has different emphases, the format also differs in what they highlight. For example, MLA emphasizes authorship, APA emphasizes the date of publication or creation, and Chicago emphasizes source origins. They emphasize different publication details because of the priorities of the fields that commonly use them. MLA is commonly used in the humanities, APA in the social sciences, and Chicago in history. The more specific you could make it for the other researcher, the better. Now that the same source can be published on different platforms, all the more it is important to make your sources easy to identify. At the end of the day, academic citation, whether it's an issue of formatting or paraphrasing, boils down to information literacy.

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Understanding the "Other" ●

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What do we do when we encounter something totally unfamiliar? ○ Different reactions (positive or negative) ○ Many people nowadays easily accept differences (not all though) Otherness ○ Dichotomies, differences ○ Prejudice ○ a set of dynamics, processes, and structures that engender marginality and persistent inequality across any of the full range of human differences based on group identities. ■ Dimensions of othering include, but are not limited to, religion, sex, race, ethnicity, socioeconomic status (class), disability, sexual orientation, and skin tone.

Orientalism and Power ●

Orientalism ○ how the West, specifically Europe, viewed the Orient as uncivilized or exotic ○ we cannot deny that orientalism and othering continue to propagate, resulting in discrimination and violence against certain groups and communities.

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Understanding Performativity ●

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Our society has conventionalized certain signs to indicate identity markers. ○ For example, we associate green and red with Christmas. When we think of the word intelligent, an image of a person with glasses may come to mind. Performativity ○ Performance → Actors ○ Day-to-day actions that are unnoticed, spontaneous ○ People are supposed to act in a certain way ○ Signs aren’t natural (ex. men with short hair, men don’t wear skirts) ■ Its repetitiveness makes it “natural” ■ Mass media forms people ○ A system that punishes people who do not follow the norms and rewards those who follow

Understanding Intersectionality ●

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There are many aspects that comprise our identity: age, gender identity, able-bodiedness, heritage, nationality, religion, and so on. These aspects intersect in how they impact our lives. We may be marginalized in one or some of these aspects. These marginalizations could compound, resulting in intersectional marginalization. Intersectionality ○ Understanding social relations by examining intersecting forms of discrimination ○ Acknowledging forms of oppression, and unique forms of oppression, exist simultaneously in a person’s life ○ Understanding all roadblocks to a person’s well-being ○ It also means listening to others, examining our privilege, and knowing how others are affected by our work...