Dream Dog

The page previous to the poem by Langston Hues being introduced to A Raisin in the Sun, contained a dedication "to mama: in gratitude for the dream." The following page then contains the poem in which I, at first thought, just thought was placed there because it contained the the title of the play. Although now, after a few more looks, I realized the poem is representative of the mood created by the play as a whole. The poem although it is talking about a dream, usually something that has a positive connotation, uses words such as "sore, "sags," and "rotten," to give it a negative connotation. 

I think this goes back to how Hansberry portrays "the dream" throughout the book. The dream many times brought more hardship than gratitude. Even though the dream was somewhat different for each character, it brought many hardships. For Walter it brought into appearance his inner selfishness, for Ruth it revealed her longing for a wholesome family, for Mama it made it harder for her to pick wether to buy her dream house or fulfill her children's dreams, for Beneatha it made it harder for her family to accept her, and for Travis his family's dreams restricted his own. Although the dream is written about unfavorably throughout the book and the poem, Hansberry expresses gratitude for it. I suspect that this is because the dream brought the family together through their differences and as far as the play goes it ends with all of them achieving some part of their dream. 

Diamond Pups

While reading The Diamond as Big as the Ritz when Kismine was introduced I often compared her to Daisy. She came from a well off family who was concerned with nothing but their own wealth. Furthermore, when she and John fell in love, it led to even more comparisons to The Great Gatsby. Daisy just as Kismine fell in love with men who were not born into the same lavish ways as they were. Although while reading further into the story, one major difference stood out to me. Kismine although just as caught up in her riches as Daisy did not leave the man she claimed to love just because he was not born rich. Daisy, on the other hand, did. Once she found out Gatsby had to work for his lavish ways she quickly left him and ran away with Tom.

Although they were mostly similar, they both relied on the riches of other people to make their way through life. Kismine at the end of DBR asks John, "'will father be there?" (DBR, 113) This illustrates that even though she is still faithful to John, she can't imagine a life without her father being there spoiling her with an unimaginable amount of jewels. In a similar way Daisy relied on the riches of her husband, and at one point Gatsby, to provide her with everything she would ever want. Both characters in The Diamond as Big as the Ritz and The Great Gatsby take advantage of the riches that surround them to create a lavish lifestyle for themselves.

Gatsby's Dog

Throughout reading The Great Gatsby there were many times where I was left to simply just wonder about Jay Gatsby, but my favorite part was when he was first introduced in the novel. To expose Gatsby Nick describes him in the following way, "he smiled understandingly--much more than understandingly. It was one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it, that you may come across four or five times in life. It faced--or seemed to face--the whole external world for an instant, and then concentrated on you with an irresistible prejudice in your favor. It understood you just so far as you wanted to be understood, believed in you as you would like to believe in yourself and assured you that it had precisely the impression of you that, at your best, you hoped to convey" (Fitzgerald, 52-53). I feel that this passage, although it is only the introduction of Gatsby, shows his true character behind his purpose before you even know his purpose. I think that by describing Gatsby as having a smile that you only encounter a few times in your life represents his dedication to Daisy. It is only but a few times in ones lifetime that you come across a man who will spend his every penny and dedicate his whole life in hope of obtaining his dream girl. Furthermore, when Nick illustrates Gatsby as looking out into the external world but then solely focusing on one thing this represents the location of his house. His house is located on the opposite side of the lake from Daisy and Tom's house, but for Gatsby he did not choose this location for the pretty view of its surroundings. Gatsby chose this location for one reason, the green light on the other side that represented his hope that he would one day end up with Daisy. 

Shy Dog

Before Jay Gatsby was even introduced, the environment that he created for himself was exposed. The parties, the girls, everything you would associate with a confident young man ready to live in the now. Although Nick later confesses that he could not "see nothing sinister about him" (54). Nick continued to wonder if by Gatsby "not drinking helped to set him off from his guests" (54).

While I was reading this part of the book I wondered to myself why Gatsby would waste his money on these parties every weekend if he wasn't even going to take part in them himself, or simply converse with people. As I continued reading the book I started to realize that this environment surrounding him was not representative of his personality at all, it was more of a romantic gesture. Jay is shy, so shy that he wasted his time on all these parties in hope of one single person coming, one single woman. Daisy. To his disappointment however it didn't work, he had to go one step further. He had to have Jordan Baker talk to Nick to set up a meet up between Daisy and himself. Although even in these desperate measures he was taking to see his lover he could not directly take action himself proving his truly shy nature. I think that Fitzgerald tried to somehow mask Gatsby's character at the beginning of the book to amplify the love Gatsby had for Daisy and to make his actions more romantic.

Dog Bone

A lot of The Bluest Eye focuses on just that, THE bluest eye. Although another metaphor that astounded me was the case in which Toni Morrison uses a different metaphor of a decaying tooth to emphasize the constant pressure the black race faces to motivate themselves to conform to white culture. The author references "the poison" (Morrison, 60) that is the cause of the damaged tooth to represent the white race, the reason for the damaged inferior blacks. On top of using poorly connotared words Morrison uses colors to make it obvious what she is referencing. For example the superficial "enamal" (Morrison, 60) is making it apparent that this shiny white exterior is the characteristic that all African Americans are yearning for will always be exposed by the "brown putty underneath" (Morrison, 60). In that time, it did not matter how hard the black race tried to mask themselves as white the standard the white race kept feeding them were impossible to reach without the African American being damaged first. I think Morrison used the metaphor of a tooth on an African American because it is one of the only places in which a white color is exposed. This furthermore expands Morrison's purpose in proving that no matter how hard one may try, the true culture with in will never be escaped by soely consuming the culture of another. The feeling of being supierior leads the white race to continue discriminating against people different than them because they are the ones controlling the social norms that are being consumed by the rest.

The Dog with Two Different Colored Eyes

In the novel The Bluest Eye a lot of it has to do with the black children and even adults trying to conform to the ways of the racist whites. A lot of this desire is represented in Pecola's constant obsession with all things with blue eyes. When she is exposed to the cat its "blue eyes in the black face held her" (Morrison, 90). In that moment Pecola was reminded of herself, her dream self. Once the cat died and it was framed as her fault, it led her once again to believe it was because of her physical appearance. If only she had those blue eyes people "mustn't do bad things in front of those pretty eyes" (Morrison, 46), she wouldn't have been framed for its death. Pecola thinks that if she looked more like the people who are harming her emotionally, she would be superior to where she is now. What Pecola is asking for is the ability to be able to cause others to have the close to the same about of emotional and physical insecurity as she has. Her wish to have the blonde hair and blue eyes of white people really illustrates her wish of obtaining the same power they have, over words, and over people. As of now Pecola has no strength, not against other people, and not against herself. If Pecola can't even fight against the words of her own brain, how can she fight against the words others superior to her?

The Blue Eyed Husky

This week we started reading The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison and I was and still am shocked at the accuracy of her writing. Even though the book was written in a different time period where there was more racism against blacks and whites, a lot of the ideas still apply today. Society constructs a deffiniton for beauty where you have to have a certain skin tone, hair color, eye color, sense of style, etc.

To be beautiful in The Bluest Eye you had to have "sole green eyes, something summery in [your] complexion, and a rich autumn ripeness in [your] walk" (62). Today, some of the same rules apply. I remember when I was younger I was talking to my friend about our eyes. He began to tell me about a new surgery in which a layer of your eye could be take off so that the result would be blue eyes. Not going to lie, I was fascinated. When I was little I always saw these beautiful celebrities with bright blue eyes and new hip clothes and I always wanted to be like them. I think that for little kids especially it is easier to succumb to views of society due to the constant exposure to "beauty." Although for those kids who do not have the recourses to mimic their role models they are left thinking that they are nowhere near beautiful, which I think is the biggest problem in society.

Polly the Dog

During class we started a discussion over the kind of things each of us played with when we were little. Some of the things listed were: Barbies, Bratz, Pokemon, Polly Pockets, and figurines. At the end of class we came to the conclusion that it was more of the girls that played with such unrealistic toys. Although it might have applied to many of the guys in our class, I disagree.

When I was growing up I had a friend, who was a guy, that ALWAYS wanted to play Polly Pockets with me; this differs from the wide known stereotype that only girls play with such toys. I would gladly agree to play and we would begin playing with "once upon a time Polly did this...and then that." Back then and even up to today, I have had to keep my promise to him that I would not tell anyone just because he thought everyone would make fun of him.  That is what I don't understand, why can't an innocent boy play with a toy he thinks is fun? Why is a toy such as a pink elephant associated with a baby girl, why not a blue elephant? Emily Prager used rhetoric through asking herself and her readers the same "what's wrong with this picture?" kind of questions. Jesus did not create the two genders with a specific color or toy picked out for each. I do not think that gender matters when relating how much a boy or a girl played with toys, I think it was just a matter of what they thought was fun.

Breeds

This week I was asked a question I never really put much thought into, is race a socially constructed concept? At first my immediate answer was yes because I have been raised not to discriminate against others. So I thought this conditioning to think of everyone as equal was what caused be to think that we all weren't equal in the first place because why else would I have to be taught that. 

Although then I thought about it, even if society didn't teach me to try and look at everyone in the same way, it would be inevitable to oversee the physical differences we all have. The factors that determine these physical differences are not constructed by society, we do not pick the color of our skin, the color of our hair, the shape of our eyes, etc. This is all genetics. I therefore believe that race itself is not a socially constructed concept but rather the stereotypes that we give each race is what is being socially constructed. As presented in the picture above Art Spiegelman states "was he really a German! Who knows. It was German prisoners also...but for the Germans this guy was Jewish." In this case the way the German is portrayed changes from a mouse to a cat. The way animal looks says nothing about them, its solely the stereotypes that go with each that changes their true view.

Sniffing for Jews

When I first opened "Maus," I didn't think much of it. I saw some pictures and some words that went along with the pictures and I though oh okay this for once might be an easy read. I was wrong. After I read a few pages of the book and further discussed it in class I realized that the use of words and pictures doesn't make it an easier read, in fact it gave it much more depth.

The words individually told a story, the pictures on the other hand told their own story as well, but when put together they told one story that told the story of a thousand others. "Maus" did not illustrate the experience of just one Holocaust survivor, it serves a greater purpose of telling the story of all of the Jews, Poles, Germans, and anyone else that was involved in the Holocaust. Each picture gave a different perspective with a different representation of each person. Wether a mouse, a pig, or a cat, each was depicted in different ways. By allowing for there to be different ways of interpreting each picture and its meaning it shows that although each person involved in the Holocaust had their own experience it all revolved around a few key factors. Art shows a frame of a cat and says,"framed photo of pet cat. Really!" This shows that in previous panels the portrayal of germans as cats was on purpose and served as one of the key factors that gave each panel its meaning. The words that went along with the pictures simply allowed for the reader to apply the individual story of Vladek to what they interpreted from the picture about all of the representatives of the Holocaust.

The Bleeding Dog

In "Woman Warrior" by Maxine Hong Kingston she symbolizes the true love Fa Mu Lan had for not only herself but for her fellow citizens with the color red. Various times she uses phrases such as "I saw my back covered entirely with words in red and black files, like an army, like my army." Fa Mu Lan looks past the pain she went through while those scratches were being carved into her back and how she had to sacrifice her body for these people she was fighting for. She looks at the red on her back as being the bleeding passion she has for fighting for what she believes in for a better outcome. I believe the black represents her schemes in making the government believe she was a man in order for her to live to be a warrior.

Kingston shows a different view of feminism by using the color red to represent a love different from the one most women think of. When most women think of the word "love" they think of meeting the perfect man who has all the right qualities to support her and their future lives. Although in this chapter she Fa Mu Lan does get married it does not distract her from her true purpose, it empowers her to fight harder.  Kingston represents love as being a passion that leads Fa Mu Lan to do things that takes more guts than any man could have. A different perception of feminism is portrayed in this piece through the use of the color red and its symbolism.

The Dogs on Their Leashes

I was born in Romania, my parents were born and raised in Romania. Despite how beautiful the country is, while my parents were growing up it was under a harsh communist rule. The citizens of the country had little to very few rights. My parents always tell me about the harsh conditions they lived under such as the limited amounts of electricity they got per day, each family only received half a liter of milk per day, depending on your license plate number you were only allowed to drive certain days, and much more following these harsh conditions.

                                                            

Henry David Thoreau wrote about the importance of civil disobedience in "On the Duty of Civil Disobedience." Based on his ideas he thought that men "think that they ought to wait until they have persuaded the majority to alter them." In the case of communism the action of one man against the government would most likely get him killed, so of course they need a larger force in order to conquer the government. The majority of Romanian citizens and citizens of other communist countries all were against the government but for a long time they did not have the power or opportunity to oppose the government. I think that it is not so much that men feel the need to wait for others to take action, I think it is more that men need to have time to confide in their fellow citizens. I also think that if a revolution took place at the wrong time it would not work out in the favor of the brave citizens.

 

Lady and the Tramp

In the Declaration of Sentiments the point the author was trying to get across was not just to convey her feministic views on the world, but to draw other people's attention to it. Elizabeth Cady Stanton states that, "he has endeavored, in every way that he could to destroy her confidence in her own powers, to lessen her self-respect, and to make her willing to lead a dependent and abject life." To imply that women stand together as a group she refers to them as "her." She does so to give her audience the opportunity to think of who he or she refers to as "her" and relate that women to the things she is describing in her passage.

Although I don't agree with the author for referring to women as a group when talking about such an opinionated topic. She is implying that all women feel this way and all women experience such things, but that is not the case. Many women today unfortunately do not view feminists in the same positive way as they would view someone who isn't afraid to voice her opinion.  Many of these other women that oppose feminism treat these active feminists worse than a man would. I'm not saying that what feminists were and are still fighting for doesn't exist, because there are many cases in which it does apply to certain women. I agree with feminists in the sense that women deserve to be treated just like men are, and in today's world men and women are almost equal to each other. I just do not agree with stereotyping mens actions towards women to be an attack on the whole gender as a group, represented by "her."

Dog Tags

Thousands of soldiers die each year, and to aid the family and loved ones of each of these brave souls, memorials are created. As stated in Postcards from the Trenches memorials serve in "closing one of the most important gaps separating the experience of soldiers and civilians." Memorials also serve as a way to pay the soldiers respect for sacrificing themselves for the better of others. Although the death of these selfless people is tragic, it also gives other civilians hope. It is an example of how, with some sacrifices of course, if you believe in something enough you have to fight until you succeed.

I believe that memorials are not always perceived in the same way, but that is the beauty of it. Each family member, each loved one, has a different memory of who the memorial is representing, but each memorial only has one physical state that represents all of those lost soldiers. Although the physical features of the memorial will not change, those features are open for interpretation. By allowing for the memorial to be interpreted it gives those who are grieving a chance to connect with those who they have lost and the ability to relate a piece of the memorial with their loved one. As Postcards from the Trenches also states, "death can only occur at the site of life." The reminiscing of those who have died could not occur without a friend or family member giving time out of his or her life to remember the deceased, and this is what i I think the purpose of a memorial is.