Required labor: 58 minutes.
1. (23 minutes) Finish the film. 2. (20 minutes) Go back and find a particular scene or a 3-5 second clip that was interesting/moving/confusing to you. Pause it on that one frame, or replay the clip, and write down everything you notice about that frame or sequence of frames. Are there people? How many? Are they scattered? Grouped together? What other objects are in this scene? 3. (15 minutes) Then, write a paragraph thinking about what message the director is trying to convey in this frame or sequence? How does this sequence or frame help you think about power, place, and community in the film.
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For September 28, 2017, please read to the end of page 17, just up to "The Snow Episode" (80min). If you, finish before the 80 minutes are up, go back and reread and/or annotate. Zitkala-sa's writing is beautiful and is packed with complex and layered ideas. Then, by Thursday at noon, write a response under our Class Discussion tab thinking about the theme of our course: power, place, and community. Questions you can consider are, What is Zitkala-Sa and her mother's relationship to space before she goes to school? How does it change? How is she and her community disempowered over the course of the narrative? (45min.)
Post a brief reflection/free write on the following: What was your experience of reading each of these pieces? What kind of sources does Teju Cole use in each of these essays? What role do the sources play in the piece?
. . Extra points (in my heart, mind, and soul) if you comment on something one of your classmates has said-- acknowledge a point they've made, agree, disagree, clarify, expand, or just notice! Cartographers
Scholars of Gender/Women's Studies Theologians: Religion & Difference Critical Race Scholars: Race, Othering, and Alterity in Mandeville’s Travels Cartographers: My Cartographers! You are responsible for giving the class a map of Mandeville’s World. Begin your cartography adventure at the beginning of the book, from the first section I’ve assigned you to read. Where is Sir John Mandeville in the world, roughly speaking? Where is he headed? Then begin to map his world. You may have to revise and redraw parts of the map as you revisit later sections in the book. (Hint: Leave room to the East) Once you have finished mapping the regions, situate some of the main beings/creatures/animals/people one can find in those regions of your map. Labels are fine, but if you’re ambitious you can draw. :-) Once you have finished, start discussing the following questions: What kind of map is Mandeville’s Travels asking us to visualize? Is it possible to map the Travels onto a modern map? Why or why not? What do we understand about Mandeville’s world from this map? How does reading the Travels help us make more sense of a map like the Hereford Mappamundi? Scholars of Gender and Women’s Studies Scholars, we need you now more than ever! Thank you for helping us understand the complicated representation of women in the Travels, and Mandeville’s attitude towards women. How does Mandeville treat womens’ bodies in the Travels? What purposes does he see their body as serving? Turn to pages 123-124. Is there power in a woman’s body in the Travels? What kind of power? How are women disempowered in the Travels? Consult pages 123-124, and page 175. Of course, add in other passages, as well. Turn to the chapter on the Amazon p.116 Are the Amazon women sexualized? If so, how? If not, then how does Mandeville perceive their bodies? What do we know about an Amazon woman’s vision of the world? What role do men play in this world? Do women have power here? What does that power look like? Under what conditions can they have it? The Travels are packed with people and beings that Mandeville portrays as Others. One of his objectives seems to be to capture just how Other the various people in far off lands are. Are women Others in the Travels? Some of you may think they are. Some may think they aren’t. Discuss this in your group. Make sure you take each other to passages that prove your point. Is there anything consistent or static about Mandeville’s attitude towards women? Theologians: Religion and Difference Esteemed theologians, I have asked you here today to help us better understand the religious politics at work in Mandeville’s Travels. Sir John Mandeville is curious, interesting, even obsessed with documenting his observations of the way people practice their faiths, what and who they worship, and why. Understanding Mandeville’s relationship to Christianity and non-Christians beliefs is crucial to helping us understand John Mandeville’s vision of the world. Begin by reviewing the sections you were assigned. As a group, make a list of the various people who observe a faith other than Christianity. Make sure you put page numbers by them, so you can direct the class to the appropriate passages. Then, focus on Mandeville’s portrayals of Saracens. What parts of their faith does Mandeville document? What does Mandeville use to understand Saracen belief? Mandeville transcribes a full conversation with the Sultan. Does he do this anywhere else in the selection that you’ve read? Why is this conversation so important for Mandeville? How does his analysis of the Saracens compare to his study of people of other faiths. Pay attention to Chapter 32, “Of the goodness of the people in the isle of Bragman.” Turn back to the Prologue of the Travels. What does Mandeville lay out as one of his objectives for writing the Travels? Does this change the way you read his analysis of non-Christians? If so, how? Where in the world does Mandeville find Christians? What do you make of this? Scholars have repeatedly referred to Mandeville as “tolerant and fai[r].” Would you agree? Would you disagree? Why? Critical Race Scholars: Race, Othering, and Alterity in Mandeville’s Travels Begin by reading the additional print out I’ve given you. Then review the pages you were assigned. As a group, start to make a list of Others in Mandeville’s Travels. Think about race: What racial markers does Mandeville use to describe the various people he comes across? You may detour and consider what a racial marker even is. That’s Ok. It’s a very important question. Is there a value prescribed to various skin tones in the piece? Is there a racial hierarchy? If so, what is it? Direct us to the appropriate passages. Consult the handout I’ve given you. According to Mandeville, why are people in Nubia black? Where else do you see such a relationship between peoples’ physical appearance and the environment? Close read this passage word by word. How does this passage help us understand Mandeville’s vision of the world? What role do Others have in shaping Mandeville’s world? Why is it important for us to know so much about them? Where are most of the marvels and Others located in Mandeville’s world? Why is that important? Sarah Giorgi's Paragraph on Place: The view is awe inspiring, like something out of a painting in the Louvre. You can touch the clouds, smell of pine, hear the birds. Surrounded by all this magnificence, you feel as small as an ant. The land spreads out in all directions from beneath your feet. And although you are at peace, you can’t help but feel fear: fear of bears, fear of loneliness, and fear misdirection. Yet all these emotions are nothing compared to the beauty that surrounds you.
Close Reading Analysis: By opening the piece with the words “the view,” Sarah Giorgi allows us to believe she is already present at the location, observing it. At first, our position to the author is one of an observer who does not have direct access to the view itself, but has access to the author’s experience of it. This abruptly shifts, however, when the second sentence begins with the second person pronoun, “you.” The pronoun drags us into the piece. In fact, we find ourselves replacing Giorgi. She is not observing us as we engage with this view. However, we cannot yet visualize what is before us. Giorgi offers us visual details by way of the auditory, olfactory, and touch senses, and not by way of sight. In other words, the view materializes before us through our experience of it and not just our ability to see it. We realize there are clouds because, she tells us, we can “touch” them. We learn there are “birds” because we can “hear” them. We imagine “pine[s]” because we can “smell” them. The piece is packed with opposites. “Magnificence” is perceived by way of embodying an “ant.” Land moves “out[ward]” despite being “beneath [our] feet.” We experience “peace” while we also feel “fear.” We are isolated, yet surrounded by birds and the possibility of bears. And so, the movement back and forth between opposites and extremes leaves us unsettled. She asks us to respond to the sublimity of the place, of the unknown and unreliability of the place by settling into it, by immersing ourselves in it. But perhaps what is most interesting in this piece is that Giorgi likens a very sensory experience of a place to “a painting in the Louvre.” While a painting in a museum can be beautiful and even awe-inspiring, there are few ways we can experience a painting other than seeing it. We cannot touch it, or smell it, or hear it. This comparison, then, redefines the way we understand Giorgi to experience artwork in a museum as much, if not more, than it portrays her experience of the world at large. In fact, there is no better way to understand Giorgi’s view of the world than to unpack her final sentence: “Yet all these emotions are nothing compared to the beauty that surrounds you.” “Emotion” is compared directly to “beauty.” For Giorgi, experiencing the beautiful moves well beyond the visual. It is an all-embodied experience. Dear all,
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