Ryan

Ryan

//Assignment 1:// What is the most interesting thing you have learned since the start of this class? The various and diverse spectrum of viewpoints that each and every one of us have. I learnt through our many discussions a lot about the various aspects of a book to which we should pay attention; for instance, themes, language, word choices, style and sentence structure are all crucial in shaping what a text is and the effect it holds on its intended readers. I have also learnt how to deliver better presentations, which I believe prepares me well for IOPs and IOCs in the future.

With which points made did you agree most (in relation to the discussion re mission statements / learner profile/ UWC values)? I agree most with the point that the UWC values is made to inspire and inform potential benefactors, parents, and prospective teachers of the aims, intents, and overarching vision of the school. I also concur with the interpretation that the IB learner's profile is slightly idealistic, and while I do not feel intimidated or fearful of it, it does set lofty standards and idealistic visions.

With which points did you disagree most (in relation to the discussion re mission statements / learner profile / UWC values)? I disagree with the stance that the IB learner's profile is a tract of indoctrination, sets lofty standards which might intimidate prospective students, and supports elitism by establishing a disparity in quality between IB students and normal students. I believe that the learner's profile aims to set a standard for which IB students should strive, and inspires others to follow suit as well. While lofty and idealistic, it undoubtedly encourages students, IB or not, to be the better person.

Anything else you would like to tell us. I hope the classes will later focus more on literary works and exercises as I feel unprepared for tests that may come. Discussions and assignments should be continued. The desks and chairs should also be arranged in a fashion that would encourage participation and conversation within the class.

Essay 1 on Context and Setting of Beloved and their respective effects of a reader's interpretation and response to the novel: Nearly a hundred years before //Beloved// was written, Margaret Garner killed her own daughter in a bid to deliver her from a dehumanizing life of slavery. This act of desperation, compelled by the horrors of slavery, inspired Toni Morrison to write the book //Beloved// to remind us of slavery’s inhumanity, brutality, and the way it ultimately destroys the lives and identity of the oppressed. For instance, Sethe’s attempt to murder her own daughter speaks for the magnitude of violence perpetrated in slavery, and Halle’s descent into madness reinforces my point.

Furthermore, Morrison lived in a time where racism still ran strong in America, where the psychological horrors of past slavery still reaches to the present and rends a schism between African Americans and White Americans, fending off harmony and generating an atmosphere of animosity. In narrating the relationship between Beloved and Sethe, Morrison conveys her belief that in order to create a stable future, we must readily confront, comprehend, and make amends for the past, even if the past is harsh, brutal, and hard to swallow. Morrison proposes that Americans must learn to confront the history of slavery in all of its jarring depravity before they can close the schism and remedy the antagonism between the two peoples. She believes that Americans need to know the truth behind slavery, confront the past rather than evade it, before they can mend the divide it has left behind – a regrettable trend of racial discrimination which is still being perpetuated in our society today.

Moreover, it is important to note that //Beloved// is set in 1850, a time when abolitionism begins to come to fruition and a period in which slavery is being uprooted from America. The North was then the stronghold of the abolitionists, while the South harbored the recalcitrant racists who still adhered to the belief that slavery is justifiable. The fact that Denver was born in this period shows that they are emerging from slavery towards freedom. Finally, the setting of sweet home, which was more or less a farm, allowed for the interpretation that slave owners in the past deemed their slaves little more than animals, if not worse. It allowed the comparison between slaves and animals to be drawn, and thereby reminding us of the cruel and lamentable past of slavery which America has gone through.

Finally, the setting of sweet home, which was more or less a farm, allowed for the interpretation that slave owners in the past deemed their slaves little more than animals, if not worse. It allowed the comparison between slaves and animals to be drawn, and thereby reminding us of the cruel and lamentable past of slavery which America has gone through and has also tried to keep in hushed, diluted silence and forgetfulness.

Beloved may revolve around the events of a singular family, but its themes and setting are without a doubt, universal.