Day 14 February 20, 2003
1. Names. Midterm—distribute and discuss. Be sure to get names of those not there.
In the News: as usual, various things going on. Embargo on Michael Jackson news today.
How about this one?
http://www.theonion.com/onion3604/nfl_star_homicide.html
And what do we think about this?
http://www.heritage.org/Research/Welfare/em860.cfm
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/19/nyregion/19PULS.html
2. Last day on Color Purple. “My first response to this book is that I'm surprised I actually read it.” Gotta love it. Side note, perhaps, on reading . . . college is a lousy time for recreational reading, I know; professorial life isn’t a whole lot better. But if you can work some books into your life, summers, vacations, whenever, whatever kind of books you find yourself drawn to, you won’t be sorry.
First, let’s take a little time for questions about what happens. Some journals indicated a little confusion about events . . . everybody clear? In the great tradition of cliffhanger novels, we think Nettie is dead, but she’s just missing . . .
Next chapter, 180 ff: showdown #1 with Albert. “It’s time to leave you and enter into the Creation.” He tries to put her down again, but this time she has an answer.
Aside on Harpo trying to rule over
Albert
tries to slap Celie, she sticks him with her case
knife. What will people think? Shug; “Why any woman give a shit
what people think is a mystery to me.” They laugh at the men.
Sofia’s youngest, Henrietta, isn’t Harpo’s.
Squeak will go North too. . . and
(One of the fascinating things about this book is the way “family” keeps being defined and redefined. It’s much more a matter of who loves who than who is legally or formally bound, hmm?)
The turning point might be on 187: Celie’s curse: Albert says “you nothing at all.” She says, “But I’m here.” She’s possessed, it seems; the winds come to her aid. She finally decides not to be a victim, though not without help.
Celie comes to her strength partly as she becomes a writer, as she learns to express her feelings and her human worth. The centrality of speech and communication to this novel: from being so isolated that she has to write to God, to talking to Shug, writing to Nettie, talking to Albert openly and on the same level, not him giving orders. Her cursing him is a big step, claiming the right to speak and to power.
193:
work, money, friends, love, time. One sort of “happy” ending would
stop somewhere around here, or jump from here to Nettie and the children
returning. But no. The plantationizing
of the Olinka; Nettie and Samuel marry; so do Adam and Tashi;
they go to
And
Shug takes off with Germaine, for one last fling, leaving Celie. It’s hard for
her, but it does allow her to form some kind of relationship with Albert.
(238). And Eleanor Jane, the white woman who hangs around
247 Albert says: “I think us here to wonder. . . . The more I wonder, the more I start to love.”
Also,
a longstanding quasi-literary theme that goes back at least to Keats and
Shelley: the duty of hope.
As I just read in Kathleen Norris’s The Cloister Walk, despair is itself a sin, traditionally—the idea that the world is just doomed and we can’t do anything about it, which sometimes passes for knowing sophistication, she argues is just a lame excuse for idleness. 128-129.
In what ways does the book play against stereotypes or predictable outcomes? Celie’s reconciliation with Albert? Her drifting away from Shug? The book doesn’t end with a re-formed nuclear family, does it? Or does it?
And think about a key issue that we’ll be talking more about: where do we locate responsibility? If people have tough lives, how much do we expect them to pull themselves up by their own bootstraps, how much do they need help from “outside,” formal or informal? The set of questions at the AAWN website, fascinating in what they suggest. http://aawn1.tripod.com/
Do you think it treats men unfairly? Which men in particular? Certainly it focuses on some black men’s attitudes and behaviors as a problem for black women.
What allows Celie to develop? Love and work, Freud said, were the secrets of adult happiness . . . she develops relationships, confidence, she makes money, she finds out she can do things others value.
*Where and how does it suggest liberation and transformation come? What are the stages that Celie goes through? What resources does she discover? What changes for her, and what has to change within her? How do others change around her? Margaret Atwood, “to refuse to be a victim.” Shug can’t liberate Celie without her help. Celie forces Albert to confront his actions, and he turns out to be less than completely worthless after all.
1. Recognize the oppression.
2. Learn to hope. The need for models: Shug, Sofia.
3.
Avoid violence as vengeance,
4. Love and solidarity: Shug, others
5. Work and independence: positive action away from victimization.
6. Forgiveness and reconciliation as equals. Refusal of hatred, recognition of the humanity of the adversary. Albert and Eleanor Jane need liberation as much as the oppressed.
What makes it possible for Albert to change? “You know meanness kill.” He gives her the last letters. He starts to treat her like a human being, rather than a possession.
How might we connect this book with other things we’ve read and discussed? What about J/H and the possibility of change without or with lessened violence? What does it suggest about possibilities for working things out, for changing attitudes and behaviors, for mending the disastrous inequalities that blight so many peoples’ lives?
Student Responses
Erin Weber
I really have enjoyed
reading the Color Purple. It really touches on many
aspects of life. And the greatest
impact I had from it was that no matter
what the hardships and turmoil
one has been through, you can rise above and
find yourself.
One can see a link between
Miss Celie’s life and the entire Civil Rights
movement. Here we have two oppressed
objects, dealing with life and putting
up with whatever is thrown
their way, ranging from rape, beatings,
injustices and a basic miserable life
with no meaning or hope for a better
future. In the end however Miss
Celie stands up to Albert (Mr.), in a
triumphant confrontation that you can
tell has been held up tight inside her
for so long just waiting to get
out and make a difference to better her life
and to show that she has the
strength to rise up against this oppressing
power that was held over her for
so long. And that is similar to the Civil
Rights, finally action was
put into place, people were tired of being
oppressed and treated as if they were
the scum of the earth, when the only
thing that made them different
was the color of their skin. After Celie has established her new found life and
has risen above, you can
see how everyone now looked at
her different and now had a respect for the
women that she was and really
what she had always had been… a survivor. And
when she is reunited with Nettie
and her children, the story can close with
the hope of the future looking
remarkable and full of promise.
In the News: http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/19/nyregion/19PULS.html
The New York Times:
Economy Is Tough All Over,
but in
By LESLIE EATON
This article really informed
me of something I really didn’t know what was
going on. In NY, the recession is
going strong and is even in danger of
getting worse. As the rest of the
country begins to rebuild itself up from
the recent recession, NY has an
all time low unemployment rate, and business
is just not getting better.
two years — more than the
population of many cities. The unemployment rate,
which in the spring of 2001 had
fallen to 5.3 percent, has been climbing
steadily and jumped to 8.4 percent
in December. Many jobs have been
eliminated due to a chain reaction of
larger corporations closing, which
leads to their food service
departments, janitorial and other staffing needs
being out of work. The number of
households not on welfare but receiving
food stamps, which some analysts
cite as an indicator of a bad economy, has
risen 20 percent in the last
year, to 124,000.Over the years other
surrounding states have been in similar
situations with NY, but this time NY
stands alone and the hope for the
future is not looking bright.
The book really strikes me in many ways. The book has some really graphic detail that I am not used to in any of the books I have read for either fun or for school purposes. The format of the book is new to me as well. I am not used to the whole book being letters, but to be honest it is not as bad as I thought it would be. I will say that the book has caught my attention and does keep me interested, this is something that is hard to do. I sometimes find myself questioning what I have read due to the graphic nature, I have never encoutered this before in any book. But I do find the book enjoyable.
Zach Simpkins
Getting though the book was
an overall good feeling. I really
enjoyed the reading novel. While I heard
some talking about the dialect of the writing being hard to get through, I
wasn't too bothered by it b/c I had to read Huck Finn for Survey of Am.
Lit. and
compared to trying to read through Jim this wasn't so bad. The part of the book when all the letters
from Nettie come into play I was confused as too why
they were in there, I kept thinking: this could be another novel in
itself. The end seemed to bring them
together alright, but I did seem to think there were alot
of the letters from Nettie. I really
enjoyed the part of the book when Celie up and told Mr. Blank off... It kinda gives a good feeling to the reader to finally Celie
stand up for herself. I also enjoyed the
part where Celie teaches Mr. Blank how to sew, I found
that to be really humorous. I almost
laughed out loud when Mr. Blank told Celie that when he was younger, he spent alot of time with his mom and would sew. It just seemed
funny b/c of how Mr. Blank's character is portrayed through out the novel.
http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=20030224&s=easterbrook022403
This article is about the idea of a
hydrogen cel car.
The author spoke about the problems involved with having hydorgen as a fuel source.
The first problem is about how hydrogen doesn't appear on earth in its
natural form, and that inorder
to get it we must use energy, usually fossil fuels to get it. He stated that this creates a double problem
because most of the time scientist get their hydrogen
from separating the atoms of natural gas, which is a fossil fuels, so there for
we are using double the fossil fuels to create hydrogen. He later said that we could use wather, but siad that water
requires an incredible amount of energy to separate. He then went through and discussed the
problems invovled with using fossil fuel, solar
energy and necular power to separate water and get
hydrogen.
Laura Prickett
I actually really enjoyed
reading “The Color Purple”. Even though
I had
read the book previously, I
still found a lot of the story line very
interesting and I think that I
understood and interpreted it differently
this time when I read it. It had been a while since I had read it the
last
time and I was surprised how
much I had forgotten about. It is kind
of hard
to respond to the entire book
at once, and I almost wish I could have
written different responses as I
read, because the book covers so much
information and so much of a time frame
that it is hard for me to think back
to all the different parts of
the book.
I think that it was very interesting how the other started out
the
characters in the book, and it was
intriguing to see how they adapted and
matured at the story
progressed. Celie came along way from
the beginning of
the book to the very end. I also found some of the situations between
Celie
and Shug really interesting,
and at some points they were just plain weird.
I guess it is just hard for
me to think of women in that time period
exploring into what could be
considered homosexual tendencies. I
don’t know
if I was too young to
understand the last time I read the book, or if I just
don’t remember that being such an
important factor in Celie and Shug’s
relationship. I think that it is very unfortunate for Celie’s character
that she felt the way she did
towards men, not that she can be blamed for
those opinions. Stories like this are what shows how deeply
affected
children can be when horrible things
like that happen to them as a child.
I really enjoyed reading about how Celie grew and progressed as
a
character, and I like that she
learned to stand up for herself and her own
opinions with Shug’s
help. I almost got the impression at the
end of the
book that Celie really ended up
learning to love and appreciate Albert in a
new and different way. I found it really interesting how their
relationship
evolved through the story and by
the end turned into a genuine friendship.
I thought that the letters between Nettie and Celie were very
touching, and I loved how they still felt as though they had a connection
although they
hadn’t seen each other for
years. I have a sister of my own, and I
do feel
that there is a special bond
there that can never be broken, and I found the
faith they had in each other very
inspiring. I wish that there would have
been more to their reunion at
the end of the book, but I think one reason
the author kept it short and
slightly vague was because the reader already
knew who special and spiritual
their bond really was, so she didn’t need
stress it at the end. I kind of feel that it was just to give the
story the
last bit of closure that it
needed.
~Amy Rodabaugh
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A32508-2003Feb19.html
Ryan Whitaker
Response to letters 70 –82
In this section,
Shug’s concept of God is a lot different from Celie’s. Shug is more personal and empowering. Unlike Celie Shug does not describe God as a white man really Shug does not put any type of race or gender with God. Instead Shug believes that people see God in their own way. Celie’s recognition that she has control over who she think God is and does not have to like the religious viewpoints that she gets handed to her and is an important step to find herself respect.
Celie’s assertion comes out in this section. The moment that defines her as a person is the speech she gives to Mr. Blank, which contrasts with her silence and the assault on Mr. Blank contrasts the years of agony that she took when she was a slave. He tries to tell her that she is a weak helpless and ugly black woman, but Celie resists the hurt he tries to inflict on her with the words he says. Basically the speech she gives in reply to what Mr. Blank says gets him to rethink things that he has done and helps him to turn his life around and starts trying to do well in the eyes of people.
http://www.theonion.com/onion3604/nfl_star_homicide.html
Is the above story for
real? Whatever notions this man has
about Christianity, he is crazy! How can
any person possibly think that by killing someone, they are doing God's
work...especially when the victims have done absolutely nothing wrong! I would have to say that D'Aundré
Banks is insane. However, that would not be a good plea in court because then he
would get off on insanity. But, really,
and truly, he must be crazy if he honestly thinks this way! I don't know much about "The
Onion", so I am wondering just how much of a stretch has actually been put
on this story. Just reading it makes me
mad. What kind of an example is this man presenting to the world about
Christianity? He is a reason that
non-Christians remain non-Christians.
They see the acts of "Christians" and think they are no
different. Unbelievable.
As for "The Color
Purple", the book itself is very disturbing...However, I was glad to see
everything pan out for the better in the end.
I was beginning to wonder whether or not Nettie was really going to be
coming back. A few parts of the book
were slightly confusing...like the explanation of how Samuel got Adam and
Olivia and how that related to how Alfonso was not Celie's
dad. Perhaps I just need to read that
part again. I took pity on the people in
Miranda Thorn
I really liked the ending of the book, The Color Purple. It was very empowering, because we’d read this whole book about Celie living this horrible life – however, as the end of the book drew closer, she gained more power and more confidence in herself. I also really enjoyed the scene where she, for the first time, stood up to Mr. ______. I thought when she started making pants too, that it was very empowering for her. She now had a purpose in her life – a profession. One thing that I found very interesting was near the end when Celie and Mr. ____ started talking and having a good relationship for once. I thought that was really, really neat. Celie didn’t just get out of that bad situation of living with him, but ended up starting a new, healthy relationship with him. The religious part of the book was also neat – how Nettie ended up becoming very religious, and I think that rubbed off on Celie in the letters, and led Celie into really believing in God – not just writing to Him because He was the only one who would supposidly listen.
One article
that I looked up was from the New York Times, and it was about how the antiwar
protests that were held all over the world haven’t
swayed Bush’s plans for war against
Erica Wiebe
When I first started reading the
Color Purple I had a hard time getting use to the style it was written in. After a while it got easier to read and it
went very fast. It really got interesting
when Celie found the letters from Nettie that Mr.________ had been keeping from
her. It was really interesting to see
how Nettie fit into the story. I was
wondering how the author was going to tie the whole book together by writing
letters. I think that it ended up coming
together very well. It was interesting
how religion started to play a part in the story with Nettie going to
http://www.heritage.org/Research/Welfare/em860.cfm
The article that I read was about
drug abuse among welfare recipients. The
former Governor of Michigan introduced a procedure where people that apply for
welfare are tested for illegal drugs. If
they were found to have drugs in their body they were not turned away but
instead provided with appropriate treatment options. The only way that they would not get the
money is if they refused to take part in a rehab program. The president said in his state of the union
address that he wants to increase the amount of money used to help people
overcome their drug addictions. However,
there needs to first be a way to identify those who need help. There is a need for this testing and rehab
programs because a lot of people on welfare buy these drugs. The Governor’s idea could reshape the welfare
system and how to give people more than just money but also a way to change
their lifestyle.
Kristen
Washington