Long Live the Family

A major theme in A Raisin in the Sun is family and the importance of it.  Almost every decision made is on the behalf of the family. Though the character's goals and desires may have different from each others, any one of them would have benefited the group as a whole.

Although an alcoholic owning a liquor store is quite sketchy, had the idea became successful it would have potentially pushed the Youngers out of poverty.  The reason why this dream isn't taken so seriously is because it came in the beginning of the book, where the family is still relatively divided.  In the beginning of the book, fights are a lot more common and Mama has to keep them together.  It is only until the tragedy at the end of the book happens that the Younger family is finally united.  They have to cope with the loss of the insurance money and Beneatha even disowns Walter, saying that "[Walter] is no brother of mine" (145).  But despite these problems they still unite to overcome Mr. Lindner's racist warnings.  The final goal of the book has turned into the house which represents the creation of one, big, dream for the whole family.

The house itself is also a big factor in the theme of family.  In fact, the whole play is done in the Younger's apartment.  The home is a very cramped one, representing the poverty and oppression, while also remotely symbolizing the togetherness of the family and their dreams. Characters not in the Younger family are still only seen in the Younger's apartment, centralizing the Younger characters.  I have also noticed that most of the bad things happen outside the home, for example Walter's drinking, Travis chasing a rat, and the stolen insurance money.  I'm not completely sure as to what this means, but I think it has to do with the idea that as individuals, the Younger's dreams aren't important.  It is only the dream of the family, of having a new house that is the most important one, and by having undesired events happening outside of the house, this is what Hansberry was trying to exemplify.  It is also fitting that the last scene is Mama leaving the house, representing the family's dream being reached.

Wealth's Corruption

Wealth and corruption seem to go hand in hand in The Great Gatsby and The Diamond as Big as the Ritz.  Money is often paired with happiness . The more money someone has, he/she is generally happier.  Another way of thinking is that money can easily solve all problems.  While all these may be true, money also causes blindness towards reality, making one think that with money, anything is possible.

Gatsby has so much money that he has no use for it.  Yet what's ironic is that he spends his time looking across the bay at another house from his beautiful mansion.  Because he has so much money, he thinks that he is able to reunite with Daisy and bring back the past.  But the reality is that he can't. Wealth's power only goes so high, and fixing the past isn't something wealth can do. Reading about Gatsby also gives the impression that he didn't live for much.  Sure he lived lavishly, but what his purpose in life and what were his accomplishments? He never got the girl, and he died at a young age. All those years of finding and waiting for Daisy goes to waste after one simple misunderstanding.

Similarly, Braddock Washington is insanely wealthy, but what does his wealth mean?  His only purpose in life is to guard the family secret, which means that he can never leave the chateau.  He becomes so consumed with his wealth that he will do what ever it takes to protect it, even if it means killing anyone who knows of it.  This greed causes him to blow up the mountain of diamond.  He
destroys all his wealth and everything he lived for just to make sure that no one else can have it.
He lived luxuriously, but without meaning.

Irony of the Past

"Gatsby believed in the green light, the orgastic future that year by year recedes before us.  It eluded us then, but that's no matter--to-morrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms farther....And  one fine morning-----
So we beat on,  boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past" (Fitzgerald 180).

I've come to realize after reading this book that it is basically all about Gatsby trying to re-create his memories.  Because of this obsession, he is essentially living in the past. Even in the very beginning of the book he is reaching out at the green light, which also represents his past.

One thing I have always wondered is why Gatsby allows all those rumors about him to keep going around. It would seem obvious that such rumors would ruin his reputation.  However, I believe he keeps these rumors to hide his purpose, to reunite with Daisy.  He literally has no use for his money.  He holds these extravagant and lavish parties attended by a hundred people, yet the only purpose for them is to attract Daisy.  In fact, the whole idea of Jay Gatsby is an illusion! We find out later in the book that his real name is James Gatz, along with the fact that he never actually went to Oxford University and a whole other bunch of misconceptions.  He is trying to get away from the "janitor's work with which he was to pay his way through college"(Fitzgerald 105) yet ironically enough he is trying to get back together with Daisy.  It's like he's trying to run away from his past yet chase after it.

I really like this ending to the book. The memorable quote characterizes the characters and people who chase after their past as boats against a current.  Unfortunately, these boats usually end up in tragedy.

The Irony of Desire

While I was reading The Great Gatsby over break, I noticed something very ironic with Mr. Gatsby.

Jay Gatsby is portrayed as incredibly wealthy, living in a "factual imitation of Hotel de Ville in Normandy"(9) with a marble swimming pool. He has so much money and owns so many things. Yet despite all this, he desires the green light.  Nick's first encounter with Mr. Gatsby is during a late night in which Gatsby is standing at the edge of his dock with his arms stretched out "toward the water in a curious way" (25).  Later in chapters four and five we come to realize that the green light belongs to Daisy's house and of the past relationship Mr. Gatsby and Daisy had together.  We assume Jay Gatsby lives a relaxing and easy life, filled with partying and fun adventures.  This isn't the case when Jay first reunites with Daisy in Nick's house though, for he becomes very nervous and loses his usual calmness. Judging from the way Jay reacts to his encounter with Daisy, it is obvious that he really does want to be back with her again, to have it be just like five years ago .  This ultimately shows that even though someone could have everything he/she needs, something else is always desired.

The Privilege of Innocence

I've noticed that a reoccurring theme The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison has been innocence.  In their innocence, children shouldn't have a care in the world. Everyday should be filled with fun and games.  For many characters in The Bluest Eye  though, this wasn't the case.  Many of them lost their innocence at a young age, changing their perceptions and beliefs for the rest of their lives.

Pauline loses her innocence when she marries Cholly Breedlove. Once she marries Cholly, her life becomes a sorrowful one.  Without Cholly to provide a steady income, she has to work very hard to provide for her family. Her loneliness also causes her to become addicted to movies, which in turn starts her obsession of beauty. She later becomes addicted with being the perfect servant for the Fishers.  Influenced by a wealthy white family, she begins to perceive everything as her own, such as the Fishers kitchen and their food.  We see that she has trapped herself in her own fantasy, just like Pecola has.

Speaking of Pecola, she is probably the most traumatic loss of innocence.  She loses her innocence when she gets raped by Cholly. The incident scars Pecola, seen by the "rigidness of her shocked body" and "the stunned silence in her throat" (162).  Once this happens again, Pecola has completely gone insane.  Another instance is when Junior takes Pecola to his house.  After a short fight, Geraldine comes in and curses Pecola out.  All of her tragedies chip away at her innocence and end up taking her mind.

Childhood is supposed to be a happy and blissful time, but when it's not, things get out of hand quick.

The Influence of Media

For the majority of her life, Pauline in The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison is heavily influenced by the media. Pauline creates many narratives to portray her life, but the problem with her narratives is that the meanings she derives from them negatively impact her. All of her pain and suffering could have been avoided if she just realized that Cholly would never be the "Stranger" from her stories.  Even her experience with with Fishers causes harm, and not only to herself.  By regarding her own experiences as more meaningful then with her own family, Pauline also hurts her children.  This is the reason why Pecola and her brother don't receive any love from Pauline, making their relationship very brittle. In fact, this is probably why Pecola calls her mother Mrs Breedlove.

Perhaps the most damaging is her addiction to movies. By watching movies, she begins to "regard love as possessive mating, and romance as the goal of the spirit" (Morrison 122).  She comes to believe that love is no loner about "lust and caring for" but rather possession and beauty.  The narrator even describes love and beauty to be the "most destructive ideas in the history of human thought"(Morrison 122).  After watching the movies for some time, Pauline begins to rank people on a scale of beauty. She goes from disregarding physical beauty to embracing it, which shows how much the media has affected her.

Meringue Pie

When I first saw the nickname Claudia and Frieda came up with for Maureen Peal, I wondered, "Is there another reason for the nickname other than the similarities between the spelling?"  Sure enough, after searching it up on Google images, I came across a small, white, and cute picture of the pie:

Does this description ring a bell? Well it should, because that is exactly how Toni Morrison portrays Maureen Peal in The Bluest Eye.  Maureen Peel is described in the book as a "disrupter of seasons", and "a high-yellow dream child with long brown hair braided into two lynch ropes that hung down her back"(62).  This passage suggests the oppression of blacks, as supported by Maureen's skin color and social status. Also, the "two lynch ropes" also stimulate racial oppression. Even though Maureen is portrayed as a "dream" child, the connotation of her descriptions hold the darker meaning of what her family really is.  Her introduction hints that her family's success is directly related to the oppression of the poor and colored.

No matter how hard Claudia and Frieda try to "restore their equilibrium", their attempts at classifying Maureen as someone equal to them will never work.  This is simply because of their differences in color and class status.  Everyone else looks at Maureen as a perfect role model, and nothing can be done to change that.  

I'm kinda hungry now, I guess this is the burden Shankar has to endure while writing his blog posts :P

Puzzle Paragraph Two

While others may say that they aren't influenced by society's standards, the truth us that they really are in some way, shape, or form.  In Toni Morrison's novel, The Bluest Eye,  she references a distant conversation she had with a girl named Pecola.  In this conversation, Pecola expresses her longing for blue eyes.  However, Toni doesn't think that Pecola should have blue eyes and tries to make it seem like she isn't profiling. Toni believes that Pecola shouldn't be a lone ranger and accept her looks as who she is.

From this forward, I can tell that beauty and color are going to be two main themes throughout this book. If Pecola keeps trying to change herself based on society expectations, then she will dig herself into a pit of hopelessness.  This pit is sort of like a casino; once someone starts gambling then it becomes impossible to stop.  I expect Pecola's path to be similar to a fire, consisting of destruction and suffering  Although this book isn't a memoir, it will still have the same effect as one.  I am sure verisimilitude will be used throughout this book as the characters fight a battle against society's norms.

What Race Are We?

Today, race is more of an explanation for cultural differences between different populations of people. Despite all of us being genetically similar, why are we all classified into races?  Is race even a legitimate way of classifying people? After all, we were the ones who set the boundaries.

What makes everyone different are environmental factors such as geography and culture.  After living in a place for quite some time, people begin to have specific changes to adapt to that area. In fact, race was used to categorize people based on different locations.  Based off of where someone was from, he/she would be placed in that race.

Now comes the problem with genetics deciding race.  This isn't possible, since everyone is genetically the same.  Just because black people can get sickle cell and whites can't doesn't mean they can be put into different categories.  People can have different skin color, eye color, hair texture, nose length, and others but these simple differences aren't enough to put everyone into separate sections.

The fact is, everyone is becoming more and more similar.  With immigration, more people have never been to their ancestor's countries or have known their culture and heritage. Despite my parents growing up in China, I don't know a whole lot Chinese culture.  But this difference doesn't separate us; we are still the same family and value the same things.  So what race does this make me?  I believe the answer to that is the "Human" race.

The Guilt of Survival

The second part of Maus deeply depicts Vladek's influences from the war.  After surviving, he gains many habits, such as hoarding and preserving everything. His conservative nature leads to many arguments between him and his son, Artie.  Now, with his father gone, Artie realizes that depicting Auschwitz is a near-impossible task. He feels hopelessness and frustration because he knows that anything he accomplishes will never be as much of an accomplishment as surviving Auschwitz.  This situation also causes a type of guilt felt by Artie.  He experiences this guilt because he didn't have to go through Auschwitz and isn't able to connect with his father experiences and trauma.  His therapist then says that maybe Vladek acts the way he does because he also experiences guilt.  Different to Artie's guilt, Vladek may feel a survivor's guilt.  On an individual level, many Holocaust survivors have to cope with this guilt, the guilt that they survived the camps yet many others didn't.  All of this guilt talk leads to Artie declaring a bigger guilt. He says that the blame of the Holocaust extents beyond the Germans, and that everyone should always feel it.  This raises the question of who really was responsible for the Holocaust? Could something have been done to destroy the concentration camps?  What could the communities in Germany have done to help the Jews? Could the Allies have gone faster?  

Whoever is responsible for the Holocaust can be debated, but whether it's the result of an army or one man, raising this question shows how wrong and terrifying those times were.

Our Default Settings

While reading David Wallace's "This is Water" story, I came across the unfamiliar term of "default setting".  Yet even though I had never heard this term before, upon reading the piece I realized that I also had this "setting".  I realize that I often view myself as the main character in this world.  Have I always been self-centered?

An important idea to come out of Wallace's "This is Water" is that everyone subconsciously believes that he or she is the "absolute center of the universe, the realest, most vivid and important person in existence" (233).  For example, let's say I am playing a video game, and I get paired up with another person who isn't as good.  I would feel quite frustrated because this is my natural way of thinking. I wouldn't think that maybe my teammate is new to this game, or that he/she just doesn't care about it as much as I do.  I realize that because of this, the world really is a selfish egocentric world. After all, life mainly is about living life to the fullest, which usually doesn't count others lives.  

I believe that if everyone looks at other people's perspectives instead of their own then the world would be a better place.  Homelessness might not even be a thing if this was the case.  The only problem is that there is no switch, and it doesn't happen on its own. Thinking like this requires a conscious effort in order to "stay conscious and alive, day in or day out" (238). People have to understand that self-centered thinking makes them slip away from reality.

Does America Love Us Back?

"That's when I realized that yeah we're different, but we're different in a little bit different way than we thought."   Spoken by Amer Zahr at a 2015 TEDxDetroit talk, he really points out the problem nowadays with racial profiling.  If everyone is created "equal", then why does racial profiling still exist?

Him recalling the young boy with a clock getting arrested reminded me of the Ferguson shooting.  The two stories are very similar.  The boy with the clock got arrested simply because he was an Muslim. That being the only reason is ridiculous. If it were some other white boy then no suspicions would have been raised, I'm sure of it.  Just like with the Ferguson incident, the officer wouldn't have threatened to shoot so soon had the offender have been another race.  Also, in Ferguson, 97% of people arrested are African American, whereas the cities population is only 67% black (BBC News). Racial bias much? I'm sure Irving and Ferguson aren't the only cities with racial profiling either, and judging from these two incidents, some major changes definitely have to happen with many police forces.

Yes, I get that after incidents such as 9/11 and the Paris hostage situation, racial tensions would rise.  But just because a small group of Muslims caused a tragedy, doesn't mean everyone should start profiling all Muslims as terrorists.  Basically, someone shouldn't be judged based on the way he/she looks. Not all men are rapists, just most rapists are men.

Is Patriotism a Good Thing?

To most people, love toward one's country seems perfectly normal, but does that mean someone from Michigan should feel brotherly love for someone in Florida just because of lines drawn by random people hundreds of years ago?  People like to wave and rally around flags, but patriotism isn't always a good thing.

I wasn't quite sure what the line, "'Those are the seeds for war", meant in Vowell's conversation with a group of immigrants. At the time, I didn't quite understand the idea of patriotism and how it could potentially start a war.  Now I know that patriotism often involves placing one's own country above others in the world.  Logically, it would seem that this kind of thinking would cause some violence.

Ideology that places people above others also sounds a lot like racism.  This is the exact patriotic propaganda Hitler used to convince Germans that Jewish people were inferior and the cause of problems.  The reason why many Germans supported Hitler is because it is easier to accept hatred when we find fault in those who provoke it.

Does patriotism even help the country?  Many countries are more patriotic than the U.S., yet we rank lower than several other countries on the liberty scale(according to the World Press Freedom Index).
Patriotism isn't needed to defend values or land in which we all share.

Now, don't think I'm not proud of what my country has done.  It's just that I have limits.  While seeing the good side of our country, I like to criticize it on its wrong doings.  However, to people who think that their country is "best in the world" and will do whatever it takes to prove it, I just don't think it is necessary.

In the Pursuit of Equality

Though equality has been something America has bragged about for a long time, it hasn't actually been around for long.  Woman suffrage was granted in 1920, and African Americans couldn't vote till 1965.  Even though the Declaration of Independence states that "all men are created equal", it intentionally leaves out slaves, minorities, and women.  Historical evidence shows that equality wasn't always one of America's strengths.  

If the Declaration of Independence is supposed to represent the whole country, why does it only account for white males?  In fact, the declaration totally contradicts itself, claiming "liberty and justice for all".  Even the founding fathers themselves had owned slaves. Still, Thomas Jefferson was prepared to criticize slavery, condemning King George to allow slave trading. Unfortunately, his criticism was deleted under a vote by the continental congress.  What did the writers have in mind when writing this document?  The declaration states that it is the government's job to protect individual rights, and upon becoming corrupt, "it is the right of the people to alter or abolish" their government. At the time, this idea was totally new.  Replacing a monarchy with a Republican government was a revolutionary change.

While "the people" today are more widely thought of, the principles of the Declaration of Independence started the American values.  Today, after countless disputes and riots, I can enjoy seeing the different cultures as I walk around my community.  Nowadays, companies will employ without bias towards races or genders, diversity is present, and everyone can decide on who the next best president will be.  While the Declaration of Independence didn't initially start equality, it laid the foundations for it.