Writing and Power
Students will be able to critically examine and act on the relationship among identity, literacy, language, and power
Writing Response 1: The Eve of The Spirit Festival
This artifact demonstrates how personal feelings towards culture and heritage can identify one's identity.
In this response, I wrote about Emily, who neglected her Chinese heritage her whole life. She struggles on trying to accept her Chinese heritage while identifying with American culture instead. She did not have a good relationship with her father, but after he passed away, she ended up turning back to her Chinese roots. She reflects in some instances at the end, such as wearing traditional mourning colors to her father's funeral, and after having a dream of her father tugging on her hair, she asks her sister to cut it. Cutting hair had a symbolic meaning in Chinese culture as well. Although she may not realize it, the actions that she shows show that her Chinese heritage actually has emotional power over her. Her grief ties in with her identity and acceptance of culture.
I was able to explore cultural literacy in this assignment, such as the symbolism of cutting hair, and how it shows Emily to navigate through grief and find belonging to her culture. Emily's journey throughout the story shows that identity is made, and not something that is there from the start.
Paper 3: The Power of Hunger in Literature
For this artifact, I demonstrated how hunger can consume and shape one's identity, which holds power over their own life.
In this assignment, I chose to write about the Oxherd from the Seventh Night Poems, Tian from Hunger, and Jeannette from The Glass Castle. All of these characters had a form of hunger, whether it was physical or emotional, that consumed them. The Oxherd had a longing for love, Tian had a desire for success, and Jeannette had a desire to leave her life of being mistreated and living in poverty. Their hunger was not just a feeling, but rather a strong drive that influences the choices they make.
I noticed that their hunger held power over all of these characters as well. For the Oxherd, his longing for the Weaver Maid took control over the distance between them. In Tian's instance, his drive for his ambitions took over his whole life, ruining his relationships with his family, leaving him unsatisfied till the very end. However, in Jeannette's case, she uses her hunger as motivation to leave her family and to build a better life. Analyzing all of these characters shows how desire and longing can become both a source of power and a struggle.
