FINAL BLOG POST

Walking into women’s literature I wasn’t sure of what to expect. I had some stereotypical views as did I am sure most of the class. I though that this class was going to be about women empowerment and well, feminism. Ii was way wrong. This course talked about way more then women. This course brought up the issue of the struggles between yourself and society. This course I believe related to finding you. All the books had one central theme in common, the struggle between society and yourself. Precious from push had to overcome stereotypes and what every teacher though or assumed about her, Rosa had to overcome her past, each of the Maribel sisters had to essentially hide from society what they truly were. Each book related to this theme of struggle. This course dealt a lot with the human emotion and the internal struggles inside one self. Eve Ensler talked a lot about this struggle. In all three works we encountered this course Eve used this as her central theme. In The Vagina Monologues, Eve tried to use an uncomfortable subject, vaginas, to try and prove her point. Eve showed us that as a society women are looked down upon. The Vagina Monologues was all about taking back the word vagina and empowering ourselves to stand up for ourselves and not play into society, and to love your vagina. The final movie we watched was so moving. In the movie Eve followed women as they went through prison. In this movie I discovered that there was a lot more to each of these women then their crimes. This goes back to the theme of the class, we labeled each one of these women by the crimes that put them into jail but by seeing how each of the women interacted with Eve made me see past their crimes and into themselves. The title of this class I believe is like the title of one of the books we read. I labeled this class when I first walked in as a women’s study class, after the course however I learned that there was tons more to the class then just learning about women in history. I took so much out of this course and the main thing was not to let society influence what I think of others as well as not let society label me. This course allowed me to see how people’s backgrounds influenced them such as Allison in Fun Home, Precious in Push, and Rosa in The Shawl.  Women’s studies left me with many valuable lessons about society and myself and I believe it is so important to take these lessons and relate them to my life because it will make me more aware of others emotions. This course can be related to men as well as women. This course is about society as a hole.  Women’s study is so important to learn about people and their emotions, this course showed me that fist impressions are not always right and that where you come from doesn’t designate where you are going. In Two or three things that I know for sure we see how Dorothy is struggling to get through life and to not let her family define her. Dorothy forged her h=own path and we see that it defiantly wasn’t easy for her, but she made it through and she was so much happier as a result. Precious showed us all that we can defy the odds and by having one person believe in you it will make all the difference in the world. Having that one person believe in Precious allowed her to go on and get an education. Coming to terms with your past was a major part of The Shawl. Rosa had to overcome what happened to her in the concentration camps to be able to move on with her life. Rosa had to relive her past as well as understand it to be able to move on. Although our past is very important it doesn’t not define us and one needs to understand their past before they move on with their future. 

Dorothy Allison post

Two or Three Things I know for sure was a very relatable book in many ways. This book was all about Dorothy Allison coming of age and growing up and discovering who she was. I enjoyed seeing the difference in attitude between the beginning of the book as well as the end. Also in the novel towards the end of the book you can see a transformation in photographs. In the picture of aunt dot and the mother sitting on the steps you notice how miserable they were and how they almost look to tired or fed up to keep going on throughout the day, they looked as if they had nothing to live for. I feel that this is crucial to Dorothy’s growing up. Dorothy must have had it rough, she was trying to create a different path from the rest of your family and that is really hard. By the end of the novel you see Dorothy in a picture with her partner and their family. I feel as though this picture is a complete different representation of family. This picture Dorothy looks genuinely happy. I feel as though everything Dorothy did in her life is so her and her family could live differently. I feel as though Dorothy wanted to beat the odds and not do what everyone else in her family expects her too. I think that Dorothy had expectations for herself when not many people did. I think this relates directly to Push by Sapphire. In Push precious had to defeat the odds in the same way as Dorothy. The major difference between Precious and Dorothy is that Dorothy had expectations from herself and not her family and precious had no expectations from anyone other then Ms Rain. I think that having expectations within yourself dictates where you want to go, if you have no expectations you will stay where you are but if you want something you have to go for it and fight because it you don’t fight for something that you want no one else will.  “Two or three things that I know for sure, and one of them is how long it takes to learn to love yourself, how long it took me, how much love I need now.” Self love and giving yourself the love you deserve is a big step for everyone to learn because having this self love/worth allows you to fight for what you want, and this is what allowed Dorothy to live the life she wanted to live.

Two or three things i know for sure

I really enjoy the photos in the book two or Three Things I know for Sure. I think the pictures help tell the story of her life just by looking at them. Ever since I was younger I always believed a picture could tell you everything that you want to know. I think that throughout the book with each picture you saw a new part of Dorothy’s life. You see her growing up as a hopeful child and then throughout the years you see how her facial expressions as well as her wardrobe change a lot as her life progresses.  I also thing the “two or three things I know for sure” sections tell a lot about Dorothy’s philosophies.  “Two or three things I know, two or three things I know for sure and one of them is that to go on living I have to tell stories, the stories are the one sure way I know to touch the heart and change the world. I think that this is the main purpose of Dorothy Allison’s book. I believe she told the story to instill leasons upon the rest of the world. I believe she wanted everyone to see that her life wasn’t easy. “Two or three things I know for sure.” I believe is an idea Dorothy Allison wanted to show her readers that she only know two or three things but when she knew them she knew them and she wanted to share her knowledge with the world not only to tell her story but to  change other people. This autobiography is very relatable in many ways. This book allows you to relate to family, hardships, good times, as well as bad times this book shows you that, like Dorothy, you can go against the odds and against society. “Two or three things that I know for sure, and one of them is that I would rather go naked than wear the coat the world has made for me.”

THE SHAWL

Reading “The Shawl” put the word survivor into a whole new perspective for me. Rosa demonstrated that being a survivor was as much of a positive thing as people think it was. I think that Rosa had it harder than the non survivors. Every day Rosa had to live with regret and hatred and she tortured herself. Rosa lost everything in the concentration camps her family, Magda, and her relationship with Stella. Through all of that loss she also lost herself. I don’t think people think enough about the after affect of surviving such traumatic events.

I believe that the study Stella made Rosa partake in was degrading and horrible for Rosa. I think Stella only had selfish reasons. Stella wanted Rosa to stop blaming her for the death of Magda. I think looking back at her experience at the concentration camps would be a valuable thing for Rosa. I think that Rosa needs to confront her past head on and also she needs to take all of her internalized anger and tell others about it she needs to talk to release all of her repressed feelings.

I am very confused by the ending of the novella. After Rosa saw the shawl again Rosa had all of these visions with Magda. Ozick made it seem like as soon as Rosa saw the shawl Magda came alive. I believe that seeing the shawl again brought back memories for Rosa and helped her cope. I think that coping has a lot to do with surviving and having to learn how to live when everything is gone is also very important.