Friday 6/29/12

1.) The most memorable outside-school experience I've had that has expanded and deepened my subject area content knowledge, or at least understanding of its relevance, was when my best friend, who is mexican, told me that it is sometimes awkward learning about literature that comes primarily from white males. We had a discussion about how everyone perceives his or her own reality differently in a certain way based on a variety of experiences. We discussed what is important, and how schools and teachers determine one piece of literature, or one author to be more valuable than another. As someone who does not identify with any specific diverse culture, this conversation completely opened my eyes to the reservations, perceptions, and feelings people may have when confronted with the literature most commonly taught in schools. I began to wonder what kind of message it sends when the curriculum does not contain enough diversity and the impact that could have on very brilliant students. Would they pull away out of an inability to identify? Or out of defiance of assimilation? Her very real experience called into question critical aspects of my subject area, and the importance of well rounded content knowledge. The phrase playing over in my mind right now is, British literature isn't everything, although I love it. Latino literature, Chinese literature, and a variety of other cultures all have an influence on American literature and have very current and primary relevance in our world today. When it comes to student buy-in and engagement, I think of my friend's experience, and remember the critical importance of incorporating diversity when teaching literature.

2.) The class discussion on Ball seemed to gravitate heavily towards everyone's individual experiences in high school. Though we wondered if we were off topic a bit, I find it extremely interesting how interested and thoughtful everyone became when we began to reflect on our high school teachers and high school classes. Ball makes a claim that much of our content knowledge in subjects other than what we majored in in college comes from what we learned in high school. I initially disagreed with this claim because I felt that the first two years of college, the lower division courses are all focused in different subjects similar to high school. Although I still think my opinion can be seen as valid, I was fascinated to see how many people in our class truly felt that their high school classes and high school teachers had a strong influence on the content knowledge in various areas that they possess today.

3.) I think I have officially nailed down a specific line of inquiry. My question is: Who are prominent Hispanic/Latino authors in California and how does their community and culture influence their writing? I may want to take this a step further as far as looking at what this influence has on the American Literature cannon. I am extremely satisfied with my question, I just want to figure out a more articulate way to tie in the second part of it. I am very excited to pursue this line of inquiry as I have found a significant amount of potential experiential sources. With those experiential sources I think I will find many primary sources, so right now I'm a little concerned about finding more secondary sources. As far as experiential sources, I have corresponded with professor Leon over the past couple days and she had sent me an incredible list of authors from Northern California, Bay Area, Southern California, and all over the country, with whom I am going to be able to come in contact with. She also shared with me some upcoming literary events that I can attend. For the one experiential source I need to have by Tuesday, I think I will be trying to visit La Pena, which is a cultural center in Berkeley with programming focused on Hispanic and Latino authors.

4.) I don't have any pictures or art work to add here, however I love art work and perhaps could incorporate that into my research so that I can learn more about it, and have acquire better access to it. My favorite quote is from Aristotle: "It is the mark of an educated mind to entertain a thought without accepting it." I love this quote because I feel like it articulates the beauty of a good argument, or being able to write a good paper, or understand someone else's position. To have educated conversations we need to be able to entertain a thought, that, we may not necessarily adopt as our own or believe in. But in order to understand our belief, we have to understand the counter. I can't put it in much better words than Aristotle! I think this indirectly connects to my focus question because in English, we write essays on literature, and regardless if you share the opinion with the author or with another classmate, you have to be able to understand all those opinions in order to accurately and effectively articulate your own. Incorporating diversity within the literature we present in our classrooms could spark controversy based on cultural beliefs put forth in the literature, if we keep in mind Aristotle's quote, we can keep an open mind, grow and learn something new and quite possibly even change our opinion.