Questions after 10/8 in ENGL 190

Above is Bill Reid's sculpture of Raven releasing humans from a cockle shell.  A Haida artist, Reid was also involved in preserving artwork from this culture and participating in environmental activism.



Good evening :)

Next week will be a catch-up week so that we will have time to add to our collection of stories for the midterm and do more review.  For the next class, read Lynda Barry's "Today's Demon: Magic" in ch. 5 and Alice Walker's "Everyday Use" and Sandra Cisneros' "The House on Mango Street" in ch. 6.

I will also hand out copies of our next essay assignment, the extended response to fiction.

Finally, the study guides are going up starting tonight.

Here are a few questions for your journal.  By the 22nd, you should have six entries.  Each entry should answer two to five questions.

-- Continue to compare and contrast "Girl" and "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?," focusing on plot, character, point of view, or theme.  Feel free to use terminology.  Consider what is written on the page and what is implied.  Consider that both are literary fiction.

-- Continue to compare and contrast folklore and literary fiction.

-- If Arnold Friend is indeed the Devil, how does this affect your reading of "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been"?

-- If he is simply a not-so-young man who preys on teenage girls, how does this affect your reading of "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?"

-- Argue for or against more "experimental" fiction like "Girl."  

-- Argue for or against more conventional fiction like "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?"

-- What role does the text in "Today's Demon: Magic" play?  What role do the images play?  Why

-- If you regularly read graphic fiction (or have read some examples), where does "Today's Demon: Magic" seem to fit in?  Why?

-- Compare and contrast "Today's Demon: Magic" with either "Girl" or "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?," focusing on plot, character, point of view or theme.  What do both stories teach us about growing up female?

-- Do you believe the narrator in "Everyday Use"?  Why?  Why not?

-- Compare and contrast the stories told in first person with the other stories in second and third.  Which perspectives seem to be more satisfying?  Which seem to be more natural?  Why?

-- What role does narration play in the stories that we've read so far?  Consider Cisneros' use of a child as a narrator.

-- Discuss the family dynamics in "Everyday Use" and/or "The House on Mango Street."  Consider how much "Everyday Use"'s narrator seems to dislike Dee.  

-- How would the family in "Everyday Use" be different if the father were alive?

-- Choose a minor character in one of our short stories.  What does this character add to the short story?

-- How is genre useful when studying literature?  How is it not useful?

I'm looking forward to seeing what you have to say!

Dr. Szlyk