final reflection

By choosing a different lens from what I’d normally would do, opened my mind up more in realizing that I don’t have to analyze things always in such a complex way(psychoanalytic) because doing too much can be an overkill, and looking at it simply might be the right way at times. The representation of the lens were similar for this book in that both focused on race and their controversial problems such as segregation, civil rights, and equality, but also differed in many ways. For example, Huck was written by Mark Twain, a white man, giving a lens through a white little boy in the 1860s in the south. Twain depicts African-Americans as they were during the time, slaves, but gave them the characteristics of being dimwitted and naive, almost being child-like. In Song of Solomon, it was written by Toni Morrison, an african american woman, omnisciently telling the life of an african american man in the times of the 1960’s. She illustrates them as being rich and educated, for his grandfather was a doctor. I believe if I didn’t look at the novel through this lens, I wouldn’t come to a consense that although it was satirically written, Twain presented Jim and the rest of the slaves in a very grotesque manner that is very racist. As for in Song of Solomon, I saw how ignorant Milkman was being about him being black and that thinking that just because he has money, it excluded him of the racial discrimination. Something I felt that I missed out on from focusing on this lens was how gender played. The benefit and the downside of using this lens is that I tended to combine race and economic status; if the person was white then they had to have some kind of money, but that isn’t the case. Ultimately, your race doesn’t classify how much money you have. My beliefs changed about this lens by thinking I am limited of what I’m going to write, but actually there’s many extensive things I can cover in this case. It doesn’t have to be only about that lens, but be integrated in something else and see how race integrates with that issue.

responding towards song of solomon

There’s segregation all over the book of Song of Solomon. Even though most of the limitations aren’t there in concrete form, there still a brick wall in people’s minds who don’t cross certain paths because of their race. In other terms, it’s people staying in their lanes.  The most memorable part of the novel that stuck to me was when Milkman’s family is going for a drive and as they’re looking around the area, Lena, one of Milkman’s sister asks why they’re in the region if “those are white people houses”.  Even though it's such a childish thing to ask, people as of now question the same the thing. I even do this. I feel out of place if I go somewhere that isn't necessarily filled with 'Latinos' or economically meant for me. The system of exclusion was broken, but people don't integrate with others just because sadly that's the way it is. As of now in society, we'd like to believe that most of us are pretty diverse with who we hang out with, but at the end of the day there's a big similarity we all have that incidentally groups us as friends, acquaintances, partners, etc. ranging from race, social status economically and on so forth that suppressed us.

I do relate to staying in my nonexistant hurdle because I’d feel excluded being conciously aware that there’s differences that are polar between me and others of another culture, generally white people. I think it’s a safety net for me to hang out with people who are the same as me in that sense because I know I won’t get judged, while in the view of if I do put myself out there, there’s this prolong fear of not being accepted and it can just be because I’m not white.

realization of skin color

In the excerpt of the struggle for race and class consciousness based on the novel, Song of Solomon, the author analyzes Milkman’s persona on what the story is really about. Doreatha targets his attitude about being of African-American descent. He doesn’t see what’s the purpose of having a racial identity while many thought it mattered during the critical period of the 1950s to 60s when the civil rights were beginning to be demanded. He doesn’t care about what’s occurring because Milkman doesn’t believe there’s much correlation because it doesn’t affect him directly or personally. This is indicated when he reacts to the death of Till, a black girl who was lynched stating’ “Fuck Till. I’m the one in trouble”. By saying this, Milkman believes that his problems are so much more bigger than a boy who is now dead and doesn’t see the reasoning of why people are concerned over who isn’t living anymore. As the book continues, Milkman comes to an epiphany that he can’t be cynical for he’s bigger than what he thought he was since he belongs to a group that’s brutally discriminated against.

The big eye-opener to Milkman was when he was assaulted an officer. He realizes that he’s still African-American and people won’t treat him differently regardless of what’s his economic status. This is a turning point for him in his journey of his identity of what it means being black.

doctor street vs. main avenue

Town maps registered the street as Mains Avenue, but the only colored doctor in the city had lived and died on that street, and when he moved there in 1896 his patients took to calling the street, which none of them lived in or near, Doctor Street. Later, when other Negroes moved there, and when the postal service became popular means of transferring messages among them, envelopes from Louisiana, Virginia, Alabama, and Georgia began to arrive addressed to people at house numbers on Doctor Street. The post office workers returned these envelopes or passed them on to the Dead Letter Office. Then in 1918, when colored men were being drafted, a few gave their address at the recruitment office as Doctor Street. In that way, the name acquired a quasi-official status. But not for long. Some of the city legislators, whose concern for appropriate names and maintenance of the city’s landmarks was the principal part of their political life, saw to it that “Doctor Street” was never used in any official capacity. And since they knew that only Southside residents kept it up, they had notices posted in the stores, barbershops, and restaurants in that part of the city saying that the avenue running northerly and southerly from Shore Road fronting the lake to the junction of routes 6 and 2 leading to Pennsylvania, and also running parallel to and between Rutherford Avenue and Broadway, had always been and would always be known as Mains Avenue and not Doctor Street.(4)

Morrison establishes a fine line between the two races of African-Americans and Whites. The distinction of the two is shown at the beginning of the story where the narrator sets the scene. Much confusion is put into thought to a street that is called differently to the races. The name originally given is Main Avenue, Doctor Street fits better to the African-Americans; there’s reasoning to why the name seemed “appropriate” to their eyes. However, the Whites are superior and will name the street whatever they want no matter what it’s preferably called by everyone else.

The narrator is introducing the setting of the story and begins to briefly tell the story about Main Avenue. There was always much confusion of the actual name of the street for it seemed as if it was mentally graved to the group of the African-Americans that they have an established name for it and that “a few gave their address at the recruitment office as Doctor Street”. Knowing the fact that many people believe the place is called something else shows the significance of what the name means to them. It’s a part of their culture that they don’t want to be stripped from them so they “[kept] it up”.

Although there’s a majority that the strip of lane should be called Doctor Street, the whites aren’t going to give in and change the name. Theres no doubt that there’s some folks other than the african-americans whom used the name Doctor Street, but because they don’t want to comply into their idea, they’ll leave the name as Main Avenue as a sense of subliminal supremacy. The author demonstrated how the whites, primarily the ones who were in authority of the postal service, “had notices posted in the stores, barbershops, and restaurants ...had always been and would always be known as Mains Avenue and not Doctor Street.”(4) tried to force something into the society.

unintentional flaws

Morality and adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Julius Lester exemplifies the flaws in the anti-racist reputation of the novel. Lester discusses how ‘a boy held captive by a drunken father is not in the same category of human experience as a man enslaved’. I agree with this because one can’t use that as an analogy. Although, it’s not right for a parent to be abusive towards their child, comparing slavery with it downplays the severity of that issue. In Huck’s case he is still considered a person while the people who were owned by others weren’t. They were given the sense that they were property, dehumanizing them. The negative connotation this book implements is that Twain doesn’t realize how grave slavery is by creating a false comparison between the two situations.

Twain’s “huckleberry finn” shows much of the segregated minds in the time period of the 1800’s. As Huck is taking Jim to the free land of Cairo, he begins to have an inner conflict of is he doing the right decision doing so. Based on how times were back then, Huck couldn’t have the amiable bond he wish he could with Jim due to the restraints from his societal expectations where he’d be “[called] a low down abolitionist” p.37 ; as of now, such pressures aren’t measured so extreme. However according to Lester, this internal conflict isn’t as special as Twain wants us to think it is because he wrote this book 20 years after slavery was abolished. Adding to what this critiquer is saying, many already agreed with anti-slavery at the time, but subconsciously still racist. It’s ironic for the novel to be about slavery seen through the eyes of a white boy while the African-Americans are painted child like being uneducated and irrational. Ultimately, Twain had good intentions in not creating a prejudiced scene, but did so anyway.

Final

The two novels were a fantastic experience because I only saw the book through the psychoanalytic lens, this was different since I only used to read to find the main message of the story,but I never concentrated on something so specific. The experience I learned through reading from a certain perspective, was that there can be many ideas just from looking through a critical lens, but also you can make interpretations on why things are occurring in the book. If I would of real the book through one of the critical lens I would of seen Huck Finn as a normal immature kid just trying to escape, and the Milkman as a hopeless man finding a treasure he would never be able to find. Through my lens I was able to determine that the Milkman and Huck were both trying to pursue something, Huck was trying to pursue freedom from his guardians, who in part he felt were rough on him, and The milkman was trying to pursue his interest in the gold he couldn't find. Though there were some other things, like hucks friend being a minority and some of the challenges he has to faced during the slave era, and I think I might have missed this If I was just focusing on the psyconlytical lens. Though using just the psychoanalytic lens I was trying to determine the characters emotions and mental conflicts, and try to see how that played a role in their actions, or what was the reason behind their actions. Though the downside was that I didn't really look at all the characters I only focused on the main characters. The way we used the lenses did change my view of books, because now I can read a book and look at it through a critical lens instead of  trying to figure out the theme of the story.

SoS Responding and Reflecting

The story shows less affection of milkman, he seems to be really separate from the other character. Though it is due to him being really desperate to find gold and become really rich. In order for him to find gold he leaves in a desperate attempt to hopefully find gold near Macon’s old Pennsylvania farm. I can tell Milkman wants to be rich and he wants it the easy and fast, from my personal experience I have to dealt with the same problem, wanting to be rich really quick, without having to work a lot, though it is typically hard and though it is hard, in your mind you want to continue to find any means possible to get what you want, and I see this in the milkman and he wants to get rich by any means possible even by traveling to another place to see if he can strike gold, though after arriving the place he comes to find out that there is no gold, and he eventually gives up and pursues to find the family history. Since Milkman doesn’t find gold he gives up his pursuit, he is mentally worn down since he comes to find out that there was never gold and, his mentally broken down, which is why he didn’t keep on pursuing to find gold. This shows that Milkman had a mentality change, and his mentality changed he went from being more greedy, to showing that he had more interest in the family history.

Final Project Reflection

1. What did you learn from the experience?  I learn that black people were discriminated for a really long time for no reason this even though over the time slavery stopped the racist towards black people was bad in both books Song of Solomon and Huckleberry and Finn.
2. How was the representation of your lens similar in the two novels? How was it different? The representation of my lens are similar in the two novels even though they are not in the same time periods they still relate to the and show the same topic of how black people struggle in the past and how over the time it changes the way the treat black people but they are still been discriminated.  
3. What are some things you got from the novels that you think you wouldn’t have gotten if you hadn’t been focusing on your lens? I think some of the things i wouldn’t gotten if I hadn't have been  focus in my lens would of be the way African American people in both books and how the past affected the way new generations will look at eachother and how they’ll hate each other in the future. Although this people were treated badly they came up with different ways to survive and not let themselves from the whites.
4. What are some things you got from the novels that you think you might have missed as the result of focusing on your lens? I got all of the things from the novels I don’t think I missed something.
5. What are the benefits of using a critical lens? some of the benefits of using critical lens is that you can just focus in on topic and see straight forward what you going for. What are the downsides ? some downside might be that you can be to focus about your lens and forget the other one or the other things you need to do.
6. How did your beliefs change (if at all) about your topic as the result of this project? My beliefs stayed the same because I already know the terrible things white people have done to Negroes in the past.

Final Reflection

Reading Song of Solomon and Huckleberry Finn through the Historical/Biographical lens has opened up new insights into the books for me. I had not noticed so many similarities between the books and the real world events surrounding the authors before reading through this lens. However while using a critical lens to read ones up new points of view and interpretations of the book one tends to focus on the lens and try and make connections to it from everything, which can often take away from the experience of just reading the book and cause one to miss other important points made by the author.

I learned many things about Mark Twain and Toni Morrison that I had not previously known and that I would not have learned had I not been reading through the Historical/Biographical lens.  I learned where Mark Twain took his pen name from and I learned a lot about racial history in America.

Having read both of these books before, it was a new experience and a new way to look at them and it was certainly interesting. Both of the novels reflected the authors own experiences and views on race to a certain extent with Huckleberry Finn reflecting Mark Twain's life more then his views on race and Song of Solomon reflecting Toni Morrison's views on race more then her own life experiences. Toni Morrison is writing from the point of view of a black woman and thus has an inside perspective while Mark Twain is white and writing from the perspective of a white man who knows that the poor treatment of blacks is wrong. Their different perspectives are shown in the way each book talks about race. While it is a present topic in Huckleberry Finn, the theme of race is far more prevalent in Song of Solomon. 

Final- wendy sumano

As I started to read “Huckleberry Finn” I felt as if this book had multiple perspectives and had a broader side of what was actually happening during this time period. As “Song of Solomon” was more of how the same ethnicity people interacted with one another based on their economical background. To my understanding “Huckleberry Finn” was more racist with the vocabulary used but it was not to detail of what was happening. They were both surprising due to the  new content it had that I didn’t know about but they were very enjoyable since a lot of history, not taught in schools, was brought up.

Critical lens had a very important factor in the way I read and understood the stories. As it has benefits it also has downside. As I choose Marxist lens I would of never focused on how the economy affected the their life and the treatment they got but I would have viewed the book from a  race perspective since it was something that was present all the time. I believed that if I wouldn’t of chosen the Marxist lens I wouldn't be able to understand how the social economic structure had a role among black people. But a downside that I saw for focusing on one lens was that I missed the interaction among the general roles. I was too focus viewing the book from the marxist lens that I put to a side all the other lens and perspectives.

Over all, I think this project was an eye opener because I learned that not only were they discriminated by the white people but also by their own kind when they were in a lower economical status. I learned that capitalist ideas change people and cause them to forget what they had to go through in order to be at a higher place in the social classes. People in this country in the past and now only take in consideration their profit without looking at the consequences and the affect they caused on others.

Critical Lens Expert

 Macon a greedy, self absorbed, unforgiving (and unforgiven) a man who is incapable of showing love or receiving it. Hating his wife, Ruth, ignoring his daughters, Lena and First Corinthians, and disowning his sister,Pilate, are the sum of Macon’s family connections.

     The text represents the overall meaning of Macon throughout the story. At the beginning of the story Macon shows his unappreciated attention to his wife, and his wife feels like she not present, and doesn't feel real, and that is why she needs the water mark stain to feel like she is living “she regarded it as a mooring, a checkpoint, some stable visual object that assured her that the world was still there: that this was life and not a dream.” Macon made her feel worthless which made her feel unappreciated and that's why she didn't feel like she was living in reality. The author does describe Macon as a “greedy,self absorbed,unforgiving,and hating” character which is clearly represented throughout the book as we can tell he only is that way because he got everything he wanted. As a child Macon grew up in a wealthy family and he got everything he wanted, so his young life as a result is then reflected into his future life which explains why he is so greedy, and so selfish. Macon does not have the need to feel loved or to love because he got everything he wanted as a kid. The way he acts as a husband,father, and brother is all the same he is greedy no matter what, because he's always been greedy, his mentality is the result of his childhood.