Discussion & Reflection

By looking through my journals I can see the growth in my writing. In the beginning my journals were more focused on just answering the prompt. It felt more like essay writing than journal writing. As the semester has passed, I have learned that journal writing is meant for me to branch out my ideas on the topic, that it doesn’t have to be so focused on the prompt. I learned that the prompt is there to give me ideas on what to write about so that I can explore my interpretation of the reading or the film. I like that my writing really does show my flow of thoughts and I like that as I write my journals I figure out new meanings behind symbols and certain elements that I originally didn’t know or didn’t have the intention of writing about. What I don’t like about it is that to me it feels like its simple writing, I don’t necessarily support all my claims sufficiently, sometimes I just move on to another topic which is a bad habit for when it comes to formal essay writing.

Since journal writing is my only experience with informal writing for a class it has helped me become a better writer by making me more confident with my writing. Before, I viewed writing as something I had to do in order to get through the class, I only wrote to pass the assignments. This meant my writing was very focused. It was mainly planned out essays in which I put a lot of thought and took time writing and revising and editing. Because of the long process of writing I always dreaded doing it. However, writing journals has opened up a whole different side of writing for me. These journals aren’t simply assignments they’re expressions of my thoughts and opinions on what I just read or saw. They let me write more freely without the worry of structure, or answering a thesis. My ideas can flow between topics and this lets me understand the reading more or appreciate the film more. This is why I enjoy writing journals. I can write without the worry of a grade or of getting off topic. Writing is created to help us express our thoughts on paper and now I can truly appreciate that and my thoughts.

Irene Redfield and Clare Kendry are truly complex characters in the Nella Larson’s Passing. The point of view in this novel, third person, also adds to the complexity/confusion. However, the point of view does focus more on Irene and how she is feeling, what she is thinking and what she is doing from day to day. This point of view still does not make it easy to understand what the characters are thinking.

In terms of sympathizing for one character more than the other, this is also hard. Irene seems like she is the more caring and loving one as she stays true to her race and identity which can cause one to sympathize her but the ending kind of turns what we interpret of Irene’s character. Is Irene deserving of our sympathy? Also, Irene is extremely judgmental; she judges all of Clare’s actions very harshly, she criticizes Gertrude, in a way, because she has married a white man over a man of her own race, she is also constantly talking negatively about her husband. She says that her husband does not care for his sick patients and also their relationship seems to be a problem because of Irene’s attitude. As readers, we do not see any romantic connection between Irene and her husband and this hints at a romantic relationship with Clare because they are often talking about each theory in a subtle but sexual way. However, this does not make Irene a caring or loving character. Also, during the dance, we can sense that Irene is jealous of the fact that everyone seems to love Clare and enjoy her company. Irene is just an overall, harsh, judgmental and jealous character in the novel. This judgement is made way before we become suspicious, as readers, that she may have caused Clare’s death. Also, Irene cannot seem to say no to Clare about anything which is not very admirable. This is also confusing because is Irene doing this because she is sympathetic towards Clare’s situation or something else?

On the other hard, the reader sort of sympathizes for Clare because of her tough situation and her ‘loneliness” that is brought up more than once in the novel. Clare chooses this life of lying and hiding from her personal identity. Clare, however, comes from an extremely difficult past. Her father dying, and her aunts mistreating her, these are all reasons that Clare is the way she is. One’s past ultimately affects their future forever. Clare’s past, along with her loneliness. has a great affect on how the reader views Clare. We see that Clare is lying about her race and identity but she still has a longing for her “black” side. Clare is always wanting to join Irene in gatherings, dances and other occasions to get to see people from her past that are of the same race and reconnect with them. Most of these actions make Clare look caring and genuine in her actions. The reader feels sympathy for Clare when Clare is telling Irene that she is the safer, wiser, and happier one. This leads the reader to believe that Clare still cares about her race and wishes she could get away from this life of lies. Clare gets a horrible, unexpected ending as she is pushed out of a window by one of the characters. Irene was jealous of Clare and this made the readers feel that Clare did not care about Irene’s feelings because she was suspected of getting close to Irene’s husband.

All these internal conflicts put together do not lead us to believe that Irene or Clare are very sympathetic/admirable at all. However, because of Clare’s past and consistent behavior, I would have to say that she is a little more sympathized but not sympathetic. Also, because Irene and Clare both made questionable decisions, I do not believe any of them are admirable. The only thing that is admirable about Irene is her connection with her true identity/race even though she may or may not have killed Clare.

After reading Passing, I can definitely sympathize more with Irene. Clare admits herself that she is manipulative and selfish. She seduces Irene on several instances and takes advantage of the fact that Irene is genuinely trying to help her simply because they share the same race. I cannot sympathize with Clare because she chose to live her life as a white woman, but relies on her black ties to get her through life. If she truly wanted to be among Irene and Gertrude, why didn’t she remain a part of their culture? She had a welcoming community that would accept her, but she chose to outcast herself for someone who didn’t even know her true self. Even after choosing to leave the community, she expects Irene to be loyal to her.

The ending of the book is unclear. I could not make out the cause of Clare’s death. Did she fall out of the window intentionally because she couldn’t face Jack after he knew the truth? Did Irene feel so threatened by her that she pushed Clare out the window herself? If Irene did push Clare, then I might change my stance on who is character more deserving of sympathy. However, if Clare brought her death upon herself, she should have known the risk she was putting herself in. If she didn’t, Irene told her on several occasions that she was playing with fire by not telling Jack of her race before marrying him.

Clare not only lied to her husband, but she betrayed her one and only true friend. By cheating on Jack with Irene’s husband, Brian, she provoked Irene’s bad side to reveal itself. When Clare threatened Irene’s family and her marriage, Irene had to put an end to Clare’s manipulations. Despite Irene’s genuine efforts to be friendly with her old classmate, Clare never respected Irene’s feelings or her person.

So far I’ve really enjoyed the topics of our journals. They really help me understand and think more deeply about the material we cover in the class. Usually when I write journals I just sit and write them at once, not really taking  breaks. My ideas sort of flow from the prompt and I write down the thoughts that come to mind. The summary journals are an exception; I usually read the piece a few paragraphs at a time and pause to summarize each section I read. One thing I like about my journals is that they flow pretty well. They are also fairly easy to follow despite not having an outline or anything done beforehand. One thing I dislike is that sometimes I feel that I don’t take my time to really separate my thoughts so some ideas get mixed together. Note taking is very different than journaling because when I take notes, I’m mostly trying to take down as much important information as fast as possible, while journaling doesn’t have a time constraint. Journaling also involves coming up with your own ideas, which note taking does not. Overall I like writing journals because even though they could be hard to get through sometimes, in the end they really do help me understand the material in new ways and are thought-provoking.

This is the first time I’ve kept a journal and weekly updated it. After I read a good novel or watch a decent movie, I often feel the need to talk about it to someone; I compare journaling to that. Writing out my thoughts satisfies that feeling. Personally, for the most part, I’ve enjoyed the idea writing out fresh thoughts on a piece of work. I’ve learned that it also helps me better understand and retain what I have read.

I do not think journaling is like note-taking. Note-taking is mostly objective writing, based on texts. However, my journal entries express my thoughts over a subject. Note-taking often gets tedious, and is something I get bored of. However, journaling is more interesting because I am expressing my, often very opinionated, thoughts on a topic.

Looking over my journal entries, I noticed some similarities with the way I write. The structure of my writing is mostly the same. Given that this is free-writing, I often do not fix up or change anything after I write it, other than for summaries. The assignments that I dislike the most are the summaries. They tend to be the longest as I often am conflicted with what to leave out. They also feel similar to note-taking and are certainly the most tiresome. The entry I liked the best was the one for Bread Givers, in which we had to compare Sara and her father. I really enjoyed the novel which is why I loved writing about it.

I actually do not like quite a few of the journal entries I’ve written. At some points, many of them seem like texts written on a whim that have not been looked over at all. At other points, it seems as though I was not properly able to create a flow and am jumping from topic to topic. Also, a few of them seem rushed and I know they could have been better written, had I spent more time on them. However, as I write more and more entries, I am getting more used to them and they do seem to be getting better. Overall, although at some points it does just seem to get tedious, I do enjoy journaling.

Journal entry-writing is one scholarly activity that I can’t say I’ve done in years, which is unfortunate because I really enjoy it. I like having the freedom to express whatever I think about something I’ve learned and/or read without the rigid, standardized parameters that I’ve come to expect to be imposed on my writing.

Even though I think my past journal entries for this class are pretty good in that they are fairly comprehensive, accurate reflections of the thoughts that I had while I read a piece of writing or watched a film, they are clearly a little rough around the edges. This is okay with me, though, because I’ve gotten the impression that these journal entries are not meant to be super polished and perfect. I’ve noticed in reading over my journal responses that my introductions and conclusions are kind of weak, if they’re even present in the entry at all, which they aren’t always.

I definitely prefer writing journal entries over taking notes. For one, note-taking is pretty tedious, and it restricts my thinking to one track, whereas writing journal entries allows me to think about the material I’ve been taught in class in a variety of ways rather than just the single way that my professor or textbook conveys the information. I also like writing journal responses because I feel like an actual human being while I’m doing it. Note-taking makes me feel like a robot, always mechanically recording what I see and hear, processing information on an unrelentingly linear, impersonal level. Also, I feel like I learn a lot more through writing journal entries than I ever would through just taking notes. I retain more information because I’ve made personal connections and reactions to the material, and I’ve thought about the material in many ways, giving me greater understanding of what I’ve learned.

The thing I liked the most about journaling in this class was the variety of subject matter. We did not just read novel after novel. I gained experience in writing about film and graphic novels. I had to think a little more when writing about these because it did not come as naturally to me. Another aspect I liked of journaling instead of taking notes is that I was able to voice my opinion. Journal entries are a bit more of an in depth look at a work. They require the writer to really think and contemplate the prompt before writing.

Note taking is also useful in its own way. While reading or watching a film it cam be useful to jot down anything that comes to mind in the moment before I forget. It can be beneficial to refer back to these notes to jog my memory. I usually do take notes while reading and I find that it helps me substantially when it comes to writing the journal.

I feel that journaling has given me a bit more freedom than note taking. I was allowed to choose a specific part of the text that was most interesting to me. Note taking can be kind of limiting sometimes because I feel pressure to cover all the material. Journaling allowed me to develop one idea further than I would have otherwise. For example, when we did the reflections on the films I was able to choose one scene that I had something to say about. My lease favorite part was probably the summaries because they felt very similar to note taking. I guess they did make me read the text a lot more closely because I knew I would have to summarize it afterwards.

Each of these techniques all have their own purpose in the classroom and one could argue that they are equally useful. I definitely prefer jailing over note taking because it gives me more freedom but I also see a purpose for note taking and summarizing.

Throughout this semester, journaling has been one of, if not, the most effective method of retaining and analyzing the information provided to me when reading the text in this course. When I write down what is being said in the novels and summarize the major key concepts and plot points within the story, I am able to understand more of what the author is trying to convey and synthesize the thematic components of the literature effectively. Moreover, the summary-style of journalling also furthers my interpretation of the text.

One of the most memorable journal entries I’ve written this past semester is my entry about Breadgivers by Anzia Yezierska because of the thematic concepts that I found in the novel and how I applied that to both the characters in the plot as well as how I interpreted them in the context of my own life. I particularly enjoyed analyzing what the meaning of the American Dream meant for all the characters as well as how that reflected in how I view that same dream in my life. Breadgivers is a novel that is both empathetic and relatable; the themes of sacrificing traditions and standards in order to achieve success in the real world is something that I connected to heavily because I find myself going through the same struggle all throughout my time in college and journaling about that relationship allowed me to express my thoughts on the subject as well as further analyze the ideal of the American Dream in an alternative way.

On a more general note, journaling is something that I enjoy doing, both academically as well as personally. However, I have a newfound respect for academic journaling because it not only focuses on recalling information from a novel or piece of literature, but it also incorporates the personal analysis and stream-of-consciousness style of personal journaling. In that way, writing journal entries about these novels has helped me develop my own literary analytical skills and go further in depth about what the text signifies and what message the author is trying to convey through various rhetorical strategies.

When comparing journaling and note-taking, I prefer the former because of the artistic liberty that comes both reading and writing journals. While there is some fluidity in the note-taking process in terms of connecting ideas, journaling’s free-range capabilities allow for a wider range of interpretation, which fosters discussion about more unorthodox ideas that come from each journalist. Additionally, note-taking focused more on transplanting information directly from the novel to a notebook, so a lot of the literary analysis that comes from discussion and reflection is either lost or stunned in the process of jotting down notes.

All in all, the process of journaling has been very enjoyable through this past semester and has helped me develop myself as both a writer and reader. It has sharpened my analytic skills as well as paraphrasing the text that I read into language that is coherent for me.

 

I have mostly enjoyed the journal entries that we have been assigned over the semester. I find it an opportunity to create a preliminary analysis of the topics of discussion for class. It allows for greater preparation and promotes discussion in the classroom. The summaries are beneficial because they imprint useful information into my memory; however, some have felt overlong and tedious. Still, its positives have outweighed the trouble. The coursework and general organization of assignments has been well spaced and has given me a strong knowledge of immigration history in New York.

I try to avoid getting in the habit of sloppy writing, so despite the informality of the journal entries, I focused on varying sentence structure and using verbals. However, I believe I could have used a more diverse vocabulary in all of my posts. In general, I am very satisfied with both the quality of my posts and the tasks we have been assigned.