Session 11: Asian Pacific American literature

Read:

• Project Mulberry
• Siu-Runyan (2002): This article focuses on "Books that teach about the Asian and Pacific Island peoples of Hawaii". What does it add to your understanding of that population? Of the purposes and need for multicultural literature in general?
  
• Yamate (1997): As of 1997, what was the state of publishing for Asian American texts? What type of research might you do to explore whether anything has changed over the last 10 years? What themes might you find in Asian Pacific American literature?
  

Write (Group B):

• Write a questioning the text paper and submit it by the Angel dropbox by 6pm the night before class

Blogging:

• If you are a "C": Please post before the class session. The topic is "open"--you can write about Project Mulberry, either of the two readings, or something else!
• If you are an "B" or "A": Respond to at least one post from a "C" before session 12.

Publishers and books

A friend who is a librarian sent me this email and then gave me permission to post it here for our class' consideration:

Here are some interesting articles from Publisher's Weekly about publishers and books. (just in case we had any doubt that publishing was not about the bottom line...)

The Book That Takes Off Running
Read the full article at:
http://www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA6492857.html.html?nid=2788&

MySpace Does Branded Book with HC
Read the full article at:
http://www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA6493884.html?nid=2788&

Identity Crisis? Not Really
Read the full article at:
http://www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA6492859.html?nid=2788&

Manga as a genre/Different blog format

I've been poking around to see how other instructors use blogging in their literature/literacy classes and I found Everyday Literacies. Here's a link to a post two students did on Manga, a genre we aren't addressing! (Although I will bring in a graphic novel in a couple of weeks.)

I thought that it was interesting that:

• Rather than each student having a blog, all the class members are authors of the same class blog
• The writing style seems more "chatty" or relaxed(?) than the type of writing we've been doing.
• The writing seems to serve multiple purposes: collaboration, sharing information, floating ideas, etc.
  

One of the key ideas I want people to have as they leave this class is that our design choices have pedagogical consequences! After looking at this site, do you see any advantages or disadvantages to the blog's design? (Or maybe it makes sense to talk about this in terms of different purposes?)

Stereotyping Native Latin Americans in the Film Industry

The Carney Latin American Solidarity Archive (CLASA) at the University of Detroit Mercy presents:

(Sorry for the incorrect information in class! I thought this was on the MSU campus!)

Dr. Rocio Quispe-Agnoli, MSU
“The Fear of the Other: Stereotyping Native Latin Americans in the Film Industry”

Tuesday, October 30 (Tomorrow morning!)
10:00 am
Jane & Walter O. Briggs Building, Room 10

ROCIO QUISPE-AGNOLI is Associate Professor of Colonial and Postcolonial Latin American Studies and Acting Director of the Center for Integrative Studies in the Arts and Humanities at Michigan State University (MSU), and is also affiliated with MSU’s American Indian Studies Program. She earned a Master’s degree and Ph.D., both in Hispanic Studies, at Brown University. She has published “La fe ind�gena en la escritura: asimilaci�n y Resistencia en los Andes coloniales” (Lima: Universidad de San Marcos Press, 2006). She recently edited “Beyond the Convent: Colonial Women’s Voices and Daily Challenges in Spanish America” (2006). She has co-directed an intensive summer institute for teachers which, among other topics, critically examines how Latin America/Latin American-ness is represented and how stereotypes may be reinforced in K-12 textbooks and curricular resources. Dr. Quispe-Agnoli will discuss the films “The Royal Hunt of the Sun,” “Cabeza de Vaca,” “Pocahontas” (2005), and “Apocalypto” (2006), with critical emphasis on how the films portray Native Latin Americans. She will also mention how a new documentary by Nova helps to dispel myths about the Andean Indigenous past. Historians and archaeologists are discovering new data which has helped them to rewrite Incan history.

Co-sponsored by Women’s and Gender Studies

For more information contact CLASA Director Dr. Gail Presbey at 313-993-1124 or visit the CLASA Website at http://liberalarts.udmercy.edu/clasa/.

Remember to log blog activity!

This weekend I spent some time looking at your blogs and catching up on reading posts and comments. Today I realized that I wasn't systematically recording people's participation! (Good news in terms of what it says in terms of how engaged I am in your writing, bad news in terms of record keeping.)

Please continue to keep track of your posting and commenting activity on the log that is at the end of the syllabus! It will help me "catch" any work you've done that I've missed!

Weight as a disability?

I'm still thinking about our discussion about how weight might be considered a disability. (For those who weren't there, we weren't talking medically, but about how people's bodies are sorted into those that are "normal" and those that are "unacceptable" socially.)

I'm not going to do a full review, but I think The Earth, my Butt & other Big Round Things by Carolyn Mackler treats weight in an interesting way. The main character, Virginia, struggles with how people see her as well as how she sees herself. Although she loses weight in the end (trope of disability), she does so on her own terms and makes a clear statement to others about whether her body is up for discussion.

I wonder if it is "possible" to write a story about a "person of size", as I've heard say, and not have them "resolve" their weight "problem"? (Take the quotes seriously!)

This is a fun read. I would love to talk about it! (And if anyone wants to take on the challenge of thinking about size and disability, it might be an interesting project. I would want to talk about what might be tricky about how it is framed.)

Session 10: Exploring Latino/a Literature

This week we'll continue to talk about critical literacy (bring the Kuhlman article to class) and then focus on Latino/a children's and adolescent literature.

Read:

• Becoming Naomi Leon
• Ada (2003): This chapter is from the book A Magical Encounter: Latino Children's Literature in the Classroom. Why does Ada use the term "Latina" to identify herself? How is this connected to her understanding of self and history? What does she add to our understanding of the insider/outsider debate? To our understanding of the Pura Belpre award?
  
• Barrera and Quiroa (2003): This chapter is from the book Stories Matter: The Complexity of Cultural Authenticity in Children's Literature. Why is it important to consider the use of Spanish in texts? When does it enhance the text? When does it detract from the text? How might audiences of Spanish/English and English speakers be accommodated?
  

Write (Group A):

• Write a questioning the text paper and submit it by 6 pm the night before class.

Blogging:

• If you are a "B": Please post before the class session. The topic is "open"--you can write about Becoming Naomi Leon, the Ada or Barrera and Quiroa articles, or something else!
  

• If you are an "A" or "C": Respond to at least one post from a "B" before session 11.