Author: gandy.8

Text Review – The Poisonwood Bible

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The Poisonwood Bible, by Barbara Kingsolver, tells a story of how a cultural exchange defined by imperialism, power, and racial prejudice goes horribly wrong through the eyes of the five female main characters. The book follows the Prices, a white American family of missionaries, on their journey to the Congo in the early 1960s. Nathan Price is husband and father to five Price women and very fundamentally Christian and Western in his understanding of gender roles and his duty to bring Jesus to the Congolese. Orleanna, his wife, and their four daughters Rachel, Leah, Adah, and Ruth Ann are reluctant, but agreeable to Nathan’s mission.

The Price family soon find themselves as unwelcome outsiders in the village of Kilanga, and Nathan’s hellbent commitment to his abrasive and condescending attempts at evangelization cause a seemingly never-ending litany of struggle, and danger, for the family. On the national level, Congo is fighting to fight off the influence of outsiders as well. The government is in a fight to regain power from imperialist Belgium who had colonized the country years ago, and the Congolese leadership working to take its place refuses the support of Western, capitalist influence in the country any further as it would never fully free them of colonial rule. This creates an environment where white outsiders are even more unwelcome, and the Price’s feel the effects of the unrest in the country.

The Poisonwood Bible offers a unique look into the power dynamics which are at play both in Kilanga and nationally in the Congo by allowing each of the women of the Price family to narrate their time in the village. Through them, we as readers come to understand the personal biases of each they’ve brought with them from the United States, but also the toxic influence Nathan has on them as well, and how they compromise this as they learn to understand the people and culture of Kilanga. We might not have otherwise got this perspective had an external narrator told their stories. Adah, Leah’s twin, is mostly mute during her childhood and her chapters offer the only true insight to her perspective and understanding of the events that happen in the village other than her family’s interpretation of her voice. The book ends with the stories of each Price woman following their climatic exit from Kilanga. Whether back home in Georgia, or around the world, each woman offers a reflection of what happened to their family and a new understanding of the very real consequences interfering and exerting power on another culture can have. This is what Kingsolver hopes we as readers can reflect upon as well, as we have over the course of this semester in this class.

Week 11 Context Research Presentation – American Responses to 9/11

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Ryan Garza, Flint Journal
(https://www.mlive.com/news/flint/2011/09/ten_years_after_sept11_attacks_1.html)

Following the terrorist attacks on the United States on September 11, 2001, Americans were left reeling. Though a total count would not be known for months, 2,734 people were declared dead as a result of the attacks (cdc.gov). The events were also the first of their kind to be perpetrated in the United States, and Americans were left with feelings of anger, sadness, and fear. Many Americans chose to respond to the attacks and these emotions with new obvious displays of patriotism. Flags flew outside homes and businesses, signs, hats and t-shirts were adorned with phrases like ‘Proud to be American’, all in an effort to unify the country in a display of strength.

There were also definite impacts on our popular culture following September 11. Patriotic songs soared into the top music charts as new anthems for freedom. Whitney Houston’s rendition of ‘The Star Spangled Banner’, originally released in 1991, reentered “the Hot 100…shot up to #6 selling over 1 million copies (and) earning an RIAA Platinum award”

billboardchartrewind.wordpress.com

(billboardchartrewind.wordpress.com). The now-infamous song ‘God Bless the USA’, originally recorded in 1984 by Lee Greenwood, made a “Hot Shot Debut” at spot 16 in both the Hot 100 and the Billboard Hot Country Singles charts (billboardchartrewind.wordpress.com). While movies and television shows cancelled or delayed releases depicting a terrorist villain for a period after the attacks, just a few years later came a number of titles such as The Hurt Locker, War of the Words, and 24, depicting American protagonists in a war-torn setting exacting justice on often foreign enemies creating chaos (Ellis, vox.com). The shift in popularity of these kinds of films and shows following 9/11 perhaps suggests “Americans wanted patriotic affirmation, but not images of potential consequences…(T)hose films began to establish a pattern of portraying torture and war as unfortunate, but necessary” (Ellis, vox.com).

Also born of the terrorist attacks was a new fear and mistrust for anyone believed to be an outsider in the United States, especially those perceived to be from the Middle East. What was originally patriotic displays of unity and resilience gave way to what could be called “hypernationalism”, which can be associated with intolerance of minorities and their ideologies and religions, and with warmongering (Li and Brewer 727-8). New restrictions and targeted screening processes were put in place in airports, and there was massive support nationally to initiate military action in the Middle East, a move that had little support outside of the United States. Li and Brewer found that the presence of “heightened patriotism” in those with a common purpose was also linked to “heightened nationalism and less tolerance for internal diversity” (729). The consequential actions of both the United States government and its most fervently patriotic citizens following 9/11 would support this theory.

 

Works Cited

BillboardGuy. “The 14 # 1 Singles of 2001 and Remembering September 11, 2001.” Billboard Chart Rewind, 26 May 2020, billboardchartrewind.wordpress.com/2020/04/20/the-14-1-singles-of-2001-and-remembering-september-11-2001/.

CDC. “Deaths in World Trade Center Terrorist Attacks — New York City, 2001.” Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 11 Sept. 2002, www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm51spa6.htm.

Ellis, Lindsay. “Movies, Patriotism, and Cultural Amnesia: Tracing Pop Culture’s Relationship to 9/11.” Vox, Vox, 9 Sept. 2016, www.vox.com/2016/9/9/12814898/pop-culture-response-to-9-11.

Li, Qiong, and Marilynn B. Brewer. “What Does It Mean to Be an American? Patriotism, Nationalism, and American Identity after 9/11.” Political Psychology, vol. 25, no. 5, 2004, pp. 727–739. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/3792341. Accessed 30 Oct. 2020.

Diary of Systemic Injustice Showcase: Women as Others in STEM fields

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@cleaselmy male classmates love listening to my input and letting me finish my sentences ❤️. true respectful kings 🥰. ##fyp ##womeninstem ##misogyny ##men♬ original sound – Claire McDonnell

The story of a recent Tiktok post gone viral has highlighted how women are still considered to be an ‘other’ in certain fields. The article, written by Tanya Chen for Buzzfeed News, chronicles the recent experience of Claire McDonnell attempting to work on a group project with her male colleagues. McDonnell is a graduate student at The University of Iowa in a program related to science and finance. While having a conversation over Zoom, Claire attempts to contribute to the conversation on multiple occasions, however, she finds herself consistently spoken over, ignored, or dismissed by her male group partners. Despite Claire having “worked in commercial underwriting for years, and [the assignment] was the same thing (she) did in that role,” she is still only one of four women currently enrolled in the program (Chen). This is all too common when considering the amount of women in STEM fields.

While the number of women in STEM has increased from 1993-2010, the rate at which men have increased is such that the percentage growth for women is minimal.

According to the National Science Foundation (NSF), while the number of women in STEM-related fields has “nearly doubled over the past two decades” (as of 2010), it has narrowed the gap between men and women in STEM careers only slightly (nsf.gov). When considering all STEM-related fields, women make up 28% of working professionals. While this is a 5% increase in female representation since 1993, it is still quite small considering the growth of jobs in STEM fields, and in some fields the percentage of women has actually decreased because the growth of men occupying these positions has significantly outpaced that of women. When considering pay equity or minority female representation in STEM, we can further see the extent to which these groups are truly othered in these professional fields. On average, women in STEM fields make between 25-33% less than men in the same positions, with slight variance depending on their education level. Women with the highest degree possible in their field make about 25% less than men with the same education, which is a slightly smaller gap than other women in STEM experience. (nsf.gov)

Female representation is still relatively small, and men have long been the dominant voice in those fields and use that power to speak over the contributions of women. These sentiments resound in the comments of the video recording McDonnell shared to the platform Tiktok, with scores of women commenting their similar experiences and sharing their feelings of frustration and anger at the actions of McDonnell’s colleagues (Chen). In The Second Sex, Simone de Beauvoir asks, “Why is it that women do not dispute male sovereignty?” One commenter on McDonnell’s video challenges her to do as much: “Literally keep talking. Do not stutter. Speak as if they aren’t saying anything. Keep talking until they realized they’ve interrupted you.” (Chen)

 

 

Works Cited

 

Chen, Tanya. A College Student’s TikTok Has Gone Viral For Showing Her Male Classmates Repeatedly Interrupting Her On Zoom. 2 Oct. 2020, www.buzzfeednews.com/article/tanyachen/stem-college-students-tiktok-interrupted-by-male-classmates?utm_source=dynamic.

de Beauvoir, Simone. The Second Sex. Excerpt from “Introduction”.

National Science Foundation. “Science and Engineering Indicators 2014.” S&E Indicators 2014 – Chapter 3. Science and Engineering Labor Force – US National Science Foundation (NSF), National Science Foundation, Feb. 2014, www.nsf.gov/statistics/seind14/index.cfm/chapter-3.