Writing Blog

        She/Her        20 

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Blog 15: A comparison of Leonard Cohen films

The first movie about Leonard Cohen was Marianne & Leonard: Words of Love by Nick Broomfield. It was focused on Marianne and her relationship with Leonard. There was no real focus on the other women in his life and he was not glorified or vilified either. It seemed as if they tried to make him appear more human by showing his victories as well as his mistakes. It was a heartwarming story considering how Marianne ended up happy even without him and how even though they had a very complicated relationship, they still had love for one another in the end. They finally recognized the role of his muse Marianne and gave her the credit she deserved while depicting her as a somewhat strong and independent woman, even though they did not go into details about her as a person.  

On the other hand, the movie Ladies and Gentlemen... Mr. Leonard Cohen by Don Owen and Donald Brittain was solely focused on Leonard Cohen. Marianne was not particularly mentioned if at all. It was filmed all in black and white and in a way that reminds me of the early 90s. The target audience seems to be people who were already fans of him and just want to immerse themselves even more without being challenged on their idealized perspective. Leonard is being glorified, they only put forward his accomplishment and virtue. They talk about him being a vegetarian and how his interest in people was genuine and how funny he was amongst other things.

It almost feels as if both movies are not talking about the same man. In Ladies and Gentlemen... Mr. Leonard Cohen, he does not seem to have any real problem and seems to always be perfect without hurting the people surrounding him. The other movie talks about an artist looking for something he could not quite reach and causing pain to the people around him, especially Marianne. This one seemed too much choreographed and idealized, especially with the last scene where Cohen explains that it was just a performance.

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Blog 14: McCord Museum

After I visited the McCord exhibition “Indigenous Voices of Today: Knowledge, Trauma, Resilience”, I was inspired to try and learn a little more about Indigenous languages. The first and last videos are really what inspired me the most about learning one of their languages. It was in French and English and hearing their language mixing with them was a very beautiful experience. It made me sad that I could understand everything except those parts where I needed to read the subtitles. Understanding someone and their culture often starts with connecting with them and doing so while talking each other languages. It is also a mark of respect especially considering how it is our fault as descendants of colonizers that their culture is disappearing. Therefore, I am starting to learn at least a few words until I have the time and opportunity to take a class on the subject.

The first step to achieving this was finding how to get the information. I wanted to learn the language of the nation that lives on the land used by Montréal. This language is the Mohowak language called Kanyen’keha[1]. I am used to going on the app store and finding a dozen of applications and finding a hundred books in libraries to help me in my quest of learning a new language. For Kanyen’keha there was nothing, I was discouraged before even starting. It was incredibly frustrating and it made me sad to consider how hard it was to have access to education on this language. After a lot of research, I found a website and this is where I learned how to say “thank you”, “hello” and “goodbye”[2]. I plan on continuing my learning in the hope of having an actual conversation in their language.

[1] Green, Jeremy. “Kanyen'kéha : La Langue Mohawk.” L'Encyclopédie Canadienne, 4 May 2018, https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/fr/article/kanyenkeha-langue-mohawk.

[2] “Glosbe Dictionary.” Glosbe Dictionary - All Languages of the World in One Place, https://glosbe.com/.

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Blog 13: Angelique reading exercise

In class, we did this same exercise and we choose the scene where Angelique tried to befriend Manon when she comes to get her famous fish recipe. We chose it because it gave great insight into Manon's character and how once again Angelique was being hated for something she had no control of.

I have redone this exercise at home and chose scene twelve where Angelique and Manon sang together and get stopped by Therese. I chose this one because doing the activity in class made me realize the details that I missed of their relationship and how the scene would have looked since it is mostly stage directions.

It was different than the in-class experience since it was my interpretation and it that was not directly influenced by anyone else I could imagine the scene better but I could also still keep the emotions that I imagined they would have had.

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Blog 12: Pilates as a break

While I was working on writing my other blogs, I decided to take a break. This time though, instead of just scrolling through my phone or trying to meditate again I did pilates. I went into it thinking I would be exhausted afterwards and have no motivation left to write. Since usually when I train, I relax afterwards.

 Instead, I was pleasantly surprised by how productive I felt. It was as if I had just saved time. I think my choice of physical activity also helped since pilates includes less cardio. It is similar to yoga, but while only activating specific muscles to achieve repeated movements to have a better balance and more strength. While I was training, I was completely invested in the movements and I stopped focusing on my blogs to simply follow the instructions. When the one-hour class ended, I was happy to start writing. Since my muscles were getting tired, I could now take a break to physically relax.

 The most important aspect that I did not take into consideration is that writing takes mental effort and that pilates take physical effort. So even though there were no moments where I was doing absolutely nothing, it still gave me a break since I worked through a different sphere of myself. I will definitely be doing this again, especially when it seems as if I do not have enough time to train. When I have a lot of exams, I usually stop training completely and get consumed by my studies instead. Now though, I know that by doing this I feel way more productive and still feel like I got a break and relaxed.

[apathtohealing]

Blog 11: Meditating as a break

I have already meditated before but I never quite succeeded at it. Every time I intended to fall asleep when I could not so I would try to meditate to bore me into slumber. Therefore, I am not expecting much out of this, but I figured that a video guiding me through it in a different context might work better. Since this time, I will be writing my blogs for 30 minutes, then take a break to meditate for 30 minutes and then write for another 30 minutes.

 As I expected, it did not work at all. Every time I tried to follow the instructions, I just could not do it. When I had to control my breathing to try and be in sync with the videos it seemed as if I forgot how to breathe and I would be stressed out instead of relaxing. Then, when I gave up and just breathed normally, the voice was so slow and tame that I would get distracted. My mind would start to sing lyrics from the musical I watched the night before called tick, tick… BOOM! by Lin-Manuel Miranda. I was stuck inside my mind with nothing stimulating enough to focus on apart from the constant loop of lyrics.

 Finally, when the clock ticked its last second and relieved me from the hell of the past half an hour, to say I was relieved is an understatement. The only thing that I did not expect and that brought me joy out of this experiment was how glad I was when it ended. I went back to writing with joy since I could finally do something that I considered productive and stimulating.

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Blog 10: Review of The Sighlence of Sky by Anana Rydvald

The Sighlence of Sky was a very minimalist play. There was only one performer who played three characters and the only props were the three masks to differentiate them. There were also sound effects and a big screen behind the stage that displayed some words that brought clarity to the story. I was very surprised by how clear the story could be with just a few props and a single performer. I loved when she took the mask of the daughter, put it on her shoulder and turned her back to the spectators as if the mother was hugging her daughter. I was completely amazed by the simplicity of it all while still being incredibly clear as to what was happening. I think the stage was built in such a small space, because of how minimalistic the play was. If the performer had played on a very big stage she would have seemed lost and would have run around way more. The space used was more controlled this way and as a spectator, I felt as though it was easier to concentrate on the only performer and the little details since there were no distractions to focus on instead.

I was also shocked by the physical violence included in the play. One instance of this was the rape scene. The performer managed to make us understand such a terrible act without showing any real part of it. Sky gets undressed, following the demands of the man who brought her upstairs, and then from her body language of discomfort and the sudden closing of the lights made us understand that something really bad happened.

In my everyday life, disability is not a subject that I am confronted with, but it has always been a relevant subject. Working towards educating people to erase the stigma around it is something that can only do us good. It touched me to see such a personal perspective of how parents can deal with having a disabled child.

[apathtohealing]

Blog 9: Careers in English A response to readings of Nov 9

Since I know I won’t be continuing in this particular bachelor's degree and I also do not know exactly where I am going university-wise, I will do this exercise as if I would complete a bachelor's degree by accumulating certificates. I was quite surprised to learn in the presentation that it might be possible to become a translator with any bachelor’s degree. Therefore, I decided to look into it in depth to know exactly which steps I should follow. To start my research, I found the prerequisite of the OTTIAQ[1] to be a licensed translator. The simplest way is to have a bachelor’s degree of translation from any university in Québec, but it is also possible to gain the title with a master in translation. The prerequisites for the master's are to have grades of at least 3.0 on 4.3 and have either a bachelor’s degree of translation or a DESS[2] of translation. Therefore, at first glance, I seemed non-eligible, but I looked into the DESS before coming to a conclusion.  To my surprise, to be accepted, any bachelor's degree would work. Therefore, no matter which undergrad 3 years program I end up completing, it would make me eligible as long as my French is deemed good enough and that my grades are at least 3.0 on 4.3.

The plan would then be to finish a bachelor's degree and then do the DESS. Then I could apply to the master and then apply to be a licensed translator and start their certification process. This is good news for me, considering how I keep changing my mind and finding new interests. So even though I will not finish the English literature bachelor, I just learned that with any three certificates I could still end up as a translator without needing to start everything from the beginning. This is also why I will not take any steps right now to help me achieve this particular career since I am still unsure about this path.

[1] Ordre des traducteurs, terminologues et interprètes agrées du Québec 

[2]Diplôme d’études supérieures spécialisées

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Blog 8: BEANS by Tracey Deer

Watching the movie BEANS was a very peculiar experience for me. It was one of the rare film where I found that every scene stood out. It was also the first time that I got any information on what happened in the Oka crisis and how indigenous people were treated. It was a beautiful and insightful movie that touched me a lot. Even though I was already informing myself and trying to help how I could, this gave me a feeling of urgency to do so. For the first time, I could really see how we, as French Canadians, treated them horribly wrong and how not long ago this all was.

With that being said though, the scene where they get lynched in the car is the one that I found the most shocking and one of the many where I cried. I just could not believe that people could do such a thing. Even as I am writing this, I find myself at a loss of words to describe the way it made me feel. It is so inhumane and cruel. They were not just angry while screaming insults and being disrespectful. It felt like pure hatred and utter disgust towards Indigenous people. They were physically endangering them and kept going even though they could see them through the windows crying and terrified for their lives. The police were doing nothing to help, they were not arresting them, they did not even try to calm the situation. Some of them even laugh at all of this. It was shocking to see how someone whose job is to protect can just ignore people who need help because they are racist and want to see them suffer. It was incredibly sad and terrifying to know that this happened on such a scale since it was not only one bad police officer, it was all of them present.

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Blog 7: English Literary Lecture

The event I went to was a student conference called “What Literature Teaches Us About Gender, Race and Social Normes” from the class ANG 7921 dissertation seminar on Wednesday, November 17th at the UdeM building called Lionel-Groulx. There were many readers with very interesting points, but I will solely focus on one, which is Crystelle Cotnoir-Thériault whom I already had as a teacher in the previous semester. When I saw that she was going to take part in the seminar I started to really look forward to it. I loved her as a teacher and her analysis always made me rethink the text we had read. Therefore, I was just feeling very grateful to have the occasion of learning from her again.  She did not let me down and even exceed my expectations. Her lecture was called “A Knight Disarmed: Lancelot’s Vulnerability in Malory’s Morte Darthur”. It was about a text I had previously read excerpts from in her class and even though I had already heard analysis from it, she brought a completely new perspective. It was about the feminization of Lancelot through his rape and through being bedridden from his injuries. She brought a very original point of view and made it seem so obvious even though when I read it, I did not make those connections at all. I was pleasantly surprised of learning new things about this text to the point where I would go to another lecture about it as long as it is Crystelle who is giving it. Even though the audience got to ask questions, I did not ask any since she explained everything so well that I felt as if I understood it all. The only aspect that I would have appreciated that was missing is to have a PowerPoint visually supporting her lecture. My mind tends to wander around and that would have focused my attention more on what she was saying at all times.

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Blog 6: English Literary Reading Event

There was a literary reading event called Montreal review of Books – Fall Issue Launch where three writers read aloud some of their work. It was on November 16th at 7 pm as a YouTube live event from the Atwater Library and Computer Centre Westmount. The authors were Eli Tareq El Bechelany-Lynch, Helen Chau Bradley and Tara McGowan-Ross and they were presented by Malcolm Fraser. Before the event I was dreading it, I expected it to be an elitist event. I had a very stereotypical idea of old white men talking about their poems that I could not quite relate to or even understand. It was also part of the reason why I chose to attend the online live event instead of going in person. I thought I would feel out of place. To my pleasant surprise, it was the total opposite. The authors were young and interesting and it made me regret not meeting them. Something that I enjoyed about every author was seeing their style and then hearing their text. It was fun to put a real person behind those words. It is also very interesting to hear how the text was intended to be read, with all the pauses and intonations at all the right places. The only downside from this event compared to reading the stories myself was that I could not binge-read everything. They were only excerpts and the interruption from the rest of the crowds also put a distracting effect to it. Overall, I felt more connected to the text than I usually do by reading them myself, since the text seemed more alive. The author who struck me out the most was Tara McGowan-Ross with her memoir called Nothing Will Be Different. For someone so young who does not have any particularly grand achievements to be writing a memoir is such an interesting concept. It highlights how everyone has something to say and that it is worth listening to. She made it so captivating that I even bought her book.

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Blog 5: Work somewhere you don’t usually work

As an experiment for class, I went and worked somewhere I do not usually do. I briefly thought about working in a park, but I figured it was getting too cold outside for me to sit around without doing anything physical to stay warm. I also contemplated the idea of working in a café, but I figured that I would get too distracted by other people's conversations.

Which is why I ended up trying to write an essay on a bus. It was the kind of fancy vacation bus that went from Montreal to Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu and the ride lasted for about an hour. I thought it would be quite easy considering how I am used to reading in public transportations. It was also going to be a long uninterrupted ride in comfortable seats so I assumed it would cause no problems. I thought it would be a ride with very little to no distractions since people do not speak or listen to music aloud in those buses. This is why I was pretty shocked by the results. It was an incredibly unproductive experience. I seriously underestimated how easily I get distracted by nature and by the back of other people’s heads. I caught myself staring at trees and realizing that 15 minutes had passed without me writing anything. Then I would manage to write an argument only to then stare at people's hair colour trying to figure out what I should dye my hair next.  At least, I still managed to do a plan for my essay and put my major arguments in bullet points. The problem was that I could not concentrate for a long enough period of time to actually create good sentences that worked with one another. All things considered, it was still a good experience. I did end up in Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu even though my essay was not finished and I also knew that I was going to go blonde the next time I dyed my hair.

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Blog 4: Why study literature?

Why study literature? I waited a long time before responding to this question, so long that I even submitted this assignment late. At first, I thought about giving a very generic answer focusing on how literature is a door to other worlds and how I wanted to participate in spreading such an escape from reality. The real reason, at least if I am being honest with myself, is that I am only here because I was scared. I was scared of committing to another university program and not liking it. I was scared of disappointing people by changing my major again. But I knew I loved reading and I knew I was good in English so literature was the easy path. I could commit to it without being scared of quitting again. Literature was for me, an easy escape from my anxieties. I always used books and stories as a way of coping with stress. I assumed that I could keep using that technique and make a living out of it afterward. The issue was that it just created news problems. I couldn’t read out of enjoyment anymore, because I had to focus on mandatory novels. None of the videos and readings changed my opinion on why I went into literature. It did though become a part of things that would help me figure out that I was not in the right place. It gave me another perspective on why people study literature and so did talking with my peers. I could hear the passion in their words and knew I was not feeling the same thing. It was just last week that I finally decided that it was enough. I had to stop forcing myself in a program that does not passionate me and instead try out the things that do interest me. I had to stop and figure out what I really wanted instead. Which is why I am quitting university and will not study literature anymore. 

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Blog 3: Les Voisines

The audio walk for “Les Voisines” was a very peculiar experience. Since the director cannot control the circumstances in which the audio-walk happens, it creates quite a couple of problems. Our group tried to separate everyone, but the two minutes gap between every participant was not enough. At the first street corner, I was already with two other students, because of our different walk rhythms, we were now at the same time and throughout the walk, we kept rejoining again. Afterward, our group of three soon became a group of nine. I can only imagine how odd we must have looked in the everyday scenery of the people who live there. A group of nine women silently walking in sync in their street before stopping randomly. We ended up following families on their daily walk because their path was the same as ours for a couple of blocks. It sure gave a unique experience one could not have lived in a classic theatre. The narrator kept saying how invisible she felt in her new part of town, but I could not feel anything else then invasive. I was in their street looking at their home and interrupting their peaceful family time, which made me feel very inappropriate. Since the creators have no control over the condition of the walk, they could not predict all the construction workers and the people we kept disturbing. When we were asked to wait before crossing a street it resulted in being honked at, because drivers were confused. Construction workers asked us to move away and let them do their work. Also, as someone with a short attention span, I did not register most of the things the narrator said because I was busy being worried about disturbing someone again. I also got easily distracted by the flowers I found pretty and the shops I wanted to stop at afterward. I hope to get the occasion of doing this audio walk again at a different time of day and on my own to achieve an experience closer to what the creator had in mind.

[apathtohealing]

Bog 2: Audio tour

I went on the audio walk called “A flower in the river”. It is a walk that starts from the Berri-UQAM metro station and goes straight down Saint-Denis Street until it reaches the shore. I did it after a long day of work on the second of October on a Saturday from 10 pm to 11 pm. The walk was a documentary of the Rwanda genocide and its survivors who immigrated to Montreal. The path is the same one they follow on their commemorative walk and it felt as if I was walking it beside them, only at a different time. I went in too late to stop at the flower shop and buy a flower to throw in the river with them as a memorial, but I still felt connected to them. The contrast of the audio walk where a thousand people were walking in unison compared to me walking alone really allowed me to feel like I was connecting with them. The city felt calmer as if it stopped to listen to them talk. I am grateful to have walked it at night, a time of day which felt more appropriate to me. A warm sunny day would have felt as if their story was just a daily activity to pass my time instead of stopping and trying to connect with her. Every contrast stood out and made this experience very dear to my heart. The noise of the narrator walking among a thousand people with all the cacophony of their celebration and honoring, compared to me walking alone in silence listing to them. I am someone who usually talks a lot and tries to fill the silence, but this allowed me to just take a step back and listen. I could hear their background music middling with the sound of their steps in between the different speeches and interviews. As a person who was lucky enough to be born in Quebec without being a visible minority, this experience gave me an occasion to be grateful, to educate myself by listening to them and letting them take all the space they needed for it.

[apathtohealing]

Blog 1: Proofreading a friend’s essay

As an experiment for one of my university classes, I will proofread a friend’s essay, since I have never done it before. When people give me feedback on my essays, it always ends up being helpful. It brings me an awareness of aspects that I could clarify and spelling errors to correct. I will be doing it for a friend who comes from a field that I have zero to no knowledge of. Therefore, I only expect to be able to help her with spelling errors and repetitive words. In the best-case scenario, my ignorance on the subject might also help to see if her text is so well written that anyone can understand what she is explaining.

 I really enjoyed the opportunity of helping my friend with her essay. Surprisingly to me, the part she found the most helpful was using me as a barometer of how clear her explanations are even to someone with no knowledge of her field of study since this is what she was graded on. Therefore, everything that I did not understand in her text she got to work on until I did. The technique we used was that I read everything once, I underlined what did not make sense to me, and then she explained it to me aloud. Afterward, I would tell her which part of that new explanation needed to be added to her text to make it clearer. Since her text was in French which is my native language, I did not expect my syntax to have been a problem. This showed me how English studies changed how I write. I would make comments on her syntax and underline what I thought was wrong. We argued a little on what is good syntax and then concluded that the French way is completely different from the English way. Therefore, helping her also helped me, because I will now pay closer attention to my syntax when writing in French.