Rachel’s Blog

[rachhamilton]

Cheating

In Newport I Watch My Father Lay His Cheak to a Beached Dolphin’s Wet Back by Ocean Vuong

I chose this poet because he was a poet that my poet, Chelsea Dingman, uses as a model and as inspiration for her own poetry. I was drawn in by this poem because of the unique style its written in, it switches back and forth in each line and because there is no stanzas that separate it. The choice of using this design allows the author to flow from one topic to another without breaking or stopping. Another interesting choice the author made is that the title is not a distinct word or phrase, its more part of the poem. He is able to incorporate a lot of different ideas including family and war, but never really switching to the other, he just flows between the two.

[kellig22]

Mentor poet #1

this poem really stuck out to me mainly because of the overall theme, the theme of this poem is death. in the beginning it talks about taking your own life, saying “I will not shoot myself” then moves into a deeper death theme saying “do it the same way most Americans do” and has an underlying theme of police brutality.  The theme is extremely fitting because the author is a bisexual colored man living in America. 

[rachhamilton]

This poem is very interesting the way that it shifts, from suicide to natural death to police brutality. I agree that it’s very sad and is personally related to his own life.

[rachhamilton]

Poetry blog #2

As the Daughter Recites Psalm 91

Chelsea Dingman

I couldn’t decide on a poem to do for this post so I asked my sis to pick a number between 1 and 81-that’s the number of pages in this book- and she picked 63 so this is what I got. But I actually really liked this poem, it once again displays Dingman’s ability and talent in talking about hard situations like abuse and give us an inside to what has happened. She starts this poem off very strong, “He says he’ll kill her”, this line alone, in its own stanza, you instantly know that this poem is going to be sad and I guess it almost insights anger. You later find out that the speaker(herself) is talking about her mother being abused not herself in this case, and how she feel about her mother’s situation. The title confused me a little at first, “As the Daughter Recites Psalm 91” so I looked up the verse in the Bible and Psalm 91:2 stood out to me the most, it says “This I declare about the lord, he is my refuge, he is my God and I trust him” and then later it talks about how those who love and trust in him will be protected and saved. Dingman never says anything about this in the poem but I think she relates back to it in the last line which is italicized, in order to stand out and show its deeper meaning, “this time, let her not forget.” I think that she talking about the little girl’s innocent search for hope, she sits outside the bathroom reading this bible verse and praying that her mother doesn’t forget and find a way out of her situation.

[rachhamilton]

Mentor poet #1

“Billy” by Chelsea Dingman

I think it took me at least 10 times of reading this peom to really understand what was going on and what Dingman was trying to say. The poem says “for my father” at the beginning which typically gives you a sentimental feel like ‘oh this is dedicated to her dad, how cute’ but then you read it and it’s a very sad story. Basically the way that I understand this poem is that she’s writing to herself about her dead-beat father (and if not her, some else with a bas father) and I didn’t get that at first, I kinda thought that she was writing to him but that didn’t really work. This poem kinda tricks you by saying “for my father” then talking bad about him. She says that he wasn’t around much, like she was waiting for him a lot (“waiting for your father to come home from the fields”) and he was unreliable (“ not knowing when he made you quit school, you’d pay for the son before you”). She writes this peom like she’s telling a story, I think that’s she’s trying to tell herself ‘look how far you’ve come’ and ‘you’re better off without him because he wasn’t there’. This poem is thought provoking and very sad as she talks about a father who wasn’t around.

[kellig22]

Jericho Brown.

https://www.jerichobrown.com/

When I was looking through the living poet list, the name “Jericho” really caught my eye. I clicked on the link that took me to his website and I really felt like it was love at first sight. looking around his website it had an overall vibe of “warm” and “cozy” it was like the website was giving me hug. The flowers everywhere, the colors, THE POEMS!!! I KNEW Jericho Brown was going to be MY mentor poet, I didn’t even waste my time and flirt with other poets. 

The poem that really stood out to me was “Flower” which I put below…  yellow is by far my favorite color, whenever I wear a piece of clothing that is yellow, I have a really kick-butt day. So when Jericho came out swinging saying EVERYTHING was yellow, I was in love and I knew it was going to be good. 

Flower

Yellow bird. Yellow house. Little yellow Song

Light in my Jaundiced mouth. These yellow Teeth need

Brushing, but You admire My yellow Smile. This

Black boy Keep singing. Tiny life. Yellow bile.

[rachhamilton]

I really love this! I can see that you really connected to your poet and I can really see how Jericho Brown is really the perfect mentor poet for you. 

[rachhamilton]

My mentor Poet: Chelsea Dingman

I went through and looked into a few different poets but none of them stood out to me the way the Dingman’s did. Her poetry stood out to me because of its raw emotion. She writes about topics, like loss and abuse, that many people would be too scared to write about, but she is so intone with her experiences. Her poetry digs into deeply emotional themes that I found very interesting. This is the very first poem that I looked at, from what I can tell, its Dingman telling the story of how her husband died. She doesn't sugar coat her situation, she tells the reader the outright truth. You can really feel the pain, regret and grief through her words and her imagery. I really like this poet because she is blunt while at the same time being deep, and it really gives the reader an inside look at her life and her experiences. 

[rachhamilton]

The Incurable Romantic

Normal and Abnormal: This is an important motif that Frank Tallis brings up throughout the book. Basically this describes majoritys as normal describing a certain behavior versus the minority of that behavior. Tallis brings up the Roman philosopher Lucretius, and the distinction that he made when it comes to love: love going well is normal and love going wrong is abnormal. And Tallis relates this to psychiatry as focused on finding the abnormal in a normal population. I feel like that was a little confusing but basically people who love abnormally (differing from the normal population). This idea is brought up repeatedly throughout the book, it describes how people with abnormal behaviors love and interact with others , which determines how they are limited in society.

[rachhamilton]

Mental Illness

In this ted talk, Eric Walton is a 16 year old kid shares his struggles with mental illness, specifically bipolar disorder. Yes he is only 16 but this is his story and he shares his own personal experiences of living, or as he describes it: surviving. He talks a lot about the stigma that was placed on him as a child who lashed out and threw temper tantrums, and how he was treated. Many kids bullied him and feared him, he was put in a psychiatric hospital multiple times and even put in jail a few times, mostly because no one knew what was wrong with him. Eventually they figured out that he had bipolar disorder but because of the stigma that was placed on him it was hard for him to get to where he is now. He says that if he had been treated with respect and not feared or bullied his recovery might have been easier. The way he was treated, because he didn’t fit in, he didn’t match the status quo, he was different, affected his mental health and made his recovery much harder for him. And on the other side his mental illness caused him to isolate himself, and made relationships with friends and family very difficult because he was so feared. The incurable romantic discusses romantic relationships in specific but mental health effects all relationships not just romantic ones.

[jiajia-binks]

Education and the Feminine Mystique

Friedan talks about education a lot, since it is a major influence on how we view the world and live our lives. Educators are not immune to the constructs of society. In the 60s, with the rise of functionalism (theory in sociology of focusing on “how thing are” rather than what they could be) in academic circles, educators began to believe that their role was to teach women how to be successful inside the house. The social science reports all pointed that “too much” education or dedication to a career was the root of unhappiness in housewives. Consequently, the educators turned their focus to the “adjustment within the world of home and children.” Of course, they thought they were doing what was best for women.

In 2014, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie published her book “We Should All Be Feminists.” She describes one of her first experiences with institutionalized sexism as a child in Nigeria. In primary school, a teacher promised that whoever got the highest score on a test could be the classroom monitor. Adichie got the highest score on the test, but before she could assume her earned position, the teacher clarified that the monitor had to be a boy. Although her story and Friedan’s story take place in different time periods and continents, the theme is the same- educators can reinforce prejudices, consciously or unconsciously. The feminine mystique can be perpetrated by the educated and informed when their information comes from sources that are influenced by current prejudices, and these educators go on to inform the next generation, and the cycle goes on.

[rachhamilton]

This is really interesting that the influences on children come from the people that are supposed to educate them, and make them a more meaningful part of society, but they just oppress these women and make them feel less worthy when in fact the opportunity should be equal. Changing the way that adults treat children, I think, is the key to equality.

[jiajia-binks]

The Status Quo

In our class discussion of “No Unmarked Woman,” we asked the question of “why did female oppression (from both women and men) continue through time?” With all the scientific and philosophical advancements, why didn’t the understanding of women progress? One major reason is our tendency to stick to the status quo. The scientific assumption was that men and women have separate roles because that is how “a social order can function.” However, this wasn’t backed by scientific facts- it just appeared to be a “human constant” because the status quo had existed for so long. The roles of each gender became ingrained in society, so much so that it was treated as an unchanging aspect of humanity, something that was instinctual. 

In modern society, many recognize the status quo as harmful and inequitable. In her book “Feminism is for Everybody,” bell hooks describes how “most men are disturbed by hatred and fear of women, by male violence against women, even the men who perpetuate this violence.” Essentially, many men recognize and deplore the negative effects of the patriarchy on women, but they are also fearful of what will happen if the patriarchy is dismantled. As a result, many men “find it easier to passively support male domination even when they know…it is wrong.” This fear of change is rooted in the fear of losing benefits and what they believe is their masculinity. Masculinity was traditionally tied closely to being a “provider”, to “independence, dominance, aggressiveness, and competitiveness.” (quote from Komarovsky in the picture above) Perhaps that is why so many men felt threatened by the recent Gillette’s ad- they believed it was taking away from their “masculinity,” when really it is their definition of masculinity that needs to be updated. 

Link to the Gillette ad: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=koPmuEyP3a0

[rachhamilton]

“The boys watching today will be the men of tomorrow” this was a quote that stood out to me from the Gillette ad, and I think they make a really important point: that actions of adults have huge effects on children. Children are the key to changing this status qou that you talk about above, influence the bits of the next generation to be respectful and to hold each other accountable (as the ad suggests) is extremely important to changing the lives for women and gaining equality. I also really liked the thing that you said about men passivly supporting male dominance because that’s what they know and what they were taught but in order to change things that needs to change, teach boys to support others support other men other women just other people and this will be the change that we need.

[jiajia-binks]

Freud and the Feminine Image

Freud’s ideas on psychology and the nature of woman influenced the scientific community, and in turn, general society. Freud’s image of women corresponded with the image perpetuated by the feminine mystique- one where women were inherently deficient and a passive object in a man’s life. For many American women who were already told that they could not be equal to men, this was a final blow to any dreams beyond the home they might have had. The opinions of others could just be opinions, but science was considered fact. There seemed to be no way to argue against Freud’s revered theories.

I think this passage is interesting because it points out the human fallibility inherent to all sciences. Science aims to discover the absolute truth, but flawed and biased humans are the ones that are conducting the scientific studies. Although Freud gained many insights in his psychological studies, he was limited by the conventional viewpoints and accepted “truths” of his time. The “language and rubrics that have been determined…up until their time” can limit even the greatest genius. Specific cultural factors of Europe in the end of the 19th century were later found to be the cause of what Freud identified as instinctual and changeless.

Before Freud, other scientists and philosophers attempted to analyze the difference between the nature of men and women. Rousseau, a philosopher in the 18th century, concluded that women should aspire to different virtues than men because of their inherent inferiority. Rather than qualities like truth or fortitude, obedience and docility should be the main virtues taught to women. In A Vindication of the Rights of Women, Mary Wollstonecraft refutes Rousseau’s claim by explaining that if women have no other virtues than those required to depend on her husband, how can she, as a person, dignify herself in life?  Wollstonecraft argues that there is no proof of natural inferiority, since “it cannot be demonstrated that woman is essentially inferior to man because she has always been subjugated.” In other words, woman’s assumed inferiority is only a result of cultural influences, not nature. Freud made the same mistake, along with many of followers, which perpetuated the idea of natural feminine inferiority as an indisputable truth because it was believed for so long.

[rachhamilton]

It’s unbelievable that people trusted the theories by these male scientists just because they were educated white males, probably rich too, even though there are definitely gaps it was science so it was true. I feel like people believing this kind of science has led to higher standards on science and research. The biases shown in freuds theory are clearly true which makes me really question what was going on in the heads of the people during this time.

[rachhamilton]

Vincent Van Gogh

Vincent Van Gogh was a renound painter that lived in the 1800s that experienced mental illness throughout a lot of his adult life. Living with chronic mental illness, he cut off his own ear and committed suicide in 1890. Though he lived with mental illness, he went on to create some of the most masterful paintings in the world.

[jiajia-binks]

Feminism!

The first nonfiction topic that came to my mind was feminism, something that I am very passionate about. I immediately went to Goodreads in order to find book recommendations for a feminist books. There are so many strong feminist writers out there, so I picked out many books from the library to try to narrow my range down. Finally, I decided to read The Feminine Mystique as my primary source, since it is considered one of the most revolutionary books of the 1960s and helped re-spark the feminist movement after World War II. It is an older book, so I also decided to read some modern feminist books, like We Should All Be Feminists and Feminism is for Everybody, for my supplementary sources to compare the perspectives and issues of then and now.

Link to the Goodreads list: https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/feminist

[rachhamilton]

I think this is a wonderful idea to get an idea of how the feminine mystique (the book) effected the future of the feminine movement. and of course the different perspectives.

[rachhamilton]

Vincent Van Gogh

Vincent Van Gogh was a renound painter that lived in the 1800s that experienced mental illness throughout a lot of his adult life. Living with chronic mental illness, he cut off his own ear and committed suicide in 1890. Though he lived with mental illness, he went on to create some of the most masterful paintings in the world.

[rachhamilton]

Mental health

GeneralMHFacts

I couldn’t get the image to show clear, but basically it’s statistics by NAMI (national alliance on mental illness) on the numbers of people living with a mental illness. The biggest number you notice is 43.8 million American adults experience mental illness or one in five adults. There are a lot of people living with mental illness, but there are different severities that people experience, it also says that one in twenty five American adults live with a serious mental illness. Some cases are harder to deal with than others but for all of them it is an illness.

[rachhamilton]

Mental illness

In our society there is a lot of shame put towards mental illness. Which is very unfair, my other posts have focused on how a person with mental illness interacts with people, giving off a bit of an idea that it’s wrong for a person to have a mental illness. And this is completely untrue, like the quote above says ‘it’s okay’. Mental illness effect many people and many of them act perfectly ‘normal’ in social situations, but there are extreme cases where some social behaviors are effected and that changes how they are perceived by others and how they fit into society.

[rachhamilton]

A star is born

Just because I just watched this but I think it relates. Jack, the main character, goes throughput the movie dealing with different types of mental illnesses including addiction and depression. This has multiple possible causes, like a troublesome childhood, stress from fame, and a physical illness that he dealt with, and throughout the movie you can see how this effects his relationships with his girl and his brother. He was a famous singer in the movie and though this is a fictional story, I think it depicts the inside story of what some celebrities deal with on a regular basis and how this effects their relationships and how they live their lives.