#punctum prompt

[farisbaadhaim-blog]

Claudia Rankine Citizen

After reading the first couple of pages Citizen I feel there is strong racial tension between the races here in the United States. In the past couple of months and year there have been big movements like Black Lives Matter and many other. The purpose of theses movement is to establish equality between every race and lower the racial tension between races. 

If Claudi Rankine was in my shoes, she would see that there some segregation toward people from the Middle East due to the multiple bombing. In addition, now the media and people on social media paint every muslim with the same bad paint brush. However, times have gotten better, and now people and the media don’t generalizes that normal people that are Muslim are not terrorists. I feel that Claudi Rankine would share similar thoughts because in Citizen she is taking about the same issues many Muslims are facing around the world

[molly-moriarty-blog]

Claudia Rankine’s Citizen

As I was thinking of what to write for this post, I realized how brilliant the first dozen pages of Citizen are. Citizen is a work about racism and awareness of being different, which isn’t something that’s easy for everyone to understand. But Rankine starts Citizen with things that are all familiar at their roots: Thinking too much while trying to go to sleep. Awkward elementary school interactions. The feeling of affronts by friends. Sitting silently in your car.

The first few entries in this book are all still entries about race, but they’re entwined with incredibly relatable situations. This is a really clever way of imparting to the reader the way that these hurtful moments are inseparably wrapped up in everyday life.

If Claudia Rankine looked at my life, she’d see a whole lot of privilege. I’m not a minority, I haven’t faced a ton of adversity in my life, I’m of able body and mind, I’ve got a complete family, and I’ve been educated and employed without an extraordinary amount of effort. And, the most inherent mark of privilege: I don’t even think about it. I think that makes it more important for me to understand that not everyone’s life is like that, and that my accidental place gives me a unique vantage point to make injustice something that I notice, call out, and make sure I don’t contribute to. The barriers addressed by Claudia Rankine are being constructed by everyday occurrences. So, like Claudia Rankine, my job should be to seek out each individual bricklayer. 

[ustby-blog]

Citizen - Exploring Racial Injustices

If Rankine spent a day in my shoes she probably wouldn’t have much to write about nor notice any major/noteworthy racial or gender injustices. Her whole work of poetry in “Citizen” is focused on racism and the role it has played in our society. Her writing is rich with examples of adversity that African-Americans face, and specifically women, even in today’s world. She touches on a few instances where skin color came into play negatively for African-Americans and had been very demeaning specifically because of their skin color. A specific example that struck me was the instance of Serena and Venus Williams in women's tennis. Serena in specific had lost matches due to blatant missed calls by different officials and had been mocked and ridiculed by fans at the BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells for her race. I thought it to be intriguing how Serena had seemingly matured to rise above all of the hate throughout her career, especially after she had been suspended for her unsportsmanlike actions toward an official whom she believed to be intentionally signaling incorrect calls against her. Serena’s maturation genuinely showed when sports commentators talked about well Serena was able to “hold it together” during the matches. (35) Another commentator suggests that Serena has “grown up” which brings  to question ― Is it childish to lash out against racial injustice? Or is it best to maintain composure?

[ahpunctumproject-blog]

You wait for our eye to sort of "turn on", for the elements to fall into place and that ineffable rush to occur, a feeling of exultation when you look through that ground glass, counting ever so slowly, clenching teeth and whispering to Jessie to holdstillholdstillholdstill and just knowing that it will be good, that it is true.

Sally Mann

It is very easy for me to connect and associate with the emotions and the experience that Sally is expressing in this quote. That ever illusive feeling of being in “flow”, when the entire world seems to come to a halt and the barriers between the experience and that who is experiencing seem to melt away. The feeling of being completely absorbed in one’s passion, Sally utilizes words and phrases such as ineffable rush, exultation and truth to describe her reality in that moment.  The clenching of the teeth, praying that Jessie does not move a muscle, she transports the reader directly to that breathless moment that surely precedes the capturing of any eternal photograph.