...A fascinating and powerful narrative, “Recitatif” by Toni Morrison, tells the story of two girls, Twyla and Roberta, who share quite a complicated relationship. From the time they meet at St. Bonaventure, an orphanage, at the tender age of eight to when they become adults and start leading lives of their own, they are plagued by their racial, social, and economical differences. One of the most interesting aspects of the short story is the symbolism of Maggie, a disabled woman who works at the orphanage, and the tremendous impact she has on Twyla and Roberta. Numerous critics have analyzed the portrayal of Maggie in the story, and have come to some varied conclusions. In my opinion, as Twyla and Roberta are reunited with one another through the course of their lives, they slowly begin to see and accept that Maggie is a reflection of their mothers, and – to a larger extent – also themselves. The issues explored in “Recitatif” resonate with many readers on many different levels and, in effect, much has been written and discussed about it. This is largely due to the fact that Morrison has left a lot open to the reader for interpretation. “Revised Memories and Colliding Identities: Absence and Presence in Morrison’s ‘Recitatif’ and Viramontes’s ‘Tears on My Pillow’” by Helane Adams Androne is a very focused critical piece that argues that both central characters have suffer from strained relationships. "Transfiguring Aesthetics: Conflation, Identity Denial, and Transference in “Passing...
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...spheres as men, resulting in a blurring of the once distinct boundaries between the male and female worlds. This intersection of the sexes had two effects: first, because women were no longer confined to domestic work, they had less incentives to remain in dominantly female circles; second, because women could operate in the male world as individuals, they had to learn to mirror male patterns of dominance or portray the traditional role of women. These combined effects resulted in the breakdown of sisterhood as women distanced themselves from female bonds in order to gain power in the male world. This fall of sisterhood is evident in literature, which I will convey through an analysis of three selections: A Streetcar Named Desire, a play by Tennessee Williams; “Recitatif,” a short story by Toni Morrison; and “Everyday Use,” a short story by Alice Walker. First, I will...
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...Using Facebook to Teach Rhetorical Analysis Jane Mathison Fife The attraction of Facebook is a puzzle to many people over the age of thirtyfive, and that includes most college faculty. Yet students confess to spending significant amounts of time on Facebook, sometimes hours a day. If you teach in a computer classroom, you have probably observed students using Facebook when you walk in the room. Literacy practices that fall outside the realm of traditional academic writing, like Facebook, can easily be seen as a threat to print literacy by teachers, especially when they sneak into the classroom uninvited as students check their Facebook profiles instead of participating in class discussions and activities. This common reaction reflects James King and David O’Brien’s (2002: 42) characterization of the dichotomy teachers often perceive between school and nonschool literacy activities (although they are not referring to Facebook specifically): “From teachers’ perspectives, all of these presumably pleasurable experiences with multimedia detract from students’ engagement with their real work. Within the classroom economy technology work is time off task; it is classified as a sort of leisure recreational activity.” This dichotomy can be broken down, though; students’ enthusiasm for and immersion in these nonacademic literacies can be used to complement their learning of critical inquiry and traditional academic concepts like rhetorical analysis. Although they read these texts daily...
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