10.21.14+and+10.22.14

New seating chart

Finish discussing Encounters 2, 3, and 4 of "Recitatif" For each encounter we discussed: setting, changes in the relationship, memory, how memory of Maggie changed, cultural/social impacts (separate vs. equal, gentrification), and victimhood

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 * Discussion Questions: **
 * 1) **Why does the story continually return to references to the orchard and to Maggie? What is significant in these continual references? What are we to make of the confusion Twyla experiences in her memories of these things. Roberta tells Twyla one version of those events, then Roberta later admits doubts about her own story. What’s going on here? **

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 * 1) **What does that tell us about collective memory? Why do they each remember it differently? What does it say about them as characters and their desires? **

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 * 1) **How does Morrison use imagery to position time? **

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 * 1) **How does Morrison use character detail to expand our understanding of each character while simultaneously making elements of each more ambiguous? **

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 * 1) **What repeated ideas or references do you notice? (hair, food, shelter, orchard, music) **

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 * 1) **Let’s look at her narrative structure; why does she write three encounters? How are each similar to one another? How are they different? What changes and what stays the same? For the things that stay the same, why do they stay the same? **

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 * 1) **When Twyla says that she and Roberta had to discover “How to believe what had to be believed,” what does she mean? **

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 * 1) **<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Is this ultimately a pessimistic story? Or do identity, and friendship, show themselves as transcendent somehow, undamaged in their essence by change? What details in the story help you to decide on your answer? **

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 * 1) <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">**<span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">“’Okay’ I said, but I knew I wouldn’t. Roberta had messed up my past somehow with that business about Maggie. I wouldn’t forget a thing like that. Would I?”(170) Why is this important? What concept or theme is Morrison continuing here? **

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 * 1) <span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">**<span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Throughout the story, Morrison uses offensive language. Why do you think she uses this language? What effect does she want it to have on readers and what do you notice about who uses the language? **

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 * 1) <span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">**<span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Why does the story end with those lines? What is the role of Maggie in the story? **
 * 1) <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">**<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">According to <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline;">__The American Heritage College Dictionary__ <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"> and the <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline;">__Encarta World English Dictionary__ <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">, “recitation” and “recitative” are given the following definitions. How might these help to explain, or continue the explanation of, Morrison’s title? **
 * <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">**<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">The public reading aloud of something or reciting of something from memory, esp. poetry. **
 * <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">**<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">The listing or reporting of something. **
 * <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">**<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Of, or relating to, or having the character of a recital or recitation. **
 * <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">**<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Mus. – a vocal style in which a text is declaimed in the rhythm of natural speech with slight melodic variation. **
 * <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">**<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">A style of singing that is close to the rhythm of natural speech, used in opera for dialogue and narration. **

Read: Encounter 5--discuss collective memory/title

Brainstorm: major elements of the story (these will factor into writing next class)
 * memory
 * race
 * friendship
 * segregation
 * victimhood
 * abandonment
 * stereotypes
 * mothers/family
 * family structure
 * money/wealth
 * home/setting
 * trust
 * loyalty
 * superficiality vs. reality
 * desire vs. action
 * expectation vs. reality
 * adults vs. children
 * growing up
 * perspective
 * love
 * gentrification
 * relationships
 * civil rights/historical context
 * age/childhood
 * feelings/emotions
 * silence/being silenced
 * secrets
 * past/time/change
 * past vs. present

HW: Bring a SSR book to class on Thursday/Friday