Unit 1 Journals 1-3

On Discovery by Maxine Hong Kingston

Physically Tang Ao is transformed into a woman through a series of painful processes. First, the women pierced his ears, which is painful but not unbearable. Then they bound his feet, which I’ve heard is a very painful process. At the end of his transformation, they plucked all the hair out of his face, which is never fun. Then they caked him in makeup. Psychologically, Tang Ao transformed by becoming more woman-like. When the story first started, he was a typical guy that would do anything to be surrounded by women, then he was transformed into one. A major example, is when we was hanging up his foot bindings. He had to hang them outside so they wouldn’t stink up his house, and he was embarrassed to be hanging up such personal items. Lastly, Tang Ao was transformed socially through many processes as well. He had to live in a house that held other women to help him during his transformation, so he learned about a woman’s behaviour from them. People also spoke about him as a “she” rather than a “he.” So socially, he was changed quite a bit.

On Being A Cripple by Nancy Mairs

Mairs refers to herself as a cripple because it is straightforward. It doesn’t beat around the bush or make her seem weak in any way. She also seems to enjoy making people a little uncomfortable with the word. But I think that by her using the word, she is showing that she is strong even if she is crippled. And though she doesn’t enjoy her disease in the slightest, she does enjoy being strong and confident. Plus, Mairs doesn’t like the way words like “handicapped,” or “disabled” sound or imply. She says that “handicapped” implies that someone has deliberately put her in this compromised position. And she doesn’t like “disable” because that could mean anything, not just the loss of limb control; the meaning of disabled could range from mental illnesses to physical ailments. And Mairs doesn’t like “differently abled” because it basically means the same thing as the other two, therefore it doesn’t change anything about the problem. So she decided to use the term “cripple” because it fit her situation best.

The Power Of Books by Richard Wright

Being a major lover of books, I really felt this quote deep. Books are really a sort of drug, you can never get enough of the words flowing through you, and sentences twisting and encompassing your world. It’s a beautiful feeling being surrounded by books and knowing that all those stories will tell you something new, give you new information, or just make you fall in love with its characters. I love that feeling of holding a book in my hands, the scent of its pages wafting through the air, and knowing that this book will keep me company for a long while, even after I’ve finished it. But I can understand why Wright would feel guilty reading the books he was reading. Those books, told of secrets that were not meant to be known by the black men, they held secrets that white men scorned. And Wright felt guilty knowing that he held these secrets, these secrets he shouldn’t be holding. But he couldn’t just stop reading, he’d already read all those secrets. It would be absolutely impossible to go back to how his life was before.

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