Post 4, Group B: If Christ Came to Chicago by: JJ Leath

             In class, we discussed W.T. Stead’s work If Christ Came to Chicago. In the excerpt we read in class, Stead wrote about a prostitute in Chicago by the name of Maggie Darling. Stead spent significant time within the brothel that Maggie worked at. He was there and observed their “monotonous existence” and observed when they were “pulled” by the police. Stead could have focused on their vices, or Stead could have also focused on police corruption in Chicago, for he witnessed this first-hand. Rather, he chooses to spill the most ink about Maggie’s past. This conscience choice made by the author is revealing about his purpose of writing this work. Stead has directed this work at the upper-class so that they can gain understanding of what it is like to be a person in Maggie’s position and to humanize people on the fringe of society. 

            To analyze a work, it is crucial that you examine the context from which it was written. The context of If Christ Came to Chicago can be gleaned if you consider the audience that Stead was writing for. This account was published in 1894 as a book. Lower-class audiences wouldn’t have the money to buy the book, the leisure time to read it, and the illiteracy rate in the lower-class at the turn of the 19^th century was much higher than the illiteracy rate in the upper-class. Further, I'm not sure that the audience was meant to be citizens of Chicago, I believe that this work was meant for those in Stead's home-city of London. This may have been written about Chicago, but it was widely circulated and published in England. When the time period is considered, it becomes clear that this book was written for the upper-class (possibly specifically the upper-class in London) with the specific goal of educating them on the realities of living life in the shoes of a person like Maggie Darling.  

            Given context, I believe that you can start analyzing Stead’s intentions. While on the surface Stead was just showing the life of a prostitute, I don't think Stead wanted to simply show what it was like to live like Maggie Darling. Stead wanted to humanize Maggie, and by doing so, humanize every “Maggie Darling” that we all see daily, if we live in a large city that is. The social elites of London, Chicago, and New York would likely run into “Maggie Darling” often (especially if they were frequently clients of their corner’s ‘Maggie’). They would see the impoverished on the street, and they would likely keep their distance. It is easy to blame their vices and poor decisions when you can keep a distance from them and their story. When you can keep your distance from a group, it is easy to "otherize" them. What If Christ Came to Chicago did was remove that distance. Stead threw Maggie’s story in your face; you can’t escape it. 

            Stead then took this one step further. He starts by showing the realities of Maggie’s life, he then humanized her, and he finished by telling the account of the villain of the story. The prostitute wasn’t the villain, it was a rich catholic. As a reader, I had to ask if there was anything significant about this. Given the context of the piece and Stead’s purpose, I believe that he was inadvertently telling the upper-class that the social ills that occur in the city’s underbelly is somewhat their fault. When Maggie told her story, she accounted that she was able to get out of the prostitution scene in San Francisco, and if it weren’t for the self-righteous action of the rich catholic Mrs. McD, Maggie wouldn’t have been pushed into prostitution again. She could have been an “up-standing citizen”. I believe that this aspect of Maggie’s life is what creates the most powerful social commentary of the piece – Maggie's lot in life wasn't entirely her fault. I think that this is supposed to be a metaphor to Victorian England and the economic system that was propping up the London elite. It was the economic system that was pushing the "Maggie Darlings" of London into desperate situations. The message of If Christ Came to Chicago ultimately is that the world’s “Maggie Darlings” aren’t all bad, they are desperate, and those with power and influence are somewhat responsible for this.   

            The fault of the upper-class in Victorian wasn’t explicit, but they were definitely exploiting the lower classes of London. During the Victorian period in England, the Industrial Revolution was raging in London. This became the source of much of this newfound wealth, and while industrialization created a great deal of wealth, there were many in Victorian England that were left behind.  In “Economic Development and the Demographics of Criminals in Victorian England”, the authors examined the trends of crime in this time period. The authors noted that “As industrialization proceeded, workers increasingly found their human capital unsuitable to the technology level, which forced some into crime”. In this paper, the data from Victorian England showed a 20% increase in economic crime (or non-white collar crime done for economic gain). The crime statistics in this paper show desperation within the lower-classes. While I don’t think the upper-class is guilty for their success, it is indisputable that the system propelling them was burying others.

            What makes If Christ Came to Chicago interesting and so important is its applicability today. We are in the next Industrial Revolution. Computers are affecting our economy like machines did in Victorian England. The wealth that has been created has been incredible. It has created billionaires like Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg. And just like the Industrial Revolution, there are members of our society being left behind. How many different homeless people have you seen while you drive to school? How many times was the widening wealth gap brought up during the 2016 election? We are living in an Industrial Revolution remix, and the question is whether we will learn the lessons being shown in If Christ Came to Chicago or if we will continue to blame the misfortune of the forgotten on "their own poor choices".

Source:

Vickers, Chris, and Nicolas L. Ziebarth. “Economic Development and the Demographics of                              Criminals in Victorian England.” The Journal of Law and Economics, vol. 59, no. 1, 2016,                  pp. 191–223., doi:10.1086/684303.

Group B Post 4: Outsider Looking In-Sherman Alexie's Perspective: Kathleen Paxtor

Alexie writes his poems and short stories to recount parts of his life in his perspective. He uses themes of alcoholism, racism, colonization, despair, and resentment to capture the audience into feeling what he felt. For most of Alexie’s characters they “struggle to survive the constant battering of their minds, bodies, and spirits by white American society and their own self-hatred and sense of powerlessness” (Casey). For example in the poem On the Amtrak from Boston to New York he writes with what could be considered resentment. This poem is about the overwhelming colonization of American culture overriding Native Americans and their culture. The protagonist of this poem resents the lady for bringing up the history of something that was part of his history first; she was ignorant to the history beyond what she was taught. He call this “her country’s history” not “his” or “our”. He feels the need to be quite and keep his thoughts to himself, he views the ‘white American society’ as his ‘enemy’. He writes: “while I, as all Indians have done since this war began, made plans for what I would do and say the next time somebody from the enemy thought I was one of their own;” in this he clearly separates himself from the other, the enemy vs. him (Alexie).

Sherman Alexie in his writing uses his ‘outsider’ perspective to make the reader interact with his identity. Alexie is a Native American that was born and raised in a reservation in Spokane. Alexie continuously writes himself into his characters and uses themes that have affected him his whole life; “he is roused to consciousness about his own entrapment within clichés and culturally constructed ways of reacting” (Garic). The influence his youth had on him is seen in all of his writing, he uses themes of despair, racism, and lost identity to show what it is like to be a “part time Indian” in world that is socially constricted.

By seeing things through Alexie’s eyes we can try to understand his world. Alexi writes to “understand the world and to make fun of the world (Garic). In his short story Indian Education he writes about his personal experiences at school. Victor (the main protagonist) describes his education through specific episodes of his life that really stayed with him. Much like Alexie, Victor learned lessons that didn’t necessarily come from attending school and books but from experiences and life lessons. He uses specific experiences of others and compared them to his perspective. For example, in 8^th grade Victor could hear “the white girls’ forced vomiting” and asked them to “give [him their] lunch if they were just going to throw it up”. In the end, Victor concludes with “there is more than one way to starve”(Alexie).  By using an eating disorder as a metaphor Alexie is able to show that starvation goes beyond just food; “other forms of starvation are not explicitly tied to food, as those on the reservation are starving for a real education, for dignity, and for a better quality of life” (Battaglia). While these two girls were throwing away their bodily nutrition, Victor (Alexie) saw it as throwing up opportunities. This correlates with his past because Alexie chose to go to a public school for education he had more opportunities, his friends back home were not so lucky. The opportunities that were being thrown away were ones that were wanted by others who are starving for more.

Through Sherman Alexie, you can learn life lessons through different accounts and perspectives; lessons he learned through his youth, perspectives formed from a socially constrict universe that labeled him as an outsider looking in.

References:

Battaglia, Soheila. Theme of the Short Story “Indian Education. https://penandthepad.com/theme-short-story-indian-education-1669.html. 2017.

Casey,Rob. Poetry Foundation. Sherman Alexie. Poetryfoundation.org

Garic, Vanja. "Part-Time Identities and Full-Time Narration as an Absolution in Alexie's the Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian." Neohelicon: Acta Comparationis Litterarum Universarum, vol. 44, no. 1, 2017, pp. 189

Post 4, Group B: Traditions; The Lottery

The Lottery by Shirley Jackson got published in 1948. The story takes place in a small village right in the square of town on June 27th. The author, Shirley Jackson does not use much emotion in writing to show how the act that’s going on is looking at as usual. This story is about a village that has a lottery once a year to choose which people in town should be the sacrificed so that the people will have a full year of growing crops. Shirley Jackson has many messages about human nature in this short story but the most of all, she conveys how cruel and violent people can be to one another by killing others for no good reason. The villagers’ blind acceptance of the lottery has allowed ritual murder to become part of their town fabric. Another very significant message that Shirley conveys is how custom and tradition can hold great power over people. For me, I would say this whole tradition of human sacrifice over a lottery is a crazy and a stupid tradition. Just because something is tradition, doesn’t mean it’s right or healthy.

What bothers me, is that no one speaks up for themselves and telling that doing this whole lottery thing is a bad idea and there is God up in heaven who is not happy for the town people’s action. For example, Shirley Jackson demonstrates how the lottery could make anybody do horrible things to other people, and everyone thinks of it as ordinary. 

In The Lottery, the old man Warner states, “Pack of crazy fools,” he said. “Listening to the young folks, nothing's good enough for them. Next thing you know, they'll be wanting to go back to living in caves, nobody works anymore, live that way for a while. Used to be a saying about Lottery in June, corn be heavy soon. The first thing you know, we'd all be eating stewed, chickweed, and acorns. There's always been a lottery” (4). What the old man was saying, is that through a loss of traditions of the lottery, the people in town have not only become fools but they have lost their wisdom, and they are not very bright. Everyone will go with it because it’s in fact tradition. I would say to go against tradition would be to go against the community, so no one is willing to do that.

The Lottery combines elements of horror, irony, domestic tranquility, and convention in traditions. I feel like the entire process of the lottery is inherently unfair, unjust, unthinkable. Its ritual, formally grounded in longtime culture, not just in the village but elsewhere, and does not mask the mindless evil of the act. I mean, are any justice in a community? What happened, to those times when people are taught to learn how to build a better society? That’s the part that the village people don’t understand, creating a better community is not about strict traditions or human sacrifice, it’s about how you put an effort to make functional changes. For example, you help your neighbors, the fundings, the donations, and to ensure that a community can be a great place to live where everyone can be happy, not full of sacrifice.   

Cited:

Https://Sites.middlebury.edu/Individualandthesociety/Files/2010/09/jackson_lottery.Pdf.

Bonus 9: Who Has the Right? - Brandon Ince

         I've never felt more like a super villain than when articulating my thoughts for one of these bonus questions, this one in particular has me feeling especially rancorous. It is my belief that anyone has the right to write about any subject for any reason and that the burden of responsibility to dignify any particular work falls on the audience. The idea that a work would be determined to be not valuable due to a predetermined set of circumstances or elements that do not have anything to do with the document itself is fallacious at best. What matters is the prose, not the author's personal relation to the subject matter, any assertions to the contrary would be an avocation for a form of discourse censorship which will only hold us back in the end. In order to become a stronger society we will have to allow all voices to have the right to write/speak on all topics, and at the same time we must as an audience acknowledge the responsibility - nay, the necessity of developing a critical eye to discern the soundness of the message.
        I feel an obligation to expound on something I said in the previous paragraph, my assertion that censorship will hold us back. I am not saying that censorship in all instances and in every situation is bad, there are certainly times in which withholding certain information is appropriate. Most of the time this is when the specific audience is not 'ready' to be exposed to such information, namely children with something like the horrors of war, or other 'R-rated' material. What I am saying is that within the context of well-to-do adults, the defensive embargo on certain perspectives within a forum of discourse is both immature and destructive.
         The first amendment is a wonderful thing, it allows all a freedom to speak and it provides all who listened an idea to criticize. The very point of putting an idea out there in the first place is to have it dignified, sometimes through praise - often through criticism. There exists an ebb and flow between idea and criticism and discourse it provides, and with each cycle a society grows more defined and stronger. If one wishes to preemptively condemn a certain perspective outright, then they rob the rest of society from the potential cycle of discourse and thus prevents a perfectly good learning experience. If there is a speaker who hates, let him hate in the same way as if there is a speaker who loves, let him love. All voices have value if not within the content of their words then the experience of defining their message.
         I almost feel as if those with firsthand experience with the topic are all the least qualified to speak. Their authority is informed by mere happenstance not distinction. The only thing they would be suitable to author is a low level firsthand account or meaningless memoir. Whatever sort of opinion or editorial they would pen would most certainly be compromised by their experience, which is at the end of the day - a very small world picture.

Group B - Post 4: 'A Tragic Recounting' Hiroshima and In This Corner of the World - Kenneth Butcher

In the wake of the Nuclear bombings of Nagasaki and Hiroshima at the end of the second wold war there have been many a stories across multiple mediums depicting the life of non active combatant military Japanese folk shortly preceding and in the aftermath of this catastrophic event. Over Spring Break I had the opportunity to experiences a fairly new iteration of one of these stories in the form of an animated film entitled, "In This Corner of the World" and I thought I'd takes this opportunity to compare and contrast the rhetorical and cinematic devices the film employs with those that the excerpt from the story "From Hiroshima" does, in order to see how the help us formulate empathy, as well as get a similar message across in two different ways.

The plot of 'In this corner of the world' follows the life of a woman named Suzu who lives in a seaside town called Eba in Hiroshima City. In 1944, 18-year-old Suzu, working for her grandmother's small family business of cultivating Nori (edible sea weed), is told by her parents that an unknown young man has come to propose marriage to her. The man, whose name is Shusaku, lives in Kure City, a large naval port city 15 miles away from Hiroshima City, as a navy civilian. He remembers that he and Suzu had first met during one of Suzu's childhood visits to the city. Suzu decides to marry him and moves to join Shusaku's family in Kure. As Suzu adjusts to her new life in Kure, the threat of the Pacific War slowly begins to encroach on the daily lives of the townspeople. Most of the first half is spent establishing Suzu as kind of a regular, lovable, artistic ditz to both endear us to her on a personal level and to later heighten the emotional impact of what we know is going to happen to her. It isn't really till the second half, after she goes to live with her husband and his family in Kure, that we start to see the realities of war start to encroach into her everyday life in the way of things like, the military police presence begin to grow in her town over time, certain food and resources progressively becoming more scarce to the point that the government has to give them out in extremely small rations, and randomly being forced to stop whatever it was they were doing at the time and go into an underground bomb shelter every time there was an air raid. All of this coming to an extremely emotional head when her sister in law is killed by a previously thought to be inactive bomb shell that had crashed on the beach after an air raid; and the explosion causes her to lose her right hand. This is where the characterization that the first part created comes into play because we see someone who we've spent the better part of 40 to 45 minutes getting to know and are for suffer at the hands of something preventable, with the intended purpose of wanting to create anger in the viewer particularly towards the situation and or the circumstances that led to it and sympathy and empaty for her loss. The significance in this scenario being (though she is a fictional character) Suzu is a stand in for all the Japanese folk who had to live in a similar situation or even bombed for a war they may not have been 100% behind; who we in the U.S would usually only get to hear about and see as statistics or a really high percentage rate.

From Hiroshima by John Hersey seeks to elicit the same feeling but It chooses to do so through the medium of written text and through the lens of the peoples lives in the aftermath of Hiroshima. Phrases like "Dr. Fuji lay in dreadful pain throughout the night on the floor of his family's roofless house on the edge of the city" and "Dr. Sasaki had not looked outside the hospital all day; the scene inside was so terrible and so compelling that it had not occurred to him to ask any questions about what had happend beyond the windows and doors." (pgs 112 in The Art of Fact) are meant to put a face to what would otherwise be just another casualty of war. Thus making the realities of the destruction it causes more real and unavoidable to the reader.
I read and that sought to critical analyze another academics use of Numbers to attempt to explain the rational for dropping the bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki that I found pretty interesting. Kimura choose to state, "Heartbreaking stories have been recorded,2 for example, as illustrated by the testimony of a sixteen-year-old boy, Akira Onogi: We found this small girl crying and she asked us to help her mother. Just beside the girl, her mother was trapped by a fallen beam…we had no choice but to leave her. She was conscious and we deeply bowed to her with clasped hands to apologies to her and then we left.3 " (Kimura pg 21) as a preface before diving into the factors at play he felt that didn't justify the dropping of atomic bombs on Japan twice. The reason I found this to be particularly interesting is because this piece was written in 2013 and I believe Kimura feeling the need to preface this article like this really encapsulates and generation shift in looking at the event. One that is in many ways far removed from the more detached and numerical/mathematical way of looking at war and it's effect that were very prevent in the past on a societal scale. And I also believe that ultimately looking at war through the lens of it's affects and not the short term of whatever the dispute is over is a good thing, if not a little idealistic, because of how things like the aforementioned retold accounts (fictional or otherwise) help us better empathize with our fellow man, and ideally not want to see them in such catastrophic situations.

Sources:

In This Corner of the World (film). (2018, April 02). Retrieved April 09, 2018, from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_This_Corner_of_the_World_(film)

Applying Taurek’s ‘Should the Numbers Count?’ to (un)justify Hiroshima and Nagasaki: A combination of historiography and applied ethics by Tets Kimura
http://www.flinders.edu.au/sabs/sis-files/history/FJHP/Volume%2029/Tets%20Kimura%20vol%2029%202013.pdf

Post 3, Group C(Resubmission): Much Needed Relief During the "Crack Era" by Rob D

The movie The Last Dragon was a much needed stress relief for the African American community during the 1980`s. This was the Era when the African American community was reaching the height of the “Crack era.” The “Crack Era” was a time where the black community suffered an epidemic of crack abuse(https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crack_epidemic).  The African American communities needed something to inspire and motivate the minds of the people within the community. What the African American community was lacking confidence. I feel this movie delivered a positive alternative to what was somewhat the norm during that time.

The Last Dragon is a movie that was created in 1985 by Berry Gordon. This movie is about a young African American New Yorker martial artists, Leroy Green (Taimak), that is inspired to achieve the same skill level as the legend Brue Lee. He trained tirelessly in order to reach his goal. He never had the confidence to feel that his skill level was good enough to be considered a master. The level of mastery Leroy wanted to achieve was the “Glow.” Meanwhile, Leroy faces several trails and tribulations that forces him to face his fears (lack of confidence). One of them is Kung Fu master Sho-Nuff (Julius Carry) who apparently already achieved the “Glow” and another is his confidence with women. Because of his training, he never got a chance to learn how to approach women. 

While commuting, he finds a women in trouble from being kidnapped and rescues her. The woman was the infamous singer and television show host Laura Charles. She was being kidnapped because a Bossman wanted his wife, which was an inspiring music artist, to debut her music on the television show of which Laura was hosting. Laura denied her request and she was ignored. The Bossman didn’t like how his wife was devastated by her denial so promised his wife that he would be able to get her music exposed. His attempt to kidnap Laura was to force her to listen to his wife’s  music. Leroy used his Kung u skills to fight off the team hired to kidnap Laura. Laura offered to hire Leroy to be her bodyguard.

 Due to the failed attempt to kidnap Laura, he hired the Kung Fu Master Sho-Nuff to take out Leroy. Sho-Nuff is claimed to be the master and willing to contest any one that doubts it. He hears that Leroy has an acceptably high level of skill and goes on a man hunt to challenge him. In parallel, he was hired by a Bossman to help him keep Leroy out of his way. First, Sho-Nuff went to Leroy’s family’s pizza shop to find him. When he went there and Leroy wasn’t there. As a result, Sho-Nuff and his crew vandalized the property sending a intimidation factor for Leroy. Sho-Nuff walked away chanting, “who is the master?” His crew replied “Sho-Nuff!”

Leroy searches for some “master” which he thought was required in order to obtain his desired skill level. He found that the “master” he was looking for Wan only a facade. Meanwhile, Leroy accepts the offer to be Laura’s bodyguard. They  spent a significant amount of time with other and developed feelings for each other(Typical movie plot). Leroy was extremely attracted to Laura but didn’t know how to express his feelings for her. As mention, his confidence with women was low.  In parallel, he didn’t feel that Laura was attracted to him because he was not the typical and somewhat of a karate nerd. During this time Leroy and Laura had a falling out  and Laura ended up getting kidnapped. She was brought to the living quarters of the Bossman where she was forced to listen to his wife’s record.

Leroy finds out where she is and goes to rescue her. During the process, he faces a dual with Sho-Nuff where he was attempted to be stopped. They battle it out and Sho-Nuff started to get the best of Leroy. His low confidence in his skill level hindered him from initially defeating Sho-Nuff. Just when Leroy defeat seemed to be certain, Sho-Nuff asked Leroy, “who is the master?’ Leroy replied, “I am!” Leroy overturn the fight and defeated him. He the achieved his “glow.”

To provide prospective of why the crack epidemic influenced this movie; there are several aspects. The main character Leroy demonstrates the overcoming of self related issues. Leroy sufferers from anxiety issues then challenged, yet he overcomes every obstacle.  According to the NATIONAL FORUM JOURNAL OF COUNSELING AND ADDICTION,"The Impact of Crack Cocaine on Black America"
"Crack impacts the Black community in many ways. Crack is linked to increased sexual risk taking behaviors, increased incarcerations of parents and breadwinners, and increased firearm related homicide rates. Not only has crack cocaine impacted the Black community in the areas of increased sexual risk taking and violence, but it also contributes to poor intimate relationships and relationships conflict between Blacks"(https://www.google.com/urlsa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=http://www.nationalforum.com/Electronic%2520Journal%2520Volumes/Hendricks,%2520LaVelle%2520The%2520Impact%2520of%2520Crack%2520Cocaine%2520on%2520Black%2520America%2520NFJCA%2520V2%2520N1%25202013.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwjEz862svraAhVr7IMKHUVCBOAQFjAAegQICRAB&usg=AOvVaw1UglF0QA320u_rT-3uGTbg). Leroy expressed positivity to combat the impact of crack cocaine in the black community.

In all, this movie expresses being different in order to achieve higher levels of self is okay. The charter Leroy demonstrated to the black community to overcome fears and reach within to reveal true self confidence. During the Crack Era this was much needed. Because of the lack of confidence in poverty areas, it is easy to fall into addiction. When Leroy searched for the “master,” this facade represents the same facade that a fix from Crack would give someone. In this movie Leroy conquers all of his fears while maintaining his true self which provides a much needed relief.