Observe.
PART A: RELATED TEXTS
Carefully select FOUR (4) texts related to the concept of Belonging. Each of your chosen texts must be of a different text type and you are not to use texts examined in class. You must include the text in your portfolio.
For each text, you must have an analysis of the text’s concepts of belonging and the language forms and features and structures that shape such concepts. Word limit: 500 words each.
ITEM NAME AND TYPE: Never Let Me Go, Kazuo Ishiguro (Novel)
SOURCE AND DATE: Faber and Faber Publishing, London, 2005
Never Let Me Go is narrated by Kathy, a Hailsham boarding school student. However the children's fates post school are not typical— the students are “clones” bred for organ donation. Shunned by the wider world due to their intended purpose, the students form close-knit relationships to support each other as they undergo a series of donations until their deaths.
Employing an introspective style, Never Let Me Go is narrated in first person. While the wider human community claim the clones have no feelings, the emotional similarities of clones and humans longing for recognition and affection are highlighted through a self-observational style: “it seemed to me these dark byways…existed just for the likes of us, while the big glittering motorways...were for everyone else”. The first-person style highlights the clones’ personal feelings and thoughts, contradicting the lies that have been created to allow social stratification for the donation system to occur. The clones are metaphorically called “spiders” to convey human disgust towards them. The clones feelings are laid bare with an introspective quote: “ [it] never occurred to us to us how we would feel...being the spiders.” This displays that yearning for equitable treatment is an intrinsic desire, shared universally by both humans and clones.
The euphemism of “completion” is used in place of “death”. It displays the humans’ reluctance to deal with death and their use of clinical language to further dehumanise the clones and devalue their existence. Human self-interest is the motivation for the exclusion of clones from the community.
A recurring motif in the novel is the song “Never Let Me Go”. The lyrics express Kathy’s desire for inclusion and security. As she ages, the music evokes childhood memories that sustain her through the friends’ donations. Hailsham is seen as one thing the humans cannot deprive the clones of: “I’ll have Hailsham...safely in my head...something no one can take away”. Even though they leave Hailsham, the link to place is not severed because of the power of memory. This alludes that shared experiences of place can be a source of strength in absence of current connections. Having shared experiences of exile, the clones find comfort in each other.
Ishiguro’s narrative is infused with a sense of fatalism. Simple language is utilised to project the narrator’s sheltered worldview and her calm acceptance of a clinical, unjust world. The students are told that their “...life must now run the course that’s been set for it”. Kathy and the clones implicitly accept these roles, as their identity is defined by the humans’ ethos. The clones’ harsh treatment has conditioned them to accept their assigned roles, never rallying to change their identity.
The overarching message of the novel urges against complacent acceptance of designated identities and reluctance to challenge social barriers. This allows the characters to belong to their allotted fate and never carve out their own identity.
ITEM NAME AND TYPE: Grass-skirts Revolution (Article)
SOURCE AND DATE: Jo Chandler, 2011,The Sydney Morning Herald Online, 26 November, http://www.smh.com.au/world/grassskirts-revolution-20111125-1nyzf.html , Accessed 1st December
Grass-skirts Revolution details the campaign for a Women’s Bill in Papua New Guinea (PNG), which aims to increase female representation in the country’s male-dominated parliament. The feature explores women’s struggle for belonging within decision-making institutions. It is intertwined with a profile of Australian Dame Carol Kidu, the sole woman in the country’s parliament.
The article contextualises the cultural barriers to women’s participation in PNG and the extraordinary nature of Carol Kidu’s story – a white Australian who has found a place within PNG’s clan-based society. The headline “Grass-skirts Revolution” contrasts traditional women’s clothing with the concept of upheaval-a pun on a “grassroots revolution”, suggesting community-driven change is needed to achieve the aspiration of women being elected as parliamentarians. This implies that enfranchising women with political opportunity can coexist with the preservation of PNG culture.
Kidu’s struggles to integrate into communal living are central to her story. Initially, she was labelled a ‘pale interloper’, however over time this changed and the community then supported her campaign efforts. One image shows Kidu centre in sharp focus surrounded by smiling Motu locals in soft focus. This illustrates that despite her differing ethnicity, she has gained acceptance in their culture and community.
The article begins with a direct quote from the Speaker of PNG’s Parliament: “I invite all Honourable Gentlemen to rise in their places”, emphasising how women are excluded from Papua New Guinean institutions of power. This is extended through a cultural allusion to the Parliament’s architecture being in the style of a Sepik spirit house, a place that women are forbidden to enter. Culture plays a significant role in marking the boundaries for approval within PNG society – this enforces that women seeking to live outside traditional confines face prejudicial barriers.
Expert opinion and socio-cultural analysis is included in the article to explain why women have been excluded. Professor Betty Lovai, social scientist, explains the impact of shifting gender roles intersecting with strong tribal traditions, claiming that in PNG where “...men have embraced modernisation...women have remained stuck in old paradigms.” The colonisation of PNG brought rapid development; however women lost traditional protections and power with introduced Western orthodoxy. As a bigger gender gap emerged, complementary traditional roles were distorted. This lack of empowerment causes negative social outcomes for women, excluding them from education and leadership.
The closing statement of the article “taim bilong ol meri” (“time for women”) is in Tok Pisin (Pigin English) to convey Papua New Guinean sentiment for change. There is a double meaning of the word “bilong” in Tok Pisin, meaning ‘for’ and ‘belonging to’. It affirms that women need to be incorporated into political structures to have ownership of their own lives. The key message is that inclusion of women in PNG’s leadership will not only bring benefits for women, but society as a whole.
ITEM NAME AND TYPE: The Arrival (Picture book)
Incorporating a delicate mixture of features derivate from chronological and storybook art, The Arrival is a graphic novel which discovers the journey of a migrant. The experiences are conveyed through pictures that, through the homochromatic sepia color palette, wrinkled texture and page arrangement, resemble old reminiscences and photographs; lending the story the legitimacy and inclusivity that are associated with family albums.
The wordless nature of the story highlights the character’s incapability to communicate with those around him, and the term ‘alienation’ is realized in the literal representations of the new country with its alien creatures. Most of the surrounding peoples’ faces are in blurred and in shadow, suggesting the unwelcoming and impersonalized feeling the persona experiences. War-torn countries are depicted as under attack of giants bearing flamethrowers and gigantic tentacles; or a city that appears vast and labyrinthine. These visual metaphors represents the struggles of ‘finding one’s way’ through the hostile environment and the oppressive power of authorities.
The persona’s family’s symbol of their place homeland is an origami bird. This becomes a leitmotif as it appears in their kitchen and, later in the text, their letters to one another. However, as the persona and begins to find his sense of belonging in the new country, the bird is replaced with the creature befriended by the persona: which has, in itself, become a characterisation of the protagonist’s growing acceptance of, and by, the new society.
The persona’s frustration and distress as he arrives in the new country are portrayed through body language, size and angles. He is initially unrecognizable in a full-page high-angle image of the tiny migrants, with the enormous city in the background. Upon completing tests and being literally labeled by the examiners, twelve frames are devoted to his fruitless attempts of communication, punctuated by the scratching of his head, the burying of his face in his hands, the shrugging of his shoulders, and, ultimately, the resigned wringing of his hat and looking away. He is the only figure on the entire page, underlining his complete isolation. As the responder, we feel as though we are responsible for this lack of understanding, as it appears the man is talking out of the book at us, as though in the second person.
This is juxtaposed by the persona’s body language and angles later in the text, as he finds a family to which he can relate. He finds himself sharing a frame with another man, in an uninterrupted sequence of eye-level shots. The man presses his hands to his chest in an understanding gesture, puts his arm around the protagonist, and invites him home. It is in this family’s kitchen that the images are once again, following a long era of bleak grey, illustrated in a golden sepia tone symbolizing the persona’s renewed hope, and this is the first time he is depicted smiling.
ITEM NAME AND TYPE: Feliks Skrzynecki (Poem)
Peter Skrzynecki's poem "Feliks Skrzynecki" discovers multifaceted concepts about belonging. The poem suggests that belonging comes from a connection to place and people, individuals can choose to belong and that belonging can be altered over time. Feliks in Peter Skzynecki’s poem "Feliks Skrzynecki" feels a close connection to places and people. Feliks is described at the beginning of the poem as loving “his garden like an only child”, sweeping “its paths Ten times around the world.” The simile and hyperbole incorporated evoke a sense of his dedication and hard work towards his garden and his parental feelings towards it, connection to this place like a father would with an only child. His sense of belonging also emerges from Polish background connections which “reminisced About farms where paddocks flowered … Horses they bred…" The accumulation of positive connotation conveys a sense of their nostalgia and shared pride for their Polish cultural heritage; this heritage being the one which connects them together and therefore nurtures a sense of belonging.
Feliks Juxtaposed to his son, in the poem, which chooses not to belong with his father’s Polish friend. The negative connotations of “violently” creates a sense of his alienation from them. The high modality when he says he “never got used to” the friends’ “formal address” of his father as "Feliks Skrzynecki" further suggests his disconnection and choice not to belong with his father's friends. Instead, he pursues learning, "stumbling over tenses in Caesar's Gallic War", forgetting his "first Polish word." The education which he is receiving seems to lead him away from his culture and community, but this process does not seem be take place consciously, and actually a slow unpredictable drift.
There is an ambiguous modification of the son’s attitude towards belonging over time in the poem. The metaphor of him pegging his “tents Further and further south of Hadrian's Wall.” is highly ambiguous. Peter’s education has resulted in him positively moving away from his European heritage. Yet he moves away from studying Latin, apparently a dead language that he “stumbles over" rather than masters. Even though this is occurring, he seems to be aware of the negative impact of his moving away, acknowledging that his father is “happy as I have never been.” Placing the adjective “happy” at the beginning of the line foregrounds his hesitation about his progression of movement away from tradition. He observes that his attitudes to belonging to his Polish heritage have been negative, but seems to have a modified consciousness that it is not unavoidably a positive thing to move away from one's cultural homeland.
Peter Skrzyecki's poem, from a second generation migrant perspective, exemplifies an ambiguous attitude towards belonging that comes from being located between two cultures.
Carefully select FOUR (4) texts related to the concept of Belonging. Each of your chosen texts must be of a different text type and you are not to use texts examined in class. You must include the text in your portfolio.
For each text, you must have an analysis of the text’s concepts of belonging and the language forms and features and structures that shape such concepts. Word limit: 500 words each.
ITEM NAME AND TYPE: Never Let Me Go, Kazuo Ishiguro (Novel)
SOURCE AND DATE: Faber and Faber Publishing, London, 2005
Never Let Me Go is narrated by Kathy, a Hailsham boarding school student. However the children's fates post school are not typical— the students are “clones” bred for organ donation. Shunned by the wider world due to their intended purpose, the students form close-knit relationships to support each other as they undergo a series of donations until their deaths.
Employing an introspective style, Never Let Me Go is narrated in first person. While the wider human community claim the clones have no feelings, the emotional similarities of clones and humans longing for recognition and affection are highlighted through a self-observational style: “it seemed to me these dark byways…existed just for the likes of us, while the big glittering motorways...were for everyone else”. The first-person style highlights the clones’ personal feelings and thoughts, contradicting the lies that have been created to allow social stratification for the donation system to occur. The clones are metaphorically called “spiders” to convey human disgust towards them. The clones feelings are laid bare with an introspective quote: “ [it] never occurred to us to us how we would feel...being the spiders.” This displays that yearning for equitable treatment is an intrinsic desire, shared universally by both humans and clones.
The euphemism of “completion” is used in place of “death”. It displays the humans’ reluctance to deal with death and their use of clinical language to further dehumanise the clones and devalue their existence. Human self-interest is the motivation for the exclusion of clones from the community.
A recurring motif in the novel is the song “Never Let Me Go”. The lyrics express Kathy’s desire for inclusion and security. As she ages, the music evokes childhood memories that sustain her through the friends’ donations. Hailsham is seen as one thing the humans cannot deprive the clones of: “I’ll have Hailsham...safely in my head...something no one can take away”. Even though they leave Hailsham, the link to place is not severed because of the power of memory. This alludes that shared experiences of place can be a source of strength in absence of current connections. Having shared experiences of exile, the clones find comfort in each other.
Ishiguro’s narrative is infused with a sense of fatalism. Simple language is utilised to project the narrator’s sheltered worldview and her calm acceptance of a clinical, unjust world. The students are told that their “...life must now run the course that’s been set for it”. Kathy and the clones implicitly accept these roles, as their identity is defined by the humans’ ethos. The clones’ harsh treatment has conditioned them to accept their assigned roles, never rallying to change their identity.
The overarching message of the novel urges against complacent acceptance of designated identities and reluctance to challenge social barriers. This allows the characters to belong to their allotted fate and never carve out their own identity.
ITEM NAME AND TYPE: Grass-skirts Revolution (Article)
SOURCE AND DATE: Jo Chandler, 2011,The Sydney Morning Herald Online, 26 November, http://www.smh.com.au/world/grassskirts-revolution-20111125-1nyzf.html , Accessed 1st December
Grass-skirts Revolution details the campaign for a Women’s Bill in Papua New Guinea (PNG), which aims to increase female representation in the country’s male-dominated parliament. The feature explores women’s struggle for belonging within decision-making institutions. It is intertwined with a profile of Australian Dame Carol Kidu, the sole woman in the country’s parliament.
The article contextualises the cultural barriers to women’s participation in PNG and the extraordinary nature of Carol Kidu’s story – a white Australian who has found a place within PNG’s clan-based society. The headline “Grass-skirts Revolution” contrasts traditional women’s clothing with the concept of upheaval-a pun on a “grassroots revolution”, suggesting community-driven change is needed to achieve the aspiration of women being elected as parliamentarians. This implies that enfranchising women with political opportunity can coexist with the preservation of PNG culture.
Kidu’s struggles to integrate into communal living are central to her story. Initially, she was labelled a ‘pale interloper’, however over time this changed and the community then supported her campaign efforts. One image shows Kidu centre in sharp focus surrounded by smiling Motu locals in soft focus. This illustrates that despite her differing ethnicity, she has gained acceptance in their culture and community.
The article begins with a direct quote from the Speaker of PNG’s Parliament: “I invite all Honourable Gentlemen to rise in their places”, emphasising how women are excluded from Papua New Guinean institutions of power. This is extended through a cultural allusion to the Parliament’s architecture being in the style of a Sepik spirit house, a place that women are forbidden to enter. Culture plays a significant role in marking the boundaries for approval within PNG society – this enforces that women seeking to live outside traditional confines face prejudicial barriers.
Expert opinion and socio-cultural analysis is included in the article to explain why women have been excluded. Professor Betty Lovai, social scientist, explains the impact of shifting gender roles intersecting with strong tribal traditions, claiming that in PNG where “...men have embraced modernisation...women have remained stuck in old paradigms.” The colonisation of PNG brought rapid development; however women lost traditional protections and power with introduced Western orthodoxy. As a bigger gender gap emerged, complementary traditional roles were distorted. This lack of empowerment causes negative social outcomes for women, excluding them from education and leadership.
The closing statement of the article “taim bilong ol meri” (“time for women”) is in Tok Pisin (Pigin English) to convey Papua New Guinean sentiment for change. There is a double meaning of the word “bilong” in Tok Pisin, meaning ‘for’ and ‘belonging to’. It affirms that women need to be incorporated into political structures to have ownership of their own lives. The key message is that inclusion of women in PNG’s leadership will not only bring benefits for women, but society as a whole.
ITEM NAME AND TYPE: The Arrival (Picture book)
Incorporating a delicate mixture of features derivate from chronological and storybook art, The Arrival is a graphic novel which discovers the journey of a migrant. The experiences are conveyed through pictures that, through the homochromatic sepia color palette, wrinkled texture and page arrangement, resemble old reminiscences and photographs; lending the story the legitimacy and inclusivity that are associated with family albums.
The wordless nature of the story highlights the character’s incapability to communicate with those around him, and the term ‘alienation’ is realized in the literal representations of the new country with its alien creatures. Most of the surrounding peoples’ faces are in blurred and in shadow, suggesting the unwelcoming and impersonalized feeling the persona experiences. War-torn countries are depicted as under attack of giants bearing flamethrowers and gigantic tentacles; or a city that appears vast and labyrinthine. These visual metaphors represents the struggles of ‘finding one’s way’ through the hostile environment and the oppressive power of authorities.
The persona’s family’s symbol of their place homeland is an origami bird. This becomes a leitmotif as it appears in their kitchen and, later in the text, their letters to one another. However, as the persona and begins to find his sense of belonging in the new country, the bird is replaced with the creature befriended by the persona: which has, in itself, become a characterisation of the protagonist’s growing acceptance of, and by, the new society.
The persona’s frustration and distress as he arrives in the new country are portrayed through body language, size and angles. He is initially unrecognizable in a full-page high-angle image of the tiny migrants, with the enormous city in the background. Upon completing tests and being literally labeled by the examiners, twelve frames are devoted to his fruitless attempts of communication, punctuated by the scratching of his head, the burying of his face in his hands, the shrugging of his shoulders, and, ultimately, the resigned wringing of his hat and looking away. He is the only figure on the entire page, underlining his complete isolation. As the responder, we feel as though we are responsible for this lack of understanding, as it appears the man is talking out of the book at us, as though in the second person.
This is juxtaposed by the persona’s body language and angles later in the text, as he finds a family to which he can relate. He finds himself sharing a frame with another man, in an uninterrupted sequence of eye-level shots. The man presses his hands to his chest in an understanding gesture, puts his arm around the protagonist, and invites him home. It is in this family’s kitchen that the images are once again, following a long era of bleak grey, illustrated in a golden sepia tone symbolizing the persona’s renewed hope, and this is the first time he is depicted smiling.
ITEM NAME AND TYPE: Feliks Skrzynecki (Poem)
Peter Skrzynecki's poem "Feliks Skrzynecki" discovers multifaceted concepts about belonging. The poem suggests that belonging comes from a connection to place and people, individuals can choose to belong and that belonging can be altered over time. Feliks in Peter Skzynecki’s poem "Feliks Skrzynecki" feels a close connection to places and people. Feliks is described at the beginning of the poem as loving “his garden like an only child”, sweeping “its paths Ten times around the world.” The simile and hyperbole incorporated evoke a sense of his dedication and hard work towards his garden and his parental feelings towards it, connection to this place like a father would with an only child. His sense of belonging also emerges from Polish background connections which “reminisced About farms where paddocks flowered … Horses they bred…" The accumulation of positive connotation conveys a sense of their nostalgia and shared pride for their Polish cultural heritage; this heritage being the one which connects them together and therefore nurtures a sense of belonging.
Feliks Juxtaposed to his son, in the poem, which chooses not to belong with his father’s Polish friend. The negative connotations of “violently” creates a sense of his alienation from them. The high modality when he says he “never got used to” the friends’ “formal address” of his father as "Feliks Skrzynecki" further suggests his disconnection and choice not to belong with his father's friends. Instead, he pursues learning, "stumbling over tenses in Caesar's Gallic War", forgetting his "first Polish word." The education which he is receiving seems to lead him away from his culture and community, but this process does not seem be take place consciously, and actually a slow unpredictable drift.
There is an ambiguous modification of the son’s attitude towards belonging over time in the poem. The metaphor of him pegging his “tents Further and further south of Hadrian's Wall.” is highly ambiguous. Peter’s education has resulted in him positively moving away from his European heritage. Yet he moves away from studying Latin, apparently a dead language that he “stumbles over" rather than masters. Even though this is occurring, he seems to be aware of the negative impact of his moving away, acknowledging that his father is “happy as I have never been.” Placing the adjective “happy” at the beginning of the line foregrounds his hesitation about his progression of movement away from tradition. He observes that his attitudes to belonging to his Polish heritage have been negative, but seems to have a modified consciousness that it is not unavoidably a positive thing to move away from one's cultural homeland.
Peter Skrzyecki's poem, from a second generation migrant perspective, exemplifies an ambiguous attitude towards belonging that comes from being located between two cultures.