And Another Two...
This one, "Questioning The Canon", from ExpectoRants. An excerpt:
"(Sassy was not really being pointless, just underequipped for the subject.) If anyone wants to critique the canon, one must be sure to build a strong case. But first, one must be very familiar with the canon. I think Sassy's basic error in her questioning and line of defense is that she was criticizing something she didn't bother to study in-depth, thus she came off "philistinic," in the words of Exie Abola. Trouncing a critically acclaimed work just because one didn't understand it because it's too hard indeed smacked of something unswallowable. No wonder the academic and literati types were up in arms, what with all that intricately hard work of theirs brushed aside in such a cavalier fashion. As Angela Stuart-Santiago wrote, Sassy would've made a better argument had she claimed, for instance, that Amado Hernandez's work is a piece of leftist propaganda; she could've made a more passable argument and spurred a more interesting exchange. Familiarity inevitably also means one must know one's art and literary history, the evolution of theories, the philosophies shaping a given art at a given time, or else, one hasn't much to say on the subject. But this is not to say Sassy is being pointless. It's just that she wasn't equipped enough and she came off really dismissive to the point of being arrogant."
This one, "On Reading", from Being A Crafty Neko. An excerpt:
"Maybe it’s the method of teaching which should be modified in order to bridge the gap between the two generations: the present-day students’ and the writer’s. I recall the summer I had to read Beowulf for an English class. Our professor gave us history lessons in order to make us understand the background of the text. She also read aloud certain parts of the text and gave her commentaries and asked us questions too. It might not have been the most interesting class (and being so early did not help one bit) but I didn’t hate Beowulf despite the difficulty I had reading it. Oh and I also had other readings in Middle English which were painful to read so I could relate with what could be called nosebleed moments. The Noli and El Fili were also difficult to understand and I even had the experience to try and tutor someone in Filipino class because of that. I had to review El Filibusterismo and history because of that. It was difficult because the tutee was not well-versed in Filipino because he grew up speaking in English in school and at home. That didn’t mean that we gave up. It meant more effort. The problem is, as I see it, if we don’t help each other understand the text, what will happen? Nothing.
This post with all the links has been updated.
"(Sassy was not really being pointless, just underequipped for the subject.) If anyone wants to critique the canon, one must be sure to build a strong case. But first, one must be very familiar with the canon. I think Sassy's basic error in her questioning and line of defense is that she was criticizing something she didn't bother to study in-depth, thus she came off "philistinic," in the words of Exie Abola. Trouncing a critically acclaimed work just because one didn't understand it because it's too hard indeed smacked of something unswallowable. No wonder the academic and literati types were up in arms, what with all that intricately hard work of theirs brushed aside in such a cavalier fashion. As Angela Stuart-Santiago wrote, Sassy would've made a better argument had she claimed, for instance, that Amado Hernandez's work is a piece of leftist propaganda; she could've made a more passable argument and spurred a more interesting exchange. Familiarity inevitably also means one must know one's art and literary history, the evolution of theories, the philosophies shaping a given art at a given time, or else, one hasn't much to say on the subject. But this is not to say Sassy is being pointless. It's just that she wasn't equipped enough and she came off really dismissive to the point of being arrogant."
This one, "On Reading", from Being A Crafty Neko. An excerpt:
"Maybe it’s the method of teaching which should be modified in order to bridge the gap between the two generations: the present-day students’ and the writer’s. I recall the summer I had to read Beowulf for an English class. Our professor gave us history lessons in order to make us understand the background of the text. She also read aloud certain parts of the text and gave her commentaries and asked us questions too. It might not have been the most interesting class (and being so early did not help one bit) but I didn’t hate Beowulf despite the difficulty I had reading it. Oh and I also had other readings in Middle English which were painful to read so I could relate with what could be called nosebleed moments. The Noli and El Fili were also difficult to understand and I even had the experience to try and tutor someone in Filipino class because of that. I had to review El Filibusterismo and history because of that. It was difficult because the tutee was not well-versed in Filipino because he grew up speaking in English in school and at home. That didn’t mean that we gave up. It meant more effort. The problem is, as I see it, if we don’t help each other understand the text, what will happen? Nothing.
But I swear, language does matter. If we don’t understand the language of the text, or find a way to somehow read the text, we won’t be able to figure out the beauty within the text. Sadly, Filipino is not a strong point in our educational system. Our textbooks are in English and in my experience, my parents have been speaking to us in English even when we were kids and they were buying us a lot of books in English. As you can read, most of my reading experience is in English. Maybe that’s part of the reason I could relate with Connie’s frustration with reading the text."
Click the links above to read the whole posts.This post with all the links has been updated.
posted by pgenrestories at 11:42 AM
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