CBB Class Blog

Shapeshifters was very interesting, particularly the first story, “A Quarrelsome Man.” Upon talking to my classmates, I found that a lot of people felt that that was the best one. It was definitely weird in that this interaction between the man and his son and this random woman was very unusual. The way that she hardly said anything and he continued to talk and talk was uncomfortable at times. However, while most of the story seemed to imply that she wanted to leave based on her actions, we got hints at her thoughts such as her attachment to the boy, that showed that she was happy to be there too. It seemed like it could be the beginning of an unlikely friendship, but there were weird aspects to it that opposed that theory, such as the sexual tension insinuated. I think that the way it was written was what pulled me in rather than the story itself. For instance, it was written in a way that was very grounded, descriptive, and unique. However, the story itself made me a bit uncomfortable based on the awkward interactions. However, in the third story, “The Truth is in the Clothes,” the story itself was far more interesting, but the way it was written didn’t pull me in the entire time. It could get a bit obscure and confusing, particularly the scene with the catacombs in the wall. The last story was very enjoyable, though a little hard to follow. The adventure, goals, and desires were something that the reader can take an easy interest in, and even relate to as far as the desires for newer and better things (like in voyage two); the feeling of being crowded and feeling stuck in your life (like in voyage 3); and the feeling of. Ring somewhere you don’t want to be and wanting to go back home (like in voyage 4.) These little details that were relatable made it far easier for me to get involved and interested in the rest of the story that I cannot relate to at all, like in voyage three where the girl wants to go home to a place that is in chaos, or in voyage two where the young man is a war veteran. This story was particularly hard to follow for me because of all of the switching around with locations, but nonetheless I enjoyed it. I feel like this is one that I will end up reading again and using for a paper later, because there is a lot to dig into there. In the first story, I found the word “Stolid,” which I could understand based on context clued, but I did google it anyway and it is defined as “calm, dependable, and showing little emotion or animation.” I particularly like this word and have added it to my document of vocabulary words to remember. Another thing on that last piece is that I enjoyed talking in class about the physical parallel of the stories on the pages. I did not notice that while reading. One of my main questions is more of a desire than a question. I feel like there is so much history involved in studying the literature of the Caribbean, and I feel like a physical timeline would personally help me out. I will likely be going through later and kind of placing what happened when. I know that we discussed that the last one was much longer ago than the first story. I suppose my question is, is time important in how these stories relate to each other? Obviously it is important that we know when the story is taking place as we are reading it. However, is it incorrect to relate each of these stories to each other just because they are written by Caribbean women or should we be thinking about these stories just individually?

• Voyage 1: This place that they think they are going is fantastical, crystal and waterfalls (largest waterfalls in South America) , 
• Voyage 2: the girls grandfather who went to England (gets finger shot off?)  to fight in the way and then returned home, a young man of 21 taking breaths of the future, the future that he is looking forward to is different things like the library, galleries, theatre, museums, etc of England, parallel fantasies at play here 
• Voyage 3: Then there’s someone who feels like he is suffocating, voyage of escape, if I don’t get out of this colony I will suffocate, Keep in mind new Amsterdam and London between where everyone is coming and going. London is the center of Metropol, and new Amsterdam is the colony, 
• Voyage 4: Then we have the last guy’s daughter who wants to go from London back to the West Indies which is her home, Guyana is in there, it is an English speaking Caribbean location 

Each of these voyagers has an image of the place in their head and they MUST get there, but when they get there the fantasy is not real. It’s mostly all the girl’s story, who came back to Guyana in the 80’s to do something and she is the one who probably drank the lava and river water rather than anyone else. Bad time in Guyana, inflation, people lining up for things like matches and oil and whatnot 

p. 168 middle of the page “_____ ritual” – possible vocal word 

Abeng: “Abeng” by Michelle Cliff has been primarily about the coming of age of a young girl named Clare. As of right now, I am halfway through the book. This book does a wonderful job of including stories about this child, her family, history, and this community as a whole. Some important themes that we are working with here are the mixture and separation of colors. Red people specifically are being mentioned a lot as young Clare struggles to figure out where she falls racially. She is taught that she is white, while seeing that her mother is black and her skin is dark, and she is failing to realize that race is generally a spectrum. This is due to her father’s strong stance on her being white. Her father, so far, doesn’t even seem to be entirely white. I believe that he was described as somewhat red too. I wonder if the redness of these people correlates at all to how our society (more prominently the hip hop community) address people as “red/yellow bone.” While Clare is beginning to ask questions about race and its importance, specifically seen when she is asking about hypothetically marrying a Jewish man (p. 72-74), the book is taking us in bigger directions throughout history by calling allusions to the holocaust, the burning of the slaves by Clare’s great. Grandfather, and the role of the mother country vs. the colonies. The story Mma Alli and Inez was one of my favorite parts. There are so many interesting aspects, between Inez’s being so young and in such a horrid position of rape and captivity, to the one breasted warrior woman being the symbol of freedom and sexuality. (p. 33-36) I want to know more about one breasted warrior women. The book described them as having been a phenomenon, but I’ll have to look up the cause, the history, and the cultural implications of having one breast in Africa, or later, the Caribbean. The fact that the writer chose not to kill Mma Alli in a very emotional way made it much more striking to me as well. To me, after hearing of her help with the abortion and pleasure and freedom, to have her die in a fire with little description was enough to be striking. If the book had drug out a long mournful passage, it would not have hit me as hard as it did. I wonder if they’ll be referenced again later. 

• Obeah- Sorcery, especially that of the Caribbean
• Quashee- A slave faithful to white planters (the book defined this but I wanted to remember it)
• Tabernacle- (in biblical use) a fixed or movable habitation, typically of light construction; a meeting place for worship used by some Protestants or Mormons
• Lotos Eaters- The Lotos–Eaters” is a poem by Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson, published in Tennyson’s 1832 poetry collection. … The poem describes a group of mariners who, upon eating the lotos, are put into an altered state and isolated from the outside world.
• Chasseur- a soldier, usually in the light cavalry, equipped and trained for rapid movement, especially in the French army.
• Cutlass- short sword
• Primogeniture- the state of being the firstborn child.
• Parasol- figured it out via context clues, but a sun-brella
• Buckra- a white person, especially a man.
• Applique- ornamental needlework in which pieces of fabric are sewn or stuck onto a large piece of fabric to form pictures or patterns.

This is ultimately a coming of age story and we really saw this in the third and fourth quarter of the novel. While there was very little in the way of a traditional plot as far as rising action, climax, and resolution go, it did maintain a fairly strong and even level of interest for me. I think that being written this way, while less exciting, made the narrative feel more realistic. Furthermore, the history, anecdotes, characterization, and the way that the characters relate to and interact with one another kept me interested to hear more. On the topic of how these people interact with one another, one big theme is silence amongst the women. You see this in Kitty’s mother to Kitty____, in Kitty with Clare____, and eventually in Clare with Beatrice when she is having her period. The period being the ending of the story really clearly defines this as a coming of age story. The most striking scene in the whole story to me is when Clair has the gun. _____ In taking the gun, Clair has crossed boundaries in a way that gives her power, independence, and unpredictability. When the man is watching her naked, she seems to have a very adrenaline fueled response because she does a series of things that are out of the ordinary. In yelling at a grown man, telling him to get off of her property, and establishing her right to be there (This is my grandmother’s land)she is owning her place in the world in a way that seems to have a lot to do with her race and class level. In fact she points that out herself. When she actually fires the gun ____ and pulls up. At the last minute it shows that she might have been overly ambitious in her decision to kill a man and just barely had the sense of mind (the “common sense” that Zoe has to have) to realize that she would most certainly be held accountable for killing a man. However, in shooting the bull in the ye and then having to put it down she did make a huge mistake that she was held accountable for both by herself and others. This is a new sensation for her and a very defining part of her “coming of age.” Another aspect of this scene is that she both found her power in being whiter, and found yet another example of her having less freedom because she was a girl. If she was a boy, she would have been in more trouble for killing a bull than for taking a gun, but her family is far more concerned with the fact that she, a little girl, took the gun without asking permission and was able to totally shock those around her with this action. _____ She is shown no mercy or comfort in these actions. Maybe it is after this that she grows and matures into another “woman of silence” if you will. She seemed to really find her place in these moments, as a child, a mixed girl, being of a comparatively higher class, and a woman. We don’t see much exactly in the way of how much money everyone has and what exact type of life they live. How does Clair’s family compare to the American middle class family? How does Jamaica in this time compare to middle class America today? How far apart are Zoe and Clair in their financial positions? What type of future do they both hold career wise? We get enough to know that Clair and Zoe both are able to achieve educations, but not the same ones ______.  How much do they each go without? How privileged is Clair? I got the impression that Clair does not go without as far as food and home go, but that she is starved when it comes to intimate relationships and respect of those around her other than her father and sometimes Zoe. _____. I get the impression that Zoe is not going hungry, but lives in a poor house. However, she seems to have better relationships with her family, demonstrated by her conversations with her mother______ and the fact that is told knowledge that Clair isn’t, such as the change in her body. Also, the way the two girls are taught also seems to parallel this. Clair technically has a better education, but she seems to be taught about less relevant things, like British history _____ by less enthusiastic teachers, while Zoe is taught about the world around her by a teacher who is actually passionate about what he does and the kids he teaches ______. 

The Bridge of Beyond by Simone Schwarz-Bart

This story chronicles the lives of the women of the Lougandor family, and focuses primarily on Telumee. Toussine, Telumme’s grandmother, is known as the “Queen Without a Name,” as a title of honor and she is Telumee’s main, at at most times only, confidant. We get to see the histories of these women, from Toussine’s love story, to Victory’s husband’s stabbing. The story line mainly follows Telumee as she navigates coming of age and finding her place in the world, much like Clair from Abeng. As Telumee gets older, she becomes more intertwined in her society, and we see this through scenes like when she would go to the river to wash clothes. At first she seemed very observant, as if she was an outsider while these women gossiped and laughed from their throats. However, as she ages and navigates her own friendships and relationship, especially after her marriage to Elie, we see her become one with the environment around her rather than simply an observer. She is obviously a huge part of her community as well, which is likely because of her relation to the Queen With Without a Name. I say this because of how everyone reacts when she goes crazy and everyone helps her when her grandmother dies. It seems like a close knit community where everyone would help each other, but you see a large amount of people standing around her grandmother’s house eavesdropping, staring at Telumee as she walks, and paying general attention to her. You don’t see the whole town coming to stop Elie from losing his mind, but everyone gives Telumee treats and company to help her get better. Another important aspect to discuss is how the power of women works. You see the theme throughout this class of these strong black women with internal power, but no power physically. By internal power I mean the way that the women of “Abeng” use silence or how Telumee uses both silence and careful speech to avoid unpleasant situations with her female employer while washing clothing. Telumee’s internal power and strength is seen excellently when she avoids rape from the monsieur by threatening to hurt him. While she does not physically stop them or even rearrange her clothing to cover her breasts back up, she uses her words and resoluteness to make him leave her alone. However, you also see her weakness when it comes to Elie. We saw plenty of foreshadowing that he would be cruel in the way he always described her as a tethered goat who he would kill if she ran away, but we also see how the image of this beautiful man building her a house keeps her going through her awful days working for the white family. She seemed to almost be more caught up in the ideal than in his personality. I think we learn more about how hard Elie worked and how good he looked then how well they got along. She is easily controlled by this man and even when he beats her, she does not leave. By the time he moves that woman into the house and kicks her out she has lost her mind. It would seem that all of this could be a possible result of how well she handles happiness and how little she knew about how to handle real pain. She was always happy and bubbly, lightening the lives of those around her, and so when hers fell apart she did not know how to handle it. 

An interesting theme here is companionship and death. Telumee’s grandmother said that she would be there after death and that people would think that they were talking to one woman when they spoke to Telumee, but that they would really be speaking to two. This is later addressed by a statement that the company of the dead cannot replace that of the living. While it is comforting to Telumee that her grandmother stays around after death, one has to consider that her grandmother was really her only true companion. The silent protection cannot possibly replace the presence of love and companionship in life. Luckily, Telumee finds a new friend in Ma Cia, who at least comes back in a physical form of a dog after death.

My questions would be, what are the definitions of those three words I couldn’t find, what is the exact time period of this, and what is their religion? I see that church, death, and afterlives play big roles here. I assume that they are christians, being a colonial society, but what parts of Telumee’s ancestor’s religions play the roles of reincarnation and ghosts in this? 

Vocab: 

• Caprice- a sudden and unaccountable change of mood or behavior.
• Hamlet-a small settlement, generally one smaller than a village.
• vivaneaux- red snapper
• sapodilla- a large evergreen tropical American tree which has edible fruit and hard durable wood and yields chicle.
• quadrille- a square dance performed typically by four couples and containing five figures, each of which is a complete dance in itself.
• mazurka- a lively Polish dance in triple time.
• beguine- a popular dance of West Indian origin, similar to the foxtrot.
• vetiver- a fragrant extract or essential oil obtained from the root of an Indian grass, used in perfumery and aromatherapy.
• askance- with an attitude or look of suspicion or disapproval.
• collonades- a row of columns supporting a roof, an entablature, or arcade.
• Limpid- free of anything that darkens; completely clear.
• confabulations- Confabulation is a symptom of various memory disorders in which made-up stories fill in any gaps in memory. German psychiatrist Karl Bonhoeffer coined the term “confabulation” in 1900. He used it to describe when a person gives false answers or answers that sound fantastical or made up. (*** favorite word I’ve learned so far!)
• breadfruit- the large round starchy fruit of a tropical tree, which is used as a vegetable and sometimes to make a substitute for flour.
• interlocutor- a person who takes part in a dialogue or conversation.
• manioc- cassava with long tuberous edible roots and soft brittle stems
• malaccas- brown cane that is widely used for walking sticks and umbrella handles
• tamarinds- sticky brown acidic pulp from the pod of a tree of the pea family, widely used as a flavoring in Asian cooking.
• brocade- a rich fabric woven with a raised pattern, typically with gold or silver thread
• larrup- thrash or whip (someone)
• kilibibi- couldn’t find, possibly a sauce, maybe a pepper sauce
• wheedle- use flattery or coaxing in order to persuade someone to do something or give one something.
• bougainvillea- an ornamental climbing plant that is widely cultivated in the tropics. The insignificant flowers are surrounded by brightly colored papery bracts that persist on the plant for a long time.
• Divest- deprive
• bechamel- a rich white sauce made with milk infused with herbs and other flavorings.
• vespers- a service of evening prayer in the Divine Office of the Western Christian Church (sometimes said earlier in the day).
• mombin- a common tropical American shrub or small tree (Spondias purpurea) with compound leaves and purple paniculate flowers. — called also jocote. — compare hog plum. 2 : the edible purplish fruit of the mombin.
• roving- travel constantly without a fixed destination; wander.
• heliotrope- a plant of the borage family, cultivated for its fragrant purple or blue flowers which are used in perfume.
• balustrade- a railing supported by balusters, especially an ornamental parapet on a balcony, bridge, or terrace.
• sawyer- a person who saws timber for a living.
• adegonde- could not find 
• sibylline- relating to or characteristic of a sibyl; prophetic and mysterious.
• acomat-  a high official in certain Muslim countries and caliphates, especially a minister of state.
• diaphanous- (especially of fabric) light, delicate, and translucent.
• Voum/voum-tac- could not find