Two for Tuesday

Form B 2009 Question 2.
The passage below is from “The Indispensable Opposition,” an article by Walter Lippmann; it appeared in The Atlantic Monthly in 1939. Read the passage carefully. Then write an essay in which you analyze the rhetorical strategies Lippmann uses to develop his argument.
Form B 2009 Question 2

To answer this questions I would have addressed the specific diction chosen by Lippmann and connected the relevance of a words in the beginning, middle and end. I would also talk about the Voltaire quotations used and the purpose is serves for Lippmann's argument. Also I would analyze how we do not value our own freedom with the examples Lippmann shared and how that only leads of us valuing the freedom of others even less.

The responses, at least the first one, did a great job of connecting the thoughts through out the entire passage and the entire message. The first response also recognized the subtle call of action that Lippmann included in a couple of different places in his essay. The second response picked out things that mattered but failed to analyze them properly if at all. The third response merely summarized the prompt.

I probably would have done a good job at finding the evidence and then analyzing it, but I would most likely have missed the call to action. Also I probably would not have connected the beginning and end as well as I would have hoped to in my original thoughts of the prompt. I think my answer would have been sufficient for about a 6 or 7.

FoRmAlIsM

As far as the formalists are concerned each peace of literature is the one and only of its kind. "Formalism attempts to treat each work as its own distinct piece, free from its environment, era, and even author." Formalist writing is supposed to be creative and uninfluenced by anything around it.

The PWB can indeed me considered formalistic for more than one reason. It is on of the only book of its kind about the Congo and white people living in sync with black people. The Price family did not come into the village and dominate and live well while the villagers suffered, it was the other way around. An unheard of story in that time. Ruth May managed to get the black children playing "Mother May I?" AND get them to understand her directions. That is indeed a unique scene. The characters themselves do not seem to allow themselves tobe influenced by their surroundings. Rachel criticizes the natives clothes, mother did not pay closer attention to Mama Tataba when she cooked or cleaned, Father did not believed Mama Tataba about the garden it goes on and on. The mother's opinion is strangest of all, she is glancing back the story and reflecting on events that have no yet happened for us as readers, that also makes the novel stand out and perhaps fall under the category of formalistic. However Barbara Kingsolver did allow her passion and knowledge of nature effect this book by putting  in the endless reference sand scenes about the nature in Africa and describing. That detail may rule it out of the formalistic area. 


LINKYYY

Apocalypse Now!!

     There were two things that struck me as wildly different in the movie than in the book. For one Kurtz was a military man who forced his way back into Vietnam but without a purpose really. The second difference was the end scene of Kurtz's death.
     In the book HOD Kurtz had a purpose, he was extracting ivory. However his ways were a bit unorthodox to the people around him. Not only was he extracting the most ivory from the surroundings but he was also killing the least amount of natives. And his passion was his ivory. In the movie Kurtz didn't seem to have a purpose for being in Vietnam. While matching the book Kurtz is treated and revered as a god he isn't taking advantage of the natives. He isn't even in Vietnam anymore he is in Cambodia. So it is strange to me that they chose for that to be a plot of the film.
     As for the end, Willard kills Kurtz by his own will. How can someone who holds a man so highly kill him? In HOD Marlow was effected by the death of Kurtz he would never dream of killing him, he wanted him to live. Marlow wanted to hear about his plans and his techniques; not let them die in the grave with him. Willard is now revered as the new god like figure however Marlow would have been killed by the natives had he pulled such a stunt.
     Of course the entire movie was different but those two huge plot changes did not settle well with alluding to the book at all.
   

Difficult Passage

Pages 114-116

The detail and dialogue in Heart of Darkness implies that the crew is now surrounded by natives. They had just passed a pile of wood and a note for them saying "Wood for you. Hurry up. Approach cautiously." Was this what the unknown author meant? There are natives that may attack? "A cry, a very loud cry, as of infinite desolation, soared slowly in the opaque air." Since Conrad never gives meaning to the natives language the question is left what does this cry mean? Was it just a call for all the natives or was it the warning call for the people on the steamer.

There is a thick fog around the steamer, most of the day and night. Is this the reason that the African's live there to trap their victims? Or maybe they are just curious as to who is passing by and what they want.

Heart of Darkness Quote

"The old river in its broad reach rested unruffled a the decline of day, after ages of good services done to the race that peopled its banks, spread out in the tranquil dignity of a waterway leading to the uttermost ends of the earth. " Page 66

The Congo as well rested at night, there were no steamboats sailing on it, it would be far too dangerous and it definitely leads to the uttermost ends of the earth.

What specifically caught my eye about this quote was the middle part, "after ages of good service done to the race that peopled its banks", the word service is very foreshadowing and allusive to the story of the Congo that Marlow is about to share. It is also very interesting that it says to the race, not the europeans or englanders, race. Conrad does not say the race that lived there, but the race that peopled its banks. That is just like what happened in the Congo. The white race came in and forced the African's to do "service" for them. Not only did our English teacher slow down and emphasize that paragraph but the teacher also did so with the next three or four times the narrator used the word service or serve. This sentence was the beginning of a very powerful allusion.

The choice of the word dignity is also interesting as the natives received no dignity from the white people. But the reference to the uttermost ends of the earth is an allusion to the Congo River, which just keeps going and going and going. I did not really fully understand the significance of the last part of the sentence.

It Seriously is Seriously Screwed-Up

      I have always held the views of a humanitarian. Perhaps not a die-hard humanitarian but none the less the way other people are treated has always been a concern of mine. Learning from history books, for me personally, is not as different as it is reading about Leopold. People are indeed screwed-up and when those people have influence they can do almost anything they desire. After all Leopold started with the title of a King, and almost no money to fund his dreams. 

     The American colonists started with nothing as well, not even a title. Yet by the time they were all done and settled they had exterminated a huge majority of the Native Americans. Of course the British helped as well, but did the colonists stop after theRevolutionary War? Did they try to make peace of the Indians? No! They simply kept encroaching on the Indian's territory. In fact a majority of the colonists did not even see the irony behind their conquests.                          They escaped England because of the oppression they felt, yet they came to America, their land of "freedom", and oppressed. Only 100 years after the Revolutionary War, in 1890, the now Americans, created what goes down in history as The Wound Knee Massacare. Where Major Samuel Whitside simply massacred hundreds of Indians, men, women, children, all were in his cross heirs. And in 1973 it happened again, having the name of The Wounded Knee Incident. This time the Native American held their own and camped out in their town of Wounded Knee, South Dakota. They were fighting for their rights, the same rights that the Americans before them had fought o valiantly for, only 200 years ago. 

     It is only natural with the introduction of black slaves that the American;s would not have any issues with that either. Much like in the Congo living conditions for the slaves were awful and they worked long days with little food. In fact black slaves were preferred for work on plantations especially in the Caribbean and the South because they were accustomed to the hot and humid weather. They were lashed with whips, they were raped, some had metal collars around their neck with bells so they could not escape. Sometimes these collars would fuse with the skin because of the hot conditions and the amount of time worn, between the sweat and the stress. 
     It is one thing to enter African and learn their ways and explore their land in order to create your world map. In fact even the introduction of new technologies would be welcome. But it is entirely a different thing when people enter a different country and continent and begin to take advantage of the people and resources. The Natives in the Congo were already accepting next to nothing in payment, how a human mind can think that enslaving them and taking innocent lives is better than giving them some clothe is beyond me. They had enough resources to pay fair wages yet they chose not to, greed is so over powering for human beings. Of course the whites did distance themselves from the action by making sure natives committed the awful crimes onto other natives. 

     Not even in the 21st century has the world collected it self. There is still slavery today. In an age where cell phones take pictures and can send them hundreds of thousands of miles to a friend. We have little documentation of slavery today, even more so we have little acknowledgement for the slavery today. Virtually everything that comes to America is coming from people who endure slave like conditions. Everything labeled "Made in China" comes from the Chinese people who are paid next to nothing for their work. They work in dangerous conditions creating our Apple products and so much more. 

"Where There Aren't No Ten Commandments"

Chapter 8 is the first chapter in the book thus far to address the slaves and the slave trade directly. There is no beating around the bush in this chapter. The only attempt to cover up the evidence of the trade is on page 130 where they are called "volunteers". However it does nto take a genius to figure out that they are obviously nto volunteers, especially with information in the rest of the chapter. The chapter opens up discussing the luxuries that the Europeans possess even the Congo. Even though they are hundreds of thousands of miles from a civilized world. Leopold is still trying to cover up the slave trade, but he is being challenged more openly now, some people pay attention while others do not. As he is running out of funds he begins to call on fellow states men for help.

By the time he is done a lot of the Belgian officials who wanted no part in Africa owned large parts of it. The African's, realizing that this will not stop, begin to form bands of rebels, some more successful than others. Yet none being able to significantly effect Leopold's purposes. Men, women and children are taken slaves without any discrimination, weak or strong. The process of the children going to mission schools is introduced as well as the Force Publique, which is French for Public Force. Often times there were young black men under the control of one or two Belgian officers. They were forced tod o the dirty deeds. Hochschild makes a parallel between the Nazi's camps and the Congo. 
World War 2 is well known and there is a lot of information about the atrocities that happened in the German camps. The Congo on the other hand is not well publicized and virtually NO ONE knows what took place here. THis chapter has a white hand account, an honest one, about what took place. But it also have the account of an African woman Ilanga, who watched her husband be murdered right in front of her. Of course there are also accounts of the people behind this horrible regime. Last of all this chapter does not forget to check in with Leopold and his family life, as well as his political life.

The pictures are placed in the middle of this chapter. They are in chronological order in terms of what the reader knows as the book has revealed it. They start out innocently showing the pictures of the rulers, Leopold, Stanford and Sanford as well. Then they move into a picture of an African rulers, and missionaries. There true color of this chapter are revealed in the pictures of the slaves themselves, and the effects the Belgians had on their home life. At the end the pictures are of things and people that will be addressed in later chapters. There are also political cartoons and an advertisement for a gathering at the church of England. 


People are still taken advantage of in all parts of the world, Africa included. China however also has a large, practically forced labor system. As the massive factories pay very little to the Chinese workers. Africa still has forced labor, it is simply largely ignored as it is not happening on our own soil. Everything is a distance, which makes it a lot easier to deal with. There is not wide spread usage of media in Africa because there is no money for technology there. Thus the world is left to be blissfully ignorant of everything that goes on there.

Quiz Questions

1.Why is slavery first “nakedly” addressed first in this chapter? No euphemisms or analogies.
2. Why do you think at the end of the chapter, page 139, there is a translation from French to English for the white people songs, but no African dialect for the song the Africans sang?
3. What did Congo provide for the male youth of Europe?
4. How does Lefranc’s observations/account affect our perception of life in Congo?5. While the use of the slaves for the railroad is described, very briefly, why is there no further mention of the railroad and its progress?