My reflection

Patty Keefe

Prof Cercone

LAI513- Book Group Reflection

27 March 2008

The Color Purple by Alice Walker was very well developed. It followed Celie’s life so beautifully while constantly representing her lifelong struggle. She was a survivor of her own life. Celie was very dynamic and went through a change from innocent and afraid to confident and determined. I related to Celie’s longing to see her sister again. It reminds me of my own longing to see my boyfriend who is a soldier stationed in South Korea. Our whole relationship was in letters for a long period of time. There is something therapeutic about writing about your life to someone who will read it with love and understanding. Hopefully students could learn about this through classroom letter activities.

One of my favorite quotes of the novel is, "I think it pisses God off if you walk by The Color Purple in a field and don't notice it." I think this book sends a message to its reader to enjoy your life while you are here. Also, it inspires its audience to notice the beauty that you have all around you.

Nettie tries to get Celie to stand up for herself against Mr. _____ and his mean children and Celie has this to say, "But I don't know how to fight. All I know how to do is stay alive" (Walker, 18). I think that this moment shows how her mental and physical abuse she has endured has beaten Celie down to her weakest self.

"The sheriff know how women is, anyhow" (Walker, 88). These comment made by almost every male. The novel represents woman as crazy, wild, and needing to be tamed. There are treated inferior and wrong. They are abused, strong women that are constantly open for judgment. One of my favorite moments was when Celie left Mr.______. Finally, Celie was ready to stand up and fight for herself.

I was excited to read with a small group of people. I thought that reading the book would have become a more social activity. Whenever I read by myself, I always wish that I had someone there to express my emotions or ask questions. I also wondered how others thought and related to the same novel I was reading. My group was very excellent at responding to my ideas and gave affirmative feedback often. I wish there was more questioning and personal reactions to feed off of from my group members. A lot of times, I felt that I was talking to myself and as a result it was not very useful. This activity was difficult for my group because technology was not readily available for the some of the members. Also, some of my group members had a difficult time with the technology portion of this exercise. I created the blog and sent my group members the usernames and password to sign into the blog, but it still seemed a little confusing for some. As a future teacher, I will have to make sure that there are alternatives available for students. Also, I would provide them with ample amounts of how-to lesson on the ins and outs of blogging. Teachers must never assume that students know everything, because they may fall without proper guidance and scaffolding.

Jago’s NCTE text on Alice Walker was very brief. I agreed with all of the philosophy’s and had a craving for more after I finished it. In class we had a professor come in who spoke about using clips of films to layer meaning in novels. Jago offered similar techniques. She suggests that the whole movie that Color purple must never be show in its entirety. That is too much time wasted. Students should watch a well represented clip of The Color Purple than exchange there ideas with a partner in the form of “paper ims” comparing the scene from the text and to their own lives. Our class discussions leaned more towards dissecting the modes used in the film clip. In the future, I would blend modal dissection while using Jago’s idea about “paper ims”.

I was disappointed that Jago did not speak on how to teach the very upsetting images of abuse that are present in the novel. She spoke more about how to fight against censorship, but not so much on how to teach many scenes which are very graphic. That is what I was hoping to find information on.

If I had a chance to teach A Color Purple, I would definitely work with the power of letter writing. Having a specific audience for your words changes how you write and would be interesting to play with in class. I would also use this as a novel to talk about gender and the problems caused by sexism.

This class project was different than the others I have done because it is preserved in time. I can always go back to our group blog and remember my ideas and thinking about my first impressions with the novel. Publishing work makes it so much more meaningful. Also, I was given a chance to read as a student first. I did not have to comb the novel for themes or vivid imagery. I felt the book. It was nice to not have the pressure to create lessons or ideas on how to teach it. I just read it for fun. I read it to actually get to know the characters and relate to it myself. It felt like a summer time read with no pressure. It was much more enjoyable.