On Vampires & Volvos

I know that the Twilight saga by Stephenie Meyer doesn't exactly fit into the multicultural category, but I feel like I should comment on them, seeing that the movie (which was pretty good in my opinion) came out this past weekend.

I came across this saga by recommendation of a friend's younger sister. At first, I said no--no way am I going to waste my time reading books about vampires. The books sat on the kitchen counter for a couple of weeks until, out of boredom one summer night, I picked up the first one, Twilight...four days later, I found myself looking up the release date for the fourth installment (which I had to wait over a month for) and noticing more silver Volvos on the road than ever.

I was strangely drawn in by the vampire stories...much like I was with J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series. I know these books are written for adolescents, but I think that it is a wonderful thing for adults to be able to enjoy the literature as well.

I have had many lengthy discussions with my eleven year old niece regarding Edward Cullen and Jacob Black; which is one more reason I love these books--Aunt Kim gets more cool points! Seriously though, I love being able to discuss books with my niece and it makes me feel good to know she loves reading as much as I do. Also, as a future teacher, I think that it's a good idea to keep up with what's new or what's hot when it comes to children's or adolescent literature.

"No book is really worth reading at the age of ten which is not equally (and often far more) worth reading at the age of fifty." --C.S. Lewis

Confessions & Coincidences

Confessions of a Closet Catholic by Sarah Darer Littman made me cry...and then it made me think.

Before class and after my reading of this book, I had a discussion with my mother over the phone. Many times, talking to my mom leads to talking about religion. My mother is a very religious woman who has faith in God like no one else I know. I told her how this book had made me cry--because it reminded me of when my Grandma became sick and soon after died.

My mom lovingly tried to talk about these issues with me using the faith that keeps her standing (as she says). I, on the other hand, have had my faith tested (in the past few weeks and months more than ever) and I was voicing my thoughts and feelings to my mom about this. A lot of times, I feel like Jussy--my family is "religious" to some degree (some members more than others), but I don't always feel like I know where I fit into it. I challenged my mom's views and points and craved more answers than she could give me. The phone call did not end on too happy of a note.

When I got home from class that night, I received a phone call from my dad saying that my Grandma (my other one) was in the hospital and not doing so good. After hanging up the phone from that conversation, I once again thought about Jussy, who thought that her questioning of her family's religion had brought on her Bubbe's sickness--I had done the same thing.

I'm not sure where I'm going with this post...maybe it's just random thoughts and coincidences tied together. I don't really believe that I caused my 92 year old Grandmother's sickness, but I do think that it's just awesome that a piece of literature can bring about so much thought and discussion. I'm really glad we read this book and I intend to make good use of it in my classroom someday.

Asian-American Literature

Just last week, I had to read Baseball Saved Us for TE 401. After reading this book and then reading Yamate's article on Asian Pacific American children's literature, in which she mentions the book, I find myself once again feeling frustrated and ignorant.

I have to admit that I was completely ignorant to what went on with the Japanese internment camps in America after the attack on Pearl Harbor. The fact that I learned something like this from a children's book during my senior year of college both saddened and encouraged me. I was upset that I was deprived this information throughout all my years of school...after reading the book and looking into it on my own to learn more, I find it amazing that this topic never came up during my twelve years of elementary, middle and high school or in any of my college history courses (not that I'm a history major or anything). But, I was also encouraged by the book--I felt better knowing that at least here is a book that I can have in my classroom someday that students can learn from--so they may know about this awful situation that happened (before they're 28 years old!).

Yamate's article, however, brought back more frustration...it made me think more about the book: yes, it did open my eyes to something major that I had no knowledge of, but I was so caught up with the new information that I didn't realize what Yamate later pointed out to me: "[Baseball Saved Us] masks some very negative messages [and] misses a prime opportunity to explore why racial epithets are dangerous and hurtful and what can be done in the face of such incidents". She also points out that "the intimation that playing baseball and developing greater skills in the game [of baseball] and developing greater skills in the game was some sort of positive outcome of the internment is appalling".

This brings me to my last point for today, which Yamate also wrote about in her article--the reviewing process. Like Yamate says, reviewers can be basically anyone...there is no standard for who reviews books, and if "an outsider" reviews a book about a certain culture, something may be lost or omitted in the review. (Great, now we have an "insider/outsider debate" for reviewers as well as authors?) But her point is well taken--my 401 professor obviously thought this was a good choice of literature to bring to the class of future teachers...and without Yamate's article, I may have never looked at any differently than that. I'm pretty sure that I will never be able to choose the "right" or best literature 100% of the time, but I can say that because of the articles that we've read throughout our 448 course, I feel like I am better educated to make decisions on what types of literature to include in my classroom.