Author: Hannah Griffin

As Lizzie said in her post, I too thought the emphasis on brows in the latest reading from Dante was interesting considering how brows have become such an important part of beauty in recent years. But, like Lizzie, I’m unsure how this will connect with Morrison’s Paradise, if at all.

Because I am really into makeup, I’m very intrigued by how easy it is to change your appearance depending on your eyebrows– if they’re thick and full or very thin, it really does make a difference. It was funny how Dr. McCoy “challenged” us to pay attention to others’ eyebrows because I do that anyway. I’m not sure if this is because I have a passion for makeup or if I just notice little things.

It’s interesting that eyebrows can be seen as a form of expression. I’d never thought of it that way but when you look in the mirror and make faces at yourself, how often do your eyebrows give away what emotion you’re feeling? Many people furrow their brow in concentration or raise them when they’re surprised. So what does it mean that a few years ago the trend was to shave your brows? Without eyebrows, would it be harder to tell how someone’s feeling? This seems like a silly question but I really am curious, and this might be even sillier, but for some reason I thought of Britney Spears shaving her head during her famous breakdown.

Something I’ve noticed come up in the assigned readings thus far is the emphasis Violet and Joe both place on choice. What’s ironic is that Violet talks about choosing Joe, while Joe talks about choosing Dorcas. It gave me an image in my head of a sort of circle– as Violet pursues Joe, Joe pursues Dorcas. It also brought me back to the whole concept of churning that happens in Toni Morrison’s novels.

The first mention of choosing that caught my attention was when Violet was describing the funeral and attempting to explain why she did what she did. On page 95 she says, “That’s why it took so much wrestling to get me down, keep me down and out of that coffin where she was the heifer who took what was mine, what I chose, picked out and determined to have and hold on to. . . ” (Morrison). I’ve bolded all the words here that I believe have relevance to this concept of choice. Initially I thought this language was bizarre. Nowhere does Violet use the word “love.” Instead, all of her language points to possessiveness.

Continue reading “Idea of “Choice” in Jazz”

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s TED talk about the danger of the single story never fails to leave me moved. So much of what she says is relevant in today’s society.

Adichie explained how her experiences as a child showed how vulnerable and impressionable children are in the face of the “single story.” It made me wonder how many parents, specifically in the U.S., are unaware of the impact they have on their children– not only impacting them with their own words, but the kinds of media they expose them to. Continue reading “The Danger of the Single Story in Today’s Society”

I just finished reading “Venus in Two Acts” and I have to say this essay really struck a chord with me. Since elementary school, the African American literature I’ve been exposed to was almost exclusively about slavery. I can’t think of any specific titles right now, and my memory could be skewed, but it seems as though once a year growing up we read our one token African American novel in reading group (the lack of diversity in the kinds of books we read is a problem in and of itself that I’ll save for another post) and it was always about slavery in a historical sense.

Continue reading “Retelling the Slave Narrative”

During the in-class exercise that we completed today, my group focused on Lina and which aspects of her character were affirmed and which were not. We agreed as a whole that Lina is a strong person; she has been through and survived so much. Not only is she strong in the physical sense (she takes care of Rebekka almost single-handedly when she’s ill), but mentally strong. On page 57 she describes, “the shame of having survived the destruction of her families. . . .” Carrying that kind of survivor’s guilt at such a young age is nearly impossible to imagine, so clearly someone would have to be of strong mental standing to move forward from that.

Continue reading “The credibility of Lina’s character traits”