EDU 3234 Online Task 2: MARGINALISED LITERATURE
Do we have a canon for Malaysian literary works?
Yes.
Consider the fact that their works are well-known and most importantly included as part of the school syllabus- (both in BM and English)
Let's say we do, who do you think are in it?
I think that the recipients of the national literary scholar awards (anugerah sasterawan negara) are in the list of Malaysian literary canon. The recipients of the awards are listed below:-
1. 1981 : Kamaluddin Muhamad (Keris Mas)
2. 1982 : Dato' Shahnon Ahmad
3. 1983 : Datuk Dr. Usman Awang
4. 1986 : Datuk A. Samad Said
5. 1988 : Muhammad Dahlan bin Abdul Biang (Arena Wati)
6. 1991 : Prof. Dr. Muhammad Haji Salleh
7. 1993 : Datuk Noordin Hasan
8. 1996 : Datuk Abdullah Hussain
9. 2001 : S. Othman Kelantan
10. 2009 : Dr. Anwar Ridhwan
The recipients who have produced Malaysian literature in English, some titles and the category of their works are listed below:-
1981 : Kamaluddin Muhamad (Keris Mas)
a.) Jungle of Hope
1983 : Datuk Dr. Usman Awang
a.) Mother’s grave (poem)
b.) Father Utih (poem)
c.) Little Girl (poem)
1986 : Datuk A. Samad Said
a.) The Dead Crow (poem)
1991 : Prof. Dr. Muhammad Haji Salleh
a.) words for father (poem)
b.) on a dry bund (poem)
c.) three beserah fishermen (poem)
d.) seeds (poem)
e.) the traveller (poem)
f. ) si tenggang’s homecoming
The recipients whose literary work are being used in the school’s textbooks are as below:-
Malay literature
1982 : Dato' Shahnon Ahmad
a.) Gelungnya Terpokah (short story) for SPM level
1991 : Prof. Dr. Muhammad Haji Salleh
a.) Anak Global (poem) for SPM level
English literature
1981 : Kamaluddin Muhamad (Keris Mas)
a.) Jungle of Hope (novel) for SPM level (Form 5)
1986 : Datuk A. Samad Said
a.) The Dead Crow (poem) for PMR level (Form 1)
1991 : Prof. Dr. Muhammad Haji Salleh
a. ) si tenggang’s homecoming (poem) for SPM level (Form 4)
The poems by Erica Jong raises some feminist issues. What are they?
The feminist issues raised by Erica Jong in her poems are sex-positive issues, gender difference, gender bias, patriarchy and oppression of women, male dominance in love and family relationship, gender equality for women and women's rights and interests.
Do you think they are suitable to teach at the secondary school level? Explain.
I think that they are not suitable to be taught at the secondary school level because her works are sexually explicit and it might corrupt the young minds. However, her works are suitable for adult audiences. Erica Jong is an American woman and she has been married four times. Her works reflects her thoughts and her community’s culture. Some issues discussed in her poems and other literary works are taboo in the eastern culture. Therefore, they are not suitable for our eastern culture and her literary works cannot be taught at the secondary school level.
Is Hillary Tham's poem more suitable?
Hilary Tham is a local Malaysian writer. Therefore, her poems are more suitable for our eastern culture and they can be taught at the secondary school level because the use of language in her poems are more moderate and her poems often deals with common female issues.
The short tale from the Native American group is about a girl who is unsatisfied with her life. How is this a universal experience? Can it teach our students anything?
This is a universal experience across all country, society, race and religion because no matter how much people get of something, they want more and more. Some of them are very greedy and they are not thankful or grateful to god and the people around them. In relation to the real life, the people nowadays are very materialistic. No matter how much they earn, they are still not satisfied with what they have and they always want more and more! Another example which I can relate to is some people are not satisfied with their marriage life so they end up having extra marital affairs. Referring to the story, the girl was deceived by the handsome outlooks of the man who turns out to be one of the horned serpents. We can use this story to teach our students to be grateful and be satisfied with the simple things they have. They need to appreciate their god, parents, teachers and etc. for the things they have given to them. They also need to learn that having something is better than having nothing! For example, having an old bicycle is better than having none. Other than the above, another moral value from the story is not to trust someone based on their looks because they might have bad intentions. They look good from the outside but they are bad inside.
From internet sources find out more about Langston Hughes.
From your findings about his background, tell me about the dilemma he conveys through the poem CROSS.
This poem explores the deepest emotions and troubles of a young man born into a world of confusion. He is confused by his heritage but arrogant in his pride. He is growing up in the whirl of a white society, and cannot decide whether he is white or black. Hughes, using a black mother and white father, completely makes it easy for the reader to understand and almost foreshadow where this poem is going. It is evident that there is an inner sense of not belonging in this child. In line three through eight, it is clear that the child is sorry for all the pain he has brought on to his parents, unknowingly. He shows remorse for all the curses and bad wishes he said to his parents, now that they are dead. But this is all because of a bigger problem. Now that his parents are both dead, he has no one to turn to, to help him figure out what his is. He can’t seem to figure out whether he is going to die in riches or rags. This is the great dilemma Hughes presents to the reader and leaving the audience in query to this unanswerable question. He cannot seem to find any truth in himself whatsoever, this child is and forever will be lost in his own identity. Hughes uses this boy’s struggles symbolically, not to show the pressures of a “crossed” child but rather to show how we as a society stereotype the races. The white father dying in a fine house whereas the mother dies in a shack, depicts the common view of the white race as being a more upscale and richer society and the black culture oppressed in poverty and forever bound to the slums of the world.
I find "Dinner Guest: Me" laden with irony and sarcasm. Briefly state if you feel the same.
I agree that "Dinner Guest: Me" is laden with irony and sarcasm because of the following lines:-
Stanza 1, Line 1 & 2
I know I am
The Negro Problem
Stanza 1, Line 9, 10 & 11
Of darkness U.S.A.--
Wondering how things got this way
In current democratic night,
Stanza 1, Line 14
"I'm so ashamed of being white."
I personally think that this poem is about Langston Hughes being invited to a fancy restaurant by a white person and the two of them were discussing race. You can tell by the way he says 'Asked the usual questions' and how the white person is embarrassed to be white. A black person in a fancy restaurant was a big deal back in those days. Not only do they have to wait for service in the restaurant but their discussion is about the answer to race relations and in the end of the poem he says; the answer to the problem is to wait.
The experience in the poem Harlem is one that is true for many people. Do you agree?
Yes. It is the unequal treatment among the blacks and the whites. The blacks are marginalized and they are treated like second class citizens. In 1951–the year of the poem's publication–frustration characterized the mood of American blacks. The Civil War in the previous century had liberated them from slavery and federal laws had granted them the right to vote, the right to own property and so on. However, continuing prejudice against blacks, as well as laws passed since the Civil War, relegated them to second-class citizenship. Consequently, blacks had to attend poorly equipped segregated schools and settle for menial jobs as porters, ditch-diggers, servants, shoeshine boys and so on. In many states, blacks could not use the same public facilities as whites including restrooms, restaurants, theaters and parks. Access to other facilities such as buses, required them to take a back seat, literally, to whites. By the mid-Twentieth Century, their frustration with inferior status became a powder keg and the fuse was burning. Hughes well understood what the future held, as he indicates in the last line of the poem.
The 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments to the U.S. Constitution–approved in the post-Civil War era–granted black Americans basic rights as American citizens, as did the Civil Rights Act of 1875. However, court and legislative decisions later emasculated the legal protection of blacks. For example, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1896 (Plessy v. Ferguson) that it was legal to provide "separate but equal" accommodations for passengers of Louisiana's railroads. This ruling set a precedent that led to segregated schools, restaurants, parks, libraries and so on. Meanwhile, hate groups inflicted inhuman treatment on innocent blacks including brutal beatings. Lynchings of innocent blacks were not uncommon. Many so-called "enlightened" or "liberal-minded" Americans looked the other way, including law-enforcement officers, clergymen, politicians and ordinary Americans. By the mid-20th Century, black frustration with white oppression formed itself into a potent blasting powder.
Langston Hughes fights for the voice of his people. What is the movement called?
The movement is called ‘Harlem Renaissance’ (the New Negro Movement). The African Americans used art to prove their humanity and demand for equality. The Harlem Renaissance led to more opportunities for blacks to be published by mainstream houses. Many authors began to publish novels, magazines and newspapers during this time. The new fiction attracted a great amount of attention from the nation at large. Some authors who became nationally known were Jean Toomer, Jessie Fauset, Claude McKay, Zora Neale Hurston, James Weldon Johnson, Alain Locke, Eric D. Walrond and Langston Hughes. In 1916-17, Hubert Harrison founded the militant "New Negro Movement", which is also known as Harlem Renaissance. In 1917, he established the first organization (The Liberty League) and the first newspaper (The Voice) of the "New Negro Movement" and this movement energized Harlem and beyond with its race-conscious and class-conscious demands for political equality, an end to segregation and lynching as well as calls for armed self-defense when appropriate. Therefore, Harrison is called the "father of Harlem Radicalism."
